R. H. M. Tsang

Automated calibration system for a high-precision measurement of neutrino mixing angle θ13 with the Daya Bay antineutrino detectors

We describe the automated calibration system for the antineutrino detectors in the Daya Bay Neutrino Experiment. This system consists of 24 identical units instrumented on 8 identical 20-ton liquid scintillator detectors. Each unit is a fully automated robotic system capable of deploying an LED and various radioactive sources into the detector along given vertical axes. Selected results from performance studies of the calibration system are reported.

Assembly and Installation of the Daya Bay Antineutrino Detectors

The Daya Bay reactor antineutrino experiment is designed to make a precision measurement of the neutrino mixing angle θ_(13), and recently made the definitive discovery of its non-zero value. It utilizes a set of eight, functionally identical antineutrino detectors to measure the reactor flux and spectrum at baselines of ~ 300–2000 m from the Daya Bay and Ling Ao Nuclear Power Plants. The Daya Bay antineutrino detectors were built in an above-ground facility and deployed side-by-side at three underground experimental sites near and far from the nuclear reactors. This configuration allows the experiment to make a precision measurement of reactor antineutrino disappearance over km-long baselines and reduces relative systematic uncertainties between detectors and nuclear reactors. This paper describes the assembly and installation of the Daya Bay antineutrino detectors.

Measurement of cosmic-ray muons and muon-induced neutrons in the Aberdeen Tunnel Underground Laboratory

In this study, we have measured the muon flux and production rate of muon-induced neutrons at a depth of 611 m water equivalent. Our apparatus comprises three layers of crossed plastic scintillator hodoscopes for tracking the incident cosmic-ray muons and 760 L of a gadolinium-doped liquid scintillator for producing and detecting neutrons. The vertical muon intensity was measured to be Iμ = (5.7±0.6)×10–6 cm–2 s–1 sr–1. The yield of muon-induced neutrons in the liquid scintillator was determined to be Yn = (1.19 ± 0.08(stat) ± 0.21(syst)) × 10–4 neutrons/(μ•g•cm–2). A fit to the recently measured neutron yields at different depths gave a mean muon energy dependence of 0.76±0.03 for liquid-scintillator targets.