Hunting for dark matter has a new surprising target

Gravitinos loaded with superheroes can be the long-sought-after response to dark matter.

Dark Matter remains one of the greatest mysteries of fundamental physics. Many theoretical proposals (axions, WIMP) and 40 years of in -depth experimental research have not explained what dark matter is. Several years ago, a theory that seeks to unify the physics of particles and gravity introduced a radically different possibility: the severities of superheroes and electrically as candidates of dark matter.

A recent article in Physical examination Through scientists from the University of Warsaw and the Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics show that new underground detectors, in particular the Juno detector which will soon start to take data, are well suited to the detection of the severity of dark matter, even if they have been designed for neutrino physics. The simulations that brings the physics of elementary particles with advanced quantum chemistry indicate that a gravtino would leave a signal in the unique and ambiguity detector.

In 1981, the winner of the Nobel Prize Nobel Murray Gell -Mann, who introduced quarks as a fundamental constituents of matter, observed that the particles of the standard model – Quartks and Leptons – appeared in a purely mathematical theory formulated two years earlier: N = 8 Supergravity, noted for its maximum symmetry. N = 8 supergravity includes, in addition to the particles of standard model of spin 1/2, a gravitational sector with the graviton (of Spin 2) and 8 gravity of 3/2 spin. If the standard model is indeed connected to n = 8 supergravity, this relationship could point to one of the most difficult problems of theoretical physics – unifying gravity with particle physics. In its ½ spin sector, n = 8 supergravity contains exactly 6 quarks (u, d, c, s, t, b) and 6 leptons (electron, muon, taon and neutrinos), and it prohibits any particles of additional material.

After 40 years of research on the intensive accelerator without discovering new particles of matter, the content in matters predicted by n = 8 supergravity remains coherent with observations and is always the only known theoretical explanation of the reason for which the standard model has precisely this number of quarks and leptons. However, a direct cartography between n = 8 supergravity and the standard model was faced with a major problem: the electrical loads of quarks and leptons were offset from ± 1/6 compared to their known values. For example, the electron would have a load -5/6 instead of -1.

Supergravity extension

Several years ago, Krzysztof Meissner of the Faculty of Physics of the University of Warsaw, Poland and Hermann Nicolai of the Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics (Albert Einstein Institute / AEI), Potsdam, Germany returned to the idea of ​​Gell-Mann and was able to go beyond the standard material and 8 Supergravity particles. The modification is very wide by pointing to an infinite symmetry K (E10), little known mathematically and by replacing the usual symmetries of the standard model.

One of the surprising results of the modification, described in the articles in Physical examination letters And Physical reviewis the fact that gravitinos, probably of the extremely large mass near the planck scale, or a billion masses of protons, are electrically loaded: 6 of them have a load ± 1/3 and 2 of them ± 2/3. Gravitinos, even if they are extremely massive, cannot decompose because there are no particles in which they could decompose. Meissner and Nicolai therefore proposed that 2 load gravitines ± 2/3 (the other 6 have a much lower abundance) could be particles of dark matter of type very different from everything that has proposed so far. Namely, the usual candidates widely announced, either extremely light axes, or intermediate mass (proton) such as the Wimp (the massive particles in weakly interaction) were electrically neutral, in compatibility with the name “dark matter”. However, after more than 40 years of intensive research by many different methods and devices, no new particles beyond the standard model has been detected.

However, gravitinos have a new alternative. Even if they are electrically loaded, they can be candidates of dark matter because being so massive that they are extremely rare and therefore “ therefore do not shine on the sky ” and avoid the very narrow constraints on the load of the constituents of dark matter. In addition, Gravitinos’ electric charge suggested a completely different way of trying to prove their existence.

Original paper in 2024 in EUR. Phys. J. By Meissner and Nicolai stressed that neutrino detectors, based on different scintillators of water, could suit the detection of gravitinos of dark matter. However, research is extremely difficult by their extreme rarity (probably a single gravitino for 10,000 km3 in the solar system), which is why there is no detection prospect with detectors currently available. However, new giant underground detectors, oil or liquid argon are construction or planned and realistic possibilities for the search for these particles now.

Among all detectors, the Chinese underground neutrino observatory (Juno), now under construction, seems predestined for such research. It aims to determine the properties of neutrinos (in fact antineutrinos), but as neutrinos interact extremely weakly with matter, detectors must have very large volumes. In the case of the Juno detector, this means 20,000 tonnes of a biological and synthetic oil in the shape of oil, commonly used in the chemical industry, with special additions, in a spherical vessel with a diameter of about 40 meters with more than 17,000 photomultileurs around the sphere. Juno is expected to start measures in the second half of 2025.

The Juno advantage

The document recently published in Physical examination By Meissner and Nicolai, with employees Adrianna Kruk and Michal Lesiuk of the Chemistry Faculty of the University of Warsaw, presents a detailed analysis of the specific signatures that the events caused by Gravitinos could produce in Juno and the future liquid argon detectors such as the deep experience of Neutrino Underground (Dune) in the United States.

The article describes not only the theoretical background both on the sides of physics and chemistry, but also a very detailed simulation of possible signatures depending on the speed and track of a gravtitino traveling through the oil vessel. It required very advanced knowledge of quantum chemistry and intensive processor consumption calculations. The simulations had to take into account many possible history – from the C14 radioactive C14 present in the oil, the dark counting rate and the efficiency of photomultiplars, the absorption of photons in oil, etc.

The simulations show that with the appropriate software, the passage of a gravitino through the detector will leave a unique signal impossible to be wrongly identified with a passage from one of the particles currently known. The analysis establishes new standards in terms of interdisciplinarity by combining two different areas of research: theoretical and experimental physics of elementary particles on the one hand and very advanced methods of modern quantum chemistry on the other.

The detection of Gravitinos Superhevy would be a major step in the search for a unified theory of gravity and particles. Given that gravitinos should have masses of the Planck mass order, their detection would be the first direct indication of physics near the Planck scale and could thus provide precious experimental evidence for unification of all nature forces.

References:

“Signatures of supermassive loaded gravitinos in liquid scintilliat detectors” by Adrianna Kruk, Michał Lesiuk, Krzysztof A. Meissner and Hermann Nicolai, August 13, 2025, Physical examination.
Two: 10.1103 / FM6H-7R78

“Standard Model Symmetries and K (E10)” by Krzysztof A. Meissner and Hermann Nicolai, August 7, 2025, Journal of High Energy Physics.
Two: 10.1007 / JHEP08 (2025) 054

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