arXiv subjects

K. E. Lim

Publications and source records attributed to K. E. Lim.

43 records · Page 3Linked to original sources

arXiv2011

Dark Matter Results from 100 Live Days of XENON100 Data

We present results from the direct search for dark matter with the XENON100 detector, installed underground at the Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso of INFN, Italy. XENON100 is a two-phase time projection chamber with a 62 kg liquid xenon target. Interaction vertex reconstruction in three dimensions with millimeter precision allows to select only the innermost 48 kg as ultra-low background fiducial target. In 100.9 live days of data, acquired between January and June 2010, no evidence for dark matter is found. Three candidate events were observed in a pre-defined signal region with an expected background of 1.8 +/- 0.6 events. This leads to the most stringent limit on dark matter interactions today, excluding spin-independent elastic WIMP-nucleon scattering cross-sections above 7.0x10^-45 cm^2 for a WIMP mass of 50 GeV/c^2 at 90% confidence level.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2011

Material screening and selection for XENON100

Results of the extensive radioactivity screening campaign to identify materials for the construction of XENON100 are reported. This Dark Matter search experiment is operated underground at Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso (LNGS), Italy. Several ultra sensitive High Purity Germanium detectors (HPGe) have been used for gamma ray spectrometry. Mass spectrometry has been applied for a few low mass plastic samples. Detailed tables with the radioactive contaminations of all screened samples are presented, together with the implications for XENON100.

physics.ins-det↗

arXiv2011

New Measurement of the Scintillation Efficiency of Low-Energy Nuclear Recoils in Liquid Xenon

Particle detectors that use liquid xenon (LXe) as detection medium are among the leading technologies in the search for dark matter weakly interacting massive particles (WIMPs). A key enabling element has been the low-energy detection threshold for recoiling nuclei produced by the interaction of WIMPs in LXe targets. In these detectors, the nuclear recoil energy scale is based on the LXe scintillation signal and thus requires knowledge of the relative scintillation efficiency of nuclear recoils, Leff. The uncertainty in Leff at low energies is the largest systematic uncertainty in the reported results from LXe WIMP searches at low masses. In the context of the XENON Dark Matter project, a new LXe scintillation detector has been designed and built specifically for the measurement of Leff at low energies, with an emphasis on maximizing the scintillation light detection efficiency to obtain the lowest possible energy threshold. We report new measurements of Leff at low energies performed with this detector. Our results suggest a Leff which slowly decreases with energy, from 0.144 +/- 0.009 at 15 keV down to 0.088 +0.014 -0.015 at 3 keV.

nucl-ex↗

arXiv2011

Xenon Recirculation-Purification with a Heat Exchanger

Liquid-xenon based particle detectors have been dramatically growing in size during the last years, and are now exceeding the one-ton scale. The required high xenon purity is usually achieved by continuous recirculation of xenon gas through a high-temperature getter. This challenges the traditional way of cooling these large detectors, since in a thermally well insulated detector, most of the cooling power is spent to compensate losses from recirculation. The phase change during recondensing requires five times more cooling power than cooling the gas from ambient temperature to -100C (173 K). Thus, to reduce the cooling power requirements for large detectors, we propose to use the heat from the purified incoming gas to evaporate the outgoing xenon gas, by means of a heat exchanger. Generally, a heat exchanger would appear to be only of very limited use, since evaporation and liquefaction occur at zero temperature difference. However, the use of a recirculation pump reduces the pressure of the extracted liquid, forces it to evaporate, and thus cools it down. We show that this temperature difference can be used for an efficient heat exchange process. We investigate the use of a commercial parallel plate heat exchanger with a small liquid xenon detector. Although we expected to be limited by the available cooling power to flow rates of about 2 SLPM, rates in excess of 12 SLPM can easily be sustained, limited only by the pump speed and the impedance of the flow loop. The heat exchanger operates with an efficiency of (96.8 +/- 0.5)%. This opens the possibility for fast xenon gas recirculation in large-scale experiments, while minimizing thermal losses.

physics.ins-det↗

arXiv2011

First Dark Matter Results from the XENON100 Experiment

The XENON100 experiment, in operation at the Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso in Italy, is designed to search for dark matter WIMPs scattering off 62 kg of liquid xenon in an ultra-low background dual-phase time projection chamber. In this letter, we present first dark matter results from the analysis of 11.17 live days of non-blind data, acquired in October and November 2009. In the selected fiducial target of 40 kg, and within the pre-defined signal region, we observe no events and hence exclude spin-independent WIMP-nucleon elastic scattering cross-sections above 3.4 x 10^-44 cm^2 for 55 GeV/c^2 WIMPs at 90% confidence level. Below 20 GeV/c^2, this result constrains the interpretation of the CoGeNT and DAMA signals as being due to spin-independent, elastic, light mass WIMP interactions.

astro-ph.CO↗

arXiv2010

New Measurement of the Relative Scintillation Efficiency of Xenon Nuclear Recoils Below 10 keV

Liquid xenon is an important detection medium in direct dark matter experiments, which search for low-energy nuclear recoils produced by the elastic scattering of WIMPs with quarks. The two existing measurements of the relative scintillation efficiency of nuclear recoils below 20 keV lead to inconsistent extrapolations at lower energies. This results in a different energy scale and thus sensitivity reach of liquid xenon dark matter detectors. We report a new measurement of the relative scintillation efficiency below 10 keV performed with a liquid xenon scintillation detector, optimized for maximum light collection. Greater than 95% of the interior surface of this detector was instrumented with photomultiplier tubes, giving a scintillation yield of 19.6 photoelectrons/keV electron equivalent for 122 keV gamma rays. We find that the relative scintillation efficiency for nuclear recoils of 5 keV is 0.14, staying constant around this value up to 10 keV. For higher energy recoils we measure a value around 20%, consistent with previously reported data. In light of this new measurement, the XENON10 experiment's results on spin-independent WIMP-nucleon cross section, which were calculated assuming a constant 0.19 relative scintillation efficiency, change from $8.8\times10^{-44}$ cm$^2$ to $9.9\times10^{-44}$ cm$^2$ for WIMPs of mass 100 GeV/c$^2$, and from $4.4\times10^{-44}$ cm$^2$ to $5.6\times10^{-44}$ cm$^2$ for WIMPs of mass 30 GeV/c$^2$.

astro-ph↗

arXiv2009

Self-shielding effect of a single phase liquid xenon detector for direct dark matter search

Liquid xenon is a suitable material for a dark matter search. For future large scale experiments, single phase detectors are attractive due to their simple configuration and scalability. However, in order to reduce backgrounds, they need to fully rely on liquid xenon's self-shielding property. A prototype detector was developed at Kamioka Observatory to establish vertex and energy reconstruction methods and to demonstrate the self-shielding power against gamma rays from outside of the detector. Sufficient self-shielding power for future experiments was obtained.

astro-ph.CO↗