Search for dark photon dark matter: Dark E field radio pilot experiment

We are building an experiment to search for dark matter in the form of dark photons in the nano- to milli-eV mass range. This experiment is the electromagnetic dual of magnetic detector dark radio experiments. It is also a frequency-time dual experiment in two ways: We search for a high-Q signal in wide-band data rather than tuning a high-Q resonator, and we measure electric rather than magnetic fields. In this paper we describe a pilot experiment using room temperature electronics which demonstrates feasibility and sets useful limits to the kinetic coupling ε ∼ 10−12 over 50–300 MHz. With a factor of 2000 increase in real-time spectral coverage, and lower system noise temperature, it will soon be possible to search a wide range of masses at 100 times this sensitivity. We describe the planned experiment in two phases: Phase-I will implement a wide band, 5-million channel, real-time FFT processor over the 30–300 MHz range with a back-end time-domain optimal filter to search for the predicted Q ∼ 106 line using low-noise amplifiers. We have completed spot frequency calibrations using a biconical dipole antenna in a shielded room that extrapolate to a 5σ limit of ε ∼ 10−13 for the coupling from the dark field, per month of integration. Phase-II will extend the search to 20 GHz using cryogenic preamplifiers and new antennas.