An Overview of the KamLAND 1-kiloton Liquid Scintillator
F. Suekane, T. Iwamoto, H. Ogawa, O. Tajima, H. Watanabe
备注：
In this version, the font problem was fixed. (used to include Japanese font and could not be opened properly by some brawsers). 12 pages 11 figures, 1 table. Proceedings for "KEK-RCNP International School and mini-Workshop for Scintillating Crystals and their Applications in Particle and Nuclear Physics". (Nov., 17-18, 2003, KEK, Japan.)
KamLAND is a massive liquid-scintillator-based neutrino detector studying low energy neutrino oscillation. The experiment has discovered a large deficit of the reactor neutrino flux with baseline of 180km in the year 2002. This result is placing a strong impact on the elementary particle physics. The KamLAND detector makes use of one kiloton of liquid scintillator (LS) as the active neutrino target. This is the largest homogeneous LS detector in the world. Although the light yield and attenuation length of the LS were measured to be 57% anthracene and ~10m, in the test experiments, when it is used in the KamLAND detector, the effective transparency and light yield significantly increased from these values, presumably due to the scattering and re-emission in the large scale LS. The radio active contamination in the LS is extremely low, such as 3.5E-18g/g for uranium. This is the world's lowest contamination record so far achieved and measured. The success of the KamLAND experiment is a fruit of this high-quality and large-quantity LS. In this proceedings, an outline of the LS is described.
We present a technique for separating nuclear double beta decay ($ββ$-decay) events from background neutrino interactions due to $^{8}$B decays in the sun. This background becomes dominant in a kiloton-scale liquid-scintillator detector deep underground and is usually considered as irreducible due to an overlap in deposited energy with the signal. However, electrons from 0$νββ$-decay often exceed the Cherenkov threshold in liquid scintillator, producing photons that are prompt and correlated in direction with the initial electron direction. The use of large-area fast photodetectors allows some…
The removal of Radon induced Lead from liquid scintillator was extensively studied in preparation for KamLAND's low background phase. This work presents the results from laboratory experiments performed at the University of Alabama and their implications for KamLAND and future low background experiments using carbon based liquid scintillator. It was observed that distillation was the most effective purification procedure and that one must consider a non-polar and non-ionic component of Lead in order to reach the levels of radio-purity required for these new class of ultra-low background experi…
Large liquid-scintillator-based detectors have proven to be exceptionally effective for low energy neutrino measurements due to their good energy resolution and scalability to large volumes. The addition of directional information using Cherenkov light and fast timing would enhance the scientific reach of these detectors, especially for searches for neutrino-less double-beta decay. In this paper, we develop a technique for extracting particle direction using the difference in arrival times for Cherenkov and scintillation light, and evaluate several detector advances in timing, photodetector sp…
We report on the construction and performance of a calibration source for KamLAND using the reaction C-13(alpha,n)O-16 with Po-210 as the alpha progenitor. The source provides a direct measurement of this background reaction in our detector, high energy calibration points for the detector energy scale, and data on quenching of the neutron visible energy in KamLAND scintillator. We also discuss the possibility of using the reaction C-13(alpha,n)O-16 as a source of tagged slow neutrons.
The removal of radioactivity from liquid scintillator has been studied in preparation of a low background phase of KamLAND. This paper describes the methods and techniques developed to measure and efficiently extract radon decay products from liquid scintillator. We report the radio-isotope reduction factors obtained when applying various extraction methods. During this study, distillation was identified as the most efficient method for removing radon daughters from liquid scintillator.
