The 136Xe double-beta-decay track experiment

• Published in: Nuclear instruments & methods in physics research. Section A, Accelerators, spectrometers, detectors and associated equipment Vol. 303; no. 2; pp. 309 - 322
• Main Authors: Artemiev, V.A., Brakchman, E.V., Ivanovsky, M.A., Karelin, A.K., Kirichenko, V.V., Knyazev, V.M., Kozodaeva, O.M., Lubimov, V.A., Mitin, A.I., Nikolaev, V.P., Tsvetkova, T.N., Zeldovich, O.Ya
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier B.V 01.06.1991
• ISSN: 0168-9002; 1872-9576
• DOI: 10.1016/0168-9002(91)90797-T

A detector for studying the 136Xe 2β-decay with a proportional drift chamber of volume V = 13 m 3 and operating with 10 kg of 136Xe is considered. A limit of T 1 2 (2β0ν) > 10 23 yr can be reached at the sea level. The invesigation of background with a prototype (size (1.0×0.8×0.4) m 3 and 136Xe mass 0.5 kg) showed that the track information allows a high background-rejection coefficient (> 10 6). The technique proposed in this article allows the defining of the admixture of 222Rn in the working gas at a level of 10 −20−10 −21 atom/atom. A half-life limit of T 1 2 (2β2ν) > 2×10 19 yr (90% CL) was obtained.