Light vector mediators facing XENON1T data

TL;DR

This paper explores whether a light vector mediator could explain the low-energy excess observed in XENON1T data, finding it plausible within certain parameter ranges but conflicting with astrophysical and cosmological constraints.

Contribution

It provides an analysis of light vector mediators as an explanation for the XENON1T excess, comparing experimental constraints with astrophysical and cosmological bounds.

Findings

The excess can be explained by a light vector mediator with mass below 0.1 MeV.

XENON1T constraints are competitive with laboratory bounds like GEMMA, Borexino, and TEXONO.

There is a tension between the proposed explanation and astrophysical/cosmological bounds.

Abstract

Recently the XENON1T collaboration has released new results on searches for new physics in low-energy electronic recoils. The data shows an excess over background in the low-energy tail, particularly pronounced at about $2-3$ keV. With an exposure of $0.65$ tonne-year, large detection efficiency and energy resolution, the detector is sensitive as well to solar neutrino backgrounds, with the most prominent contribution given by $pp$ neutrinos. We investigate whether such signal can be explained in terms of new neutrino interactions with leptons mediated by a light vector particle. We find that the excess is consistent with this interpretation for vector masses below $\lesssim 0.1$ MeV. The region of parameter space probed by the XENON1T data is competitive with constraints from laboratory experiments, in particular GEMMA, Borexino and TEXONO. However we point out a severe tension with astrophysical bounds and cosmological observations.