A direct test of Auger cascade induced nucleation from heavy element contamination in C3F8 bubble chambers

Bressler, M.; Lamb, N.; Neilson, R.; Windle, S.

doi:10.1088/1748-0221/17/03/p03004

Title: A direct test of Auger cascade induced nucleation from heavy element contamination in C₃F₈ bubble chambers

Journal Article · 06 March 2022 · Journal of Instrumentation

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-0221/17/03/p03004 · OSTI ID:1979433

Bressler, M. ^[1]; Lamb, N. ^[2]; Neilson, R. ^[2]; Windle, S. ^[2]

Drexel Univ., Philadelphia, PA (United States); OSTI
Drexel Univ., Philadelphia, PA (United States)

Understanding and quantifying the gamma-induced bubble nucleation background in clean nuclear recoil detection bubble chambers is of utmost importance to bubble chamber based dark matter searches. Here, we present data confirming the hypothesis that large Auger cascades from high-Z elements such as iodine and xenon dramatically increase the response of C₃F₈ bubble chambers to gamma rays. These tests, performed with a small calibration bubble chamber filled with C₃F₈+$$\mathcal{O}$$ (10) ppm xenon, show that the probability of bubble nucleation scales with the rate of xenon inner-shell vacancies, reaching values >10% per K-Shell vacancy for Seitz thresholds of interest to future dark matter searches in bubble chambers. We also place an upper limit on bubble nucleation probability for argon Auger events, relevant to large future bubble chambers which may contain some residual atmospheric argon after the active fluid fill.

View Accepted Manuscript (DOE)

Cite

Export

Save

Research Organization:: Drexel Univ., Philadelphia, PA (United States)

Sponsoring Organization:: USDOE Office of Science (SC), High Energy Physics (HEP)

Grant/Contract Number:: SC0017815

OSTI ID:: 1979433

Journal Information:: Journal of Instrumentation, Journal Name: Journal of Instrumentation Journal Issue: 03 Vol. 17; ISSN 1748-0221

Publisher:: Institute of Physics (IOP)Copyright Statement

Country of Publication:: United States

Language:: English

References (19)

