WARP liquid argon detector for dark matter survey

Abstract

The WARP programme is a graded programme intended to search for cold Dark Matter in the form of WIMP's. These particles may produce via weak interactions nuclear recoils in the energy range 10-100 keV. A cryogenic noble liquid like argon, already used in the realization of very large detector, permits the simultaneous detection of both ionisation and scintillation induced by an interaction, suggesting the possibility of discriminating between nuclear recoils and electrons mediated events. A 2.3 litres two-phase argon detector prototype has been used to perform several tests on the proposed technique. Next step is the construction of a 100 litres sensitive volume device with potential sensitivity a factor 100 better than presently existing experiments.