Bulletin of the American Physical Society
4th Joint Meeting of the APS Division of Nuclear Physics and the Physical Society of Japan
Volume 59, Number 10
Tuesday–Saturday, October 7–11, 2014; Waikoloa, Hawaii
Session 2WM: Neutrinoless Double Beta Decay Experiments and Underground Physics Challenges II |
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Chair: Kunio Inoue, Tohoku University Room: Kona 5 |
Tuesday, October 7, 2014 2:00PM - 2:30PM |
2WM.00001: TBD Invited Speaker: Masaharu Nomachi |
Tuesday, October 7, 2014 2:30PM - 3:00PM |
2WM.00002: Status of the NEXT experiment and future perspectives for HPXe-based DBD searches Invited Speaker: Juan Cadenas Neutrinos may be Majorana particles. If so, neutrinoless double beta decay processes could be observed by the next-generation bb0nu experiments. This talk will present one of the most promising ideas in the field, the use of a High Pressure Gas Xenon TPC (HPGXe) with electroluminescence gain and optical readout. A 100 kg incarnation of such a device, the NEXT-100 experiment, will start operations at the Canfranc Underground Lab in Spain in 2015. The technology can be extrapolated to 1 ton, and thus lead the exploration of the inverse hierarchy in Majorana landscape. [Preview Abstract] |
Tuesday, October 7, 2014 3:00PM - 3:30PM |
2WM.00003: CANDLES project for the study of neutrino-less double beta decay of 48Ca Invited Speaker: Sei Yoshida There is, presently, strong evidence that neutrinos undergo flavor oscillations,and hence must have finite masses. Neutrino-less double beta (0$\nu\beta\beta$) decay measurement offers a realistic opportunity to establish the Majorana nature of neutrinos and gives the absolute scale of the effective neutrino mass. CANDLES is the project to search for 0$\nu\beta\beta$ decay of $^{48}$Ca. A distinctive characteristic of $^{48}$Ca is the highest Q value (4.3 MeV) among 0$\nu\beta\beta$ isotopes. Therefore it enables us to measure 0$\nu\beta\beta$ decay signals in background free contribution. The CANDLES system consists of undoped CaF$_{2}$ scintillators (CaF$_{2}$),liquid scintillator (LS), and large photomultiplier tubes (PMTs). A large number of CaF$_{2}$ crystals in the form of 10 cm cubes are immersed in the LS. Scintillating CaF$_{2}$ crystals work as an active source detector for 0$\nu\beta\beta$ decay of $^{48}$Ca, together with LS as a multi-purpose detector component to both reject backgrounds and to propagate scintillation photons. PMTs are placed around the LS vessel to detect photons from both scintillators. The simple design concept of CANDLES enables us to increase the $^{48}$Ca source amount. $^{48}$Ca enrichment is also effective for the high sensitive measurement, because natural abundance of $^{48}$Ca is very low (0.19\%). We have studied $^{48}$Ca enrichment and succeeded in obtaining enriched $^{48}$Ca although it is a small amount. Now we have developed the CANDLES III system, which contained with 300kg CaF$_2$ crystals without enrichment, at the Kamioka underground laboratory. New light collection system was installed in 2012, and accordingly photo-coverage has been enlarged by about 80\%. Further improvement will be expected in 2014 by installing a detector cooling system in order to increase light emission from CaF$_2$ crystals. The detail of the latest CANDLES III (U.G.) system and its performance will be presented. Recently, we found that gamma rays from neutron captures on materials surrounding detector could be dominant background. These background estimation and prospects of backgrounds shielding will be also discussed. [Preview Abstract] |
Tuesday, October 7, 2014 3:30PM - 4:00PM |
2WM.00004: COFFEE BREAK
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Tuesday, October 7, 2014 4:00PM - 4:30PM |
2WM.00005: LUCIFER: scintillating bolometers for neutrinoless double-beta decay searches Invited Speaker: Luca Pattavina In the field of fundamental particle physics, the nature of the neutrino, if it is a Dirac or a Majorana particle, plays a crucial role not only in neutrino physics, but also in the overall framework of fundamental particle interactions and in cosmology. Neutrinoless double-beta decay (0vDBD) is the key tool for the investigation of this nature. Experimental techniques based on the calorimetric approach with cryogenic particle detectors have demonstrated suitability for the investigation of rare nuclear processes, profiting from excellent energy resolution and scalability to large masses. Unfortunately, the most relevant issue is related to background suppression. In fact, bolometers being fully-active detectors struggle to reach extremely low background level. The LUCIFER project aims to deploy the first array of enriched scintillating bolometers. Thanks to the double read-out - heat and scintillation light produced by scintillating bolometers - a highly efficient background identification and rejection is guaranteed, leading to a background-free experiment. We show the potential of such technology in ZnMoO4 and ZnSe prototypes. We describe the current status of the project, including results of the recent R{\&}D activity. [Preview Abstract] |
Tuesday, October 7, 2014 4:30PM - 5:00PM |
2WM.00006: TBD Invited Speaker: Phil Jones |
Tuesday, October 7, 2014 5:00PM - 5:30PM |
2WM.00007: The Physics of Underground Accelerators Invited Speaker: Michael Wiescher Underground physics plays an increasingly important role in the measurement of cross section for low energy nuclear reactions. The talk will give an overview of the physics issues that can be addressed with low energy accelerators located in a underground environment. [Preview Abstract] |
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