CALIS—A CALibration Insertion System for the DarkSide-50 dark matter search experiment

P. Agnes (1) , I.F.M. Albuquerque , T. Alexander , A.K. Alton , D.M. Asner , H.O. Back , B. Baldin , K. Biery , V. Bocci , G. Bonfini , W. Bonivento , M. Bossa , B. Bottino , A. Brigatti , J. Brodsky , F. Budano , S. Bussino , M. Cadeddu , L. Cadonati , M. Cadoni , F. Calaprice , N. Canci , A. Candela , M. Caravati , M. Cariello , M. Carlini , S. Catalanotti , P. Cavalcante , A. Chepurnov , C. Cicalò , A.G. Cocco , G. Covone , D. d'Angelo , M. d'Incecco , S. Davini , S. de Cecco (2) , M. de Deo , M. de Vincenzi , A. Derbin , A. Devoto , F. Di Eusanio , G. Di Pietro , C. Dionisi , E. Edkins , A. Empl , A. Fan , G. Fiorillo , K. Fomenko , G. Forster , D. Franco (1) , F. Gabriele , C. Galbiati , S. Giagu , C. Giganti (2) , G.K. Giovanetti , A.M. Goretti , F. Granato , L. Grandi , M. Gromov , M. Guan , Y. Guardincerri , B.R. Hackett , K. Herner , D. Hughes , P. Humble , E.V. Hungerford , Al. Ianni , An. Ianni , I. James , T.N. Johnson , C. Jollet (3) , K. Keeter , C.L. Kendziora , G. Koh , D. Korablev , G. Korga , A. Kubankin , X. Li , M. Lissia , B. Loer , P. Lombardi , G. Longo , Y. Ma , I.N. Machulin , A. Mandarano , S.M. Mari , J. Maricic , L. Marini , C.J. Martoff , A. Meregaglia (3) , P.D. Meyers , R. Milincic , J.D. Miller , D. Montanari , A. Monte , B.J. Mount , V.N. Muratova , P. Musico , J. Napolitano , A. Navrer Agasson (2) , S. Odrowski , M. Orsini , F. Ortica , L. Pagani , M. Pallavicini , E. Pantic , S. Parmeggiano , K. Pelczar , N. Pelliccia , A. Pocar , S. Pordes , D.A. Pugachev , H. Qian , K. Randle , G. Ranucci , M. Razeti , A. Razeto , B. Reinhold , A.L. Renshaw , M. Rescigno , Q. Riffard (1) , A. Romani , B. Rossi , N. Rossi , D. Rountree , D. Sablone , P. Saggese , R. Saldanha , W. Sands , C. Savarese , B. Schlitzer , E. Segreto , D.A. Semenov , E. Shields , P.N. Singh , M.D. Skorokhvatov , O. Smirnov , A. Sotnikov , C. Stanford , Y. Suvorov , R. Tartaglia , J. Tatarowicz , G. Testera , A. Tonazzo (1) , P. Trinchese , E.V. Unzhakov , M. Verducci , A. Vishneva , B. Vogelaar , M. Wada , S. Walker , H. Wang , Y. Wang , A.W. Watson , S. Westerdale , J. Wilhelmi , M.M. Wojcik , Xi. Xiang , X. Xiao , J. Xu , C. Yang , A. Zec , W. Zhong , C. Zhu , G. Zuzel

1 APC (UMR_7164) - AstroParticule et Cosmologie
2 LPNHE (UMR_7585) - Laboratoire de Physique Nucléaire et de Hautes Énergies
3 IPHC - Institut Pluridisciplinaire Hubert Curien

This paper describes the design, fabrication, commissioning and use of a CALibration source Insertion System (CALIS) in the DarkSide-50 direct dark matter search experiment. CALIS deploys radioactive sources into the liquid scintillator veto to characterize the detector response and detection efficiency of the DarkSide-50 Liquid Argon Time Projection Chamber, and the surrounding 30 t organic liquid scintillator neutron veto. It was commissioned in September 2014 and has been used successfully in several gamma and neutron source campaigns since then. A description of the hardware and an excerpt of calibration analysis results are given below.

Keywords: Dark matter; WIMP; Noble liquid detectors; Low-background detectors; Liquid scintillators; Radioactive source calibration; calibration device; insertion device; remote operation; scintillation counter: liquid; time projection chamber: liquid argon; dark matter: detector; calibration; fabrication; efficiency; hardware; organic compounds; detector: design

Domains: Physics [physics]; Physics [physics]; Instrumentation and Detectors [physics.ins-det]

P. Agnes, I.F.M. Albuquerque, T. Alexander, A.K. Alton, D.M. Asner, et al.. CALIS—A CALibration Insertion System for the DarkSide-50 dark matter search experiment. JINST, 2017, 12 (12), pp.T12004. ⟨10.1088/1748-0221/12/12/T12004⟩. ⟨hal-01703745⟩