Scientists Propose Mind-Bending Plan to Look for Dark Matter, New Physics Near the Sun - VICE

Now, a team led by Yu-Dai Tsai, a physicist at the University of California, Irvine, has proposed a fascinating space mission that would use the most accurate clocks ever invented to search for dark matter that might be bound to the Sun.

To that end, Tsai started thinking about the possibility of using these clocks to search for a hypothetical version of dark matter, known as ultralight dark matter (ULDM), which theories suggest could become bound to the Sun in a structure called a dark matter halo.

A space mission to the Sun might be able to detect ULDM particles, assuming they exist, by measuring tiny changes in the frequencies of the atomic transitions in quantum clocks that expose ULDM’s interactions with other forms of matter.

Since 2020, Tsai has been developing the concept with study co-authors Marianna Safronova, an expert in atomic physics at the University of Delaware, and Joshua Eby, a dark matter expert at the Kavli Institute for the Physics and Mathematics of the Universe.

“The solar probe mission would allow the atomic clocks to study enhanced dark matter density close to the Sun, and probe very interesting and motivated target models detailed in our paper,” Tsai noted.

“A network of clocks in space and on Earth can study many fundamental physics topics, including transient topological dark matter and multimessenger signatures of exotic particles,” the researchers concluded in the study