HEP-Astro Seminar | Hunting Dark Matter Axions and other Exotic Creatures

The nature of dark matter is one of the great mysteries of modern physics today and could be from new particles beyond the standard model. The Axion, originally conceived as a solution to the strong-CP problem in nuclear physics, is one well-motivated candidate. The Axion Dark Matter Experiment (ADMX), a DOE Gen 2 project, uses a large microwave cavity immersed in a strong static magnetic field to resonantly convert dark matter axions to detectable photons. Recently ADMX has completed its first data run with unprecedented sensitivity in the classical QCD-axion mass range of several µeV. In addition, several new detection techniques have been proposed to cover a large span of potential axion masses beyond that of the classical window. In this talk I will describe the history of axion dark matter searches, describe the recent ADMX results and give a survey of the R&D efforts currently underway to explore the entire axion dark matter mass window.