Colloquium

Upcoming Colloquium

Detecting the Secrets of the Cosmos with Quantum Materials
Dr. Elizabeth A. Peterson, Los Alamos National Laboratory

October 5, 2026
11:00am-12:00pm in HSCI-102

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The detection of dark matter, the elusive particles theorized to make up the majority of the matter in the universe, has posed a grand challenge in fundamental physics for decades. An underexplored search area is "sub-MeV light dark matter." In principle these can be detected via meV-scale signals from scattering with electrons. However, traditional solid-state detectors cannot easily distinguish dark matter from intrinsic vibrational and spin excitations that also occur at the meV-scale. Quantum materials with meV-scale band gaps, including two-dimensional (2D), topological, and f-electron materials, o4er unique advantages. In the SPLENDOR collaboration, we show that inherent anisotropy in black P and Eu₅In₂Sb₆ are expected to capture “smoking gun” evidence of the daily modulation of the dark matter wind. Further, heterostructures of the 2D topological materials HfTe₅ and ZrTe₅ distinguish dark matter signals from intrinsic excitations via orbital hybridization-induced charge transfer. These results illustrate the exciting potential for quantum materials to unlock longstanding questions in cosmological physics.

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