Higgsino Dark Matter Interpretation of the LUX-ZEPLIN 248 keV Nuclear-Recoil Event

Abstract

We propose Higgsino dark matter as a potential interpretation of the $248~\mathrm{keV}$ nuclear-recoil event of interest reported by the LUX-ZEPLIN (LZ) experiment. LZ studied several rare background processes and detector effects in detail, but did not identify any as a likely explanation of the event. A nearly pure Higgsino with mass $m_{\widetilde H}\sim1~\mathrm{TeV}$ naturally realizes inelastic dark matter through the off-diagonal $Z$ coupling of two nearly degenerate neutral Majorana states separated by a mass splitting $δ$. The same electroweak interaction fixes the inelastic Higgsino-nucleon scattering cross section, rather than leaving it as a free parameter. We show that the predicted Higgsino inelastic scattering cross section approaches the published LZ two-sided 90% confidence interval for $δ\sim350~\mathrm{keV}$.