What is direct detection of WIMPs?
There are two methods of detecting dark matter: direct detection is when you have a detector, and indirect - when you look for decay products/signs of the particle somewhere in the atmosphere. Direct method is quite exciting, because it gives some hope to “catch” a WIMP. Your detector has to be extremely large and filled with dense medium, like liquid xenon, germanium, silicon, argon, and so on. Why dense? Because you wanna make sure that the particle will hit the medium’s nuclei. WIMPs which make up halo of out galaxy are expected to travel with velocity around 200 km/sec. #darkmatter
There are two methods of detecting dark matter: direct detection is when you have a detector, and indirect - when you look for decay products/signs of the particle somewhere in the atmosphere. Direct method is quite exciting, because it gives some hope to “catch” a WIMP. Your detector has to be extremely large and filled with dense medium, like liquid xenon, germanium, silicon, argon, and so on. Why dense? Because you wanna make sure that the particle will hit the medium’s nuclei. WIMPs which make up halo of out galaxy are expected to travel with velocity around 200 km/sec. #darkmatter