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Most WIMP detectors look for flashes of light that can arise when a dark matter particle collides with normal matter. Researchers assume that some of these particles are relatively heavy—somewhere between 2 and 10,000 times the mass of a proton. This mass would best explain why dark matter has such a large effect on galaxies. However, it is also possible that WIMPs are much lighter—even beyond what is less well-found within conventional theories.

Physicist Federica Petricca of the Max Planck Institute for Physics in Germany and her colleagues searched for these lighter WIMPs. They did this using a detector made of sugar crystals operated at extremely low temperatures.