Hamburg 2001 – scientific programme

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TT: Tiefe Temperaturen

TT 2: Tieftemperatur-Teilchen-Detektoren

TT 2.2: Talk

Monday, March 26, 2001, 10:00–10:15, H

Status of the CRESST Experiment — •Philippe Di Stefano — Max-Planck-Institut für Physik

We present the status of the Cryogenic Rare Event Search with Superconducting Thermometers (CRESST) located at the Gran Sasso National Laboratories in Italy. CRESST is a direct detection search for the Weakly Interacting Massive Particles that may make up dark matter, using sapphire calorimeters with superconducting tungsten films as thermometers. Auspicious results with 262 g low-threshold crystals have been obtained recently.

We also discuss plans for the second phase of the experiment, which will involve 10 kg of scintillating calorimeters providing simultaneous measurement of a light and a phonon signal. By exploiting the difference in light yield between interactions creating electron recoils and those of same energy creating nuclear recoils, this will allow rejection of much of the electromagnetic background. A proof of principle experiment has demonstrated a rejection factor of 99.7 % at energies as low as 15 keV.