Status of the DEAP-3600 experiment

TL;DR

The DEAP-3600 experiment is a liquid argon dark matter detector that has demonstrated excellent performance and is undergoing upgrades to improve its sensitivity to WIMP particles, with recent results summarized.

Contribution

This paper provides an update on DEAP-3600's latest results and details of hardware upgrades to enhance dark matter detection sensitivity.

Findings

DEAP-3600 holds leading WIMP exclusion limits among LAr detectors.

The detector's sensitivity is currently limited by alpha-induced backgrounds.

Ongoing upgrades aim to eliminate background limitations and reach full WIMP sensitivity.

Abstract

DEAP-3600 is a single-phase liquid argon (LAr) dark matter detector, located 2 km underground at SNOLAB in Sudbury, Canada, which started taking data in 2016. The detector is sensitive to nuclear recoils induced by scattering of dark matter particles, which would cause emission of prompt scintillation light. DEAP-3600 demonstrated excellent performance, holds the leading WIMP exclusion among LAr detectors, and published several physics results. The WIMP sensitivity of the detector is currently limited by backgrounds induced by alpha activity at the LAr inlet, in a shadowed region of detector. The ongoing hardware upgrade aims at fixing that limitation and, in consequence, at reaching the full WIMP sensitivity. This paper summarizes the latest results from DEAP-3600 and details of the upgrade.