The landscape of dark matter (DM) direct detection has been profoundly altered by the slew of recent experiments. While some have claimed signals consistent with dark matter, others have seen few, if any, events consistent with dark matter. The results of the putative detections are often incompatible with each other in the context of naive spin-independent scattering, as well as with the null results. In particular, in light of the conflicts between the DM interpretation of the three events recently reported by the CDMS-Si experiment and the first results of the LUX experiment, there is a strong need to revisit the assumptions that go into the DM interpretations of both signals and limits. We attempt to reexamine a number of particle physics, astrophysics and experimental uncertainties. Specifically, we examine exothermic scattering, isospin-dependent couplings, modified halo models through astrophysics-independent techniques, and variations in the assumptions about the scintillation light in liquid xenon. We find that only a highly tuned isospin-dependent scenario remains as a viable explanation of the claimed detections, unless the scintillation properties of LXe are dramatically different from the assumptions used by the LUX experiment.

• Received 4 February 2014

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.89.103526