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Atsushi Takeda

Publications and source records attributed to Atsushi Takeda.

16 recordsLinked to original sources

Combined Pre-Supernova Alert System with Kamland and Super-Kamiokande

Preceding a core-collapse supernova, various processes produce an increasing amount of neutrinos of all flavors characterized by mounting energies from the interior of massive stars. Among them, the electron antineutrinos are potentially detectable by terrestrial neutrino experiments such as KamLAND and Super-Kamiokande via inverse beta decay interactions. Once these pre-supernova neutrinos are observed, an early warning of the upcoming core-collapse supernova can be provided. In light of this, KamLAND and Super-Kamiokande, both located in the Kamioka mine in Japan, have been monitoring pre-supernova neutrinos since 2015 and 2021, respectively. Recently, we performed a joint study between KamLAND and Super-Kamiokande on pre-supernova neutrino detection. A pre-supernova alert system combining the KamLAND detector and the Super-Kamiokande detector was developed and put into operation, which can provide a supernova alert to the astrophysics community. Fully leveraging the complementary properties of these two detectors, the combined alert is expected to resolve a pre-supernova neutrino signal from a 15 M$_{\odot}$ star within 510 pc of the Earth, at a significance level corresponding to a false alarm rate of no more than 1 per century. For a Betelgeuse-like model with optimistic parameters, it can provide early warnings up to 12 hours in advance.

hep-ex

Direction-sensitive dark matter search with three-dimensional vector-type tracking in NEWAGE

NEWAGE is a direction-sensitive dark matter search experiment with a three-dimensional tracking detector based on a gaseous micro time projection chamber. A direction-sensitive dark matter search was carried out at Kamioka Observatory with a total live time of 318.0 days resulting in an exposure of 3.18 kg$\cdot$days. A new gamma-ray rejection and a head-tail determination analysis were implemented for this work. No significant non-isotropic signal from the directional analysis was found and a 90% confidence level upper limit on spin-dependent WIMP-proton cross section of 25.7 pb for WIMP mass of 150 GeV/c2 was derived. This upper limit is the most stringent in the direction-sensitive dark matter searches.

hep-ex

Direction-sensitive dark matter search with a low-background gaseous detector NEWAGE-0.3b''

NEWAGE is a direction-sensitive dark matter search using a low-pressure gaseous time projection chamber. A low alpha-ray emission rate micro pixel chamber had been developed in order to reduce background for dark matter search. We conducted the dark matter search at the Kamioka Observatory in 2018. The total live time was 107.6 days corresponding to an exposure of 1.1 kg${\cdot}$days. Two events remained in the energy region of 50-60 keV which was consistent with 2.5 events of the expected background. A directional analysis was carried out and no significant forward-backward asymmetry derived from the WIMP-nucleus elastic scatterings was found. Thus a 90% confidence level upper limit on Spin-Dependent WIMP-proton cross section of 50 pb for a WIMP mass of 100 GeV/c2 was derived. This limit is the most stringent yet obtained from direction-sensitive dark matter search experiments.

hep-ex

First limits from a 3d-vector directional dark matter search with the NEWAGE-0.3b' detector

The first directional dark matter search with three-dimensional tracking with head-tail sensitivity (3d-vector tracking analysis) was performed with a gaseous three-dimensional tarcking detector, or the NEWAGE-0.3b' detector. The search was carried out from July 2013 to August 2017 (Run14 to Run18) at the Kamioka underground laboratory. The total livetime is 434.85 days corresponding to an exposure of 4.51 kg$\cdot$days. A 90 % confidence level upper limit on spin-dependent WIMP-proton cross section of $4.3 \times10^{2}$ pb for WIMPs with the mass of 150 GeV/$c^2$ is obtained.

hep-ex

Measurement of ambient neutrons in an underground laboratory at Kamioka Observatory and future plan

Ambient neutrons are one of the most serious backgrounds for underground experiments in search of rare events. The ambient neutron flux in an underground laboratory of Kamioka Observatory was measured using a $\mathrm{^3He}$ proportional counter with various moderator setups. Since the detector response largely depends on the spectral shape, the energy spectra of the neutrons transported from the rock to the laboratory were estimated by Monte-Carlo simulations. The ratio of the thermal neutron flux to the total neutron flux was found to depend on the thermalizing efficiency of the rock. Thus, the ratio of the count rate without a moderator to that with a moderator was used to determine this parameter. Consequently, the most-likely neutron spectrum predicted by the simulations for the parameters determined by the experimental results was obtained. The result suggests an interesting spectral shape, which has not been indicated in previous studies. The total ambient neutron flux is $(23.5 \pm 0.7 \ \mathrm{_{stat.}} ^{+1.9}_{-2.1} \ \mathrm{_{sys.}}) \times 10^{-6}$ cm$^{-2}$ s$^{-1}$. In this paper, we explain our method of the result and discuss our future plan.

