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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2026

DC Cryogenic Modeling of Open-Source SkyWater 130 nm MOSFETs at 77 K Using BSIM4

Cryogenic applications in high-energy physics (HEP) demand reliable, low-power CMOS electronics capable of operating at liquid nitrogen temperatures (77 K). The open-source SkyWater 130nm (SKY130) CMOS process has previously been shown to operate at temperatures as low as 4 K making it a promising candidate for HEP applications. In this work, we characterize and model SKY130 low-threshold voltage transistors at 77 K, which is a temperature commonly used in modeling applications for liquid argon detectors. DC characteristic measurements were performed at both room temperature and liquid nitrogen temperature. We created a cryogenic modeling approach to produce a SPICE-compatible, isothermal BSIM4-based model for select transistor sizes at 77 K. The resulting model agrees with data at 77 K with an average error on the order of 20% (relative RMS) and shows no dependence on drain voltage. Due to the open-source nature of SKY130, we have made our models publicly available on Github. We hope this work will continue the trend for democratizing circuit design at cryogenic temperatures in high-energy physics by enabling open access to accurate cryogenic CMOS device models at 77 K.

Beall, F. [Texas U., Arlington]↗
DOE OSTI2022

High Energy Experimental Research Effort: Intensity Frontier Physics with Liquid Argon Time Projection Chambers (Final Technical Report DE-SC0017925)

The proposal “University of Florida High Energy Physics Intensity Frontier Research: Liquid Argon Detectors” requested one year of funding support for the PI, one postdoc and one graduate student to start their involvement in ongoing and upcoming experiments that use Liquid Argon Time Projection Chambers (LAr TPCs) to reconstruct neutrino interactions. Specifically, it was proposed that the group join the Short Baseline Near Detector (SBND) at Fermilab and that the PI continue their involvement in the Deep Underground Neutrino Detector (DUNE).

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2025

Spatial and temporal evaluations of the liquid argon purity in ProtoDUNE-SP

Liquid argon time projection chambers (LArTPCs) rely on highly pure argon to ensure that ionization electrons produced by charged particles reach readout arrays. ProtoDUNE Single-Phase (ProtoDUNE-SP) was an approximately 700-ton liquid argon detector intended to prototype the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE) Far Detector Horizontal Drift module. It contains two drift volumes bisected by the cathode plane assembly, which is biased to create an almost uniform electric field in both volumes. The DUNE Far Detector modules must have robust cryogenic systems capable of filtering argon and supplying the TPC with clean liquid. This paper will explore comparisons of the argon purity measured by the purity monitors with those measured using muons in the TPC from October 2018 to November 2018. A new method is introduced to measure the liquid argon purity in the TPC using muons crossing both drift volumes of ProtoDUNE-SP. For extended periods on the timescale of weeks, the drift electron lifetime was measured to be above 30 ms using both systems. A particular focus will be placed on the measured purity of argon as a function of position in the detector.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2021

Argonaut - A Robotic System for Cryogenic Environments

Fermilab and the HEP community invest significant resources into liquid argon detectors. The largest and most expensive of these detectors will be located in the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE). However, recent experiences have shown that there are limited avenues of monitoring, intervention, and interaction in the internal liquid environment. This proposal shows a technological path that could provide a valuable tool to ensure or at least improve the management of these HEP detectors. The development of a robotic system named Argonaut will demonstrate several technologies including 1) demonstration of suitable mobility of a small robotic device at liquid argon temperatures, 2) demonstration of wireless communication, 3) demonstration of improved diagnostics capabilities - such as tunable optics with motion control, 4) demonstration of interconnectivity of a robotic system with hardware residing within the detector. This initial research will be a seed for extended development in cold robotics and associated technologies. This work will allow FNAL to contribute a significant technology capability to recent efforts to cryogenic detector operations.

43 PARTICLE ACCELERATORS↗
DOE OSTI2026

Helen Edwards Engineering Research Center

The new two-story facility is a critical element in support of Fermilab’s role as host laboratory for the international Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment and the Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility, providing space for engineering and detector R&D. The Edwards Center provides spaces for new endeavors such as liquid-argon detector development, the design of electronics, and chip development.

