Evaluation of the Neutron Background in a Direct WIMP Detector with Neutron Veto System Based on Gd-doped Liquid Scintillator

TL;DR

This paper evaluates neutron backgrounds in a direct WIMP detector with a Gd-doped liquid scintillator veto system, demonstrating significant background reduction and sensitivity improvements through Geant4 simulations.

Contribution

It introduces a neutron veto system using Gd-doped scintillator for WIMP detectors and estimates its effectiveness via detailed simulations.

Findings

Neutron background can be reduced to about 0.1 events per year per tonne.

The detector can reach a sensitivity of approximately 6×10^{-11} pb for WIMP-nucleon cross-section.

The proposed system effectively suppresses neutron-induced backgrounds in direct detection experiments.

Abstract

A direct WIMP (Weakly Interacting Massive Particle) detector with a neutron veto system is designed to better reject neutrons. Two experimental configurations are studied in the present paper: one is for an Xe detector enclosed in a Gd-loaded scintillator and the other one is for an Xe detector placed inside a reactor neutrino detector. The Gd-doped liquid scintillator (or the neutrino detector) is used as a neutron veto device. The neutron backgrounds for the two experimental designs have been estimated using Geant4 simulations. The results show that the neutron backgrounds can decrease to O(0.1) events per year per tonne of liquid Xenon. We calculate the sensitivities to spin-independent WIMP-nucleon elastic scattering. An exposure of one tonne $\times$ year could reach a cross-section of about 6$\times$$10^{-11}$ pb.