1208.5762 (The XENON Collaboration et al.)

Comment on "On the subtleties of searching for dark matter with liquid
xenon detectors"    [PDF]

The XENON Collaboration, E. Aprile, M. Alfonsi, K. Arisaka, F. Arneodo, C. Balan, L. Baudis, B. Bauermeister, A. Behrens, P. Beltrame, K. Bokeloh, E. Brown, G. Bruno, R. Budnik, J. M. R. Cardoso, W. -T. Chen, B. Choi, D. Cline, A. P. Colijn, H. Contreras, J. P. Cussonneau, M. P. Decowski, E. Duchovni, S. Fattori, A. D. Ferella, W. Fulgione, F. Gao, M. Garbini, C. Ghag, K. -L. Giboni, L. W. Goetzke, C. Grignon, E. Gross, W. Hampel, F. Kaether, A. Kish, J. Lamblin, H. Landsman, R. F. Lang, M. Le Calloch, C. Levy, K. E. Lim, Q. Lin, S. Lindemann, M. Lindner, J. A. M. Lopes, K. Lung, T. Marrodan Undagoitia, F. V. Massoli, A. J. Melgarejo Fernandez, Y. Meng, A. Molinario, E. Nativ, K. Ni, U. Oberlack, S. E. A. Orrigo, E. Pantic, R. Persiani, G. Plante, N. Priel, A. Rizzo, S. Rosendahl, J. M. F. dos Santos, G. Sartorelli, J. Schreiner, M. Schumann, L. Scotto Lavina, P. R. Scovell, M. Selvi, P. Shagin, H. Simgen, A. Teymourian, D. Thers, O. Vitells, H. Wang, M. Weber, C. Weinheimer

In a recent manuscript (arXiv:1208.5046) Peter Sorensen claims that XENON100's upper limits on spin-independent WIMP-nucleon cross sections for WIMP masses below 10 GeV "may be understated by one order of magnitude or more". Having performed a similar, though more detailed analysis prior to the submission of our new result (arXiv:1207.5988), we do not confirm these findings. We point out the rationale for not considering the described effect in our final analysis and list several potential problems with his study.

View original: http://arxiv.org/abs/1208.5762