11C Background in Liquid Scintillator Detectors
- Physics Department, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305 (United States)
Cosmogenic 11C produced in muon showers is one of the main backgrounds for the detection of pep and CNO solar neutrinos in underground organic liquid scintillator detectors. Experimental data available for the effective cross section for 11C by muons indicate that 11C is in fact the dominant background for the observation of such neutrinos. 11C decays are expected to total a rate 2.5 (20) times higher than the combined rate of pep and CNO neutrinos in Borexino (KamLAND) in the energy window preferred for the pep measurement, between 0.8 and 1.3 MeV.Background from 11C in organic liquid scintillator detectors can be reduced if a neutron is emitted when the 11C nuclide is created. 11C decays can be tagged on a one-by-one basis using a three-fold coincidence with the parent muon track and the subsequent neutron capture on protons. The efficiency of such background reduction critically relies on the emission of a free neutron associated with 11C production.In order to verify the hypothesis, first suggested by Deutsch, that a neutron is in fact always emitted when 11C is produced, we perform a detailed ab initio calculation of the production of cosmogenic 11C, taking into consideration all relevant production channels. Results of the calculation are compared with the effective cross sections measured by target experiments in muon beams. 'Bilnd' channels without a neutron in the final state account for only about 5% of 11C production modes.An estimation of the effectiveness of the one-by-one tagging of 11C events, in light of such 'blind' channels is performed for KamLAND, Borexino, and a possible scintillator experiment at SNOLab. Both KamLAND and Borexino can significantly improve their pep and CNO solar neutrino signal and could perform a 3% measurement of the pep solar neutrino flux in five years. At SNOLab depths the muon flux is low enough that 11C background would be much smaller than the pep and CNO neutrino signal and hence negligible.
- OSTI ID:
- 20719239
- Journal Information:
- AIP Conference Proceedings, Journal Name: AIP Conference Proceedings Journal Issue: 1 Vol. 785; ISSN APCPCS; ISSN 0094-243X
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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