WIMP-nucleus scattering in chiral effective theory

The direct search for Dark Matter particles through their scattering off nuclei is being vigorously explored experimentally. We provide a systematic study of long distance QCD/nuclear physics effects for such scatterings from first principles. Assuming scalar operator as an effective WIMP-quark interaction, we compute full next-to-leading order cross section for WIMP-nucleus scattering in chiral effective theory. As we will see, these corrections although generically within 10% as expected from chiral power counting, might play a very important role for Dark Matter direct detection phenomenology.