Based on our understanding of gravity, observations of the motion of stars and galaxies demonstrate a stronger gravitational force than can be accounted for by observable matter, i.e.<\/em> matter that emits or absorbs light.\u00a0 Big Bang Nucleosynthesis suggests that the average density of baryonic matter, in units of critical density, is 0.05 \u00b1 0.01.\u00a0 However, the total mass density, in units of critical density, WM<\/sub>, is 0.4 \u00b1 0.1.\u00a0 Therefore another form of matter must be responsible for this \u201cextra\u201d gravity.\u00a0 One hypothetical type of dark matter, so called because it neither absorbs nor emits light, is a Weakly Interacting Massive Particle (WIMP).\u00a0 There are many different forms that a WIMP could take but particle physics provides specific candidates from Supersymmetry.\u00a0 These candidate particles have a mass range of 50 \u2013 500 GeV and weak interaction cross sections.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 CWRU is a member of the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS), a collaboration of several institutions, which uses low temperature particle detectors that are sensitive to WIMPs and provide good background rejection.\u00a0 Since these detectors, which use novel technology, will soon be installed in the low-background experimental site, they have not been extensively operated under experimental conditions.\u00a0 It is known that the detectors have good sensitivity, but they have not been fully characterized.\u00a0 Over the next year, this senior project will characterize the response of a detector, guided by the needs at the experimental site to improve background rejection.\u00a0 Signals from photon, electron, and neutron sources are likely to be background signals and we will expose a detector to artificial sources of these particles.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Peter Hyland with Dan AkeribCharacterization of a Cryogenic Detector to Improve Background Rejection<\/p>\n Based on our understanding of gravity, observations of the motion of stars and galaxies demonstrate a stronger gravitational force than can be accounted for by observable matter, i.e.<\/em> matter that emits or absorbs light.\u00a0 Big Bang Nucleosynthesis suggests that the average density of baryonic matter, in units of critical density, is 0.05 \u00b1 0.01.\u00a0 However, the total mass density, in units of critical density, WM, is 0.4 \u00b1 0.1.\u00a0 Therefore another form of matter must be responsible for this \u201cextra\u201d gravity.\u00a0 One hypothetical type of dark matter,<\/p>\n