Impact of Dark Compton Scattering on Direct Dark Matter Absorption Searches

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that including dark Compton scattering significantly enhances the sensitivity and discovery potential of direct dark matter detection experiments, especially for high-mass bosonic particles like dark photons and axion-like particles.

Contribution

It introduces the importance of dark Compton scattering in absorption searches and provides improved limits on dark matter parameters using experimental data.

Findings

Enhanced detection reach for dark photons and axion-like particles.

Improved limits on dark matter parameter space from existing experiments.

Implications for future detector design and analysis strategies.

Abstract

Direct detection experiments are gaining in mass reach. Here we show that the inclusion of dark Compton scattering, which has typically been neglected in absorption searches, has a substantial impact on the reach and discovery potential of direct detection experiments at high bosonic cold dark matter masses. We demonstrate this for relic dark photons and axion-like particles: we improve expected reach across materials, and further use results from SuperCDMS, EDELWEISS and GERDA to place enhanced limits on dark matter parameter space. We outline the implications for detector design and analysis.