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Search for dark photons between $16.96 - 19.52 μ eV$ with the HAYSTAC experiment

Xiran Bai ^1,2, A. Droster³, J. Echevers³, Maryam H. Esmat⁴, Sumita Ghosh^5,2,*, Eleanor Graham^1,2, H. Jackson³, S. Jois³, M. J. Jewell^1,2 et al. (HAYSTAC Collaboration)

M. J. Jewell^1,2, Claire Laffan^1,2, A. F. Leder^3,†, K. W. Lehnert^1,2, S. M. Lewis^3,‡, R. H. Maruyama^1,2, N. M. Rapidis^3,§, E. P. Ruddy^6,7, M. Silva-Feaver^1,2, M. Simanovskaia^3,§, Sukhman Singh^1,2, D. H. Speller⁴, K. van Bibber³, Y. Wang⁴, Sabrina Zacarias^1,2,∥, and Yuqi Zhu^1,2,§ (HAYSTAC Collaboration)

¹Department of Physics, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut 06520, USA
²Wright Laboratory, Department of Physics, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut 06520, USA
³Department of Nuclear Engineering, University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, California 94720, USA
⁴Department of Physics and Astronomy, The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland 21218, USA
⁵Department of Applied Physics, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut 06520, USA
⁶Department of Physics, University of Colorado, Boulder, Colorado 80309, USA
⁷JILA, National Institute of Standards and Technology, and The University of Colorado, Boulder, Colorado 80309, USA

^*Present address: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Livermore, California 94550, USA.
^†Present address: Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, New Mexico 87545, USA.
^‡Present address: Wellesley College, Wellesley, Massachusetts 02481, USA.
^§Present address: Stanford University, Stanford, California 94305, USA.
^∥Present address: University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, California 93106, USA.

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Phys. Rev. D 113, 012010 – Published 20 January, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/3txs-dz63

Abstract

We report dark photon results from HAYSTAC phase II using data from previously reported axion searches. Additionally, we present an analysis of an unpublished dataset covering a region between $19.46 - 19.52 μeV$ . This region overlaps with a recently reported dark photon signal at $19.5 μeV$ with a kinetic coupling strength of $| χ_{rand} | ≃ 6.5 \times 10^{- 15}$ resulting from a reanalysis of previously published data from the TASEH collaboration. Given HAYSTAC’s sensitivity, if such a signal were present, it would have appeared as a large $17.1 σ$ excess above the noise. However, no such signal was observed. We thus exclude couplings $| χ_{rand} | \geq 4.90 \times 10^{- 15}$ at the 90% confidence level over the newly reported region. In addition, using our previously reported axion data, we exclude couplings $| χ_{rand} | \geq 2.90 \times 10^{- 15}$ between $16.96 - 19.46 μeV$ at the 90% confidence level.

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References (31)

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Phys. Rev. D 113, 012010– Published 20 January, 2026

Vol. 113, Iss. 1 — 1 January 2026

Received 20 October 2025
Accepted 18 December 2025

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/3txs-dz63

Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article’s title, journal citation, and DOI. Funded by SCOAP³.

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Search for dark photons between $16.96 - 19.52 μ eV$ with the HAYSTAC experiment

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Search for dark photons between 16.96–19.52 μeV with the HAYSTAC experiment

Abstract

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Article Text

References (31)

Search for dark photons between $16.96 - 19.52 μ eV$ with the HAYSTAC experiment