Low Temperature Particle Detection using Magnetic Sensing

  • Nuclear, Particle, Astroparticle and Cosmology (NUPAC) Seminars

September 16, 2025 2:00 PM
PAIS 3205

Host:
Dinesh Loomba
Presenter:
Stephen T Boyd (UNM)
At very low temperatures, a powerful new toolkit of experimental techniques becomes available. This includes phenomena like superconductivity and quantum coherence, ultra-low thermal noise, and extreme materials properties. Marshaling these tools properly, we can detect photons and elementary particles using entirely different physics from standard diode and scintillator detectors. This new physics yields unique new capabilities in particle detection, with some very important practical applications. Fortunately for us, it also yields lots of interesting problems that are fun for experimentalists to work on. Our group at UNM focuses on the modeling, design, and some of the fabrication of low-temperature "magnetic microcalorimeter" detectors and the SQUIDs to read them out. Together with our collaborators, we are currently pushing forward projects in nuclear safeguards and forensics, dark matter, and most recently double beta decay with the AMoRE collaboration. In this overview talk, I'll briefly review some background, key physics involved, how it leads to unique measurement capabilities, novel measurement approaches we use with these detectors, and some prospects for future improvements.

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