Measurement of the contribution of neutrons to hadron calorimeter signals

• DOI: 10.1016/j.nima.2007.08.049
• Publication Date: 2007-08-11T11:09:33Z
• Authors: N. Akchurin; L. Berntzon; A. Cardini; R. Ferrari; G. Gaudio; J. Hauptman; H. Kim; L. La Rotonda; M. Livan; E. Meoni; H. Paar; A. Penzo; D. Pinci; A. Policicchio; S. Popescu; G. Susinno; Y. Roh; W. Vandelli; R. Wigmans
• Keywords: Physics - Instrumentation and Detectors; compensazione; FOS: Physical sciences; Instrumentation and Detectors (physics.ins-det); calorimetri; 01 natural sciences; 03 medical and health sciences; 0302 clinical medicine; Neutroni; 0103 physical sciences

The contributions of neutrons to hadronic signals from the DREAM calorimeter are measured by analyzing the time structure of these signals. The neutrons, which mainly originate from the evaporation stage of nuclear breakup in the hadronic shower development process, contribute through elastic scattering off protons in the plastic scintillating fibers which provide the $dE/dx$ information in this calorimeter. This contribution is characterized by an exponential tail in the pulse shape, with a time constant of $\sim 25$ ns. The relative contribution of neutrons to the signals increases with the distance from the shower axis. As expected, the neutrons do not contribute to the DREAM ��erenkov signals.<br/>Preprint submitted to Nucl. Instr. and Meth. on July 24, 2007<br/>