Status of the MAJORANA DEMONSTRATOR: A search for neutrinoless double-beta decay

Journal Article · Tue Apr 28 00:00:00 EDT 2015 · International Journal of Modern Physics A

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1142/S0217751X1530032X· OSTI ID:1481711

Efremenko, Yu. ^[1]; Abgrall, N. ^[2]; Arnquist, I. J. ^[3]; Avignone, F. T. ^[4]; Baldenegro-Barrera, C. X. ^[5]; Barabash, A. S. ^[6]; Bertrand, F. E. ^[5]; Bradley, A. W. ^[2]; Brudanin, V. ^[7]; Busch, M. ^[8]; Buuck, M. ^[9]; Byram, D. ^[10]; Caldwell, A. S. ^[11]; Chan, Y. -D. ^[2]; Christofferson, C. D. ^[11]; Cuesta, C. ^[9]; Detwiler, J. A. ^[9]; Ejiri, H. ^[12]; Elliott, S. R. ^[13]; Galindo-Uribarri, A. ^[5] ; Gilliss, T. ^[14]; Giovanetti, G. K. ^[14]; Goett, J. ^[13]; Green, M. P. ^[5]; Gruszko, J. ^[9]; Guinn, I. ^[9]; Guiseppe, V. E. ^[15]; Henning, R. ^[14]; Hoppe, E. W. ^[3]; Howard, S. ^[11]; Howe, M. A. ^[14]; Jasinski, B. R. ^[10]; Keeter, K. J. ^[16]; Kidd, M. F. ^[17]; Konovalov, S. I. ^[6]; Kouzes, R. T. ^[3]; LaFerriere, B. D. ^[3]; Leon, J. ^[9]; MacMullin, J. ^[14]; Martin, R. D. ^[10]; Meijer, S. J. ^[14]; Mertens, S. ^[2]; Orrell, J. L. ^[3]; O'Shaughnessy, C. ^[14]; Poon, A. W. P. ^[2]; Radford, D. C. ^[5]; Rager, J. ^[14]; Rielage, K. ^[13]; Robertson, R. G. H. ^[9]; Romero-Romero, E. ^[18]; Shanks, B. ^[14]; Shirchenko, M. ^[7]; Snyder, N. ^[10]; Suriano, A. M. ^[11]; Tedeschi, D. ^[15]; Trimble, J. E. ^[14]; Varner, R. L. ^[5]; Vasilyev, S. ^[7]; Vetter, K. ^[2]; Vorren, K. ^[14]; White, B. R. ^[5]; Wilkerson, J. F. ^[19]; Wiseman, C. ^[15]; Xu, W. ^[13]; Yakushev, E. ^[7]; Yu, C. -H. ^[5]; Yumatov, V. ^[6]; Zhitnikov, I. ^[7]

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1. Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN, USA
2. Nuclear Science Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA, USA
3. Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Richland, WA, USA
4. Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC, USA; Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge, TN, USA
5. Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge, TN, USA
6. Institute for Theoretical and Experimental Physics, Moscow, Russia
7. Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, Dubna, Russia
8. Department of Physics, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA; Triangle Universities Nuclear Laboratory, Durham, NC, USA
9. Center for Experimental Nuclear Physics and Astrophysics, and Department of Physics, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA
10. Department of Physics, University of South Dakota, Vermillion, SD, USA
11. South Dakota School of Mines and Technology, Rapid City, SD, USA
12. Research Center for Nuclear Physics and Department of Physics, Osaka University, Ibaraki, Osaka, Japan
13. Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, NM, USA
14. Triangle Universities Nuclear Laboratory, Durham, NC, USA; Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC, USA
15. Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC, USA
16. Department of Physics, Black Hills State University, Spearfish, SD, USA
17. Tennessee Tech University, Cookeville, TN, USA
18. Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN, USA; Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge, TN, USA
19. Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge, TN, USA; Triangle Universities Nuclear Laboratory, Durham, NC, USA; Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC, USA

If neutrinos are Majorana particles, i.e. fermions that are their own antiparticles, then neutrinoless double-beta (0νββ) decay is possible. In such a process, two neutrons can simultaneously decay into two protons and two electrons without emitting neutrinos. Neutrinos being Majorana particles would explicitly violate lepton number conservation, and might play a role in the matter–antimatter asymmetry in the universe. The MAJORANA DEMONSTRATOR experiment is under construction at the Sanford Underground Research Facility in Lead, SD and will search for the neutrinoless double-beta (0νββ) decay of the ⁷⁶Ge isotope. The goal of the experiment is to demonstrate that it is possible to achieve a sufficiently low background rate in the 4 keV region of interest (ROI) around the 2039 keV Q-value to justify building a tonne-scale experiment. In this study, we discuss the physics and design of the MAJORANA DEMONSTRATOR, its approach to achieving ultra-low background and the status of the experiment.

• Research Organization: Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States). Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility (OLCF)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Science (SC)
• Contributing Organization: The MAJORANA Collaboration
• Grant/Contract Number: AC05-00OR22725
• OSTI ID: 1481711
• Journal Information: International Journal of Modern Physics A, Vol. 30, Issue 12; ISSN 0217-751X
• Publisher: World Scientific
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS
Neutrinoless double beta decay
germanium detector
Majorana