The KamLAND-Zen 800 experiment is searching for the neutrinoless double-beta decay of $^{136}$Xe by using $^{136}$Xe-loaded liquid scintillator. The liquid scintillator is enclosed inside a balloon made of thin, transparent, low-radioactivity film that we call Inner Balloon (IB). The IB, apart from guaranteeing the liquid containment, also allows to minimize the background from cosmogenic muon-spallation products and $^{8}$B solar neutrinos. Indeed these events could contribute to the total counts in the region of interest around the Q-value of the double-beta decay of $^{136}$Xe. In this pape…
We show that liquid organic scintillator detectors (e.g., KamLAND and Borexino) can measure the 8B solar neutrino flux by means of the nu_e charged current interaction with the 13C nuclei naturally contained in the scintillators. The neutrino events can be identified by exploiting the time and space coincidence with the subsequent decay of the produced 13N nuclei. We perform a detailed analysis of the background in KamLAND, Borexino and in a possible liquid scintillator detector at SNOLab, showing that the 8B solar neutrino signal can be extracted with a reasonable uncertainty in a few years o…
Liquid scintillator experiments for neutrinoless double beta decay search have high sensitivity based on the ultra low background environment and high scalability. This paper describes an overview of current ongoing projects KamLAND-Zen and SNO+.
Many experiments in particle physics, in particular in the field of neutrino searches, rely on organic liquid scintillators as target and detection material. The size of these detectors was continously growing in the last decades, up to the kiloton scale. In several cases these detectors are located at sites with enhanced safety requirements as underground laboratories or in the vicinity of nuclear reactors. Therefore, there is strong demand in liquids which are safe with respect to aspects as fire protection, human health or environmental pollution. In particular, properties as the flash poin…
It is shown that a large volume liquid organic scintillator detector with an energy resolution of 10 keV at 200 keV 1 sigma will be sensitive to solar pp-neutrino, if operated at the target radiopurity levels for the Borexino detector, or the solar neutrino project of KamLAND.
A liquid scintillator base experiment KamLAND-Zen has set a lower limit on neutrinoless double beta decay half-life, and upgrade project KamLAND-Zen 800 has started in 2019. Unfortunately, this project expects some backgrounds, and one of the main backgrounds is beta/gamma-ray from 214Bi in container of xenon loaded liquid scintillator (mini-balloon). In order to reject the background, we suggest using scintillation film for the future mini-balloon. If we can tag alpha-ray from 214Po by scintillation detection, we can eliminate 214Bi events by delayed coincidence analysis. Recently, it was rep…
Cosmic-ray muons produce various radioisotopes when passing through material. These spallation products can be backgrounds for rare event searches such as in solar neutrino, double-beta decay, and dark matter search experiments. The KamLAND-Zen experiment searches for neutrinoless double-beta decay in 745kg of xenon dissolved in liquid scintillator. The experiment includes dead-time-free electronics with a high efficiency for detecting muon-induced neutrons. The production yields of different radioisotopes are measured with a combination of delayed coincidence techniques, newly developed muon …
University of North Carolina（北卡罗来纳大学）；Triangle Universities Nuclear Laboratory（三角大学核实验室）；Massachusetts Institute of Technology（麻省理工学院）；Boston University（波士顿大学）；Tohoku University（东北大学）
Rare event searches allow us to search for new physics at energy scales inaccessible with other means by leveraging specialized large-mass detectors. Machine learning provides a new tool to maximize the information provided by these detectors. The information is sparse, which forces these algorithms to start from the lowest level data and exploit all symmetries in the detector to produce results. In this work we present KamNet which harnesses breakthroughs in geometric deep learning and spatiotemporal data analysis to maximize the physics reach of KamLAND-Zen, a kiloton scale spherical liquid …
A large area (0.5~m $\times$ 0.5~m) thermal neutron detector was developed based on 0.32~mm-thick $^{6}$LiF:ZnS(Ag) scintillator sheets. The detector was constructed for measurements of seasonal variations in low intensity thermal neutron flux at deep underground sites. The detector response to neutrons was studied using a low intensity $^{241}$Am/$^{9}$Be($α$,n) neutron source. The digital pulse shape discrimination technique was applied to separate neutron capture events from the background caused by traces of $α$-emitters from Uranium and Thorium decay chains in scintillator components. The…
