An exploratory study of a tellurium-loaded liquid scintillator based on water and p-dioxane

Fuente: arXiv
Enregistré dans:
Détails bibliographiques
Auteurs principaux: Liang, Ye, Sun, Haozhe, Wang, Zhe
Format: Preprint
Publié: 2025
Sujets:
Accès en ligne:
Tags: Ajouter un tag
Pas de tags, Soyez le premier à ajouter un tag!
_version_ 1866918245094653952
author Liang, Ye
Sun, Haozhe
Wang, Zhe
author_facet Liang, Ye
Sun, Haozhe
Wang, Zhe
contents Tellurium-loaded liquid scintillators are critical for neutrinoless double-beta decay experiments. However, conventional organic scintillators are constrained by the limited solubility of organic tellurium compounds compared with that of inorganic ones in water, whereas water-based scintillators are likely constrained by the destabilization of surfactants caused by inorganic tellurium compounds. In this work, a surfactant-free water-containing route is explored, in which an aqueous telluric acid solution is introduced into a water-miscible organic scintillator comprising p-dioxane, naphthalene, and PPO. The phase behavior of this system is mapped to delineate homogeneous-mixture domains and to estimate practical upper bounds on tellurium loading. Optical properties are characterized by UV-visible absorption spectroscopy and fluorescence spectroscopy. The scintillation light yield is obtained with a relative method that compares to a reference LAB-PPO scintillator. The measurements demonstrate scintillation quenching induced by water and by tellurium acid. These results provide benchmarks for water-containing and surfactant-free formulations and support the development of high-loading liquid scintillators for future detector design.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2505_13926
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle An exploratory study of a tellurium-loaded liquid scintillator based on water and p-dioxane
Liang, Ye
Sun, Haozhe
Wang, Zhe
Instrumentation and Detectors
High Energy Physics - Experiment
Tellurium-loaded liquid scintillators are critical for neutrinoless double-beta decay experiments. However, conventional organic scintillators are constrained by the limited solubility of organic tellurium compounds compared with that of inorganic ones in water, whereas water-based scintillators are likely constrained by the destabilization of surfactants caused by inorganic tellurium compounds. In this work, a surfactant-free water-containing route is explored, in which an aqueous telluric acid solution is introduced into a water-miscible organic scintillator comprising p-dioxane, naphthalene, and PPO. The phase behavior of this system is mapped to delineate homogeneous-mixture domains and to estimate practical upper bounds on tellurium loading. Optical properties are characterized by UV-visible absorption spectroscopy and fluorescence spectroscopy. The scintillation light yield is obtained with a relative method that compares to a reference LAB-PPO scintillator. The measurements demonstrate scintillation quenching induced by water and by tellurium acid. These results provide benchmarks for water-containing and surfactant-free formulations and support the development of high-loading liquid scintillators for future detector design.
title An exploratory study of a tellurium-loaded liquid scintillator based on water and p-dioxane
topic Instrumentation and Detectors
High Energy Physics - Experiment
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2505.13926