Search for rare processes with ZnWO4 crystal scintillators

P. Belli; R. Bernabei; F. Cappella; R. Cerulli; F.A. Danevich; S. d’Angelo; V.V. Kobychev; A. Incicchitti; D.V. Poda; V.I. Tretyak

doi:10.1051/epjconf/20136501002

Proceedings

Open Access

EPJ Web of Conferences 65, 01002 (2014)
https://doi.org/10.1051/epjconf/20136501002

Search for rare processes with ZnWO₄ crystal scintillators

P. Belli¹, R. Bernabei¹^,2, F. Cappella³^,4, R. Cerulli⁵, F.A. Danevich⁶, S. d’Angelo¹^,2, V.V. Kobychev⁶, A. Incicchitti³, D.V. Poda⁶ and V.I. Tretyak⁶

¹ INFN sezione Roma ’Tor Vergata’ , I-00133 Rome, Italy
² Dipartimento di Fisica, Università di Roma ’Tor Vergata’, I-00133 Rome, Italy
³ INFN sezione Roma, I-00185 Rome, Italy
⁴ Dipartimento di Fisica, Università di Roma ’La Sapienza’, I-00185 Rome, Italy
⁵ INFN, Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso, I-67100 Assergi (AQ), Italy
⁶ Institute for Nuclear Research, MSP 03680 Kyiv, Ukraine

Published online: 10 January 2014

Abstract

Radiopure ZnWO₄ crystal scintillators with mass (0.1–0.7 kg) have been developed and put inmeasurement in the Gran Sasso National Laboratories of the INFN to search for rare processes. The radioactive contamination of the crystals have been estimated and the double beta decay of zinc and tungsten isotopes was searched for, reaching a sensitivity at the level of 10¹⁸−10²¹ yr; in addition a new half-life limit on alpha transition of ¹⁸³W to the metastable excited level of ¹⁷⁹Hf has also been obtained. The achieved radiopurity of the ZnWO₄ crystals make them very promising detectors for ββ decay investigations while their anisotropic features make them very interesting detectors to investigate dark matter particles directionality.

© Owned by the authors, published by EDP Sciences, 2014

This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License 2.0, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.