Speeding axion haloscope experiments using heterodyne-variance-based detection with a power meter

Abstract

We describe a new axion search method based on measuring the variance in the interference of the axion signal using injected photons with a power detector. The need for a linear amplifier is eliminated by putting a strong signal into the microwave cavity, to acquire not only the power excess but also measure the variance of the output power. The interference of the external photons with the axion to photon converted signal greatly enhances the variance at the particular axion frequency, providing evidence of its existence. This method has an advantage in that it can always obtain sensitivity near the quantum noise limit even for a power detector with high dark count rate. We describe the basic concept of this method both analytically and numerically, and we show experimental results using a simple demonstration circuit.