학술논문
High-pressure xenon gas time projection chamber with scalable design and its performance at around the Q value of $^{136}$Xe double-beta decay
Document Type
Working Paper
Author
Yoshida, Masashi; Nakamura, Kazuhiro; Akiyama, Shinichi; Ban, Sei; Hikida, Junya; Hirose, Masanori; Ichikawa, Atsuko K.; Iwashita, Yoshihisa; Kashino, Yukimasa; Kikawa, Tatsuya; Minamino, Akihiro; Miuchi, Kentaro; Nakajima, Yasuhiro; Nakamura, Kiseki D.; Nakaya, Tsuyoshi; Obara, Shuhei; Sakashita, Ken; Sekiya, Hiroyuki; Shinagawa, Hibiki; Sugashima, Bungo; Urano, Soki
Source
Progress of Theoretical and Experimental Physics, Volume 2024 Issue 1, 013H01
Subject
Language
Abstract
We have been developing a high-pressure xenon gas time projection chamber (TPC) to search for neutrinoless double beta ($0\nu\beta\beta$) decay of $^{136}$Xe. The unique feature of this TPC is in the detection part of ionization electrons, called ELCC. ELCC is composed of multiple units, and one unit covers 48.5 $\mathrm{cm}^2$. A 180 L size prototype detector with 12 units, 672 channels, of ELCC was constructed and operated with 7.6 bar natural xenon gas to evaluate the performance of the detector at around the Q value of $^{136}$Xe $0\nu\beta\beta$. The obtained FWHM energy resolution is (0.73 $\pm$ 0.11) % at 1836 keV. This corresponds to (0.60 $\pm$ 0.03) % to (0.70 $\pm$ 0.21) % of energy resolution at the Q value of $^{136}Xe$ $0\nu\beta\beta$. This result shows the scalability of the AXEL detector with ELCC while maintaining high energy resolution. Factors determining the energy resolution were quantitatively evaluated and the result indicates further improvement is feasible. Reconstructed track images show distinctive structures at the endpoint of electron tracks, which will be an important feature to distinguish $0\nu\beta\beta$ signals from gamma-ray backgrounds.
Comment: 33 pages, 24 figures, preprint accepted by PTEP
Comment: 33 pages, 24 figures, preprint accepted by PTEP