Chameleon foreCAST
Philippe Brax, Axel Lindner, Konstantin Zioutas

TL;DR
This paper explores laboratory and solar-based methods to detect chameleon scalar fields, which could explain dark energy, by observing their effects on X-ray photons and proposing novel detection experiments.
Contribution
It introduces new experimental approaches, including helioscope and wall experiments, to detect chameleon particles and analyze their particle physics implications.
Findings
Chameleons could produce detectable X-ray signals in helioscopes.
Proposed experiments could directly confirm chameleon existence.
Chameleon signals are within reach of current detection technology.
Abstract
Dark energy models, such as the chameleon, where the acceleration of the expansion of the universe results from the dynamics of a scalar field coupled to matter, suffer from the potential existence of a fifth force. Three known mechanisms have been proposed to restore General Relativity in the solar system and the laboratory, which are the symmetron/Damour-Polyakov effect, the Vainshtein property and the chameleon screening. Here, we propose to probe the existence of chameleons in the laboratory, considering their particle physics consequences. We envisage the resonant and non-resonant production of chameleons in the sun and their back-conversion into X-ray photons in a solar helioscope pipe such as the one used by CAST. A detection of these X-rays would indicate the existence of chameleons. We focus on a template model for the solar magnetic field: a constant magnetic field in a narrow…
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