NIST Reference Fluid Thermodynamic and Transport Properties Database (REFPROP) Version 10 - SRD 23 Huber, Marcia; Harvey, Allan; Lemmon, Eric National Institute of Standards and Technology https://doi.org/10.18434/t4/1502528	dataset	January 2018
Nucleation in bubble chambers Tenner, A. G. Nuclear Instruments and Methods, Vol. 22 https://doi.org/10.1016/0029-554X(63)90224-6	journal	March 1963
Simultaneous operation of a liquid argon detector as bubble chamber and calorimeter Berset, J. C.; Burns, M.; Harigel, G. Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research, Vol. 203, Issue 1-3 https://doi.org/10.1016/0167-5087(82)90622-6	journal	December 1982
Geant4—a simulation toolkit Agostinelli, S.; Allison, J.; Amako, K. Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research Section A: Accelerators, Spectrometers, Detectors and Associated Equipment, Vol. 506, Issue 3 https://doi.org/10.1016/S0168-9002(03)01368-8	journal	July 2003
Development of bubble chambers with enhanced stability and sensitivity to low-energy nuclear recoils Bolte, W. J.; Collar, J. I.; Crisler, M. Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research Section A: Accelerators, Spectrometers, Detectors and Associated Equipment, Vol. 577, Issue 3 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nima.2007.04.149	journal	July 2007
SciPy 1.0: fundamental algorithms for scientific computing in Python Virtanen, Pauli; Gommers, Ralf; Oliphant, Travis E. Nature Methods https://doi.org/10.1038/s41592-019-0686-2	journal	February 2020
On the Theory of the Bubble Chamber Seitz, Frederick Physics of Fluids, Vol. 1, Issue 1 https://doi.org/10.1063/1.1724333	journal	January 1958
Auger Electron Spectra - The Basic Data for Understanding the Auger Effect Pomplun, Ekkehard Acta Oncologica, Vol. 39, Issue 6 https://doi.org/10.1080/028418600750063712	journal	January 2000
A buffer-free concept bubble chamber for PICO dark matter searches Bressler, M.; Campion, P.; Cushman, V. S. Journal of Instrumentation, Vol. 14, Issue 08 https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-0221/14/08/P08019	journal	August 2019
Some Effects of Ionizing Radiation on the Formation of Bubbles in Liquids Glaser, Donald A. Physical Review, Vol. 87, Issue 4 https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRev.87.665	journal	August 1952
Dark matter search results from the complete exposure of the PICO-60 C 3 F 8 bubble chamber Amole, C.; Ardid, M.; Arnquist, I. J. Physical Review D, Vol. 100, Issue 2 https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.100.022001	journal	July 2019
Data-driven modeling of electron recoil nucleation in PICO C 3 F 8 bubble chambers Amole, C.; Ardid, M.; Arnquist, I. J. Physical Review D, Vol. 100, Issue 8 https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.100.082006	journal	October 2019
Physics reach of a low threshold scintillating argon bubble chamber in coherent elastic neutrino-nucleus scattering reactor experiments Flores, L. J.; Peinado, Eduardo; Alfonso-Pita, E. Physical Review D, Vol. 103, Issue 9 https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.103.L091301	journal	May 2021
Measurement of charge and light yields for Xe 127 L -shell electron captures in liquid xenon Temples, D. J.; McLaughlin, J.; Bargemann, J. Physical Review D, Vol. 104, Issue 11 https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.104.112001	journal	December 2021
Direct measurement of the bubble-nucleation energy threshold in a CF 3 I bubble chamber Behnke, E.; Benjamin, T.; Brice, S. J. Physical Review D, Vol. 88, Issue 2 https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.88.021101	journal	July 2013
Dark Matter Search Results from the PICO − 60 C 3 F 8 Bubble Chamber Amole, C.; Ardid, M.; Arnquist, I. J. Physical Review Letters, Vol. 118, Issue 25 https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.118.251301	journal	June 2017
Bubble Chambers Bradner, H. Annual Review of Nuclear Science, Vol. 10, Issue 1 https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.ns.10.120160.000545	journal	December 1960
NIST Reference Fluid Thermodynamic and Transport Properties Database (REFPROP) Version 10 - SRD 23 Huber, Marcia; Harvey, Allan; Lemmon, Eric National Institute of Standards and Technology https://doi.org/10.18434/T4/1502528	dataset	January 2018
The Scintillating Bubble Chamber (SBC) Experiment for Dark Matter and Reactor CEvNS Giampa, Pietro Proceedings of 40th International Conference on High Energy physics — PoS(ICHEP2020) https://doi.org/10.22323/1.390.0632	conference	February 2021

Similar Records

First demonstration of a scintillating xenon bubble chamber for detecting dark matter and coherent elastic neutrino-nucleus scattering

Journal Article · 2017 · Physical Review Letters · OSTI ID:1346354

Baxter, D.; Chen, C. J.; Crisler, M.; +8 more

Direct Measurement of the Bubble Nucleation Energy Threshold in a CF3I Bubble Chamber

Journal Article · 2013 · Physical Review D · OSTI ID:1091428

Behnke, E.; Benjamin, T.; Brice, S. J.; +20 more

Absorption of Fermionic Dark Matter in the PICO-60 C₃F₈ Bubble Chamber

Journal Article · 2025 · Physical Review Letters · OSTI ID:2564437

Adams, E.; Ali, B.; Anderson-Dornan, Rajan; +58 more

Related Subjects

47 OTHER INSTRUMENTATION
Dark Matter detectors
Ionization and excitation processes
Liquid detectors

Title: A direct test of Auger cascade induced nucleation from heavy element contamination in C3F8 bubble chambers

Citation Formats

References (19)

Similar Records

Related Subjects

Title: A direct test of Auger cascade induced nucleation from heavy element contamination in C₃F₈ bubble chambers