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Song, N. Q., Garcia, R. B., Gomez-Cadenas, J. J., Gonzalez-Garcia, M. C., Conde, A. P., & Taron, J. (2016). Conditions for statistical determination of the neutrino mass spectrum in radiative emission of neutrino pairs in atoms. Phys. Rev. D, 93(1), 013020–10pp.
Abstract: The photon spectrum in macrocoherent atomic deexcitation via radiative emission of neutrino pairs has been proposed as a sensitive probe of the neutrino mass spectrum, capable of competing with conventional neutrino experiments. In this paper we revisit this interesting proposal in order to quantify the requirements for statistical determination of some of the properties of the neutrino spectrum, in particular, the neutrino mass scale and the mass ordering. Our results are shown as the product of the experimental lifetime, the target volume, and the number density of atoms which have to be set in a coherence state with a given electric field in the target, needed for determination of these properties with a given confidence level.
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HARP Collaboration(Apollonio, M. et al), Burguet-Castell, J., Cervera-Villanueva, A., Gomez-Cadenas, J. J., Martin-Albo, J., Novella, P., et al. (2010). Measurements of forward proton production with incident protons and charged pions on nuclear targets at the CERN Proton Synchroton. Phys. Rev. C, 82(4), 045208–33pp.
Abstract: Measurements of the double-differential proton production cross-section d(2 sigma)/dpd Omega in the range of momentum 0.5 GeV/c <= p < 8.0 GeV/c and angle 0.05 rad <= theta < 0.25 rad in collisions of charged pions and protons on beryllium, carbon, aluminium, copper, tin, tantalum, and lead are presented. The data were taken with the large acceptance HARP detector in the T9 beam line of the CERN Proton Synchrotron. Incident particles were identified by an elaborate system of beam detectors and impinged on a target of 5% of a nuclear interaction length. The tracking and identification of the produced particles was performed using the forward spectrometer of the HARP experiment. Results are obtained for the double-differential cross-sections mainly at four incident beam momenta (3, 5, 8, and 12 GeV/c). Measurements are compared with predictions of the GEANT4 and MARS Monte Carlo generators.
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Freitas, E. D. C., Monteiro, C. M. B., Ball, M., Gomez-Cadenas, J. J., Lopes, J. A. M., Lux, T., et al. (2010). Secondary scintillation yield in high-pressure xenon gas for neutrinoless double beta decay (0 nu beta beta) search. Phys. Lett. B, 684(4-5), 205–210.
Abstract: The search for neutrinoless double beta decay (0 nu beta beta) is an important topic in contemporary physics with many active experiments. New projects are planning to use high-pressure xenon gas as both source and detection medium. The secondary scintillation processes available in noble gases permit large amplification with negligible statistical fluctuations, offering the prospect of energy resolution approaching the Fano factor limit. This Letter reports results for xenon secondary scintillation yield, at room temperature, as a function of electric field in the gas scintillation gap for pressures ranging from 2 to 10 bar. A Large Area Avalanche Photodiode (LAAPD) collected the VUV secondary scintillation produced in the gas. X-rays directly absorbed in the LAAPD are used as a reference for determining the number of charge carriers produced by the scintillation pulse and, hence, the number of photons impinging the LAAPD. The number of photons produced per drifting electron and per kilovolt, the so-called scintillation amplification parameter, displays a small increase with pressure, ranging from 141 +/- 6 at 2 bar to 170 +/- 10 at 8 bar. In our setup, this Parameter does not increase above 8 bar due to nonnegligible electron attachment. The results are in good agreement with those presented in the literature in the 1 to 3 bar range. The increase of the scintillation amplification parameter with pressure for high gas densities has been also observed in former work at cryogenic temperatures.
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NOMAD Collaboration(Kullenberg, C. T. et al), Cervera-Villanueva, A., & Gomez-Cadenas, J. J. (2012). A search for single photon events in neutrino interactions. Phys. Lett. B, 706(4-5), 268–275.
Abstract: We present a search for neutrino induced events containing a single, exclusive photon using data from the NOMAD experiment at the CERN SPS where the average energy of the neutrino flux is similar or equal to 25 GeV. The search is motivated by an excess of electron-like events in the 200-475 MeV energy region as reported by the MiniBooNE experiment. In NOMAD, photons are identified via their conversion to e(+)e(-) in an active target embedded in a magnetic field. The background to the single photon signal is dominated by the asymmetric decay of neutral pions produced either in a coherent neutrino-nucleus interaction, or in a neutrino-nucleon neutral current deep inelastic scattering, or in an interaction occurring outside the fiducial volume. All three backgrounds are determined in situ using control data samples prior to opening the 'signal-box'. In the signal region, we observe 155 events with a predicted background of 129.2 +/- 8.5 +/- 3.3. We interpret this as null evidence for excess of single photon events, and set a limit. Assuming that the hypothetical single photon has a momentum distribution similar to that of a photon from the coherent pi(0) decay, the measurement yields an upper limit on single photon events, < 4.0 x 10(-4) per nu(mu) charged current event. Narrowing the search to events where the photon is approximately collinear with the incident neutrino, we observe 78 events with a predicted background of 76.6 +/- 4.9 +/- 1.9 yielding a more stringent upper limit, < 1.6 x 10(-4) per nu(mu) charged current event.
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NEXT Collaboration(Henriques, C. A. O. et al), Gomez-Cadenas, J. J., Alvarez, V., Benlloch-Rodriguez, J., Botas, A., Carcel, S., et al. (2017). Secondary scintillation yield of xenon with sub-percent levels of CO2 additive for rare-event detection. Phys. Lett. B, 773, 663–671.
Abstract: Xe-CO2 mixtures are important alternatives to pure xenon in Time Projection Chambers (TPC) based on secondary scintillation (electroluminescence) signal amplification with applications in the important field of rare event detection such as directional dark matter, double electron capture and double beta decay detection. The addition of CO2 to pure xenon at the level of 0.05-0.1% can reduce significantly the scale of electron diffusion from 10 mm/root m to 2.5 mm/root m, with high impact on the discrimination of the events through pattern recognition of the topology of primary ionization trails. We have measured the electroluminescence (EL) yield of Xe-CO2 mixtures, with sub-percent CO2 concentrations. We demonstrate that the EL production is still high in these mixtures, 70% and 35% relative to that produced in pure xenon, for CO2 concentrations around 0.05% and 0.1%, respectively. The contribution of the statistical fluctuations in EL production to the energy resolution increases with increasing CO2 concentration, being smaller than the contribution of the Fano factor for concentrations below 0.1% CO2.
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