Köln 2025 – wissenschaftliches Programm
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HK: Fachverband Physik der Hadronen und Kerne
HK 4: Instrumentation I
HK 4.2: Vortrag
Montag, 10. März 2025, 15:30–15:45, SR Exp1A Chemie
Design and Calibration Studies of the DarkMESA Experiment — •Michail Kontogoulas for the MAGIX collaboration — Institute for Nuclear Physics, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, Germany
An electron beam-dump experiment, called DarkMESA, is currently under construction at the new MESA accelerator facility in Mainz. DarkMESA is designed to detect light dark matter particles, which, in the simplest model, could couple via a hypothetical dark photon γ′ to Standard Model matter. Such a dark photon could potentially be produced in the beam-dump of the P2 experiment and subsequently decay into a pair of dark matter particles, χχ, which scatter off electrons in the DarkMESA calorimeter. The prototype calorimeter Phase A is made up of 25 PbF2 Cherenkov crystals. The calorimeter is planned to be scaled up to its Phase B which will incorporate a 0.7 m3 active volume of both PbF2 and lead glass SF5 blocks. Layers of active and passive shielding will surround the detector to minimize cosmic and beam-related backgrounds.
This contribution will focus on the development of the DarkMESA prototype and the calibration of its individual detectors, which was conducted during the MAMI beam time. The calibrated prototype was then used to measure cosmic radiation to determine its efficiency. A brief outlook of this experiment’s future plans will highlight its ongoing development, wherein different types of scintillator crystal as well as liquid scintillators are currently being studied with the purpose of being implemented in DarkMESA’s design.
Keywords: Light dark matter; Dark photon