Département de Physique des Particules

The XENON experiment aims at the direct detection of weakly interacting massive particles (WIMPs) via their elastic scattering on xenon nuclei, using a very sensitive, low background, two-phase time projection chamber. With 1-ton of ultra pure liquid xenon as target, an energy threshold below 10 keV and a rejection power better than 99.5%, the XENON sensitivity reach is close to 10?46 cm2 for spin-independent WIMP-nucleon cross section. To verify the XENON approach to dark matter detection, a first prototype (XENON10) was developed and operated for a period of several months at the Gran Sasso Underground Laboratory in Italy. XENON10 data have resulted in a 90% C.L. upper limit of 8.8 x 10?44 cm2 for a 100 GeV WIMP. Plans to improve this sensitivity by an order of magnitude are underway, with the commissioning of a new detector with 150 kg total mass within the recently approved XENON100 phase. The status of the new experiment will be presented.