Speaker
Description
LUX-ZEPLIN (LZ) is the world’s most sensitive direct dark matter detector. It is located deep underground at the 4850 ft level at the Sanford Underground Research Facility in Lead, South Dakota. This is a quiet environment, strongly shielded from cosmic rays. LZ utilises 7 tonnes of liquid xenon in a time projection chamber as a target, primarily searching for weakly interacting massive particle dark matter, but is also sensitive to a plethora of new physics models and rare processes. As with all rare event searches, LZ requires a complete and thorough understanding of all backgrounds, including those induced by the environment of the experiment: external gamma-rays, neutrons and radon. The LZ Environmental Monitoring Station (EMS) consists of a suite of detectors which measure and characterise these key backgrounds. In this talk I will introduce the EMS, highlight the benefits of a permanent in-situ environmental monitoring system for rare event experiments and present the constraints EMS data has placed on key LZ backgrounds.
| Main Contribution topic | Direct detection |
|---|---|
| Secondary contribution topic | Instrumentation for Dark Matter |