The GeMSE facility for low-background γ-ray spectrometry
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BORIS DOI
Date of Publication
2016
Publication Type
Article
Division/Institute
Series
Journal of instrumentation
ISSN or ISBN (if monograph)
1748-0221
Publisher
Institute of Physics Publishing IOP
Language
English
Publisher DOI
Description
We describe a new high-purity germanium (HPGe) detector setup for low-background γ-ray spectrometry. The GeMSE facility (Germanium Material and meteorite Screening Experi- ment) is dedicated to material screening for rare event searches in astroparticle physics as well as to the characterization of meteorites. It is installed in a medium depth (~620 m.w.e.) underground laboratory in Switzerland in a multi-layer shielding and is equipped with an active muon veto. We have reached a very competitive integral background rate of (246 ± 2) counts/day (100–2700 keV) and measured a sensitivity of ~0.5–0.6 mBq/kg for long-lived isotopes from the 238U/232Th chains in a ~1 kg sample screened for ~27 days. An extrapolation to higher sample masses and mea- surement times suggests a maximum sensitivity in the O(50) μBq/kg range. We describe the data analysis based on Bayesian statistics, background simulations, the efficiency calibration and first sample measurements.
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File | File Type | Format | Size | License | Publisher/Copright statement | Content | |
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Sivers_2016_J._Inst._11_P12017 Kopie.pdf | text | Adobe PDF | 1.1 MB | publisher | published |