First results from the LUX Dark Matter Experiment
Dr. Alexander Murphy (University of Edinburgh)

Discovery of the nature of dark matter is recognized as one of the greatest challenges in contemporary science.
The most compelling candidate for dark matter is the Weakly Interacting Massive Particle (WIMP) that arises naturally in several models of physics beyond the Standard Model. The discovery of galactic WIMPs would therefore enlighten two of the outstanding problems of modern physics - the matter composition of the Universe and the true description of fundamental particles and interactions.

The worldwide race towards direct detection has been dramatically accelerated by remarkable progress of liquid xenon time projection chambers. They have shifted the scale of target mass by orders of magnitude whilst simultaneously reducing backgrounds to unprecedentedly low levels.The most advanced of these projects is the Large Underground Xenon (LUX) detector, operated in the Davis Cavern of the SURF laboratory, USA.
The project has just completed its first run, releasing world-leading results that challenge hints of low-mass WIMPs claimed at other experiments. The project, its results, and prospects for the future, both with LUX and a larger successor experiment, LZ, will be presented.