Eur. Phys. J. C (2015) 75: 239
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjc/s10052-015-3473-y

Regular Article - Experimental Physics

Investigating Earth shadowing effect with DAMA/LIBRA-phase1

¹ Dip. di Fisica, Università di Roma “Tor Vergata”, 00133, Rome, Italy
² INFN, sez. Roma “Tor Vergata”, 00133, Rome, Italy
³ Dip. di Ingegneria Civile e Ingegneria Informatica, Università di Roma “Tor Vergata”, 00133, Rome, Italy
⁴ Dip. di Fisica, Università di Roma “La Sapienza”, 00185, Rome, Italy
⁵ INFN, sez. Roma, 00185, Rome, Italy
⁶ Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso, INFN, Assergi, Italy
⁷ Key Laboratory of Particle Astrophysics, Institute of High Energy Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, P.O. Box 918/3, Beijing, 100049, China
⁸ University of Jing Gangshan, Ji’an, Jiangxi, China

^* e-mail: rita.bernabei@roma2.infn.it

Received: 24 February 2015
Accepted: 20 May 2015
Published online: 29 May 2015

Abstract

In the present paper the results obtained in the investigation of possible diurnal effects for low-energy single-hit scintillation events of DAMA/LIBRA-phase1 (1.04 ton year exposure) have been analysed in terms of an effect expected in case of dark matter (DM) candidates inducing nuclear recoils and having high cross-section with ordinary matter, which implies low DM local density in order to fulfill the DAMA/LIBRA DM annual modulation results. This effect is due to the different Earth depths crossed by those DM candidates during the sidereal day.