New Atomic probes for Dark Matter detection: Axions, Axion-like particles and Topological Defects

TL;DR

This paper reviews recent atomic and molecular detection methods for dark matter, including axions, axion-like particles, and topological defects, highlighting their complementarity to existing astrophysical and experimental approaches.

Contribution

It introduces new atomic and molecular detection schemes for dark matter, emphasizing their potential to complement current photon and gravitational detection methods.

Findings

Atomic methods offer new avenues for axion and axion-like particle detection.

Molecular systems can detect topological defects through unique signatures.

These approaches complement existing astrophysical and experimental searches.

Abstract

We present a brief overview of recently proposed detection schemes for axion, axion-like pseudoscalar particle and topological defect dark matter. We focus mainly on the possibility of using atomic and molecular systems for dark matter detection. For axions and axion-like particles, these methods are complementary probes to ongoing photon-axion interconversion experiments and astrophysical observations. For topological defects, these methods are complementary to conventional astrophysical search schemes based on gravitational signatures.