Exploiting electron parity violation: from Standard Model tests to dark matter detection predictions

Abstract

There has been recent interest in low energy, high luminosity polarized electron beams for studies of parity-violating (PV) electron scattering, such as the MESA accelerator at Mainz or an upgraded FEL facility at Jefferson Lab. Accurate measurements of the PV asymmetry in elastic electron scattering from nuclei can be used to determine Standard Model couplings, such as the weak-mixing angle or higher-order radiative corrections, as well as to extract specific information on the nuclear and nucleon structure. To this end, low uncertainties are required from modelling some confounding nuclear and nuclear structure effects, including isospin mixing, nucleon strangeness content or Coulomb distortion of electron wave functions. We estimate the sizes and theoretical uncertainties of such effects for a carbon 12 target. An experimental precision in the PV asymmetry of a few tenths of a percent may be reachable under certain kinematic conditions, that are also discussed for the same nuclear target. This high precision PV asymmetry in elastic electron scattering can also be used to relate in a very simple manner the elastic electron-nucleus scattering cross section with the elastic neutrino-nucleus cross section. This novel relationship allows us to exploit experimentally well-determined quantities to predict unknown or recently measured observables, such as coherent neutrino-nucleus cross sections. This idea can be extended to link electron scattering to an even more uncertain magnitude: the direct detection rate of hypothetical weak-interacting dark matter particles through axial and/or vector elastic interactions with nuclei.