Future generations of liquid scintillator neutrino experiments will require stably loading tons of candidate isotopes into kiloton-scale detectors, representing a significant chemical challenge. Nanoparticles containing the candidate isotopes provide a promising method for this loading. Additionally, the unique optical properties of nanoparticles can enhance detection and background discrimination. Perovskite nanocrystals are particularly attractive due to the reliability of their crystal structure and their easily-scalable synthesis. We present here the first study of lead-based perovskite na…
We present a search for the proton decay mode $p \rightarrow \overlineν K^{+}$ based on an exposure of 8.97 kton-years in the KamLAND experiment. The liquid scintillator detector is sensitive to successive signals from $p \rightarrow \overlineν K^{+}$ with unique kinematics, which allow us to achieve a detection efficiency of 44%, higher than previous searches in water Cherenkov detectors. We find no evidence of proton decays for this mode. The expected background, which is dominated by atmospheric neutrinos, is $0.9 \pm 0.2$ events. The nonbackground-subtracted limit on the partial proton lif…
After a logically clear and simple solution of the solar neutrino problem on the basis of the hypothesis about the existence of a new interaction involving electron neutrinos and nucleons, the question arose about the origin of the distinction between the expected and observed results of the experiment with reactor antineutrino at KamLAND. In the present work, a significant attenuation of light during its propagation in the KamLAND liquid scintillator is noted, the effect of which on the observability of the expected inverse beta-decay events and on the reconstruction of their characteristics …
A new underground lab, Yemilab, is being constructed in Handuk iron mine, Korea. The default design of Yemilab includes a space for a future neutrino experiment. We propose to build a water-based liquid scintillator (WbLS) detector of 4$\sim$5 kiloton size at the Yemilab. The WbLS technology combines the benefits from both water and liquid scintillator (LS) in a single detector so that low energy physics and rare event searches can have higher sensitivities due to the larger size detector with increased light yield. No experiment has ever used a WbLS technology since it still needs some R&D st…
We have successfully built and operated a source deployment system for the KamLAND detector. This system was used to position radioactive sources throughout the delicate 1-kton liquid scintillator volume, while meeting stringent material cleanliness, material compatibility, and safety requirements. The calibration data obtained with this device were used to fully characterize detector position and energy reconstruction biases. As a result, the uncertainty in the size of the detector fiducial volume was reduced by a factor of two. Prior to calibration with this system, the fiducial volume was t…
Recent developments in the field of liquid scintillator chemistry and fast-timing photosensors paved the way for a new generation of large-scale detectors capable of tackling a broad range of physics issues. Water-based Liquid Scintillator is a novel detection medium that combines the advantages of pure water, including low attenuation, accurate direction reconstruction, and low cost, and those of liquid scintillator, including high light yield and low-threshold detection. When coupled with high efficiency, fast-timing photosensors, such as Large Area Picosecond PhotoDetectors, Water-based Liq…
Jinping Neutrino Experiment (Jinping) is proposed to significantly improve measurements on solar neutrinos and geoneutrinos in China Jinping Laboratory - a lab with a number of unparalleled features, thickest overburden, lowest reactor neutrino background, etc., which identify it as the world-best low-energy neutrino laboratory. The proposed experiment will have target mass of 4 kilotons of liquid scintillator or water-based liquid scintillator, with a fiducial mass of 2 kilotons for neutrino-electron scattering events and 3 kilotons for inverse-beta interaction events. A number of initial sen…
