Molecular sieve vacuum swing adsorption purification and radon reduction system for gaseous dark matter and rare-event detectors

Fuente: arXiv
Enregistré dans:
Détails bibliographiques
Auteurs principaux: Gregorio, R. R. Marcelo, Spooner, N. J. C., Dastgiri, F., Ezeribe, A. C., Lane, G., McLean, A. G., Miuchi, K., Ogawa, H.
Format: Preprint
Publié: 2023
Sujets:
Accès en ligne:
Tags: Ajouter un tag
Pas de tags, Soyez le premier à ajouter un tag!
_version_ 1866929229970538496
author Gregorio, R. R. Marcelo
Spooner, N. J. C.
Dastgiri, F.
Ezeribe, A. C.
Lane, G.
McLean, A. G.
Miuchi, K.
Ogawa, H.
author_facet Gregorio, R. R. Marcelo
Spooner, N. J. C.
Dastgiri, F.
Ezeribe, A. C.
Lane, G.
McLean, A. G.
Miuchi, K.
Ogawa, H.
contents In the field of directional dark matter experiments, SF6 has emerged as an ideal target gas. A critical challenge with this gas, and with other proposed gases, is the effective removal of contaminant gases. This includes radon which produce unwanted background events, but also common pollutants such as water, oxygen, and nitrogen, which can capture ionisation electrons, resulting in loss of detector gas gain over time. We present here a novel molecular sieve (MS) based gas recycling system for the simultaneous removal of both radon and common pollutants from SF6. The apparatus has the additional benefit of minimising gas required in experiments and utilises a Vacuum Swing Adsorption (VSA) technique for continuous, long-term operation. The gas system's capabilities were tested with a 100 L low-pressure SF6 Time Projection Chamber (TPC) detector. For the first time, we present a newly developed low-radioactive MS type 5A. This material was found to emanate radon at 98% less per radon captured compared to commercial counterparts, the lowest known MS emanation at the time of writing. Consequently, the radon activity in the TPC detector was reduced, with an upper limit of less than 7.2 mBq at a 95% confidence level (C.L.). Incorporation of MS types 3A and 4A to absorb common pollutants was found successfully to mitigate against gain deterioration while recycling the target gas.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2312_07720
institution arXiv
publishDate 2023
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Molecular sieve vacuum swing adsorption purification and radon reduction system for gaseous dark matter and rare-event detectors
Gregorio, R. R. Marcelo
Spooner, N. J. C.
Dastgiri, F.
Ezeribe, A. C.
Lane, G.
McLean, A. G.
Miuchi, K.
Ogawa, H.
Instrumentation and Detectors
In the field of directional dark matter experiments, SF6 has emerged as an ideal target gas. A critical challenge with this gas, and with other proposed gases, is the effective removal of contaminant gases. This includes radon which produce unwanted background events, but also common pollutants such as water, oxygen, and nitrogen, which can capture ionisation electrons, resulting in loss of detector gas gain over time. We present here a novel molecular sieve (MS) based gas recycling system for the simultaneous removal of both radon and common pollutants from SF6. The apparatus has the additional benefit of minimising gas required in experiments and utilises a Vacuum Swing Adsorption (VSA) technique for continuous, long-term operation. The gas system's capabilities were tested with a 100 L low-pressure SF6 Time Projection Chamber (TPC) detector. For the first time, we present a newly developed low-radioactive MS type 5A. This material was found to emanate radon at 98% less per radon captured compared to commercial counterparts, the lowest known MS emanation at the time of writing. Consequently, the radon activity in the TPC detector was reduced, with an upper limit of less than 7.2 mBq at a 95% confidence level (C.L.). Incorporation of MS types 3A and 4A to absorb common pollutants was found successfully to mitigate against gain deterioration while recycling the target gas.
title Molecular sieve vacuum swing adsorption purification and radon reduction system for gaseous dark matter and rare-event detectors
topic Instrumentation and Detectors
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2312.07720