CMB Instrumentation Talk: Searching for Axions using Millimeter-Wave Astrophysics

Speaker: Oliver Jeong (UC Berkeley / LBNL) In Person and zoom

Zoom info: https://stanford.zoom.us/j/868697145
Please contact Shawn Henderson on slack for zoom password.

The physical nature of dark matter remains a long-standing mystery in physics, despite the plethora of observational evidence for its existence, accounting for 85% of the mass density of the universe. The axion is a prime particle candidate for dark matter, with substantial efforts made by a number of experiments in the past several decades using a variety of different detection techniques to search for its existence. In this talk, I will discuss how millimeter-wave observatories can play a unique and synergistic role in the search for axions. First, I will present my work using Simons Array's observations of the Crab Nebula to search for axion-induced oscillations of its polarization angle, and second, I will detail the novel method of detecting the photons of axion vacuum decay using line intensity mapping data for high mass scales.