Status of the TREX-DM experiment at the Canfranc Underground Laboratory

• Published in: Journal of physics. Conference series Vol. 1342; no. 1; pp. 12091 - 12095
• Main Authors: Aznar, F, Castel, J, Cebrián, S, Coarasa, I, Dafni, T, Galán, J, Garza, J G, Iguaz, F J, Irastorza, I G, Luzón, G, Mirallas, H, Solórzano, A Ortiz de, Ruiz-Chóliz, E, Villar, JA
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Bristol IOP Publishing 01.01.2020
• Subjects: Laboratories; Physics; Radiation counters
• ISSN: 1742-6588; 1742-6596
• DOI: 10.1088/1742-6596/1342/1/012091

The TREX-DM experiment is conceived to look for low mass WIMPs by means of a gas time projection chamber equipped with novel micromegas readout planes at the Canfranc Underground Laboratory. The detector can hold 20 l of pressurized gas up to 10 bar, which corresponds to 0.30 kg of Ar, or alternatively, 0.16 kg of Ne. The micromegas will be read with a self-triggered acquisition, allowing for effective thresholds below 0.4 keV (electron equivalent). The preliminary background model, following a complete material screening program, points to levels of the order of 1-10 counts keV−1 kg−1 d−1 in the region of interest, making TREX-DM competitive. The status of the commissioning, description of the background model and the corresponding WIMP sensitivity will be presented here.