Fermilab, Fermilab↗
DOE OSTI2022

The role of ProtoDUNE-SP in future oscillation physics

Long-baseline oscillation experiments are entering a new phase where neutrino beams can provide ultra-high fuxes over long distances. These beams will lead to an era of high statistics in large neutrino detectors, creating new systematic uncertainty-limited analyses. The Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE) plans a high fux beam to travel 1300 km to 10-kT liquid argon detector modules. While neither the near detector nor the far detector has been constructed, prototypes of the DUNE Far Detector have been built and operated at CERN. One prototype, ProtoDUNE Single-Phase, is a full-scale mockup of the first 10-kT DUNE Far Detector module and can inform DUNE on detector performance and particle passage in argon. The proceedings discuss some published and in-progress results from ProtoDUNE-SP and how these results can impact current sensitivity studies and future analyses.

Diurba, Richard↗
DOE OSTI2025

Opportunities and challenges to study solar neutrinos with a Q-Pix pixel readout

The study of solar neutrinos presents significant opportunities in astrophysics, nuclear physics, and particle physics. However, the low-energy nature of these neutrinos introduces considerable challenges to isolate them from background events, requiring detectors with low-energy threshold, high spatial and energy resolutions, and low data rate. We present the study of solar neutrinos with a kiloton-scale liquid argon detector located underground, instrumented with a pixel readout using the Q-Pix technology. We explore the potential of using volume fiducialization, directional topological information, light signal coincidence, and pulse-shape discrimination to enhance solar neutrino sensitivity. We find that discriminating neutrino signals below 5 MeV is very difficult. However, we show that these methods are useful for the detection of solar neutrinos when external backgrounds are sufficiently understood and when the detector is built using low-background techniques. When building a workable background model for this study, we identify 𝛾 background from the cavern walls and from capture of 𝛼 particles in radon decay chains as both critical to solar neutrino sensitivity and significantly underconstrained by existing measurements. Finally, we highlight that the main advantage of the use of Q-Pix for solar neutrino studies lies in its ability to enable the continuous readout of all low-energy events with minimal data rates and manageable storage for further off-line analyses.

multi-purpose particle detectors↗
DOE OSTI2023

Sparse Convolutional Neural Networks for particle classification in ProtoDUNE-SP events

Deep Learning (DL) methods and Computer Vision are becoming important tools for event reconstruction in particle physics detectors. In this work, we report on the use of submanifold sparse convolutional neural networks (SparseNets) for the classification of track and shower hits from a DUNE prototype liquid-argon detector at CERN (ProtoDUNE-SP). By taking advantage of the three-dimensional nature of the problem we use a set of nine input features to classify sparse and locally dense hits associated to track or shower particles. The SparseNet has been trained on a test sample and shows promising results: efficiencies and purities greater than 90%. This has also been achieved with a considerable speedup and substantially less resource utilization with respect to other DL networks such as graph neural networks. This method offers great scalability advantages for future large neutrino detectors such as the planned DUNE experiment.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2020

Next Generation Noble Liquid Detectors

The research program here combines Generic and Directed R\&D for Liquid Noble Gas detectors for neutrino physics and dark matter. In neutrino physics and dark matter research, we are addressing some of the most fundamental questions in particle physics today by studying these tiny particles in the electron family. To study them, detectors must be large, high precision, and ideally have the ability to collect detailed information from both charge and light from neutrino and dark matter interactions. Precision detection combined with large scales can be challenging. Liquid Argon detectors mitigate some of these challenges given the nature of its interaction medium and it’s relatively inexpensive cost per ton. Significant progress has been made in the last 15 years in developing these kinds of detectors to be built and operated at large scales. However there are still challenges and new ideas in moving these detectors from ton scale to kiloton scale. To be able to get the most out of these kinds of detectors directed questions with respect to specific components running and colleting data in the detectors must be understood. As well, new ideas on how to best combine charge and light measurements may lead to new ways to learn new things with these detectors. Experimental test stands to conduct this work, as is done in this proposal, to accomplish both of these goals are critical to address both of these questions. In the test stand enabled under this grant at Yale University’s Wright lab, new developments in efficient small scale setups were developed, instrumentation developed for running and future experiments (the SBND experiment at Fermilab at present, the DUNE experiment in the future) were and will be tested, and new ideas for charge and light determination for new measurements are under study. The long term impact of this work in neutrino physcis is both for the short and long baseline programs originating at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory. At long baselines, the US flagship DUNE experiment will measure neutrino properties through neutrino oscillations using a beam originating at Fermilab and a massive LArTPC detector sited about a mile underground at the Sanford Underground Research Facility in Lead, South Dakota. Studies here on the high voltage for thes detectors, and ongoing work on charge and light production and collection in the TPC are relevant for the design and data taking of this and other LArTPC detectors to enable them to best measure the neutrinos created at Fermilab that then pass through the detector in South Dakota. What we learn in these detectors may ultimately change the course of how we understand neutrino’s impact in the early universe. What we learn about how to improve this detection technology and develop new ideas in Lar detectors in general may impact both future neutrino experiments and dark matter experiments.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2021

