EDELWEISS

EDELWEISS is an experiment which attempts to detect new particles called WIMPs from which postulated by astronomers dark matter is composed. It is part of the Laboratoire Souterrain de Modane.

The experiment is designed to measure the collisions of such particles with atomic nuclei; by such collisions, the specimen heated to ( high-purity germanium in ten samples of 400 g each in EDELWEISS II) by a few millionths of a Kelvin, and this heating is measured with highly sensitive thermometers. The sample itself is cooled down to 20 mK above absolute zero. To shield against cosmic radiation, the experiment is housed in an underground laboratory. EDELWEISS is an acronym for "Experience pour DETECTER Les Wimps En Site Souterrain ", translated: experiment for the detection of WIMPs at an underground site.

2011 reported the collaboration on the results of approximately 14 months of uninterrupted run of the experiment - there were five events as candidates for interaction with WIMPs registered with the expected background of 3 events, what the collaboration as the basis of assessment of upper bounds for the cross section of WIMPs with ordinary matter was.

Spokesman of the Collaboration is Gilles Gerbier ( CEA / Saclay ).

Other major experiments to search for dark matter in the 2000s are the SuperCDMS experiment in Sudbury and the XENON100 experiment at the Gran Sasso underground laboratory.