Bounds on heavy axions with an X-Ray Free Electron Laser

Jack W. D. Halliday; Giacomo Marocco; Konstantin A. Beyer; Charles Heaton; Motoaki Nakatsutsumi; Thomas R. Preston; Charles D. Arrowsmith; Carsten Baehtz; Sebastian Goede; Oliver Humphries; Alejandro Laso Garcia; Richard Plackett; Pontus Svensson; Georgios Vacalis; Justin Wark; Daniel Wood; Ulf Zastrau; Robert Bingham; Ian Shipsey; Subir Sarkar; Gianluca Gregori

doi:10.1103/physrevlett.134.055001

Bounds on heavy axions with an X-Ray Free Electron Laser

Jack W. D. Halliday
, Giacomo Marocco
, Konstantin A. Beyer
, Charles Heaton
, Motoaki Nakatsutsumi
, Thomas R. Preston
, Charles D. Arrowsmith
, Carsten Baehtz
, Sebastian Goede
, Oliver Humphries
, Alejandro Laso Garcia
, Richard Plackett
, Pontus Svensson
, Georgios Vacalis
, Justin Wark
, Daniel Wood
, Ulf Zastrau
, Robert Bingham
, Ian Shipsey
, Subir Sarkar

Gianluca Gregori

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

10 Citations (Scopus)

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Abstract

We present new exclusion bounds obtained at the European X-Ray Free Electron Laser facility (EuXFEL) on axionlike particles in the mass range 10−3 eV≲ma≲104 eV. Our experiment exploits the Primakoff effect via which photons can, in the presence of a strong external electric field, decay into axions, which then convert back into photons after passing through an opaque wall. While similar searches have been performed previously at a third-generation synchrotron [Yamaji , ], our work demonstrates improved sensitivity, exploiting the higher brightness of x-rays at EuXFEL. Published by the American Physical Society 2025

Original language	English
Article number	055001
Number of pages	7
Journal	Physical Review Letters
Volume	134
Issue number	5
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevlett.134.055001
Publication status	Published - 6 Feb 2025

Funding

This research received funding from the UK Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (Grants No. EP/X01133X/1 and No. EP/X010791/1). S. S. and G. G. belong to the “Quantum Sensors for the Hidden Sector” consortium funded by the UK Science & Technology Facilities Council (Grant No. ST/T006277/1) and wish to thank Andreas Ringwald for helpful comments. J. H. was partially supported by the U.S. Defense Threat Reduction Agency (Grant No. HDTRA1-20-1-0001) and the U.S. Department of Energy (Grants No. DE-SC0020434 and No. DE-NA0003764). C. H. was partly funded through the UK XFEL Physical Sciences Hub. We acknowledge the European XFEL in Schenefeld, Germany, for the provision of x-ray free-electron laser beamtime at the Scientific Instrument HED under proposal number 003326 and would like to thank all the staff for their assistance. The authors are grateful to the HIBEF user consortium for the provision of instrumentation and staff that enabled this experiment.

Keywords

Axion-like particles
axions
free-electron lasers
dynamical diffraction

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Cite this

Halliday, J. W. D., Marocco, G., Beyer, K. A., Heaton, C., Nakatsutsumi, M., Preston, T. R., Arrowsmith, C. D., Baehtz, C., Goede, S., Humphries, O., Garcia, A. L., Plackett, R., Svensson, P., Vacalis, G., Wark, J., Wood, D., Zastrau, U., Bingham, R., Shipsey, I., ... Gregori, G. (2025). Bounds on heavy axions with an X-Ray Free Electron Laser. Physical Review Letters, 134(5), Article 055001. https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevlett.134.055001

