학술논문

Operation and performance of a dual-phase crystalline/vapor xenon time projection chamber
Document Type
article
Source
Journal of Instrumentation. 17(04)
Subject
Nuclear and Plasma Physics
Particle and High Energy Physics
Synchrotrons and Accelerators
Physical Sciences
Dark Matter detectors
Scintillators
scintillation and light emission processes
Time projection chambers
Engineering
Nuclear & Particles Physics
Physical sciences
Language
Abstract
We have built and operated a crystalline/vapor xenon TPC, with the goal of improving searches for dark matter. The motivation for this instrument is the fact that beta decays from the radon decay chain to the ground state presently limit the state-of-the-art liquid/vapor xenon experiments. In contrast, a crystalline xenon target has the potential to exclude, or tag and reject radon-chain backgrounds. As a preamble to demonstrating such capabilities, the present article makes a first demonstration of the operation of a crystalline/vapor xenon TPC with electroluminescence (gas gain) for the electron signal readout. It also shows that the scintillation yield in crystalline xenon appears to be identical to that in liquid xenon, in contrast to previous results.