Development of a Prototype for a Low Dead Time Dark Matter Detector using Superheated Liquid

• Author / Creator

  Mitra, Pitam

• PICASSO (Project in Canada to Search for Supersymmetric Objects) is a direct dark matter search experiment located at SNOLAB. PICASSO uses su- perheated Freon-10 (C4 F10 ) as target for elastic scattering of Weakly Interact- ing Massive Particles (WIMPs) which are the most favored particle candidates for dark matter. In this thesis, a “geyser”, a small-scale working prototype of a low dead-time dark matter detector, is described. This detector has a novel design for the recovery of the active fluid. It is demonstrated that the detector can stably sustain superheated fluid for more than 48 hours. Systematic studies have been performed of the stability, the dead time, energy thresholds and the operational parameters of the geyser. The geyser was operated stably for more than 73 hours, out of which 40 hours of thermodynamic, optical and acoustic data were analysed. An image analysis algorithm was developed to localize events. Acoustic data was analyzed using techniques from the PICASSO experiment. A strong discrimination effect between alpha-like events and nuclear recoil-like events was found.

• Subjects / Keywords

  • Geyser
  • Superheated liquid
  • PICASSO
  • Dark matter
  • Low dead time

• Graduation date

  Fall 2013

• Type of Item

  Thesis

• Degree

  Master of Science

• DOI

  https://doi.org/10.7939/R3H98ZN36

• License

  This thesis is made available by the University of Alberta Libraries with permission of the copyright owner solely for non-commercial purposes. This thesis, or any portion thereof, may not otherwise be copied or reproduced without the written consent of the copyright owner, except to the extent permitted by Canadian copyright law.