From Mining.com, Nov. 2, 2020: Three batches of 99.99% pure copper plates mined in Finland, rolled into plates in Germany, shipped across land and sea to Fermilab, and finally rushed into storage 100 meters underground are being used in an experiment to search for dark matter.
SuperCDMS
Fermilab scientists have reached the lowest temperature ever achieved at Fermilab, testing a refrigerator for the SuperCDMS dark matter experiment. The fridge, which operates at close to absolute zero, is now one step closer toward installation at SNOLAB in Canada.
When he was growing up, Jonathan LeyVa thought he’d follow his passion for race cars and pick a profession in automotive engineering. Instead he’s working on what will become one of the world’s most sensitive searches for dark matter, the invisible substance that accounts for more than 85% of the mass of the universe.
These international projects, selected during the process to plan the future of U.S. particle physics, are all set to come online within the next 10 years.
SuperCDMS physicists are testing a way to amp up dark matter vibrations to help them search for lighter particles.
From APS News, July 2018: Scientists are looking down a number of avenues for dark matter. Fermilab’s Daniel Bowring and Dan Hooper discuss the search, and members of SuperCDMS, ADMX and other collaborations are on the hunt.
Some scientists spend decades trying to catch a glimpse of a rare process. But with good experimental design and a lot of luck, they often need only a handful of signals to make a discovery.
Fermilab is providing technology and expertise for the SuperCDMS SNOLAB project, which will expand the hunt for dark matter to particles with properties not visible to any other experiment.
Prototype tests of the future SuperCDMS SNOLAB experiment are in full swing.
New technology and new thinking are pushing the dark matter hunt to lower and lower masses.