Chiral phonons as dark matter detectors
Abstract
We propose a method for detecting single chiral phonons that will enable their use as dark-matter detectors. We suggest metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) as detector materials, as their flexibility yields low-energy chiral phonons with measurable magnetic moments, and their anisotropy leads to directional sensitivity, which mitigates background contamination. To demonstrate our proposal, we calculate the phononic structure of the MOF InF3(4 , 4' -bipyridine), and show that it has highly chiral acoustic phonons. Detection of such chiral phonons via their magnetic moments would dramatically lower the excitation energy threshold for dark matter detection to the energy of a single phonon. We show that single-phonon detection in a MOF would extend detector reach ten or more orders of magnitude below current limits, enabling exploration of a multitude of as-yet-unprobed dark matter candidates.
- Publication:
-
Physical Review Research
- Pub Date:
- December 2023
- DOI:
- 10.1103/PhysRevResearch.5.043262
- arXiv:
- arXiv:2301.07617
- Bibcode:
- 2023PhRvR...5d3262R
- Keywords:
-
- High Energy Physics - Phenomenology;
- Astrophysics - Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics;
- Condensed Matter - Materials Science
- E-Print:
- 12 pages, 4 figures