Detection of supernova relic neutrinos could provide key support for our current understanding of stellar and cosmological evolution, and precise measurements of these neutrinos could yield novel insights into the universe. In this paper, we studied the detection potential of supernova relic neutrinos using linear alkyl benzene (LAB) as a slow liquid scintillator. The linear alkyl benzene features good separation of Cherenkov and scintillation lights, thereby providing a new route for particle identification. We further addressed key issues in current experiments, including (1) the charged cur…
Environmental radioactivity is a dominant background for rare decay search experiments, and it is difficult to completely remove such an impurity from detector vessels. We propose a scintillation balloon as the active vessel of a liquid scintillator in order to identify this undesirable radioactivity. According to our feasibility studies, the scintillation balloon enables the bismuth--polonium sequential decay to be tagged with a 99.7\% efficiency, assuming a KamLAND (Kamioka Liquid scintillator AntiNeutrino Detector)-type liquid scintillator detector. This tagging of sequential decay using al…
For liquid-scintillator neutrino detectors of kiloton scale, the transparency of the organic solvent is of central importance. The present paper reports on laboratory measurements of the optical scattering lengths of the organic solvents PXE, LAB, and Dodecane which are under discussion for next-generation experiments like SNO+, Hanohano, or LENA. Results comprise the wavelength range from 415 to 440nm. The contributions from Rayleigh and Mie scattering as well as from absorption/re-emission processes are discussed. Based on the present results, LAB seems to be the preferred solvent for a larg…
Mixing plant for JUNO liquid scintillator: Design, construction, installation and commissioning
Institute of High Energy Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences（中国科学院高能物理研究所）；University of Chinese Academy of Sciences（中国科学院大学）；State Key Laboratory of Particle Detection and Electronics（粒子探测与电子学国家重点实验室）
To date, antineutrino experiments built for the purpose of demonstrating a nonproliferation capability have typically employed organic scintillators, were situated as close to the core as possible -typically a few meters to tens of meters distant and have not exceeded a few tons in size. One problem with this approach is that proximity to the reactor core require accommodation by the host facility. Water Cherenkov detectors located offsite, at distances of a few kilometers or greater, may facilitate non-intrusive monitoring and verification of reactor activities over a large area. As the stand…
In the late stages of nuclear burning for massive stars ($M>8~M_{\sun}$), the production of neutrino-antineutrino pairs through various processes becomes the dominant stellar cooling mechanism. As the star evolves, the energy of these neutrinos increases and in the days preceding the supernova a significant fraction of emitted electron anti-neutrinos exceeds the energy threshold for inverse beta decay on free hydrogen. This is the golden channel for liquid scintillator detectors because the coincidence signature allows for significant reductions in background signals. We find that the kiloton-…
We describe a compact, ultra-clean device used to deploy radioactive sources along the vertical axis of the KamLAND liquid-scintillator neutrino detector for purposes of calibration. The device worked by paying out and reeling in precise lengths of a hanging, small-gauge wire rope (cable); an assortment of interchangeable radioactive sources could be attached to a weight at the end of the cable. All components exposed to the radiopure liquid scintillator were made of chemically compatible UHV-cleaned materials, primarily stainless steel, in order to avoid contaminating or degrading the scintil…
The research of geoneutrino is a new interdisciplinary subject of particle experiments and geo-science. Potassium-40 ($^\text{40}$K) decays contribute roughly 1/3 of the radiogenic heat of the Earth, but it is still missing from the experimental observation. Solar neutrino experiments with liquid scintillators have observed uranium and thorium geoneutrinos and are the most promising in the low-background neutrino detection. In this article, we present the new concept of using liquid-scintillator Cherenkov detectors to detect the neutrino-electron elastic scattering process of $^\text{40}$K geo…
We present an improved search for neutrinoless double-beta ($0νββ$) decay of $^{136}$Xe in the KamLAND-Zen experiment. Owing to purification of the xenon-loaded liquid scintillator, we achieved a significant reduction of the $^{110m}$Ag contaminant identified in previous searches. Combining the results from the first and second phase, we obtain a lower limit for the $0νββ$ decay half-life of $T_{1/2}^{0ν} > 1.07 \times 10^{26}$ yr at 90% C.L., an almost sixfold improvement over previous limits. Using commonly adopted nuclear matrix element calculations, the corresponding upper limits on the ef…
