Sensitivity plots for WIMP direct detection using the annual modulation signature

Abstract

Annual modulation due to the Earth's motion around the Sun is a well known signature of the expected WIMP signal induced in a solid state underground detector. In the present letter we discuss the prospects of this technique on statistical grounds, introducing annual-modulation sensitivity plots for the WIMP-nucleon scalar cross section for different materials and experimental conditions. The highest sensitivity to modulation is found in the WIMP mass interval 10 GeV < ∼ m W < ∼ 130 GeV, the actual upper limit depending from the choice of the astrophysical parameters, while the lowest values of the explorable WIMP-nucleon elastic cross-sections fall in most cases within one order of magnitude of the sensitivities of present direct detection WIMP searches.

Background analysis and status of the ANAIS dark matter project

“…Five years data taking have been assumed and an energy window from 1 to 6 keVee. These prospects correspond to a detection limit at 90% CL with a critical limit at 90% CL, according to sensitivity estimates proposed in [11]. dark matter particles as responsible of the DAMA/LIBRA signal.…”

ANAIS-112 sensitivity in the search for dark matter annual modulation

“…with the maximum value at t = 152.5 days (2 nd June). The test statistic in this case is the maximum likelihood ratio, which we already used in a more general context [24]. It is asymptotically equivalent to test the difference between the χ 2 min of the null (σ = 0) and alternative (σ = 0) hypotheses [25].…”

Physics potential and prospects for the CUORICINO and CUORE experiments

“…The analysis of the CUORE / CUORICINO potential for annual modulation searches will be performed -following statistical consideration-(see Ref. [59]), with the proviso that systematic uncertainties are under control. Data on the stability of CUORICINO will be crucial to assess such hypotheses.…”

“…This has been first attempted in [63] and [64], but a more extensive and rigorous approach is followed in ref. [59] where sensitivity plots for several types of detectors (and experimental parameters) are presented, and in particular, for CUORE and CUORICINO.…”

“…The sensitivity of a given experimental device to the annual modulation signal (according to the detector material employed and the experimental parameters of the detectors) has been extensively studied in Ref. [59] on purely statistical grounds. Following the guidelines of that reference, it can be precisely quantified by means of the δ parameter, defined from the likelihood function or, equivalently, from the χ 2 function of the cosine projections of the data (for further details see ref.…”