A Review of Basic Energy Reconstruction Techniques in Liquid Xenon and Argon Detectors for Dark Matter and Neutrino Physics Using NEST

Detectors based upon the noble elements, especially liquid xenon as well as liquid argon, as both single- and dual-phase types, require reconstruction of the energies of interacting particles, both in the field of direct detection of dark matter (weakly interacting massive particles WIMPs, axions, etc.) and in neutrino physics. Experimentalists, as well as theorists who reanalyze/reinterpret experimental data, have used a few different techniques over the past few decades. In this paper, we review techniques based on solely the primary scintillation channel, the ionization or secondary channel available at non-zero drift electric fields, and combined techniques that include a simple linear combination and weighted averages, with a brief discussion of the application of profile likelihood, maximum likelihood, and machine learning. Comparing results for electron recoils (beta and gamma interactions) and nuclear recoils (primarily from neutrons) from the Noble Element Simulation Technique (NEST) simulation to available data, we confirm that combining all available information generates higher-precision means, lower widths (energy resolution), and more symmetric shapes (approximately Gaussian) especially at keV-scale energies, with the symmetry even greater when thresholding is addressed. Near thresholds, bias from upward fluctuations matters. For MeV-GeV scales, if only one channel is utilized, an ionization-only-based energy scale outperforms scintillation; channel combination remains beneficial. We discuss here what major collaborations use.

argon↗
DOE OSTI2022

Understanding the enhancement of scintillation light in xenon-doped liquid argon

Measuring the scintillation light in noble gases is an important detection technique in particle physics. Numerous rare event searches like neutrino beam experiments, neutrino-less double beta-decay, and dark matter searches use argon-based detectors. In liquid argon, the light yield can be enhanced by the addition of a small quantity of xenon, where ~10–1000 ppm are added. The general enhancement mechanism and its pathway via an energy transfer between argon and xenon excimers is well known, however the importance of absorption of argon excimer emission by atomic xenon has not been fully appreciated. This absorption significantly reduces the light yield in commercially available argon (extracted from air) which contains trace amounts (~0.1 ppm) of xenon. The addition of a small xenon dopant of ~10 ppm recovers this lost light resulting in an increased light yield over un-doped argon of about a factor of two. Here, in this paper, we introduce a model for the light production in xenon doped argon, including absorption and re-emission, and compare it to the measured time dependence of light emission in xenon-doped argon.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗
DOE OSTI2026

Measuring the neutrino-oxygen neutral current quasielastic cross section using the accelerator neutrino neutron interaction experiment

