The Global Network of Optical Magnetometers for Exotic physics searches (GNOME)

There is a growing body of evidence suggesting that there exist undiscovered "exotic" particles and fields that could interact with standard model particles in a variety of ways. We present an overview of the Global Network of Optical Magnetometers for Exotic Physics Searches (GNOME), an ongoing experimental program aimed at testing different exotic physics scenarios. The GNOME experiment uses a network of shielded atomic magnetometers and comagnetometers located around the world to search for correlated signals caused by torques on atomic spins from exotic fields of astrophysical origin. The experiment is currently investigating various types of signals, including those from topological defect dark matter (such as axion domain walls), axion stars, solitons of complex-valued scalar fields (Q-balls), stochastic fluctuations of bosonic dark matter fields, a gravitationally bound solar axion halo, and bursts of ultralight bosonic fields produced by cataclysmic astrophysical events like binary black hole mergers.