Low-diffusion Xe-He gas mixtures for rare-event detection: Electroluminescence Yield
Abstract
High pressure xenon Time Projection Chambers (TPC) based on secondary scintillation (electroluminescence) signal amplification are being proposed for rare event detection such as directional dark matter, double electron capture and double beta decay detection. The discrimination of the rare event through the topological signature of primary ionisation trails is a major asset for this type of TPC when compared to single liquid or double-phase TPCs, limited mainly by the high electron diffusion in pure xenon. Helium admixtures with xenon can be an attractive solution to reduce the electron diffusion significantly, improving the discrimination efficiency of these optical TPCs. We have measured the electroluminescence (EL) yield of Xe-He mixtures, in the range of 0 to 30% He and demonstrated the small impact on the EL yield of the addition of helium to pure xenon. For a typical reduced electric field of 2.5 kV/cm/bar in the scintillation region, the EL yield is lowered by ~ 2%, 3%, 6% and 10% for 10%, 15%, 20% and 30% of helium concentration, respectively. This decrease is less than what has been obtained from the most recent simulation framework in the literature. The impact of the addition of helium on EL statistical fluctuations is negligible, within the experimental uncertainties. The present results are an important benchmark for the simulation tools to be applied to future optical TPCs based on Xe-He mixtures.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.1906.03984,
title = {Low-diffusion Xe-He gas mixtures for rare-event detection: Electroluminescence Yield},
author = {A. F. M. Fernandes and C. A. O. Henriques and R. D. P. Mano and D. González-Díaz and C. D. R. Azevedo and P. A. O. C. Silva and J. J. Gómez-Cadenas and E. D. C. Freitas and L. M. P. Fernandes and C. M. B. Monteiro and C. Adams and V. Álvarez and L. Arazi and I. J. Arnquist and K. Bailey and F. Ballester and J. M. Benlloch-Rodríguez and F. I. G. M. Borges and N. Byrnes and S. Cárcel and J. V. Carríon and S. Cebrían and E. Church and C. A. N. Conde and T. Contreras and J. Díaz and G. Díaz and M. Diesburg and J. Escada and R. Esteve and R. Felkai and P. Ferrario and A. L. Ferreira and J. Generowicz and S. Ghosh and A. Goldschmidt and R. Guenette and R. M. Gutiérrez and J. Haefner and K. Hafidi and J. Hauptman and J. A. Hernando Morata and P. Herrero and V. Herrero and Y. Ifergan and S. Johnston and B. J. P. Jones and M. Kekic and L. Labarga and A. Laing and P. Lebrun and N. López-March and M. Losada and J. Martín-Albo and A. Martínez and G. Martínez-Lema and A. D. McDonald and F. Monrabal and F. J. Mora and J. Muñoz Vidal and P. Novella and D. R. Nygren and B. Palmeiro and A. Para and J. Pérez and F. Psihas and M. Querol and J. Renner and J. Repond and S. Riordan and L. Ripoll and Y. Rodríguez García and J. Rodríguez and L. Rogers and B. Romeo and C. Romo-Luque and F. P. Santos and J. M. F. dos Santos and A. Simón and C. Sofka and M. Sorel and T. Stiegler and J. F. Toledo and J. Torrent and A. Usón and J. F. C. A. Veloso and R. Webb and R. Weiss-Babai and J. T. White and K. Woodruff and N. Yahlali},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1906.03984},
year = {2019}
}