First Dark Matter Search with Nuclear Recoils from the XENONnT Experiment

Aprile, E.; Abe, K.; Agostini, F.; Ahmed Maouloud, S.; Althueser, L.; Andrieu, B.; Angelino, E.; Angevaare, J. R.; Antochi, V. C.; Anton Martin, D.; Arneodo, F.; Baudis, L.; Baxter, A. L.; Bazyk, M.; Bellagamba, L.; Biondi, R.; Bismark, A.; Brookes, E. J.; Brown, A.; Bruenner, S.; Bruno, G.; Budnik, R.; Bui, T. K.; Cai, C.; Cardoso, J. M. R.; Cichon, D.; Cimental Chavez, A. P.; Colijn, A. P.; Conrad, J.; Cuenca-Garcia, J. J.; Cussonneau, J. P.; D'Andrea, V.; Decowski, M. P.; Di Gangi, P.; Di Pede, S.; Diglio, S.; Eitel, K.; Elykov, A.; Farrell, S.; Ferella, A. D.; Ferrari, C.; Fischer, H.; Flierman, M.; Fulgione, W.; Fuselli, C.; Gaemers, P.; Gaior, R.; Gallo Rosso, A.; Galloway, M.; Gao, F.; Glade-Beucke, R.; Grandi, L.; Grigat, J.; Guan, H.; Guida, M.; Hammann, R.; Higuera, A.; Hils, C.; Hoetzsch, L.; Hood, N. F.; Howlett, J.; Iacovacci, M.; Itow, Y.; Jakob, J.; Joerg, F.; Joy, A.; Kato, N.; Kara, M.; Kavrigin, P.; Kazama, S.; Kobayashi, M.; Koltman, G.; Kopec, A.; Kuger, F.; Landsman, H.; Lang, R. F.; Levinson, L.; Li, I.; Li, S.; Liang, S.; Lindemann, S.; Lindner, M.; Liu, K.; Loizeau, J.; Lombardi, F.; Long, J.; Lopes, J. A. M.; Ma, Y.; Macolino, C.; Mahlstedt, J.; Mancuso, A.; Manenti, L.; Marignetti, F.; Marrodan Undagoitia, T.; Martens, K.; Masbou, J.; Masson, D.; Masson, E.; Mastroianni, S.; Messina, M.; Miuchi, K.; Mizukoshi, K.; Molinario, A.; Moriyama, S.; Mora, K.; Mosbacher, Y.; Murra, M.; Muller, J.; Ni, K.; Oberlack, U.; Paetsch, B.; Palacio, J.; Peres, R.; Peters, C.; Pienaar, J.; Pierre, M.; Pizzella, V.; Plante, G.; Qi, J.; Qin, J.; Ramirez Garcia, D.; Singh, R.; Sanchez, L.; Dos Santos, J. M. F.; Sarnoff, I.; Sartorelli, G.; Schreiner, J.; Schulte, D.; Schulte, P.; Schulze Eissing, H.; Schumann, M.; Scotto Lavina, L.; Selvi, M.; Semeria, F.; Shagin, P.; Shi, S.; Shockley, E.; Silva, M.; Simgen, H.; Takeda, A.; Tan, P. -L.; Terliuk, A.; Thers, D.; Toschi, F.; Trinchero, G.; Tunnell, C.; Tonnies, F.; Valerius, K.; Volta, G.; Weinheimer, C.; Weiss, M.; Wenz, D.; Wittweg, C.; Wolf, T.; V. H. S., Wu; Xing, Y.; Xu, D.; Xu, Z.; Yamashita, M.; Yang, L.; Ye, J.; Yuan, L.; Zavattini, G.; Zhong, M.; Zhu, T.

doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.131.041003

We report on the first search for nuclear recoils from dark matter in the form of weakly interacting massive particles (WIMPs) with the XENONnT experiment, which is based on a two-phase time projection chamber with a sensitive liquid xenon mass of 5.9 ton. During the (1.09±0.03) ton yr exposure used for this search, the intrinsic Kr85 and Rn222 concentrations in the liquid target are reduced to unprecedentedly low levels, giving an electronic recoil background rate of (15.8±1.3) events/ton yr keV in the region of interest. A blind analysis of nuclear recoil events with energies between 3.3 and 60.5 keV finds no significant excess. This leads to a minimum upper limit on the spin-independent WIMP-nucleon cross section of 2.58×1047 cm2 for a WIMP mass of 28 GeV/c2 at 90% confidence level. Limits for spin-dependent interactions are also provided. Both the limit and the sensitivity for the full range of WIMP masses analyzed here improve on previous results obtained with the XENON1T experiment for the same exposure.

Aprile E., Abe K., Agostini F., Ahmed Maouloud S., Althueser L., Andrieu B., et al. (2023). First Dark Matter Search with Nuclear Recoils from the XENONnT Experiment. PHYSICAL REVIEW LETTERS, 131(4), 1-9 [10.1103/PhysRevLett.131.041003].