Speaker
Description
COSINE-100 experiment, a direct dark matter search using NaI(Tl) crystal detectors at the Yangyang Underground Laboratory in Korea, completed approximately six years of data taking in March 2023. During this time, COSINE-100 provided valuable insights into various dark matter interpretations such as validating DAMA/LIBRA, search for sub-GeV spin-dependent dark matter search, and exploring other exotic dark matter candidates. The experiment has since been upgraded to COSINE-100U and relocated to Yemilab, a newly established underground laboratory in Jeongseon, Korea.
The upgraded experiment has achieved a significant improvement in detector performance, with an approximately 40% enhancement in light yield, enabled by a newly developed encapsulation technique for the NaI(Tl) crystals. In addition, COSINE-100U aims to further improve its sensitivity by operating the detector at a reduced temperature of −30 °C. With these substantial improvements, the experiment is expected to probe previously unexplored low-mass WIMP dark matter parameter space, particularly for spin-dependent interactions.
The installation of the upgraded detector system has been successfully completed, and data taking began in September 2025. To date, approximately 100 days of room-temperature physics data have been collected, and low-temperature data taking is scheduled to begin in March. In this presentation, we describe the detector design and performance, the analysis strategy including background modeling and event selection, and discuss the projected sensitivity for low-mass spin-dependent WIMP searches.
| Main Contribution topic | Direct detection |
|---|---|
| Secondary contribution topic | Light Dark Matter |