Superfluid ⁴He is an ideal candidate for the direct detection of light dark matter via nuclear recoils thanks to its low nuclear mass and the possibility to reach a low detection energy threshold by exploiting the generated quasiparticles. The design of future detectors based on this target, such as the DELight experiment, requires a proper understanding of the formation and partitioning of the signal for different energy depositions from various sources. This work presents an overview of the physical processes involved in the energy deposition of recoiling electrons and ions, and describes a Monte Carlo approach to the partitioning of the signal into different channels. Despite an overall good agreement with existing literature, differences in the region of interest for light dark matter searches below 200eV are observed.

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We present two variants of a magnetic microcalorimeter with paramagnetic temperature sensors and integrated dc-SQUID readout for high-resolution X-ray emission spectroscopy. Each variant employs two overhanging gold absorbers with a sensitive area of 150μm x 150μm and a thickness of 3μm, thus providing a quantum efficiency of 98% for photons up to 5keV and 50% for photons up to 10keV. The first variant turned out to be fully operational, but, at the same time, to suffer from Joule power dissipation of the Josephson junction shunt resistors, athermal phonon loss, and slew rate limitations of the overall setup. Overall, it only achieved an energy resolution ΔE_FWHM=8.9eV. In the second variant, we introduced an innovative `tetrapod absorber geometry' as well as a membrane-technique for protecting the temperature sensors against the power dissipation of the shunt resistors. By this, the second variant achieves an outstanding energy resolution of ΔE_FWHM=1.25(18)eV and hence provides, to our knowledge, the present best energy resolving power E/ΔE_FWHM among all existing energy-dispersive detectors for soft and tender X-rays.

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Ultra-sensitive cryogenic calorimeters have become a favored technology with widespread application where eV-scale energy resolutions are needed. In this article, we characterize the performance of an X-ray magnetic microcalorimeter (MMC) using a Fe-55 source. Employing an optimum filter-based amplitude estimation and energy reconstruction, we demonstrate that an unprecedented FWHM resolution of ΔE_FWHM=(1.25±0.17(stat)+0.05−0.07(syst))eV can be achieved. We also derive the best possible resolution and discuss limiting factors affecting the measurement. The analysis pipeline for the MMC data developed in this paper is furthermore an important step for the realization of the proposed superfluid helium-based experiment DELight, which will search for direct interaction of dark matter with masses below 100 MeV/c².

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To reach ultra-low detection thresholds necessary to probe unprecedentedly low Dark Matter masses, target material alternatives and novel detector designs are essential. One such target material is superfluid ⁴He which has the potential to probe so far uncharted light Dark Matter parameter space at sub-GeV masses. The new "Direct search Experiment for Light dark matter", DELight, will be using superfluid helium as active target, instrumented with magnetic micro-calorimeters. It is being designed to reach sensitivity to masses well below 100 MeV in Dark Matter-nucleus scattering interactions.

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