2003/12/04 by E. Frlez, E. Frlež, D. Počanić +59 · 43 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #Beam (structure) #Calorimeter (particle physics) #Collimator #Dark Matter and Cosmic Phenomena #Detector #Hodoscope #Muon #Neutrino Physics Research #Nuclear physics #Optics #Particle physics theoretical and experimental studies #Physics #Scintillator #hep-ex #physics.ins-det
paper · pdf · doi:10.1016/j.nima.2004.03.137
published in Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research Section A Accelerators Spectrometers Detectors and Associated Equipment 526(3), 300-347 (Elsevier BV) · 117 pages, 48 Postscript figures, 5 tables, Elsevier LaTeX, submitted to Nucl. Instrum. Meth. A
arxiv created 2003/12/04 · openalex publication_date 2004/04/21 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
We describe the design, construction and performance of the PIBETA detector built for the precise measurement of the branching ratio of pion beta decay, pi+ -> pi0 e+ nu, at the Paul Scherrer Institute. The central part of the detector is a 240-module spherical pure CsI calorimeter covering 3*pi sr solid angle. The calorimeter is supplemented with an active collimator/beam degrader system, an active segmented plastic target, a pair of low-mass cylindrical wire chambers and a 20-element cylindrical plastic scintillator hodoscope. The whole detector system is housed inside a temperature-controlled lead brick enclosure which in turn is lined with cosmic muon plastic veto counters. Commissioning and calibration data were taken during two three-month beam periods in 1999/2000 with pi+ stopping rates between 1.3*E3 pi+/s and 1.3*E6 pi+/s. We examine the timing, energy and angular detector resolution for photons, positrons and protons in the energy range of 5-150 MeV, as well as the response of the detector to cosmic muons. We illustrate the detector signatures for the assorted rare pion and muon decays and their associated backgrounds.