A pellet tracking system for hadron physics experiments

Frozen microspheres of hydrogen (pellets) are used as targets in the hadron physics experiment WASA (Forschungszentrum Jülich, Germany) [1] and will also be used in the future PANDA experiment at FAIR (GSI, Darmstadt, Germany) [2]. The interaction region is defined by the overlap of the pellet stream and the accelerator beam and has a size of a few millimeters. One would like to know the interaction point more precisely, to have better possibility to reconstruct particle tracks and events. One would also like to suppress background events that do not originate in a pellet, but e.g. may occur in residual gas in the beam pipe. A solution is provided by the presented pellet tracking system, for which a prototype [3] has been developed in Uppsala. The goal is to track individual pellets in order to know their position at the time of an interaction. The design of such a system, simulation techniques and results are presented

Nanocrystal- and Dislocation-Related Luminescence in Si Matrix with InAs Nanocrystals

We have studied the influence of ion implantation and post-implantation annealing regimes on the structural and optical properties of silicon matrix with ion-beam synthesized InAs nanocrystals. (100) Si wafers were implanted at 25 and 500 ±C, subsequently with high fluences of As and In ions. After implantation the samples were processed by furnace and rapid thermal annealing at 900, 950 and 1050 ±C. A part of the samples implanted at 25 ±C was additionally exposed to H+2 ions (100 keV, 1.2 × 1016 cm−2 in terms of atomic hydrogen). This procedure was performed to obtain an internal getter. In order to characterize the implanted samples transmission electron microscopy and low-temperature photoluminescence techniques were employed. It was demonstrated that by introducing getter, varying the ion implantation temperature, ion fluences and post-implantation annealing duration, and temperature it is possible to form InAs nanocrystals in the range of sizes of 2–80 nm and create various concentration and distribution of di˙erent types of secondary defects. The last ones cause in turn the appearance in photoluminescence spectra dislocation-related D1, D2 and D4 lines at 0.807, 0.870 and 0.997 eV, respectively

Search for eta-mesic 4He in the dd->3He n pi0 and dd->3He p pi- reactions with the WASA-at-COSY facility

The search for 4He-eta bound states was performed with the WASA-at-COSY facility via the measurement of the excitation function for the dd->3He n pi0 and dd->3He p pi- processes. The beam momentum was varied continuously between 2.127 GeV/c and 2.422 GeV/c, corresponding to the excess energy for the dd->4He eta reaction ranging from Q=-70 MeV to Q=30 MeV. The luminosity was determined based on the dd->3He n reaction and quasi-free proton-proton scattering via dd->pp n_spectator n_spectator reactions. The excitation functions determined independently for the measured reactions do not reveal a structure which could be interpreted as a narrow mesic nucleus. Therefore, the upper limits of the total cross sections for the bound state production and decay in dd->(4He-eta)_bound->3He n pi0 and dd->(4He-eta)_bound->3He p pi- processes were determined taking into account the isospin relation between both the channels considered. The results of the analysis depend on the assumptions of the N* momentum distribution in the anticipated mesic-4He. Assuming as in the previous works, that this is identical with the distribution of nucleons bound with 20 MeV in 4He, we determined that (for the mesic bound state width in the range from 5 MeV to 50 MeV) the upper limits at 90% confidence level are about 3 nb and about 6 nb for npi0 and ppi- channels, respectively. However, based on the recent theoretical findings of the N*(1535) momentum distribution in the N*-3He nucleus bound by 3.6 MeV, we find that the WASA-at-COSY detector acceptance decreases and hence the corresponding upper limits are 5 nb and 10 nb for npi0 and ppi- channels respectively.Comment: This article will be submitted to JHE

Measurement of the pn→ppπ0π−pn \to pp\pi^0\pi^- Reaction in Search for the Recently Observed Resonance Structure in dπ0π0d\pi^0\pi^0 and dπ+π−d\pi^+\pi^- systems

