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writeup/progress14/NeutronAnalysis.tex
2017-01-22 00:00:32 -05:00

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In R2013, two BC501 neutron
counters ($5''$ diameter and $5''$ depth) were borrowed from the
MuSun experiment, and placed outside the vacuum chamber on
both sides of the muon beam and centred on the stopping
target. Neutron spectra between 1 to about 20 MeV were obtained. The lower
threshold is limited by pulse shape discrimination (PSD) which
identifies neutron from photon events. Calibration of the detector
energy primarily used Cs-137 and Co-60, however these sources proved
inadequate. The Cs-127 Compton edge was too low in energy to be useful
and the Co-60 has two overlapping Compton edges. An average of the
two edge energies was used for calibration. An AmBe source was
originally intended to provide a known neutron spectrum and it did prove
useful in providing a 4.19 MeV gamma line for calibration. A ratio of the fast to slow
integrated waveform components
was used to provide neutron/gamma discrimination.
Discrimination is excellent above 1 MeVee, Figure~\ref{psdplot_2013}.
Analysis of the R2013 data demonstrated that a waveform digitiser of
at least 250 MHz sampling rate is needed to optimise the pulse shape
discrimination. A raw neutron spectrum is shown in Figure
~\ref{neutron_spectrum}. Initial work on unfolding the
spectrum has begun and is described in a later section. \\
\begin{figure}[btp]
\centering
\includegraphics[width=0.55\textwidth]{figs/PSD1}
\caption{Pulse shape discrimination between
neutrons (top band) and gammas (bottom band). The true neutron
energy is approximately twice the energy deposited in
MeVee.} \label{psdplot_2013}
\end{figure}
\begin{figure}[btp]
\centering
\includegraphics[width=0.55\textwidth]{figs/Neutron_Spectrum}
\caption{Raw neutron spectrum from an $Al$
target. The horizontal axis is electron equivalent energy
which is approximately a factor of 2 greater than the recoil
proton energy, which is of course folded by the detector
response function. \label{neutron_spectrum}. }
\end{figure}