Dorer, S. (2024, September 24). CRAB: A novel approach to the calibration of cryogenic particle detectors [Poster Presentation]. 73rd Annual Meeting of the Austrian Physical Society, JKU Linz, Austria. https://doi.org/10.34726/6939
Cryogenic particle detectors (e.g. CaWO$_4$ and Al$_2$O$_3$) have found widespread usage in many current experiments, including the investigation of coherent elastic neutrino-nucleus scattering and the search for dark matter candidates. Despite their common deployment as state of the art particle detectors for interactions in the low energy region of about 100 eV, there is currently no feasible method for their calibration in this energy regime.
The CRAB experiment (Calibrated Recoils for Accurate Bolometry) aims to provide a novel approach to the calibration of cryogenic particle detectors in the 100 eV energy regime via nuclear recoils triggered by thermal neutron capture induced gamma emission.
The method is based on the thermal neutron capture of a target crystal's nucleus, resulting in its excitation to an unstable energy state. In order to return to a stable, lower energy state, the nucleus emits energy in the form of photons -- either as a single gamma transition or a multi gamma cascade -- which leads to the recoil of the nucleus with an energy of around 100 eV.
The recoil energy deposited in the target crystal results in a temperature increase that can be measured using a transition edge sensor. By comparing the calculated recoil energy with the measured spectrum, the cryogenic detector can be calibrated.
Following a successful proof of concept in the form of the publication of a first observation of a nuclear recoil peak in the 100 eV region using the CRAB method, the collaboration's next step is the setup of the experiment at the TRIGA Mk II research reactor at TU Wien in 2024. The experiment's second phase aims to perform a high statistics, low background measurement run improving the precision of the method and providing a reliable calibration for a cryogenic detector crystal.
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Forschungsinfrastruktur:
TRIGA Mark II-Nuklearreaktor
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Projekttitel:
Neutrinowechselwirkung: Untersuchung kohärenter Neutrino-Kern-Streuung mit NUCLEUS: I 5427-N (FWF - Österr. Wissenschaftsfonds)