The Accelerator Neutrino Neutron Interaction Experiment (ANNIE) is a 26-ton gadolinium-doped water Cherenkov detector located on-axis to Fermilab’s Booster Neutrino Beam (BNB). ANNIE is uniquely positioned to perform high-statistics measurements of neutrino-nucleus interactions in water, benefiting from a large neutrino flux due to a short (100-meter) baseline. A central focus of ANNIE’s physics program is the measurement of both charged current (CC) and neutral current (NC) cross sections on water, including neutral current quasielastic (NCQE) and CC-inclusive channels. The NCQE measurement is particularly critical for constraining uncertainties in rare-event searches such as the Diffuse Supernova Neutrino Background (DSNB), where atmospheric $\nu$NCQE interactions constitute a significant and poorly constrained background. This dissertation presents a measurement of the flux-averaged neutrino-oxygen neutral current quasielastic ($\nu$NCQE) cross section using $2.573 \times 10^{20}$~POT of BNB exposure from the 2022 and 2023 beam years. The $\nu$NCQE interaction is identified through the primary $\gamma$-rays produced by nuclear de-excitation of the residual $^{15}$N$^*$ or $^{15}$O$^*$ nucleus following nucleon knockout from $^{16}$O. A dedicated Monte Carlo (MC) re-tuning campaign was conducted using an americium-beryllium (AmBe) calibration source, Michel electrons from stopped muons, and throughgoing dirt muons originating upstream of the detector. This multi-sample approach provided a wide-ranging $\mathcal{O}(\text{MeV})$--$\mathcal{O}(\text{GeV})$ dataset for tuning the simulated detector response, which was subsequently validated against AmBe neutron and Michel electron data for use in the $\nu$NCQE analysis. A dedicated laser calibration campaign was carried out to reduce timing uncertainties across the PMT system, enabling reconstruction of the BNB bunch substructure with sufficient resolution to serve as a background rejection tool. By selecting events in-time with individual neutrino bunches, beam-correlated $\nu$NCQE events are separated from diffuse and accelerator-induced backgrounds, notably skyshine neutrons and externally-originating events, that would otherwise dominate traditional charge-based selections within a small-scale, surface-level, short-baseline detector. A data-driven estimation of the skyshine neutron and external background rates was performed and incorporated into the systematic uncertainty budget. The flux-averaged $\nu$NCQE cross section on oxygen is measured to be $1.57 \pm 0.06\,(\text{stat.})$ $^{+0.91}_{-0.67}\,(\text{syst.})$ $\times 10^{-38}\ \text{cm}^{2}$. A full systematic budget is constructed by propagating uncertainties in the secondary hadronic interaction modeling, background cross section normalizations, detector response, neutrino flux, and the primary $\gamma$-ray emission probabilities from oxygen nuclear de-excitation. An idealized de-excitation model, constructed from existing measurements in the literature is developed to benchmark the predictions of the \textsc{GENIE} event generator. A comparison reveals that \textsc{GENIE} systematically overpredicts the primary $\gamma$-ray emission probability from oxygen de-excitation by a factor of $1.49\times$ for $E_\gamma > 6$~MeV and $3.07\times$ in the $3$--$6$~MeV band. This comparison motivates the dominant systematic uncertainty in this analysis, where a conservative uncertainty of $^{+39.9\%}_{-0\%}$ on the primary $\gamma$-ray signal prediction is assigned. The ANNIE result is consistent with and complementary to existing flux-averaged $\nu$NCQE cross section measurements from T2K and Super-Kamiokande, providing an independent measurement with a different detector, neutrino beam, and analysis methodology. Looking ahead, an upgrade to the ANNIE DAQ infrastructure enabling continuous extended readout will allow a complementary $\nu$NCQE neutron multiplicity measurement, directly relevant to constraining the NCQE background in DSNB searches, competitive with the recent T2K measurement at SK-Gd. The planned Super-SANDI upgrade, deploying a large Water-based Liquid Scintillator (WbLS) volume, will further extend ANNIE's reach to hadronic final states and exclusive NC channels, and enable joint measurements with liquid argon detectors sharing the BNB beamline ahead of DUNE and Hyper-Kamiokande.

Doran, Steven [Iowa State U.]↗
DOE OSTI2020

A global analysis strategy to resolve neutrino NSI degeneracies with scattering and oscillation data

Neutrino non-standard interactions (NSI) with the first generation of standard model fermions can span a parameter space of large dimension and exhibit degeneracies that cannot be broken by a single class of experiment. Oscillation experiments, together with neutrino scattering experiments, can merge their observations into a highly informational dataset to combat this problem. We consider combining neutrino-electron and neutrino-nucleus scattering data from the Borexino and COHERENT experiments, including a projection for the upcoming coherent neutrino scattering measurement at the CENNS-10 liquid argon detector. We extend the reach of these data sets over the NSI parameter space with projections for neutrino scattering at a future multi-ton scale dark matter detector and future oscillation measurements from atmospheric neutrinos at the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE). In order to perform this global anal- ysis, we adopt a novel approach using the copula method, utilized to combine posterior information from different experiments with a large, generalized set of NSI parameters. We find that the contributions from DUNE and a dark matter detector to the Borexino and COHERENT fits can improve constraints on the electron and quark NSI parameters by up to a factor of 2 to 3, even when relatively many NSI parameters are left free to vary in the analysis.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2021

DUNE Physics Program and Status

The Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE) is a next-generation long-baseline neutrino experiment with a 70-kt liquid argon detector at the Sanford Underground Research Facility (SURF) 1300 km from Fermilab. This programme includes studies of neutrino oscillations with a high-intensity muon-neutrino beam from Fermilab; as well as, proton decay and supernova neutrino burst searches. DUNE will resolve the neutrino mass hierarchy to a precision of 5σ, for all δ$_{CP}$ values, after 2 years of running with the nominal detector design and beam configuration. It has the potential to observe charge-parity violation in the neutrino sector to a precision of 3σ (5σ) after an exposure of 5 (10) years, for 50% of all δ$_{CP}$ values. The status and schedule of the project is also presented.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2021

