Micro-physics simulations of columnar recombination along nuclear recoil tracks in high-pressure Xe gas for directional dark matter searches

Understand

Directional sensitivity is one of the most important aspects of WIMP dark matter searches.

• Yet, making the direction of nuclear recoil visible with large target masses is a challenge.
• To achieve this, we are exploring a new method of detecting directions of short nuclear recoil tracks in high-pressure Xe gas, down to a few micron long, by utilizing columnar recombination.
• Columnar recombination changes the scintillation and ionization yields depending on the angle between a track and the electric field direction.