TY - JOUR

T1 - Potential dark matter detector?

T2 - the detection of low energy neutrons by superfluid 3He

AU - Bradley, DI

AU - Bunkov, YM

AU - Cousins, DJ

AU - Enrico, MP

AU - Fisher, Shaun

AU - Follows, MR

AU - Guénault, A.M.

AU - Hayes, WM

AU - Pickett, George

AU - Sloan, T

PY - 1995/9/4

Y1 - 1995/9/4

N2 - Using an existing experiment we have demonstrated in a pilot study that superfluid He-3 at 100 mu K can be used as a nuclear recoil detector sensitive to neutron and gamma interactions depositing energies down to a few hundred eV. The deposited energy is converted to He-3 quasiparticles which are detected by their damping effect on a vibrating wire resonator in the liquid. The system can be calibrated independently but a convenient fixed point is provided by the exothermic reaction n + He-3(2) = p + H-3(1) + 764 keV. Given the great potential for improvement we propose that the system might make a sensitive weakly interacting massive particle detector.

AB - Using an existing experiment we have demonstrated in a pilot study that superfluid He-3 at 100 mu K can be used as a nuclear recoil detector sensitive to neutron and gamma interactions depositing energies down to a few hundred eV. The deposited energy is converted to He-3 quasiparticles which are detected by their damping effect on a vibrating wire resonator in the liquid. The system can be calibrated independently but a convenient fixed point is provided by the exothermic reaction n + He-3(2) = p + H-3(1) + 764 keV. Given the great potential for improvement we propose that the system might make a sensitive weakly interacting massive particle detector.

KW - PARTICLES

KW - WIRE

KW - VELOCITY

KW - BEHAVIOR

U2 - 10.1103/PhysRevLett.75.1887

DO - 10.1103/PhysRevLett.75.1887

M3 - Journal article

VL - 75

SP - 1887

EP - 1890

JO - Physical review letters

JF - Physical review letters

SN - 0031-9007

IS - 10

ER -