Dark matter search results from the PICO-60 CF3 I bubble chamber
Abstract
New data are reported from the operation of the PICO-60 dark matter detector, a bubble chamber filled with 36.8 kg of CF3 I and located in the SNOLAB underground laboratory. PICO-60 is the largest bubble chamber to search for dark matter to date. With an analyzed exposure of 92.8 livedays, PICO-60 exhibits the same excellent background rejection observed in smaller bubble chambers. Alpha decays in PICO-60 exhibit frequency-dependent acoustic calorimetry, similar but not identical to that reported recently in a C3 F8 bubble chamber. PICO-60 also observes a large population of unknown background events, exhibiting acoustic, spatial, and timing behaviors inconsistent with those expected from a dark matter signal. These behaviors allow for analysis cuts to remove all background events while retaining 48.2% of the exposure. Stringent limits on weakly interacting massive particles interacting via spin-dependent proton and spin-independent processes are set, and most interpretations of the DAMA/LIBRA modulation signal as dark matter interacting with iodine nuclei are ruled out.
- Publication:
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Physical Review D
- Pub Date:
- March 2016
- DOI:
- arXiv:
- arXiv:1510.07754
- Bibcode:
- 2016PhRvD..93e2014A
- Keywords:
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- High Energy Physics - Experiment;
- Astrophysics - Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics;
- Physics - Instrumentation and Detectors
- E-Print:
- v3 to reflect published version