%0 Journal Article
%T Near-intrinsic energy resolution for 30-662 keV gamma rays in a high pressure xenon electroluminescent TPC
%A NEXT Collaboration (Alvarez, V. et al
%A Carcel, S.
%A Cervera-Villanueva, A.
%A Diaz, J.
%A Ferrario, P.
%A Gil, A.
%A Gomez-Cadenas, J. J.
%A Liubarsky, I.
%A Lorca, D.
%A Martin-Albo, J.
%A Martinez, A.
%A Monrabal, F.
%A Muñoz Vidal, J.
%A Nebot-Guinot, M.
%A Rodriguez, J.
%A Serra, L.
%A Simon, A.
%A Sorel, M.
%A Yahlali, N.
%J Nuclear Instruments & Methods in Physics Research A
%D 2013
%V 708
%I Elsevier Science Bv
%@ 0168-9002
%G English
%F NEXTCollaborationAlvarez_etal2013
%O WOS:000316192300015
%O exported from refbase (https://references.ific.uv.es/refbase/show.php?record=1369), last updated on Mon, 15 Jun 2020 09:34:06 +0000
%X 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-rays. These results demonstrate that 0.5% FWHM resolutions for the 2459 keV hypothetical neutrino-less double beta decay peak are realizable. This energy resolution is a factor 7-20 better than that of the current leading 0 nu beta beta experiments using liquid xenon and thus represents a significant advancement. We present also first results from a track imaging system consisting of 64 silicon photo-multipliers recently installed in NEXT-DBDM that, along with the excellent energy resolution, demonstrates the key functionalities required for the NEXT-100 0 nu beta beta search.
%K Xenon
%K Energy resolution
%K High-pressure
%K TPC
%K Electroluminescence
%K Neutrinoless double beta decay
%R 10.1016/j.nima.2012.12.123
%U http://arxiv.org/abs/1211.4474
%U https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nima.2012.12.123
%P 101-114