A New Way to Detect Axions from $\rm{A\bar{Q}Ns}$ Captured in the Earth

TL;DR

This paper proposes a novel method to detect axions produced by axion quark nuggets (AQNs) and anti-AQNs, which are potential dark matter candidates, using upcoming neutrino experiments with liquid noble gases.

Contribution

It introduces a new detection approach for axions from AQNs in large-volume neutrino detectors, linking dark matter research with neutrino physics.

Findings

Axions from AQNs could be detectable with future neutrino experiments.

The method leverages the large active volumes of liquid noble gas detectors.

Detection could simultaneously address dark matter and matter-antimatter asymmetry.

Abstract

Macroscopic dark matter with dominating strong interactions, supposed to be composites, represents an alternative to the most popular WIMP particles. Predicted in various models as strangelets, nuclearites, nuggets, having different internal structures and properties, but not yet observed experimentally, these forms of dark matter are associated with the existence of a large number of still unexplained observations. Nuggets, initially predicted by Witten, were reconsidered from the point of view of their internal structure and further theorized in 2003 by Zhitnitsky as axion quark nuggets and axion antiquark nuggets, as being made of quarks in a superconducting colour state, in the core, an electrosphere of electrons or positrons and a domain wall that maintain the stability of the macros with an incredible density, mass in the gram range and radius on the order of micrometers. If the existence of $\rm{AQNs}$ and $\rm{A\bar{Q}Ns}$ is demonstrated, two major open problems in physics could be addressed simultaneously: they would constitute viable dark matter candidates and, at the same time, provide a natural mechanism for restoring matter-antimatter symmetry in the Universe. The experimental evidence of the $\rm{AQNs}$ and $\rm{A\bar{Q}Ns}$ is a challenge for current and future experiments. The present study demonstrates that if these macroscopic systems exist, axions produced by $\rm{A\bar{Q}N}$s could be detected by the next generation of neutrino physics experiments using liquid noble gases, due to their huge active volumes.