A Readout System for the STAR Time Projection Chamber

We describe the readout electronics for the STAR Time Projection Chamber. The system is made up of 136,608 channels of waveform digitizer, each sampling 512 time samples at 6-12 Mega-samples per second. The noise level is about 1000 electrons, and the dynamic range is 800:1, allowing for good energy loss ($dE/dx$) measurement for particles with energy losses up to 40 times minimum ionizing. The system is functioning well, with more than 99% of the channels working within specifications.Comment: 22 pages + 8 separate figures; 2 figures are .jpg photos to appear in Nuclear Instruments and Method

Biomonitoramento de fungicida na urina de ratas prenhas: estudo do metalaxil.

Sabe-se que alterações no sistema reprodutivo e na fase de desenvolvimento animal podem ter impactos na sobrevivência da prole. Uma vez que os agrotóxicos são geralmente mais tóxicos em animais imaturos do que em adultos, o presente trabalho visou estudar alguns parâmetros a serem utilizados na medida de bioindicadores de exposição (dose interna) e que possam ser utilizados como mecanismo de previsão dos efeitos destes produtos em doses que aparentemente não causam danos. Para tanto foram avaliadas fêmeas expostas a 10 e 20 mg Kg ?1 de metalaxil v.o. durante os dias 7, 11 e 15 da prenhez. As ratas tiveram coletadas amostras de urina diariamente após o primeiro dia da exposição até o dia 19 do período gestacional. Elas também tiveram seu ganho de peso medido até o dia 20 da prenhez. Não foram encontradas alterações quanto ao ganho de peso. Os aumentos da quantidade excretada de metalaxil da maior dose, no dia seguinte a cada administração, foram respectivamente de 2,96; 5,22 e 19,84 vezes maior que na menor dose. O estabelecimento de indicadores de dose interna que quantifique o metalaxil e/ ou seus metabólitos no organismo podem auxiliar na avaliação dos efeitos decorrentes da exposição perinatal a agrotóxicos.bitstream/CNPMA/5375/1/boletim_27.pd

A First Search for Cosmogenic Neutrinos with the ARIANNA Hexagonal Radio Array

The ARIANNA experiment seeks to observe the diffuse flux of neutrinos in the 10^8 - 10^10 GeV energy range using a grid of radio detectors at the surface of the Ross Ice Shelf of Antarctica. The detector measures the coherent Cherenkov radiation produced at radio frequencies, from about 100 MHz to 1 GHz, by charged particle showers generated by neutrino interactions in the ice. The ARIANNA Hexagonal Radio Array (HRA) is being constructed as a prototype for the full array. During the 2013-14 austral summer, three HRA stations collected radio data which was wirelessly transmitted off site in nearly real-time. The performance of these stations is described and a simple analysis to search for neutrino signals is presented. The analysis employs a set of three cuts that reject background triggers while preserving 90% of simulated cosmogenic neutrino triggers. No neutrino candidates are found in the data and a model-independent 90% confidence level Neyman upper limit is placed on the all flavor neutrino+antineutrino flux in a sliding decade-wide energy bin. The limit reaches a minimum of 1.9x10^-23 GeV^-1 cm^-2 s^-1 sr^-1 in the 10^8.5 - 10^9.5 GeV energy bin. Simulations of the performance of the full detector are also described. The sensitivity of the full ARIANNA experiment is presented and compared with current neutrino flux models.Comment: 22 pages, 22 figures. Published in Astroparticle Physic

Using the Hottest Particles in the Universe to Probe Icy Solar System Worlds

We present results of our Phase 1 NIAC Study to determine the feasibility of developing a competitive, low cost, low power, low mass passive instrument to measure ice depth on outer planet ice moons, such as Europa, Ganymede, Callisto, and Enceladus. Indirect measurements indicate that liquid water oceans are likely present beneath the icy shells of such moons (see e.g.,the JPL press release "The Solar System and Beyond is Awash in Water"), which has important astrobiological implications. Determining the thickness of these ice shells is challenging given spacecraft SWaP (Size, Weight and Power) resources. The current approach uses a suite of instruments, including a high power, massive ice penetrating radar. The instrument under study, called PRIDE (Passive Radio Ice Depth Experiment) exploits a remarkable confluence between methods from the high energy particle physics and the search for extraterrestrial life within the solar system. PRIDE is a passive receiver of a naturally occurring radio frequency (RF) signal generated by interactions of deep penetrating Extremely High Energy (> 10^18 eV) cosmic ray neutrinos. It could measure ice thickness directly, and at a significant savings to spacecraft resources. At RF frequencies the transparency of modeled Europan ice is up to many km, so an RF sensor in orbit can observe neutrino interactions to great depths, and thereby probe the thickness of the ice layer