First results of axion dark matter search with DANCE

Axions are one of the well-motivated candidates for dark matter, originally proposed to solve the strong CP problem in particle physics. Dark matter Axion search with riNg Cavity Experiment (DANCE) is a new experimental project to broadly search for axion dark matter in the mass range of ${10}^{-17}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V}<m_a<{10}^{-11}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V}$. We aim to detect the rotational oscillation of linearly polarized light caused by the axion-photon coupling with a bow-tie cavity. The first results of the prototype experiment, DANCE Act-1, are reported from a 24-hour observation. We found no evidence for axions and set 95% confidence level upper limit on the axion-photon coupling $g_{a\gamma }\lesssim 8\times {10}^{-4}\mathrm{G}\mathrm{e}{\mathrm{V}}^{-1}$ in ${10}^{-14}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V}<m_a<{10}^{-13}\mathrm{e}\mathrm{V}$. Although the bound did not exceed the current best limits, this optical cavity experiment is the first demonstration of polarization-based axion dark matter search without any external magnetic field.