physics.ins-det

Measurement of ambient neutrons in an underground laboratory at Kamioka Observatory

Ambient neutrons are one of the most serious backgrounds for underground experiments searching for rare events. The ambient neutron flux in an underground laboratory of Kamioka Observatory was measured using a $\mathrm{^3He}$ proportional counter with various moderator setups. Since the detector response largely depends on the spectral shape, the energy spectra of the neutrons transported from the rock to the laboratory are estimated by Monte-Carlo simulations. The ratio of the thermal neutron flux to the total neutron flux was found to depend on the thermalizing efficiency of the rock. Therefore, the ratio of the count rate without a moderator to that with a moderator was used to determine this parameter. Consequently, the most-likely neutron spectrum predicted by the simulations for the parameters determined by the experimental results was obtained. The result suggests an interesting spectral shape, which has not been indicated in previous studies. The total ambient neutron flux is $(23.52 \pm 0.68 \ \mathrm{_{stat.}} ^{+1.87}_{-2.13} \ \mathrm{_{sys.}}) \times 10^{-6}$ cm$^{-2}$ s$^{-1}$. This result, especially the energy spectrum information, could be a new and important input for estimating the background in current and future experiments in the underground laboratory at Kamioka Observatory.

physics.ins-det

SwGridNet: A Deep Convolutional Neural Network based on Grid Topology for Image Classification

Deep convolutional neural networks (CNNs) achieve remarkable performance on image classification tasks. Recent studies, however, have demonstrated that generalization abilities are more important than the depth of neural networks for improving performance on image classification tasks. Herein, a new neural network called SwGridNet is proposed. A SwGridNet includes many convolutional processing units which connect mutually as a grid network where many processing paths exist between input and output. A SwGridNet has high generalization capability because the multipath architecture has the same effect of ensemble learning. As described in this paper, details of the SwGridNet network architecture are presented. Experimentally obtained results presented in this paper show that SwGridNets respectively achieve test error rates of 2.95% and 15.67% in a CIFAR-10 and CIFAR-100 classification tasks. The results indicate that the SwGridNet performance approximates that of state-of-the-art deep CNNs.

cs.CV

NEWAGE

NEWAGE is a direction-sensitive dark matter search experiment with a gaseous time-projection chamber. We improved the direction-sensitive dark matter limits by our underground measurement. After the first underground run, we replaced the detector components with radio-pure materials. We also studied the possibilities of head-tail recognition of nuclear tracks in the surface laboratory. For the future large volume detector, we are developing a pixel ASIC named QPIX. In this paper, these recent R&D activities are described.

astro-ph.IM

Observation of Diffuse Cosmic and Atmospheric Gamma Rays at Balloon Altitudes with an Electron-tracking Compton Camera

We observed diffuse cosmic and atmospheric gamma rays at balloon altitudes with the Sub-MeV gamma-ray Imaging Loaded-on-balloon Experiment I (SMILE-I) as the first step toward a future all-sky survey with a high sensitivity. SMILE-I employed an electron-tracking Compton camera comprised of a gaseous electron tracker as a Compton-scattering target and a scintillation camera as an absorber. The balloon carrying the SMILE-I detector was launched from the Sanriku Balloon Center of the Institute of Space and Astronomical Science/Japan Space Exploration Agency on September 1, 2006, and the flight lasted for 6.8 hr, including level flight for 4.1 hr at an altitude of 32-35 km. During the level flight, we successfully detected 420 downward gamma rays between 100 keV and 1 MeV at zenith angles below 60 degrees. To obtain the flux of diffuse cosmic gamma rays, we first simulated their scattering in the atmosphere using Geant4, and for gamma rays detected at an atmospheric depth of 7.0 g cm-2, we found that 50% and 21% of the gamma rays at energies of 150 keV and 1 MeV, respectively, were scattered in the atmosphere prior to reaching the detector. Moreover, by using Geant4 simulations and the QinetiQ atmospheric radiation model, we estimated that the detected events consisted of diffuse cosmic and atmospheric gamma rays (79%), secondary photons produced in the instrument through the interaction between cosmic rays and materials surrounding the detector (19%), and other particles (2%). The obtained growth curve was comparable to Ling's model, and the fluxes of diffuse cosmic and atmospheric gamma rays were consistent with the results of previous experiments. The expected detection sensitivity of a future SMILE experiment measuring gamma rays between 150 keV and 20 MeV was estimated from our SMILE-I results and was found to be ten times better than that of other experiments at around 1 MeV.

astro-ph.IM

First underground results with NEWAGE-0.3a direction-sensitive dark matter detector

