Looking for WIMPs in the Galactic Halo: the Search for Dark Matter Using Ultra-Cold Particle Detectors and Other Techniques

Daniel S. Akerib, Professor of Physics, Case Western Reserve University

Overwhelming observational evidence indicates that most of the matter in the Universe consists of non-baryonic dark matter. One possibility is that the dark matter is Weakly-Interacting Massive Particles (WIMPs) that were produced in the early Universe. These relics could comprise the Milky Way's dark halo and provide evidence for new particle physics, such as Supersymmetry. After reviewing some of the evidence for dark matter and the WIMP hypothesis, I will describe the search we are conducting to detect these particles using phonon-mediated particle detectors housed in a low-radioactive 20-milli-Kelvin environment 2000 feet below ground. I will also describe some of the other experiments that are part of the broad world-wide program to search for WIMPs.