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Initial results of NEXT-DEMO, a large-scale prototype of the NEXT-100 experiment

2013; Institute of Physics; Volume: 8; Issue: 04 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1088/1748-0221/8/04/p04002

1748-0221

V. Álvarez, F.I.G.M. Borges, S. Cárcel, J. Castel, S. Cebrián, A. Cervera, C.A.N. Conde, T. Dafní, T.H.V.T. Dias, J. Dı́az, M. S. Egorov, R. Esteve, P. Evtoukhovitch, L. M. P. Fernandes, P. Ferrario, A. L. Ferreira, E.D.C. Freitas, V.M. Gehman, A. Gil, A. Goldschmidt, H. Gómez, J.J. Gómez-Cadenas, D. González-Díaz, Rafael Gutiérrez, J. M. Hauptman, J. A. Hernando Morata, D C Herrera, F.J. Iguaz, I.G. Irastorza, M A Jinete, L. Labarga, A. Laing, I. Liubarsky, J. A. M. Lopes, D. Lorca, M. Losada, G. Luzón, A. Marí, J. Martín-Albo, A. Martínez, T. Miller, A. Moiseenko, F. Monrabal, C.M.B. Monteiro, Francisco Mora, Luiz Moutinho, J. Muñoz Vidal, H. Natal da Luz, G. Navarro, M. Nebot-Guinot, D. R. Nygren, C. Oliveira, Roberto Palma, J. Pérez, J.L. Pérez–Aparicio, J. Renner, L. Ripoll, A. Soto Rodríguez, J. Rodríguez, F.P. Santos, J.M.F. dos Santos, L. Seguí, Llorenç Serra, D. Shuman, A. Simón, C. Sofka, M. Sorel, J.F. Toledo, A. Tomás, J. Torrent, Z. Tsamalaidze, D. Domínguez Vázquez, J.F.C.A. Veloso, J.A. Villar, R. Webb, James T. White, N. Yahlali,

Particle Detector Development and Performance

NEXT-DEMO is a large-scale prototype of the NEXT-100 detector, an electroluminescent time projection chamber that will search for the neutrinoless double beta decay of \XE using 100–150 kg of enriched xenon gas. NEXT-DEMO was built to prove the expected performance of NEXT-100, namely, energy resolution better than 1% FWHM at 2.5 MeV and event topological reconstruction. In this paper we describe the prototype and its initial results. A resolution of 1.75% FWHM at 511 keV (which extrapolates to 0.8% FWHM at 2.5 MeV) was obtained at 10 bar pressure using a gamma-ray calibration source. Also, a basic study of the event topology along the longitudinal coordinate is presented, proving that it is possible to identify the distinct dE/dx of electron tracks in high-pressure xenon using an electroluminescence TPC.