Exclusive measurements of the quasi-free $pn \to pp\pi^0\pi^-$ reaction have been performed by means of $pd$ collisions at $T_p$ = 1.2 GeV using the WASA detector setup at COSY. Total and differential cross sections have been obtained covering the energy region $\sqrt s$ = (2.35 - 2.46) GeV, which includes the region of the ABC effect and its associated resonance structure. No ABC effect, {\it i.e.} low-mass enhancement is found in the $\pi^0\pi^-$-invariant mass spectrum -- in agreement with the constraint from Bose statistics that the isovector pion pair can not be in relative s-wave. At the upper end of the covered energy region $t$-channel processes for Roper, $\Delta(1600)$ and $\Delta\Delta$ excitations provide a reasonable description of the data, but at low energies the measured cross sections are much larger than predicted by such processes. Adding a resonance amplitude for the resonance at $m$=~2.37 GeV with $\Gamma$ =~70 MeV and $I(J^P)=~0(3^+)$ observed recently in $pn \to d\pi^0\pi^0$ and $pn \to d\pi^+\pi^-$ reactions leads to an agreement with the data also at low energies

Charge Symmetry Breaking in dd->4He{\pi}0 with WASA-at-COSY

Charge symmetry breaking (CSB) observables are a suitable experimental tool to examine effects induced by quark masses on the nuclear level. Previous high precision data from TRIUMF and IUCF are currently used to develop a consistent description of CSB within the framework of chiral perturbation theory. In this work the experimental studies on the reaction dd->4He{\pi}0 have been extended towards higher excess energies in order to provide information on the contribution of p-waves in the final state. For this, an exclusive measurement has been carried out at a beam momentum of p=1.2 GeV/c using the WASA-at-COSY facility. The total cross section amounts to sigma(tot) = (118 +- 18(stat) +- 13(sys) +- 8(ext)) pb and first data on the differential cross section are consistent with s-wave pion production.Comment: 14 pages, 5 figure

Cross section ratio and angular distributions of the reaction p + d -> 3He + eta at 48.8 MeV and 59.8 MeV excess energy

We present new data for angular distributions and on the cross section ratio of the p + d -> 3He + eta reaction at excess energies of Q = 48.8 MeV and Q = 59.8 MeV. The data have been obtained at the WASA-at-COSY experiment (Forschungszentrum J\"ulich) using a proton beam and a deuterium pellet target. While the shape of obtained angular distributions show only a slow variation with the energy, the new results indicate a distinct and unexpected total cross section fluctuation between Q = 20 MeV and Q = 60 MeV, which might indicate the variation of the production mechanism within this energy interval.Comment: 9 pages, 9 figure

Search for the eta-mesic 4He with WASA-at-COSY detector

An exclusive measurement of the excitation function for the dd->3Heppi- reaction was performed at the Cooler Synchrotron COSY-Juelich with the WASA-at-COSY detection system. The data were taken during a slow acceleration of the beam from 2.185 GeV/c to 2.400 GeV/c crossing the kinematic threshold for the eta meson production in the dd->4He-eta reaction at 2.336 GeV/c. The corresponding excess energy with respect to the 4He-eta system varied from -51.4MeV to 22MeV. The integrated luminosity in the experiment was determined using the dd->3Hen reaction. The shape of the excitation function for the dd->3Heppi- was examined. No signal of the 4He-eta bound state was observed. An upper limit for the cross-section for the bound state formation and decay in the process dd->(4He-eta)bound->3Heppi- was determined on the 90% confidence level and it varies from 20nb to 27nb for the bound state width ranging from 5MeV to 35MeV, respectively.Comment: 8 pages, 9 figure

ABC Effect and Resonance Structure in the Double-Pionic Fusion to 3^3He

Exclusive and kinematically complete measurements of the double pionic fusion to $^3$He have been performed in the energy region of the so-called ABC effect, which denotes a pronounced low-mass enhancement in the $\pi\pi$-invariant mass spectrum. The experiments were carried out with the WASA detector setup at COSY. Similar to the observations in the basic $pn \to d \pi^0\pi^0$ reaction and in the $dd \to ^4$He$\pi^0\pi^0$ reaction, the data reveal a correlation between the ABC effect and a resonance-like energy dependence in the total cross section. Differential cross sections are well described by the hypothesis of $d^*$ resonance formation during the reaction process in addition to the conventional $t$-channel $\Delta\Delta$ mechanism. The deduced $d^*$ resonance width can be understood from collision broadening due to Fermi motion of the nucleons in initial and final nuclei