Searching for Low Mass Axions with an LC Circuit

Abstract

Axions are a promising cold dark matter candidate. Haloscopes, which use the conversion of axions to photons in the presence of a magnetic field to detect axions, are the basis of microwave cavity searches such as ADMX. To search for lighter, low frequency axions in the unexplored < 2 × 10−7 eV (50 MHz) range a tunable LC circuit has been proposed. Progress in the development of such an LC circuit based search is presented here. This will include preliminary results from prototypes using electrical tuning, superconducting loop antenna, and aluminum shielding.