Clock transitions versus Bragg diffraction in atom-interferometric dark-matter detection

authored by

Daniel Derr, Enno Giese

Abstract

Atom interferometers with long baselines are envisioned to complement the ongoing search for dark matter. They rely on atomic manipulation based on internal (clock) transitions or state-preserving atomic diffraction. Principally, dark matter can act on the internal as well as the external degrees of freedom to both of which atom interferometers are susceptible. We, therefore, study in this contribution the effects of dark matter on the internal atomic structure and the atom's motion. In particular, we show that the atomic transition frequency depends on the mean coupling and the differential coupling of the involved states to dark matter, scaling with the unperturbed atomic transition frequency and the Compton frequency, respectively. The differential coupling is only of relevance when internal states change, which makes detectors, e.g., based on single-photon transitions sensitive to both coupling parameters. For sensors generated by state-preserving diffraction mechanisms like Bragg diffraction, the mean coupling modifies only the motion of the atom as the dominant contribution. Finally, we compare both effects observed in terrestrial dark-matter detectors.

Organisation(s)

Institute of Quantum Optics

External Organisation(s)

Technische Universität Darmstadt

Type

Article

Journal

AVS Quantum Science

Volume

5

No. of pages

12

Publication date

12.2023

Publication status

Published

Peer reviewed

Yes

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Electronic, Optical and Magnetic Materials, Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics, Condensed Matter Physics, Computer Networks and Communications, Physical and Theoretical Chemistry, Computational Theory and Mathematics, Electrical and Electronic Engineering

Electronic version(s)

https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2309.09538 (Access: Open)
https://doi.org/10.1116/5.0176666 (Access: Open)