Astrophysics (Index)About

PICO experiment

(PICO)
(a search for a candidate dark matter particle)

The PICO experiment (or just PICO) searches for a particular candidate dark-matter particle, i.e., WIMP. It uses a type of bubble chamber to detect interactions between WIMPs and baryonic matter: by definition, a WIMP interacts normal manner extremely rarely at most, which PICO instrument aims to detect. The experiment is based upon the notion that a WIMP is a type of neutralino (a particular class of particles theorized by supersymmetry) but I suspect it may be sensitive to at least some other possible WIMP-candidates.

The PICO experiment results from the 2013 merger of two existing efforts, PICASSO and COUPP, the word PICO abbreviating these two experiment names. PICASSO is for Project In Canada to Search for Supersymmetric Objects and COUPP for Chicagoland Observatory for Underground Particlephysics. Three versions of the PICO instrument have been used, PICO-2L, PICO-60, and PICO-40L, with a fourth, PICO-500 in development. So far no target particle has been detected, but it is establishing some energy constraints on such particles. The PICO instruments have been located at SNOLAB, a Canadian underground physics facility created at the location of the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory (SNO).


Note that there was also a cosmic microwave background (CMB) survey named PICO, for Probe of Inflation and Cosmic Origins.


(physics,dark matter,particles)
Further reading:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PICO
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SNOLAB
https://www.picoexperiment.com/
https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2015PhRvL.114w1302A/abstract
https://www.snolab.ca/

Referenced by page:
dark matter detector

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