A direction-sensitive dark matter search experiment at Kamioka underground laboratory with the NEWAGE-0.3a detector was performed. The NEWAGE- 0.3a detector is a gaseous micro-time-projection chamber filled with CF4 gas at 152 Torr. The fiducial volume and target mass are 20*25*31 cm3 and 0.0115 kg, respectively. With an exposure of 0.524 kgdays, improved spin-dependent weakly interacting massive particle (WIMP)-proton cross section limits by a direction-sensitive method were achieved including a new record of 5400 pb for 150 GeV/c2 WIMPs. We studied the remaining background and found that ambient gamma-rays contributed about one-fifth of the remaining background and radioactive contaminants inside the gas chamber contributed the rest.

astro-ph.CO

Direction-sensitive dark matter search results in a surface laboratory

We developed a three-dimensional gaseous tracking device and performed a direction-sensitive dark matter search in a surface laboratory. By using 150 Torr carbon-tetrafluoride (CF_4 gas), we obtained a sky map drawn with the recoil directions of the carbon and fluorine nuclei, and set the first limit on the spin-dependent WIMP (Weakly Interacting Massive Particles)-proton cross section by a direction-sensitive method. Thus, we showed that a WIMP-search experiment with a gaseous tracking device can actually set limits. Furthermore, we demonstrated that this method will potentially play a certain role in revealing the nature of dark matter when a low-background large-volume detector is developed.

astro-ph

Detector performance of the NEWAGE experiment

NEWAGE(NEw generation WIMP search with an Advanced Gaseous tracking device Experiment) project is a direction-sensitive dark matter search experiment with a gaseous micro time-projection-chamber(micro-TPC). We report on the performance of the micro-TPC with a detection volume of 23x28x30 cm3 operated with a carbon-tetra uoride (CF4) of 0.2 bar.

physics.ins-det

Simulation study of electron drift and gas multiplication in Micro Pixel Chamber

The physical processes of charge collection and gas multiplication of a Micro Pixel Chamber (mu-PIC) were studied in detail using a three-dimensional simulation. The collection efficiencies of primary electrons and gas multiplication factors were calculated for several electrode structures. Based on those studies, we analyzed the optimization of the electrode structure of the mu-PIC, in order to obtain a high gas gain of more than 10^4 and a simultaneous suppression of discharges. Consequently, we found that these characteristics strongly depend on the substrate thickness and the anode diameter of the mu-PIC. In addition, a gas gain of 10^5 would be expected for a mu-PIC having a thick substrate of > 150um.

physics.ins-det

MeV Gamma-Ray Imaging Detector with micro-TPC

We propose a new imaging gamma-ray detector in the MeV region. By measuring the directions and energies of not only a scattered gamma ray but also a recoil electron, the direction of an incident gamma ray would be essentially reconstructed event by event. Furthermore, one of two measured (zenith and azimuth) angles of a recoil electron gives us an additional redundancy which enables us to reject the background events by kinematic constraints. In order to measure the track of a recoil electron, the micro Time Projection Chamber($μ$-TPC) has been developed, which can measure the successive positions of the track of charged particles in a few hundred micron meter pitch. The $μ$-TPC consists of the new type of a gas proportional chamber: micro PIxel gas Chamber ($μ$-PIC) which is one of wireless gas chambers and expected to be robust and stable. Using this $μ$-TPC and the Anger camera for the detection of a scattered gamma ray, we have obtained the first gamma-ray image by the full reconstruction of the direction of gamma rays event by event.

astro-ph

Detecting the WIMP-wind via spin-dependent interactions

Revealing the nature of dark matter is one of the most interesting tasks in astrophysics. Measuring the distribution of recoil angles is said to be one of the most reliable methods to detect a positive signature of dark matter. We focused on measurements via spin-dependent interactions, and studied the feasibility with carbon tetrafluoride($\rm CF_4$) gas, while taking into account the performance of an existing three-dimensional tracking detector. We consequently found that it is highly possible to detect a positive signature of dark matter via spin-dependent interactions.

astro-ph

Performance of a micro-TPC for a time-resolved neutron PSD

We report on the performance of a micro-TPC with a micro pixel chamber($μ$-PIC) readout for a time-resolved neutron position-sensitive detector(PSD). Three-dimensional tracks and the Bragg curves of protons with energies of around 1 MeV were clearly detected by the micro-TPC. More than 95% of gamma-rays of 511 keV were found to be discriminated by simple analysis. Simulation studies showed that the total track length of proton and triton emitted from the $\rm {}^{3}He$(n,p(573 keV))$\rm {}^{3}H(191 keV)$ reaction is about 1.2 cm, and that both particles have large energy losses ($\rm > 200 keV/cm$) in 1 atm Ar+$\rm C_{2}H_{6}(10%)$+${}^{3}$He($< 1%$). These values suit the current performance of the micro-TPC, and we conclude that a time-resolved neutron PSD with spatial resolution of sub-millimeters shall be developed as an application of the micro-TPC.

physics.ins-det