0000000000642986
AUTHOR
Ander Simón Estévez
Characterisation of NEXT-DEMO using xenon K-alpha X-rays
The NEXT experiment aims to observe the neutrinoless double beta decay of 136Xe in a high-pressure xenon gas TPC using electroluminescence (EL) to amplify the signal from ion- ization. Understanding the response of the detector is imperative in achieving a consistent and well understood energy measurement. The abundance of xenon K-shell X-ray emission during data tak- ing has been identified as a multitool for the characterisation of the fundamental parameters of the gas as well as the equalisation of the response of the detector. The NEXT-DEMO prototype is a ∼ 1.5 kg volume TPC filled with natural xenon. It employs an array of 19 PMTs as an energy plane and of 256 SiPMs as a tracking plane…
Event reconstruction in NEXT using a ML-EM algorithm
La desintegración doble beta sin neutrinos es un proceso hipotético en el que dos neutrones de un núcleo se transforman en dos protones emitiendo únicamente dos electrones, sin neutrinos. La detección de un proceso así demostraría que los neutrinos son partículas de Majorana y que el número leptónico total no se conserva (las oscilaciones de neutrinos ya han demostrado que el número leptónico por familia no se conserva). La determinación de la naturaleza del neutrino podría responder a varias preguntas de diversa índole dentro de la física de partículas. Primero, podría dar explicación a la escala de masas del neutrino a través de un mecanismo de balancín (see-saw). Por…
Near-intrinsic energy resolution for 30-662 keV gamma rays in a high pressure xenon electroluminescent TPC
We present the design, data and results from the NEXT prototype for Double Beta and Dark Matter (NEXT-DBDM) detector, a high-pressure gaseous natural xenon electroluminescent time projection chamber (TPC) that was built at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. It is a prototype of the planned NEXT-100 Xe-136 neutrino-less double beta decay (0 nu beta beta) experiment with the main objectives of demonstrating near-intrinsic energy resolution at energies up to 662 keV and of optimizing the NEXT-100 detector design and operating parameters. Energy resolutions of similar to 1% FWHM for 662 keV gamma rays were obtained at 10 and 15 atm and similar to 5% FWHM for 30 keV fluorescence xenon X-…