Speaker
David Cerdeno
(IPPP, Durham University)
Description
Direct detection experiments are probing the nature of dark matter
particles with increasing sensitivities by looking for their
scattering off nuclei (or electrons) in underground detectors. Future
experiments, with increased payloads and lower energy thresholds, will
have access to wide areas of the parameter space. The search for dark
matter is, however, limited by a Standard Model background: the
coherent elastic neutrino-nucleus scattering cross section, usually
expressed as a "neutrino floor". The neutrino floor can receive
contributions from new physics models in the neutrino sector. I will
present the predictions for various new physics models to calculate
the maximum value of the neutrino floor, showing that it can be as
large as various orders of magnitude. In the light of these results,
future claims by direct detection experiments exploring the low-mass
window must be carefully examined if a signal is found well above the
expected Standard Model neutrino floor.
