Organized by: Prof. Lu Lu

Events During the Week of December 14th through December 21st, 2014

Monday, December 15th, 2014

No events scheduled

Tuesday, December 16th, 2014

No events scheduled

Wednesday, December 17th, 2014

No events scheduled

Thursday, December 18th, 2014

An Effective Field Theory Analysis of the LUX WIMP Search

Time: 2:30 pm - 3:30 pm

Place: 5280 Chamberlin Hall

Speaker: Nicole Larsen, Yale University

Abstract: The Large Underground Xenon (LUX) experiment is a dark matter direct detection experiment located 4850 feet underground at the Sanford Underground Research Facility in Lead, SD. During Summer 2013, LUX collected 10065 kg-days of WIMP search data. Ultimately LUX reported a minimum cross-section limit for spin-independent WIMP-nucleon elastic scattering of 7.6 e-46 cm2 for 33-GeV WIMPs, making it the most sensitive direct detection experiment to date. Direct detection experiments like LUX typically only present limits on spin-independent (SI) and spin-dependent (SD) WIMP-nucleon interaction cross sections. However, recent theoretical work has emphasized that in the most general effective field theory formulation there are several additional momentum-dependent and velocity-dependent interactions allowed by basic symmetries that can interfere with or modify the standard SI and SD interactions. Moreover, entirely new nuclear responses analogous to angular-momentum-dependent and spin-orbit couplings in standard weak interaction theory can emerge. Here I provide an overview of the LUX detector and last year’s WIMP search run, discuss the current status of the experiment, and highlight recent efforts toward using the LUX 2013 dataset to set limits on these new momentum- and velocity-dependent operators.

Host: Westerhoff

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Friday, December 19th, 2014

No events scheduled