Caldwell Allen, Dvali Gia, Majorovits Béla, Millar Alexander, Raffelt Georg, Redondo Javier, Reimann Olaf, Simon Frank, Steffen Frank
Max-Planck-Institut für Physik (Werner-Heisenberg-Institut), Föhringer Ring 6, 80805 München, Germany.
Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, Theresienstraße 37, 80333 München, Germany.
Phys Rev Lett. 2017 Mar 3;118(9):091801. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.118.091801.
We propose a new strategy to search for dark matter axions in the mass range of 40-400 μeV by introducing dielectric haloscopes, which consist of dielectric disks placed in a magnetic field. The changing dielectric media cause discontinuities in the axion-induced electric field, leading to the generation of propagating electromagnetic waves to satisfy the continuity requirements at the interfaces. Large-area disks with adjustable distances boost the microwave signal (10-100 GHz) to an observable level and allow one to scan over a broad axion mass range. A sensitivity to QCD axion models is conceivable with 80 disks of 1 m^{2} area contained in a 10 T field.
