Silicon photomultipliers (SiPMs) are single-photon sensitive light sensors. The excellent radio-purity and high gain of SiPMs along with a high VUV detection efficiency make them ideal for low-background photon counting applications, such as in neutrino-less double beta decay and dark matter experiments employing noble liquid targets. The Light only Liquid Xenon (LoLX) experiment is an R&D...
Searches for neutrinoless double beta decay conducted with Xe-136 can be improved by detecting the decay's daughter, the Ba-136 ion. This technique offers complete rejection of the residual radioactive background, but its practical implementation remains challenging. At Carleton University, Ba ion tagging R&D is being conducted using a cryogenic liquid xenon setup. As a proof-of-concept,...
The Light-only Liquid Xenon (LoLX) experiment at McGill University, in collaboration with TRIUMF, examines liquid xenon (LXe) for its potential in detecting rare physical events using Silicon photomultipliers (SiPMs). This research seeks to evaluate the long-term stability of Vacuum Ultraviolet (VUV)-sensitive SiPMs in LXe, understand LXe's optical properties, and develop new methods to...
The Milky Way’s (MW) most massive satellite, the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) has just passed its first pericenter approach. The presence of the LMC has a considerable impact on the position and velocity distributions of DM particles in the MW. This directly affects the expected DM annihilation rate, especially in the case of velocity-dependent annihilation models since the LMC may boost the...
