https://doi.org/10.1140/epjc/s10052-022-10656-8
Regular Article - Experimental Physics
Radiopurity of a kg-scale PbWO
cryogenic detector produced from archaeological Pb for the RES-NOVA experiment
1
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, 94720, Berkeley, CA, USA
2
INFN Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso, Via G. Acitelli 22, 67100, Assergi, Italy
3
Max-Planck-Institut für Physik, Föhringer Ring 6, 80805, Munich, Germany
4
Dipartimento di Fisica, Università di Milano-Bicocca, Piazza della Scienza 3, 20126, Milan, Italy
5
INFN Sezione di Milano-Bicocca, Piazza della Scienza 3, 20126, Milan, Italy
6
Gran Sasso Science Institute, Viale F. Crispi 7, 67100, L’Aquila, Italy
7
Institute for Nuclear Research of NASU, 03028, Kyiv, Ukraine
8
INFN Sezione di Genova and Università di Genova, Via Dodecaneso 33, 16146, Genoa, Italy
9
Institute of Scintillation Materials of NASU, 61072, Kharkiv, Ukraine
10
INFN Sezione di Roma-1, P.le Aldo Moro 2, 00185, Rome, Italy
11
National Science Center ‘Kharkiv Institute of Physics and Technology’, 61108, Kharkiv, Ukraine
12
Department of Physics, Engineering Physics and Astronomy, Queen’s University, K7L 3N6, Kingston, ON, Canada
13
Physik-Department and Excellence Cluster Origins, Technische Universität München, James-Franck-Straße 1, 85747, Garching, Germany
ag
luca.pattavina@lngs.infn.it
an
andrei.puiu@gssi.it
Received:
29
March
2022
Accepted:
28
July
2022
Published online:
10
August
2022
RES-NOVA is a newly proposed experiment for detecting neutrinos from astrophysical sources, mainly Supernovae, using an array of cryogenic detectors made of PbWO crystals produced from archaeological Pb. This unconventional material, characterized by intrinsic high radiopurity, enables low-background levels in the region of interest for the neutrino detection via Coherent Elastic neutrino-Nucleus Scattering (CE
NS). This signal lies at the detector energy threshold, O(1 keV), and it is expected to be hidden by naturally occurring radioactive contaminants of the crystal absorber. Here, we present the results of a radiopurity assay on a 0.84 kg PbWO crystal produced from archaeological Pb operated as a cryogenic detector. The crystal internal radioactive contaminations are: 
Th <40 
Bq/kg, 
U <30 Bq/kg, 
Ra 1.3 mBq/kg and 
Pb 22.5 mBq/kg. We also present a background projection for the final experiment and possible mitigation strategies for further background suppression. The achieved results demonstrate the feasibility of realizing this new class of detectors.
© The Author(s) 2022
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Funded by SCOAP3. SCOAP3 supports the goals of the International Year of Basic Sciences for Sustainable Development.