The reactor neutrino and gallium anomalies can be tested with a 3-4 PBq (75-100 kCi scale) 144Ce-144Pr antineutrino beta-source deployed at the center or next to a large low-background liquid scintillator detector. The antineutrino generator will be produced by the Russian reprocessing plant PA Mayak as early as 2014, transported to Japan, and deployed in the Kamioka Liquid Scintillator Anti-Neutrino Detector (KamLAND) as early as 2015. KamLAND's 13 m diameter target volume provides a suitable environment to measure the energy and position dependence of the detected neutrino flux. A characteri…
Cosmic muon spallation backgrounds are ubiquitous in low-background experiments. For liquid scintillator-based experiments searching for neutrinoless double-beta decay, the spallation product $^{10}$C is an important background in the region of interest between 2-3 MeV and determines the depth requirement for the experiment. We have developed an algorithm based on a convolutional neural network that uses the temporal and spatial correlations in light emissions to identify $^{10}$C background events. With a typical kiloton-scale detector configuration like the KamLAND detector, we find that the…
The potential for using slow-fluor liquid scintillators to study low energy solar neutrinos and neutrinoless double beta decay (0nbb) is explored through a series of simulations. The fluorescence model assumed for the primary fluor has characteristics similar to acenaphthene, recently used to demonstrate Cherenkov separation at energies around 1 MeV. Results here indicate notably better directional reconstruction in large-scale detectors than has previously been suggested by other approaches, allowing better identification of low energy solar neutrinos. These studies indicate that a detector w…
We present the results of FLUKA simulations of the propagation of cosmogenic muons in a 20 kton spherical liquid scintillator detector underneath 700 to 900 meters of rock. A showering muon is one which deposits at least 3 GeV in the detector in addition to ionization energy. We find that 20 percent of muons are showering and a further 10 percent of muon events are muon bundles of which more than one muon enters the detector. In this range the showering and bundle fractions are robust against changes in the depth and topography, thus the total shower and bundle rate for a given experiment can …
Powerful new multi-kiloton liquid scintillator neutrino detectors, including NOvA and LENA, will come on-line within the next decade. When these are coupled with a modest-power decay-at-rest (DAR) neutrino source at short-baseline, these detectors can decisively address the recent ambiguous signals for neutrino oscillations at high Delta m^2. These detectors are > 50 m long, and so with a DAR beam, the characteristic oscillation wave will be apparent over the length of the detector, providing a powerful verification of the oscillation phenomena. LENA can simultaneously perform numubar to nueba…
An approach to developing a feasible neutrinoless double beta decay experiment capable of probing Majorana masses in the regime of the nondegenerate normal neutrino mass hierarchy is proposed. For such an experiment, this study suggests that 130Te is likely the best choice of candidate isotope and that metal-loaded liquid scintillator likely represents the best choice of detector technology. An evaluation of the required loading, scintillator properties and detector configuration is presented. While further development of Te-loaded liquid scintillator is required, recent progress in this area …
We consider the detector size, location, depth, background, and radio-purity required of a mid-Pacific deep-ocean instrument to accomplish the twin goals of making a definitive measurement of the electron anti-neutrino flux due to uranium and thorium decays from Earth's mantle and core, and of testing the hypothesis for a natural nuclear reactor at the core of Earth. We take the experience with the KamLAND detector in Japan as our baseline for sensitivity and background estimates. We conclude that an instrument adequate to accomplish these tasks should have an exposure of at least 10 kilotonne…
The KamLAND-Zen experiment has provided stringent constraints on the neutrinoless double-beta ($0νββ$) decay half-life in $^{136}$Xe using a xenon-loaded liquid scintillator. We report an improved search using an upgraded detector with almost double the amount of xenon and an ultralow radioactivity container, corresponding to an exposure of 970 kg yr of $^{136}$Xe. These new data provide valuable insight into backgrounds, especially from cosmic muon spallation of xenon, and have required the use of novel background rejection techniques. We obtain a lower limit for the $0νββ$ decay half-life of…