Characterization and QC practice of 16-channel ADC ASIC at cryogenic temperature for Liquid Argon TPC front-end readout electronics system in DUNE experiment

ColdADC is a low-noise 16-channel analog-to-digital converter ASIC designed for cold readout electronics of Liquid Argon Time Projection Chambers (LArTPCs) in the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE). ColdADC was specifically designed for operation at cryogenic temperatures (77 K–89 K). Cold electronics is considered to be an enabling technology for liquid argon detectors in neutrino experiments. The main function of the chip is to digitize signals from the 16-channel charge-sensitive amplifier designed at BNL (LArASIC) and send digitized signals to the data aggregator and serializer chip (COLDATA). ColdADC operates with a resolution of 12 bits and a sampling rate of 2 MS/s per channel. A complete characterization of prototype chips was conducted at cryogenic temperature, involving power consumption, noise and linearity performance. In the first DUNE Far-Detector module, 384000 data channels will be read out, corresponding to 24000 ColdADC chips. Therefore, systematic testing of ColdADC chips at cryogenic temperature is vital for the quality and reliability of DUNE Single-Phase modules. We have developed a Quality Control (QC) test stand that includes ColdADC evaluation and characterization at cryogenic temperature. The QC procedure was applied to a first batch of 33 chips, corresponding to 528 data channels. The obtained results meet all the required DUNE specifications for ColdADC. Moreover, the testing outcome allowed us to identify possibilities of performance optimization that are currently being addressed in the design of the next version of the chip. The Quality Control procedure is proved to be successful and will be a reference design for future large-batch production testing of final ColdADC ASICs.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗
DOE OSTI2023

Production and testing of the large-area photon detector ArCLight

Compact large-area dielectric photon detectors that ensure modular noble liquid detectors can sense scintillation light signals for triggering and reconstruction purposes with minimal impact to the overall target volume. ArCLight is a small-volume, sizeable sensitive-area detector that consists of a light trap covered in a thin layer of TPB that can be placed inside a time projection chamber's electric field. These sensors are used in the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment Near Detector liquid argon (DUNE ND-LAr). They are constructed and tested at the University of Bern and will be deployed in the prototype experiment ProtoDUNE-ND. The talk discusses the details of assembling ArCLights, the quality control methods, and the test studies done with LEDs to assess their performance.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗
DOE OSTI2025

Toward a Robust Confirmation or Refutation of the Sterile-Neutrino Explanation of Short-Baseline Anomalies

The sterile neutrino interpretation of the LSND and MiniBooNE neutrino anomalies is currently being tested at three liquid argon detectors: MicroBooNE, SBND, and ICARUS. It has been argued that a degeneracy between 𝜈 𝜇 → 𝜈 𝑒 and 𝜈 𝑒 → 𝜈 𝑒 oscillations significantly degrades their sensitivity to sterile neutrinos. Through an independent study, we show two methods to eliminate this concern. First, we resolve this degeneracy by including external constraints on 𝜈𝑒 disappearance from the PROSPECT reactor experiment. Second, by properly analyzing the full three-dimensional parameter space, we demonstrate that the stronger-than-sensitivity exclusion from MicroBooNE alone already covers the entire 2⁢𝜎 preferred regions of MiniBooNE at the level of 2−3⁢𝜎. We show that upcoming searches at SBND and ICARUS can improve on this beyond the 4⁢𝜎 level, thereby providing a rigorous test of short-baseline anomalies.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2022

Determination of the argon spectral function from ( e , e ' p ) data

The E12-14-012 experiment, performed in Jefferson Lab Hall A, has measured the $(e, e'p)$ cross section in parallel kinematics using a natural argon target. Here, we report the full results of the analysis of the data set corresponding to beam energy 2.222 GeV, and spanning the missing momentum and missing energy range $15 \lesssim p_m \lesssim 300$ MeV/c and $12 \lesssim E_m \lesssim 80$ MeV. The reduced cross section, determined as a function of $p_m$ and $E_m$ with $\approx$4\% accuracy, has been fitted using the results of Monte Carlo simulations involving a model spectral function and including the effects of final state interactions. The overall agreement between data and simulations turns out to be quite satisfactory ($\chi^2$/n.d.o.f.=1.9). Furthermore, the resulting spectral function will provide valuable new information, needed for the interpretation of neutrino interactions in liquid argon detectors.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