About

I'm passionate about research and driven by curiosity.

My name is Michael (David-Michael) Poehlmann. I am a Ph.D. candidate at the University of California, Davis studying high energy experimental physics. I work with Prof. Emilija Pantic on liquid argon-based rare event searches. Specifically, I specialize in data analysis and simulations for the DarkSide Collaboration, working towards the discovery of dark matter.

As an undergraduate at the University of Minnesota, I worked with Prof. Prisca Cushman on the active neutron veto for the SuperCDMS SNOLAB detector. I doped plastic scintillators with gadolinium and characterized sample properties.

One of my other undergraduate research experiences was working with Prof. Jeremiah Mans. I measured the event discrimination efficiency of thin plastic scintillator sheets for the LDMX experiment.

Research

My quest to discover new particles.

Here, I am shown presenting a poster on ARIS-ER.

DarkSide

The DarkSide Program aims at the direct detection of dark matter using two-phase argon time projection chambers (TPCs). The first physics detector of the program, DarkSide-50, finished taking data in 2018. I used DarkSide-50 data set world-leading constraints on several leptophilic dark matter models.

The current phase of the DarkSide Program is DarkSide-20k, a next-generation dark matter detector at the Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso in Italy. My work has included simulation of detector backgrounds to inform and optimize the DarkSide-20k design. I have also led the development of a Python-based data reconstruction package for the next-generation DarkSide-20k experiment, as well as the low-mass sensitivity projections effort.


ARIS-ER

Modeling of electron recoil backgrounds for detectors such as DarkSide-20k and DarkSide-LowMass is limited by the lack of low-energy calibration points. Precise calibration of liquid argon's response to electron recoils down to a keVer would improve the sensitivity of future experiments to low-mass dark matter interactions.

The ARIS-ER experiment at UC Davis will accomplish this by measuring the response of liquid argon to monoenergetic gammas which Compton scatter in the detector. The energy of the scattered gamma will be precisely measured with a germanium detector. I have demonstrated the feasibility and optimized the experimental design of ARIS-ER via Monte Carlo simulations. I also developed a C++ data acquisition (DAQ) program to digitize and record photosensor waveforms.

Publications

My Orcid iD is 0000-0002-7131-8433

Papers

The DarkSide-50 Collaboration, “Search for dark matter particle interactions with electron final states with DarkSide-50,” Physical Review Letters 130, 101002 (2023).
DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.130.101002

The DarkSide-50 Collaboration, “Search for low-mass dark matter WIMPs with 12 ton-day exposure of DarkSide-50,” Physical Review D 107, 063001 (2023).
DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevD.107.063001

The DarkSide-50 Collaboration, “Search for dark matter-nucleon interactions via Migdal effect with DarkSide-50,” accepted by Physical Review Letters 130, 101001 (2023).
DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.130.101001

The DarkSide-50 Collaboration, “Search for low mass dark matter in DarkSide-50: the Bayesian network approach,” submitted to European Physical Journal C (2023).
DOI: 10.48550/arXiv.2302.01830

The DarkSide-20k Collaboration, “Sensitivity of the DarkSide-20k experiment to low-mass dark matter candidates,” manuscript in preparation (2023).

The DarkSide-20k Collaboration, “Study on cosmogenic activation above ground for the DarkSide-20k project,” submitted to Astroparticle Physics (2023).
DOI: 10.48550/arXiv.2301.12970

The DarkSide-20k Collaboration, “Measurement of isotopic separation of argon with the prototype of the cryogenic distillation plant Aria for dark matter searches,” submitted to European Physical Journal C (2023).
DOI: 10.48550/arXiv.2301.09639

The DarkSide-20k Collaboration, “Sensitivity projections for a dual-phase argon TPC optimized for light dark matter searches through the ionization channel,” submitted to Physical Review Letters (2023).
DOI: 10.48550/arXiv.2209.01177

D.M. Poehlmann, D. Barker, H. Chagani, P. Cushman, G. Heuermann, A. Medved , H.E. Rogers, and R. Schmitz, “Characterization of gadolinium-loaded plastic scintillator for use as a neutron veto,” arXiv:1812.11267 (2018).
DOI: 10.48550/arXiv.1812.11267

Book chapters

P.B. Cushman and D.M. Poehlmann, “Plastic Scintillator Detectors for Particle Physics,” in Plastic Scintillators: Chemistry and Applications (Springer International Publishing, 2021), pp. 541-588.
DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-73488-6_15

Presentations

D.M. Poehlmann, “Search for Dark Matter-Electron Interactions with DarkSide-50,” Presentation, APS April Conference 2022, New York (Apr 2022).

D.M. Poehlmann, “Position reconstruction for DarkSide-20k,” Presentation, APS Far West Conference 2021, virtual (Oct 2021).

D.M. Poehlmann, “Optical modeling and position reconstruction for DarkSide-20k,” Presentation, LIDINE Conference 2021, virtual (Sept 2021).

D.M. Poehlmann, “Constraints on sub-GeV dark matter-electron scattering from the DarkSide-50 experiment,” Presentation, APS Far West Conference 2020, virtual (Oct 2020).

D.M. Poehlmann, “The DarkSide-20k experiment in 10 minutes,” Talk, New Perspectives Conference 2020, virtual (July 2020).

D.M. Poehlmann, “Argon recoil ionization and scintillation from electron recoils (ARIS-ER),” Poster, APS Far West 2019, Stanford (Nov 2019).

Curriculum vitae

Education

  • Ph.D. in Physics, University of California, Davis (expected graduation June 2023)
    Designated emphasis in Nuclear Science
  • M.S. in Physics, University of California, Davis (Sept 2018 to Dec 2019)
  • Honors B.S. in Physics, University of Minnesota, Twin Cities (Sept 2014 to May 2018)


Honors and Fellowships

  1. Honorable Mention, Graduate Research Fellowship Program, National Science Foundation (2020)
  2. F. Paul Brady Graduate Fellowship, University of California, Davis (2019)
  3. Gold Scholar Award, University of Minnesota (2014-2018)
  4. Dean's List, College of Science and Engineering, University of Minnesota (2014-2018)
  5. National Merit Scholar, National Merit Scholarship Corporation (2014)

Contact

Michael Poehlmann

dm.poehlmann@gmail.com