https://doi.org/10.1140/epjc/s10052-022-10184-5
Regular Article - Experimental Physics
Simulation-based design study for the passive shielding of the COSINUS dark matter experiment
1
Max-Planck-Institut für Physik, 80805, Munich, Germany
2
INFN-Sezione di Roma, 00185, Rome, Italy
3
Gran Sasso Science Institute, 67100, L’Aquila, Italy
4
INFN-Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso, 67010, Assergi, Italy
5
Institut für Hochenergiephysik der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1050, Vienna, Austria
6
Dipartimento di Scienze Fisiche e Chimiche, Università degli Studi dell’Aquila, 67100, L’Aquila, Italy
7
Atominstitut, Technische Universität Wien, 1020, Vienna, Austria
8
SICCAS-Shanghai Institute of Ceramics, 200050, Shanghai, People’s Republic of China
9
Helsinki Institute of Physics, 00560, Helsinki, Finland
10
INFN-Laboratori Nazionali del Sud, 95125, Catania, Italy
c
natalia.dimarco@lngs.infn.it
h
alexander.fuss@oeaw.ac.at
Received:
18
June
2021
Accepted:
4
March
2022
Published online:
22
March
2022
The COSINUS (Cryogenic Observatory for SIgnatures seen in Next-generation Underground Searches) experiment aims at the detection of dark matter-induced recoils in sodium iodide (NaI) crystals operated as scintillating cryogenic calorimeters. The detection of both scintillation light and phonons allows performing an event-by-event signal to background discrimination, thus enhancing the sensitivity of the experiment. The choice of using NaI crystals is motivated by the goal of probing the long-standing DAMA/LIBRA results using the same target material. The construction of the experimental facility is foreseen to start by 2021 at the INFN Gran Sasso National Laboratory (LNGS) in Italy. It consists of a cryostat housing the target crystals shielded from the external radioactivity by a water tank acting, at the same time, as an active veto against cosmic ray-induced events. Taking into account both environmental radioactivity and intrinsic contamination of materials used for cryostat, shielding and infrastructure, we performed a careful background budget estimation. The goal is to evaluate the number of events that could mimic or interfere with signal detection while optimising the geometry of the experimental setup. In this paper we present the results of the detailed Monte Carlo simulations we performed, together with the final design of the setup that minimises the residual amount of background particles reaching the detector volume.
© The Author(s) 2022
Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
Funded by SCOAP3
