Speaker
Description
Though liquid argon time projection chambers (LArTPCs) excel at reconstructing neutrino interactions at ~100s of MeV in energy, their physics reach can be enhanced by extending reconstruction to much lower energies. MicroBooNE has demonstrated reconstruction capabilities for energy depositions at the ~MeV and sub-MeV scale, which manifest as isolated "blips" spanning only a few readout channels on the TPC wire planes. Using data from special R&D runs where MicroBooNE's LAr was doped with radon, new software tools were used to identify the beta and alpha decay products of progeny isotopes bismuth-214 and polonium-214. Measuring the rate of these correlated decays under different filtration configurations revealed that liquid-phase electronegative filters effectively mitigate radon contamination. Further studies using novel background subtraction techniques produced calorimetric energy spectra of these decay products, showcasing sensitivity down to ~100 keV in electron-equivalent energy for charge-based readout. These tools were then applied to standard data-taking conditions to set a radiopurity limit for ambient bismuth-214, the first of its kind for a large single-phase liquid-filtered LArTPC.
| Poster prize | No |
|---|---|
| Given name | William |
| Surname | Foreman |
| First affiliation | Illinois Institute of Technology |
| Institutional email | wforeman@iit.edu |
| Gender | Male |
| Collaboration (if any) | MicroBooNE |