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title = "Bounds on heavy axions with an X-Ray Free Electron Laser",

abstract = "We present new exclusion bounds obtained at the European X-Ray Free Electron Laser facility (EuXFEL) on axionlike particles in the mass range 10−3 eV≲ma≲104 eV. Our experiment exploits the Primakoff effect via which photons can, in the presence of a strong external electric field, decay into axions, which then convert back into photons after passing through an opaque wall. While similar searches have been performed previously at a third-generation synchrotron [Yamaji , ], our work demonstrates improved sensitivity, exploiting the higher brightness of x-rays at EuXFEL. Published by the American Physical Society 2025",

keywords = "Axion-like particles, axions, free-electron lasers, dynamical diffraction",

author = "Halliday, \{Jack W. D.\} and Giacomo Marocco and Beyer, \{Konstantin A.\} and Charles Heaton and Motoaki Nakatsutsumi and Preston, \{Thomas R.\} and Arrowsmith, \{Charles D.\} and Carsten Baehtz and Sebastian Goede and Oliver Humphries and Garcia, \{Alejandro Laso\} and Richard Plackett and Pontus Svensson and Georgios Vacalis and Justin Wark and Daniel Wood and Ulf Zastrau and Robert Bingham and Ian Shipsey and Subir Sarkar and Gianluca Gregori",

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month = feb,

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doi = "10.1103/physrevlett.134.055001",

language = "English",

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Halliday, JWD, Marocco, G, Beyer, KA, Heaton, C, Nakatsutsumi, M, Preston, TR, Arrowsmith, CD, Baehtz, C, Goede, S, Humphries, O, Garcia, AL, Plackett, R, Svensson, P, Vacalis, G, Wark, J, Wood, D, Zastrau, U, Bingham, R, Shipsey, I, Sarkar, S & Gregori, G 2025, 'Bounds on heavy axions with an X-Ray Free Electron Laser', Physical Review Letters, vol. 134, no. 5, 055001. https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevlett.134.055001

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T1 - Bounds on heavy axions with an X-Ray Free Electron Laser

AU - Halliday, Jack W. D.

AU - Marocco, Giacomo

AU - Beyer, Konstantin A.

AU - Heaton, Charles

AU - Nakatsutsumi, Motoaki

AU - Preston, Thomas R.

AU - Arrowsmith, Charles D.

AU - Baehtz, Carsten

AU - Goede, Sebastian

AU - Humphries, Oliver

AU - Garcia, Alejandro Laso

AU - Plackett, Richard

AU - Svensson, Pontus

AU - Vacalis, Georgios

AU - Wark, Justin

AU - Wood, Daniel

AU - Zastrau, Ulf

AU - Bingham, Robert

AU - Shipsey, Ian

AU - Sarkar, Subir

AU - Gregori, Gianluca

PY - 2025/2/6

Y1 - 2025/2/6

N2 - We present new exclusion bounds obtained at the European X-Ray Free Electron Laser facility (EuXFEL) on axionlike particles in the mass range 10−3 eV≲ma≲104 eV. Our experiment exploits the Primakoff effect via which photons can, in the presence of a strong external electric field, decay into axions, which then convert back into photons after passing through an opaque wall. While similar searches have been performed previously at a third-generation synchrotron [Yamaji , ], our work demonstrates improved sensitivity, exploiting the higher brightness of x-rays at EuXFEL. Published by the American Physical Society 2025

AB - We present new exclusion bounds obtained at the European X-Ray Free Electron Laser facility (EuXFEL) on axionlike particles in the mass range 10−3 eV≲ma≲104 eV. Our experiment exploits the Primakoff effect via which photons can, in the presence of a strong external electric field, decay into axions, which then convert back into photons after passing through an opaque wall. While similar searches have been performed previously at a third-generation synchrotron [Yamaji , ], our work demonstrates improved sensitivity, exploiting the higher brightness of x-rays at EuXFEL. Published by the American Physical Society 2025

KW - Axion-like particles

KW - axions

KW - free-electron lasers

KW - dynamical diffraction

UR - https://in.xfel.eu/metadata/doi/10.22003/XFEL.EU-DATA-003326-00

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DO - 10.1103/physrevlett.134.055001

M3 - Article

SN - 0031-9007

VL - 134

JO - Physical Review Letters

JF - Physical Review Letters

IS - 5

M1 - 055001

ER -

Bounds on heavy axions with an X-Ray Free Electron Laser

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