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NEXT Collaboration(Alvarez, V. et al), Carcel, S., Cervera-Villanueva, A., Diaz, J., Ferrario, P., Gil, A., et al. (2013). Operation and first results of the NEXT-DEMO prototype using a silicon photomultiplier tracking array. J. Instrum., 8, P09011–20pp.
Abstract: NEXT-DEMO is a high-pressure xenon gas TPC which acts as a technological test-bed and demonstrator for the NEXT-100 neutrinoless double beta decay experiment. In its current configuration the apparatus fully implements the NEXT-100 design concept. This is an asymmetric TPC, with an energy plane made of photomultipliers and a tracking plane made of silicon photomultipliers (SiPM) coated with TPB. The detector in this new configuration has been used to reconstruct the characteristic signature of electrons in dense gas, demonstrating the ability to identify the MIP and “blob” regions. Moreover, the SiPM tracking plane allows for the definition of a large fiducial region in which an excellent energy resolution of 1.82% FWHM at 511 keV has been measured (a value which extrapolates to 0.83% at the xenon Q(beta beta)).
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NOMAD Collaboration(Samoylov, O. et al), Cervera-Villanueva, A., Gomez-Cadenas, J. J., & Hernando, J. (2013). A precision measurement of charm dimuon production in neutrino interactions from the NOMAD experiment. Nucl. Phys. B, 876(2), 339–375.
Abstract: We present our new measurement of the cross-section for charm dimuon production in neutrino iron interactions based upon the full statistics collected by the NOMAD experiment. After background subtraction we observe 15 344 charm dimuon events, providing the largest sample currently available. The analysis exploits the large inclusive charged current sample – about 9 x 10(6) events after all analysis cuts – and the high resolution NOMAD detector to constrain the total systematic uncertainty on the ratio of charm dimuon to inclusive Charged Current (CC) cross-sections to similar to 2%. We also perform a fit to the NOMAD data to extract the charm production parameters and the strange quark sea content of the nucleon within the NLO QCD approximation. We obtain a value of m(c)(m(c)) = 1.159 +/- 0.075 GeV/c(2) for the running mass of the charm quark in the (MS) over bar scheme and a strange quark sea suppression factor of kappa(s) = 0.591 +/- 0.019 at Q(2) = 20 GeV2/c(2).
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Bross, A., Wands, R., Bayes, R., Laing, A., Soler, F. J. P., Cervera-Villanueva, A., et al. (2013). Toroidal magnetized iron neutrino detector for a neutrino factory. Phys. Rev. Spec. Top.-Accel. Beams, 16(8), 081002–16pp.
Abstract: A neutrino factory has unparalleled physics reach for the discovery and measurement of CP violation in the neutrino sector. A far detector for a neutrino factory must have good charge identification with excellent background rejection and a large mass. An elegant solution is to construct a magnetized iron neutrino detector (MIND) along the lines of MINOS, where iron plates provide a toroidal magnetic field and scintillator planes provide 3D space points. In this paper, the current status of a simulation of a toroidal MIND for a neutrino factory is discussed in light of the recent measurements of large theta(13). The response and performance using the 10 GeV neutrino factory configuration are presented. It is shown that this setup has equivalent delta(CP) reach to a MIND with a dipole field and is sensitive to the discovery of CP violation over 85% of the values of delta(CP).
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T2K Collaboration(Abe, K. et al), Cervera-Villanueva, A., Escudero, L., Gomez-Cadenas, J. J., Izmaylov, A., Monfregola, L., et al. (2013). Evidence of electron neutrino appearance in a muon neutrino beam. Phys. Rev. D, 88(3), 032002–41pp.
Abstract: The T2K Collaboration reports evidence for electron neutrino appearance at the atmospheric mass splitting, vertical bar Delta m(32)(2)vertical bar approximate to 2.4 X 10(-3) eV(2). An excess of electron neutrino interactions over background is observed from a muon neutrino beam with a peak energy of 0.6 GeV at the Super-Kamiokande (SK) detector 295 km from the beam's origin. Signal and background predictions are constrained by data from near detectors located 280 m from the neutrino production target. We observe 11 electron neutrino candidate events at the SK detector when a background of 3.3 +/- 0.4(syst) events is expected. The background-only hypothesis is rejected with a p value of 0.0009 (3.1 sigma), and a fit assuming nu(mu) -> nu(e) oscillations with sin (2)2 theta(23) = 1, delta(CP) = 0 and vertical bar Delta m(32)(2)vertical bar = 2.4 X 10(-3) eV(2) yields sin (2)2 theta(13) = 0.088(-0.039)(+0.049)(stat + syst).
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NEXT Collaboration(Alvarez, V. et al), Carcel, S., Cervera-Villanueva, A., Diaz, J., Ferrario, P., Gil, A., et al. (2013). Radiopurity control in the NEXT-100 double beta decay experiment: procedures and initial measurements. J. Instrum., 8, T01002–19pp.
Abstract: The “Neutrino Experiment with a Xenon Time-Projection Chamber” (NEXT) is intended to investigate the neutrinoless double beta decay of Xe-136, which requires a severe suppression of potential backgrounds. An extensive screening and material selection process is underway for NEXT since the control of the radiopurity levels of the materials to be used in the experimental set-up is a must for rare event searches. First measurements based on Glow Discharge Mass Spectrometry and gamma-ray spectroscopy using ultra-low background germanium detectors at the Laboratorio Subterraneo de Canfranc (Spain) are described here. Activity results for natural radioactive chains and other common radionuclides are summarized, being the values obtained for some materials like copper and stainless steel very competitive. The implications of these results for the NEXT experiment are also discussed.
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