Directional Recoil Identification from Tracks
Device for detecting dark matter particles
The Directional Recoil Identification from Tracks (DRIFT) detector is a low pressure negative ion time projection chamber (NITPC) designed to detect weakly interacting massive particles (WIMPs) - a prime dark matter candidate.
There are currently two DRIFT detectors in operation. DRIFT-IId, which is located 1100m underground in the Boulby Underground Laboratory at the Boulby Mine in North Yorkshire, England, and DRIFT-IIe, which is located on the surface at Occidental College in Los Angeles.
The DRIFT collaboration ultimately aims to develop and operate an underground array of DRIFT detectors for observing and reconstructing WIMP-induced nuclear recoil tracks with enough precision to provide a signature of the dark matter halo.
WIMP detection
There are numerous experiments worldwide attempting to detect the energy deposition that is expected to occur when a WIMP directly collides with an atom of ordinary matter. Ultra sensitive experiments are required to detect the low energy and extremely rare interaction that is predicted to occur between a WIMP and the nucleus of an atom in a target material. The DRIFT detectors vary from the majority of WIMP detectors in their use of a low pressure gas as a target material. The low pressure gas means that an interaction within the detector causes an ionisation track of measurable length compared to the point like interactions seen in detectors with solid or liquid target materials. Such ionisation tracks can be reconstructed in three dimensions to determine not only the type of particle that caused it, but from which direction the particle came. This directional sensitivity has the potential to prove the existence of WIMPs by their distinct directional signature.
The public source identifies “Directional Recoil Identification from Tracks” as device for detecting dark matter particles. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Directional, Recoil and Identification.
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This entry incorporates text from “Directional Recoil Identification from Tracks” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.