Searching for axion-like time-dependent cosmic birefringence with data from SPT-3G

Ultralight axionlike particles (ALPs) are compelling dark matter candidates because of their potential to resolve small-scale discrepancies between \(\Lambda\)CDM predictions and cosmological observations. Axion-photon coupling induces a polarization rotation in linearly polarized photons traveling through an ALP field; thus, as the local ALP dark matter field oscillates in time, distant static polarized sources will appear to oscillate with a frequency proportional to the ALP mass. We use observations of the cosmic microwave background from SPT-3G, the current receiver on the South Pole Telescope, to set upper limits on the value of the axion-photon coupling constant \(g_{\phi\gamma}\) over the approximate mass range \(10^{-22} - 10^{-19}\) eV, corresponding to oscillation periods from 12 hours to 100 days. For periods between 1 and 100 days (\(4.7 \times 10^{-22} \text{ eV} \leq m_\phi \leq 4.7 \times 10^{-20} \text{ eV}\)), where the limit is approximately constant, we set a median 95% C.L. upper limit on the amplitude of on-sky polarization rotation of 0.071 deg. Assuming that dark matter comprises a single ALP species with a local dark matter density of \(0.3\text{ GeV/cm}^3\), this corresponds to \(g_{\phi\gamma} < 1.18 \times 10^{-12}\text{ GeV}^{-1} \times \left( \frac{m_{\phi}}{1.0 \times 10^{-21} \text{ eV}} \right)\). These new limits represent an improvement over the previous strongest limits set using the same effect by a factor of ~3.8.