First broadband search for fixed-polarization dark photon dark matter with GigaBREAD

Abstract

We present the first search for fixed-polarization dark photon (DP) dark matter in the 44-52$μ\mathrm{eV}$ mass range, corresponding to 10.7-12.5GHz. GigaBREAD is a room-temperature broadband dish antenna experiment in which DP convert to ordinary photons on a cylindrical metallic emission surface and are focused onto a radio-frequency receiver. Previous searches, including GigaBREAD and several other dish antenna searches, have assumed randomly polarized DP dark matter. However, vector dark matter produced by a misalignment-like mechanism may retain an approximately fixed polarization, leading to sidereal modulation of the detector response as the Earth rotates. We reanalyze the GigaBREAD data using a polarization-matched likelihood that accounts for the time-dependent projection of a fixed DP polarization onto the detector axis. We find no evidence for a fixed-polarization DP signal and set upper limits on the kinetic mixing parameter at the level of $χ\sim10^{-12}$. These limits are about $20\%$ better than a naive limit obtained by rescaling the previous GigaBREAD limit under the fixed-polarization assumption.