The recent development of Water-based Liquid Scintillator (WbLS), and the concurrent development of high-efficiency and high-precision-timing light sensors, has opened up the possibility for a new kind of large-scale detector capable of a very broad program of physics. The program would include determination of the neutrino mass hierarchy and observation of CP violation with long-baseline neutrinos, searches for proton decay, ultra-precise solar neutrino measurements, geo- and supernova neutrinos including diffuse supernova antineutrinos, and neutrinoless double beta decay. We outline here the…
The R&D for a new type of liquid xenon (LXe) detector is ongoing to search for the neutrinoless double-beta decay ($0\nu2β$). As a result of the KamLAND-Zen experiment, it is very important to realize the all active region detector for the energy deposition of the radiation. Newly developed additional BG reduction techniques will improve the sensitivity of $0\nu2β$ search in the future. Our detector concept is LXe stored in a new type of plastic scintillator vessel. The wavelength of LXe scintillation light is shifted to visible light from 175nm (VUV) on the inner surface of the vessel. Theref…
Large liquid scintillation detectors have been generally dedicated to low energy neutrino measurements, in the MeV energy region (as for example, KamLAND and Borexino). Herein we describe the potential employment of large detectors (>1 kiloton) for studies of higher energy neutrinos interactions, from the cosmic rays and as a long baseline neutrino detector. Generally when people have considered large new instruments such as Hanohano and LENA, they have abandoned the possibility of doing useful measurements with higher energy neutrino interactions since these produce enough light to illuminate…
We describe here measurements with a new device, the "dichroicon," a Winston-style light concentrator built out of dichroic reflectors, which could allow large-scale neutrino detectors to sort photons by wavelength with small overall light loss. Photon sorting would benefit large-scale water or ice Cherenkov detectors such as Hyper-Kamiokande or ICECUBE by providing a measure of dispersion, which in turn could allow improved position reconstruction and timing. For scintillator detectors like JUNO, upgrades to SNO+ or KamLAND-ZEN, or to water-based liquid scintillator detectors like Theia, dich…
HSE University（高等经济大学）；Joint Institute for Nuclear Research（联合核研究所）
Large-scale detectors consisting of a liquid scintillator target surrounded by an array of photo-multiplier tubes (PMTs) are widely used in the modern neutrino experiments: Borexino, KamLAND, Daya Bay, Double Chooz, RENO, and the upcoming JUNO with its satellite detector TAO. Such apparatuses are able to measure neutrino energy which can be derived from the amount of light and its spatial and temporal distribution over PMT channels. However, achieving a fine energy resolution in large-scale detectors is challenging. In this work, we present machine learning methods for energy reconstruction in…
We propose the liquid-scintillator detector LENA (Low Energy Neutrino Astronomy) as a next-generation neutrino observatory on the scale of 50 kt. The outstanding successes of the Borexino and KamLAND experiments demonstrate the large potential of liquid-scintillator detectors in low-energy neutrino physics. LENA's physics objectives comprise the observation of astrophysical and terrestrial neutrino sources as well as the investigation of neutrino oscillations. In the GeV energy range, the search for proton decay and long-baseline neutrino oscillation experiments complement the low-energy progr…
The Jiangmen Underground Neutrino Observatory (JUNO) is a multipurpose neutrino-oscillation experiment, with a 20 kiloton liquid scintillator detector of unprecedented 3\% energy resolution (at 1 MeV) at 700-meter deep underground. There are ~18,000 20-inch photomultiplier tubes (PMTs) in the central detector with an optical coverage greater than 75%. Control of the systematics of the energy response is crucial to archive the designed energy resolution as well as to reach 1% precision of the absolute energy scale. The detected number of photoelectrons in each PMT differs by two orders of magni…
