SENSEI at SNOLAB: Single-Electron Event Rate and Implications for Dark Matter
We present results from data acquired by the SENSEI experiment at SNOLAB after a major upgrade in May 2023, which includes deploying 16 new sensors and replacing the copper trays that house the CCDs with a new light-tight design. We observe a single-electron event rate of (1.39±0.11)×10^{-5} e^{-}/pix/day, corresponding to (39.8±3.1) e^{-}/gram/day. This is an order-of-magnitude improvement compared to the previous lowest single-electron rate in a silicon detector and the lowest for any photon detector in the wavelength range between near-infrared and ultraviolet. We use these data to obtain a 90% confidence level upper bound of 1.53×10^{-5} e^{-}/pix/day and to set constraints on sub-GeV dark matter candidates that produce single-electron events. We hypothesize that the data taken at SNOLAB in the previous run, with an older tray design for the sensors, contained a larger rate of single-electron events due to light leaks. We test this hypothesis using data from the SENSEI detector located in the MINOS cavern at Fermilab.
Authors
- Darío Rodrigues (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7952-7168)
- Mariano Cababié (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9281-5375)
- M. Daal (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1134-2116)
- Miguel Sofo-Haro (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9397-2922)
- Ana Martina Botti (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6396-2467)
- Javier Tiffenberg (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1126-2941)
- E. Etzion (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6871-7794)
- S. Holland (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7218-3457)
- S. Scorza
- Sho Uemura (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3458-4625)
- Guillermo Fernández Moroni (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4238-6813)
- Brenda A. Cervantes-Vergara (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5305-2491)
- Rouven Essig (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3066-0486)
- Aviv Orly
- Tomer Volansky (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2275-8184)
- Edgar Marrufo Villalpando (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8169-8855)
- Ansh Desai (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5447-8304)
- Itay M. Bloch (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1931-4344)
- A. Drlica-Wagner (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8251-933X)
- Gustavo Cancelo (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6926-4010)
- Steffon Luoma
- T. Yu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4708-809X)
- Yikai Wu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0009-8963-2058)
- Federico Winkel
- Kelly Stifter
- J. Estrada
- Santiago Pérez (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0801-8411)
- Nate Saffold
- Ian Lawson
- Jonathan Kehat
Institutions
- Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (US)
- TU Wien (AT)
- Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (US)
- Tel Aviv University (IL)
- Universidad Nacional de Córdoba (AR)
- Universidad de Buenos Aires (AR)
- University of Chicago (US)
- Instituto de Física La Plata (AR)
- Institute of High Energy Physics (AT)
- Instituto de Física de Buenos Aires (AR)
- Institut des langues et cultures d'Europe, Amérique, Afrique, Asie et Australie (FR)
- Stony Brook University (US)
- Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (MX)
- Université Grenoble Alpes (FR)
- University of California, Berkeley (US)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Physical Review Letters
- Published
- 2025-04-25
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevlett.134.161002
- Citations
- 13
- Primary Topic
- Dark Matter and Cosmic Phenomena
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 22.44
Funders
- U.S. Department of Energy
- Simons Foundation
- Heising-Simons Foundation
- United States-Israel Binational Science Foundation
- Israel Science Foundation
- Azrieli Foundation
- Office of Science
- Horizon 2020 Framework Programme
- Fermilab
- H2020 European Research Council