Neutron Activation Background in the NvDEx Experiment

Abstract

An extremely low-background environment is a crucial requirement for any neutrinoless double beta decay experiment. Neutrons are very difficult to stop, because they can pass through the shields and activate nuclei in the detector, even inside the fiducial volume itself. Using Geant4 simulations we have studied the neutron background for N$\nu$DEx-100 and the most efficient way to reduce it. Using a 60 cm thick external HDPE shield the neutron background can be reduced down to $0.24\pm 0.06$ events/year, lower than the background rate due to natural radioactivity (0.42 events/year), which was used as a benchmark for these calculations. The amount of shielding material needed can be significantly reduced by placing HDPE in the empty space between the lead shield and the steel vessel; in this way, it is sufficient to add 20 cm external HDPE shield to reduce the neutron background down to $0.15\pm0.05$ events/year.Comment: 13 pages, 11 figure