We present a technique for separating double beta-decay from $^8$B solar neutrino interactions in a liquid scintillator detector. The technique uses position and time of photo-electrons (PEs) to separate directional Cherenkov light from isotropic sintillation light in the reconstruction of the kinematics of candidate events. Here we introduce a Cherenkov-scintillation space time boundary defined as the light cone in the 2-dimensional space of the arrival time and the polar angle of each PE with respect to the axis from the center of the detector to the vertex. The PEs located near the boundary…
The Jiangmen Underground Neutrino Observatory (JUNO) is a multipurpose neutrino-oscillation experiment designed to determine the neutrino mass hierarchy and to precisely measure oscillation parameters by detecting reactor antineutrinos, observe supernova neutrinos, study the atmospheric, solar neutrinos and geo-neutrinos, and perform exotic searches, with a 20 kiloton liquid scintillator detector of unprecedented $3\%$ energy resolution (at 1 MeV) at 700-meter deep underground and to have other rich scientific possibilities. Currently MC study shows a sensitivity of the mass hierarchy to be $\…
We describe the Monte Carlo (MC) simulation package of the Borexino detector and discuss the agreement of its output with data. The Borexino MC 'ab initio' simulates the energy loss of particles in all detector components and generates the resulting scintillation photons and their propagation within the liquid scintillator volume. The simulation accounts for absorption, reemission, and scattering of the optical photons and tracks them until they either are absorbed or reach the photocathode of one of the photomultiplier tubes. Photon detection is followed by a comprehensive simulation of the r…
The High Energy Physics community can benefit from a natural synergy in research activities into next-generation large-scale water and scintillator neutrino detectors, now being studied for remote reactor monitoring, discovery and exclusion applications in cooperative nonproliferation contexts. Since approximately 2010, US nonproliferation researchers, supported by the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), have been studying a range of possible applications of relatively large (100 ton) to very large (hundreds of kiloton) water and scintillator neutrino detectors. In parallel, the f…
More than forty years after the first detection of neutrinos from the Sun, the spectroscopy of solar neutrinos has proven to be an on-going success story. The long-standing puzzle about the observed solar neutrino deficit has been resolved by the discovery of neutrino flavor oscillations. Today's experiments have been able to solidify the standard MSW-LMA oscillation scenario by performing precise measurements over the whole energy range of the solar neutrino spectrum. This article reviews the enabling experimental technologies: On the one hand mutli-kiloton-scale water Cherenkov detectors per…
Neutrino geophysics, the study of the Earth's interior by measuring the fluxes of geologically produced neutrino at its surface, is a new interdisciplinary field of science, rapidly developing as a synergy between geology, geophysics and particle physics. Geoneutrinos, antineutrinos from long-lived natural isotopes responsible for the radiogenic heat flux, provide valuable information for the chemical composition models of the Earth. The calculations of the expected geoneutrino signal are discussed, together with experimental aspects of geoneutrino detection, including the description of possi…
This article describes the physics and nonproliferation goals of WATCHMAN, the WAter Cherenkov Monitor for ANtineutrinos. The baseline WATCHMAN design is a kiloton scale gadolinium-doped (Gd) light water Cherenkov detector, placed 13 kilometers from a civil nuclear reactor in the United States. In its first deployment phase, WATCHMAN will be used to remotely detect a change in the operational status of the reactor, providing a first- ever demonstration of the potential of large Gd-doped water detectors for remote reactor monitoring for future international nuclear nonproliferation applications…
The Jiangmen Underground Neutrino Observatory~(JUNO) features a 20~kt multi-purpose underground liquid scintillator sphere as its main detector. Some of JUNO's features make it an excellent experiment for $^8$B solar neutrino measurements, such as its low-energy threshold, its high energy resolution compared to water Cherenkov detectors, and its much large target mass compared to previous liquid scintillator detectors. In this paper we present a comprehensive assessment of JUNO's potential for detecting $^8$B solar neutrinos via the neutrino-electron elastic scattering process. A reduced 2~MeV…
