Speaker
Description
The DarkDot experiment is a search for light dark matter utilizing Quantum Dots as the detector medium and Superconducting Nanowire Single Photon Detectors (SNSPDs) as photon sensors. Quantum Dots are nanocrystals that are highly customizable, allowing for precise tuning of the energy needed for scintillation, the type of interaction allowed, and the wavelength of the scintillation photon. This flexibility would allow us to probe different Dark matter candidates and interactions in a single experiment. The differences in the quantum dots can also help with background discrimination. These Quantum Dots will then be coupled with SNSPDs to detect the scintillation light, taking advantage of the SNSPDs' high quantum efficiency and low dark counts. Our current work is focused on increasing the size of the SNSPDs to be used in DarkDot and other dark matter searches with collaborators at MIT. I will present on these experimental results and the plans for the future DarkDot experiment.