Abstract
Neutrino-nucleus scatterings in the detector could induce electron ionization signatures due to the Migdal effect. We derive prospects for a future detection of the Migdal effect via coherent elastic solar neutrino-nucleus scatterings in liquid xenon detectors, and discuss the irreducible background that it constitutes for the Migdal effect caused by light dark matter-nucleus scatterings. Furthermore, we explore the ionization signal induced by some neutrino electromagnetic and non-standard interactions on nuclei. In certain scenarios, we find a distinct peak on the ionization spectrum of xenon around 0.1 keV, in clear contrast to the Standard Model expectation.
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Acknowledgments
We are grateful to Patrick Huber for useful discussions on the Migdal effect and low-threshold direct detection experiments, and to Duncan Adams and Rouven Essig for discussions on the nuclear uncertainties present in the Migdal effect. We are also grateful to Garv Chauhan, Rijeesh Keloth, Mar Císcar and Camillo Mariani for useful discussions. We also thank Miguel Escudero, Alejandro Ibarra and Gaurav Tomar for useful feedback at the early stages of this project. The work of GH is supported by the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science under award number DE-SC0020262, by the Collaborative Research Center SFB1258, and by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) under Germany’s Excellence Strategy - EXC-2094 - 390783311.
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Herrera, G. A neutrino floor for the Migdal effect. J. High Energ. Phys. 2024, 288 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/JHEP05(2024)288
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/JHEP05(2024)288