Assembly, apparatus, system and method (PRaVDA range telescope)

Some embodiments of the present invention provide apparatus for detecting particles of radiation comprising: a plurality of solid state semiconductor detector devices provided at spaced apart locations along a beam axis, the detector devices each being configured to generate an electrical signal indicative of passage of a particle through or absorption of a particle by the device; and at least one absorber portion configured to absorb at least a portion of an energy of a particle, wherein one said at least one absorber portion is provided in a particle path between at least one pair of adjacent detector devices, the apparatus being configured to provide an output signal indicative of the energy of a particle, the output signal provided being dependent on the electrical signals indicative of passage of a particle through or absorption of a particle by the devices

Assembly, apparatus, system and method (PRaVDA strip detector)

Some embodiments of the present invention provide a 2D position-sensitive detector assembly comprising at least three substantially planar detector portions arranged in overlapping relationship as viewed normal to a plane of the detector portions, each detector portion comprising an array of substantially parallel, linear detector elements, the detector elements of respective detector portions being mutually non-parallel, the detector elements each being configured to generate one or more electrical signals in response to interaction of a particle of radiation therewith

PRaVDA: The First Solid-State System for Proton Computed Tomography

Proton CT is widely recognised as a beneficial alternative to con- ventional X-ray CT for treatment planning in proton beam radiotherapy. A novel proton CT imaging system, based entirely on solid-state detec- tor technology, is presented. Compared to conventional scintillator-based calorimeters, positional sensitive detectors allow for multiple protons to be tracked per read out cycle, leading to a potential reduction in proton CT scan time. Design and characterisation of its components are discussed. An early proton CT image obtained with a fully solid-state imaging sys- tem is shown and accuracy (as defined in Section IV) in Relative Stopping Power to water (RSP) quantified. A solid-state imaging system for proton CT, based on silicon strip detectors, has been developed by the PRaVDA collaboration. The sys- tem comprises a tracking system that infers individual proton trajecto- ries through an imaging phantom, and a Range Telescope (RT) which records the corresponding residual energy (range) for each proton. A back-projection-then-filtering algorithm is used for CT reconstruction of an experimentally acquired proton CT scan. An initial experimental result for proton CT imaging with a fully solid-state system is shown for an imaging phantom, namely a 75 mm diameter PMMA sphere containing tissue substitute inserts,imaged with a passively-scattered 125 MeV beam. Accuracy in RSP is measured to be ≤1.6% for all the inserts shown. A fully solid-state imaging system for proton CT has been shown capable of imaging a phantom with protons and successfully improving RSP accuracy. These promising results, together with system the capabil- ity to cope with high proton fluences (2×108 protons/s), suggests that this research platform could improve current standards in treatment planning for proton beam radiotherapy

Search for light long-lived neutral particles that decay to collimated pairs of leptons or light hadrons in pp collisions at √s = 13 TeV with the ATLAS detector

A search for light long-lived neutral particles with masses in the O(MeV-GeV) range is presented. The analysis targets the production of long-lived dark photons in the decay of a Higgs boson produced via gluon-gluon fusion or in association with a W boson. Events that contain displaced collimated Standard Model fermions reconstructed in the calorimeter or muon spectrometer are selected in 139 fb−1 of √s = 13 TeV pp collision data collected by the ATLAS detector at the LHC. Background estimates for contributions from Standard Model processes and instrumental effects are extracted from data. The observed event yields are consistent with the expected background. Exclusion limits are reported on the production cross-section times branching fraction as a function of the mean proper decay length cτ of the dark photon, or as a function of the dark-photon mass and kinetic mixing parameter that quantifies the coupling between the Standard Model and potential hidden (dark) sectors. A Higgs boson branching fraction above 1% is excluded at 95% CL for a Higgs boson decaying into two dark photons for dark-photon mean proper decay lengths between 10 mm and 250 mm and dark photons with masses between 0.4 GeV and 2 GeV

A search for R-parity-violating supersymmetry in final states containing many jets in pp collisions at √s=13TeV with the ATLAS detector

A search for R-parity-violating supersymmetry in final states with high jet multiplicity is presented. The search uses 140fb−1 of proton-proton collision data at √s=13TeV collected by the ATLAS experiment during Run 2 of the Large Hadron Collider. The results are interpreted in the context of R-parity-violating supersymmetry models that feature prompt gluino-pair production decaying directly to three jets each or decaying to two jets and a neutralino which subsequently decays promptly to three jets. No significant excess over the Standard Model expectation is observed and exclusion limits at the 95% confidence level are extracted. Gluinos with masses up to 1800 GeV are excluded when decaying directly to three jets. In the cascade scenario, gluinos with masses up to 2340 GeV are excluded for a neutralino with mass up to 1250 GeV

How do you say ‘hello’? Personality impressions from brief novel voices

On hearing a novel voice, listeners readily form personality impressions of that speaker. Accurate or not, these impressions are known to affect subsequent interactions; yet the underlying psychological and acoustical bases remain poorly understood. Furthermore, hitherto studies have focussed on extended speech as opposed to analysing the instantaneous impressions we obtain from first experience. In this paper, through a mass online rating experiment, 320 participants rated 64 sub-second vocal utterances of the word ‘hello’ on one of 10 personality traits. We show that: (1) personality judgements of brief utterances from unfamiliar speakers are consistent across listeners; (2) a two-dimensional ‘social voice space’ with axes mapping Valence (Trust, Likeability) and Dominance, each driven by differing combinations of vocal acoustics, adequately summarises ratings in both male and female voices; and (3) a positive combination of Valence and Dominance results in increased perceived male vocal Attractiveness, whereas perceived female vocal Attractiveness is largely controlled by increasing Valence. Results are discussed in relation to the rapid evaluation of personality and, in turn, the intent of others, as being driven by survival mechanisms via approach or avoidance behaviours. These findings provide empirical bases for predicting personality impressions from acoustical analyses of short utterances and for generating desired personality impressions in artificial voices

Performance of the MALTA Telescope

MALTA is part of the Depleted Monolithic Active Pixel sensors designed in Tower 180nm CMOS imaging technology. A custom telescope with six MALTA planes has been developed for test beam campaigns at SPS, CERN, with the ability to host several devices under test. The telescope system has a dedicated custom readout, online monitoring integrated into DAQ with realtime hit map, time distribution and event hit multiplicity. It hosts a dedicated fully configurable trigger system enabling to trigger on coincidence between telescope planes and timing reference from a scintillator. The excellent time resolution performance allows for fast track reconstruction, due to the possibility to retain a low hit multiplicity per event which reduces the combinatorics. This paper reviews the architecture of the system and its performance during the 2021 and 2022 test beam campaign at the SPS North Area

The influence of student gender on the assessment of undergraduate student work

The aim of this study was to investigate the influence of perceived student gender on the feedback given to undergraduate student work. Participants (n = 12) were lecturers in higher education and were required to mark two\ud undergraduate student essays. The first student essay that all participants marked was the control essay. Participants were informed that the control essay was written by Samuel Jones (a male student). Participants then marked the target essay. Although participants marked the same essay, half of the participants (n = 6) were informed that the student essay was written by Natasha Brown (a female student), while the remaining participants were informed that it was written by James Smith (a male student). In-text and end-of-text feedback were qualitatively analysed on six dimensions: academic style of writing; criticality; structure, fluency and cohesion; sources used; understanding/knowledge of the subject; and other. Analysis of feedback for both the control and target essay revealed no discernible differences in the number of comments (strengths of the essay, areas for improvement) made and the content and presentation of these comments between the two groups. Pedagogical implications pertaining to the potential impact of anonymous marking on feedback processes are discussed