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Title: Surface background suppression in liquid argon dark matter detectors using a newly discovered time component of tetraphenyl-butadiene scintillation

Journal Article · · Physical Review D
 [1];  [2];  [3];  [4]
  1. Princeton Univ., Princeton, NJ (United States); Stanford Univ., Stanford, CA (United States)
  2. Princeton Univ., Princeton, NJ (United States); Carleton Univ., Ottawa, ON (Canada)
  3. Princeton Univ., Princeton, NJ (United States); Lawrence Livermore National Lab. (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)
  4. Princeton Univ., Princeton, NJ (United States)
+ Show Author Affiliations

Here, decays of radioisotopes on inner detector surfaces can pose a major background concern for the direct detection of dark matter. While these backgrounds are conventionally mitigated with position cuts, these cuts reduce the exposure of the detector by decreasing the sensitive mass, and uncertainty in position determination may make it impossible to adequately remove such events in certain detectors. In this paper, we provide a new technique for substantially reducing these surface backgrounds in liquid argon (LAr) detectors, independent of position cuts. These detectors typically use a coating of tetraphenyl-butadiene (TPB) on the inner surfaces as a wavelength shifter to convert vacuum ultraviolet (VUV) LAr scintillation light to the visible spectrum. We find that TPB scintillation contains a component with a previously unreported exceptionally long lifetime (~ms). We discovered that this component differs significantly in magnitude between alpha, beta, and VUV excitation, which enables the use of pulse shape discrimination to suppress surface backgrounds by more than a factor of 103 with negligible loss of dark matter sensitivity. We also discuss how this technique can be extended beyond just LAr experiments.

Research Organization:
Lawrence Livermore National Lab. (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA)
Grant/Contract Number:
AC52-07NA27344
OSTI ID:
1474352
Alternate ID(s):
OSTI ID: 1469414
Report Number(s):
LLNL-JRNL-750996; PRVDAQ; 936717
Journal Information:
Physical Review D, Vol. 98, Issue 6; ISSN 2470-0010
Publisher:
American Physical Society (APS)Copyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 7 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

References (19)

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73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS