Detecting Ultralight Bosonic Dark Matter via Absorption in Superconductors

TL;DR

This paper proposes using superconducting detectors to identify ultralight bosonic dark matter through absorption processes, extending detection capabilities to lower mass ranges than previous methods.

Contribution

It introduces a novel detection mechanism utilizing superconductors for ultralight dark matter, surpassing existing constraints with moderate exposure.

Findings

Detects dark matter in the meV to eV mass range via absorption and phonon emission.

Can outperform current astrophysical and terrestrial constraints.

Applicable to hidden photons, pseudoscalars, and scalars.

Abstract

Superconducting targets have recently been proposed for the direct detection of dark matter as light as a keV, via elastic scattering off conduction electrons in Cooper pairs. Detecting such light dark matter requires sensitivity to energies as small as the superconducting gap of O(meV). Here we show that these same superconducting devices can detect much lighter DM, of meV to eV mass, via dark matter absorption on a conduction electron, followed by emission of an athermal phonon. We demonstrate the power of this setup for relic kinetically mixed hidden photons, pseudoscalars, and scalars, showing the reach can exceed current astrophysical and terrestrial constraints with only a moderate exposure.