A new concept for the direct measurement of muons in air showers is presented. The concept is based on resistive plate chambers (RPCs), which can directly measure muons with very good space and time ...resolution. The muon detector is shielded by placing it under another detector able to absorb and measure the electromagnetic component of the showers such as a water-Cherenkov detector, commonly used in air shower arrays. The combination of the two detectors in a single, compact detector unit provides a unique measurement that opens rich possibilities in the study of air showers.
The contribution of different components of an air shower to the total energy deposit in the atmosphere, for different angles and primary particles, was studied using the CORSIKA air shower ...simulation code. The amount of missing energy, parameterized in terms of the calorimetric energy, was calculated. The results show that this parameterization varies less than 1% with angle or observation level. The dependence with the primary mass is less than 5% and, with the high energy hadronic interaction model, less than 2%. The systematic error introduced by the use of just one parameterization of the missing energy correction function, for an equal mixture of proton and iron at 45°, was calculated to be below 3%. We estimate the statistical error due to shower-to-shower fluctuations to be about 1%.
Outdoor systems performance and upgrade Lopes, L.; Andringa, S.; Assis, P. ...
Nuclear instruments & methods in physics research. Section A, Accelerators, spectrometers, detectors and associated equipment,
September 2023, 2023-09-00, Letnik:
1054
Journal Article
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Over the last two decades, the possibility of using RPCs in outdoors systems has increased considerably. Our group has participated in this effort by installing several systems and continues to work ...on their optimization, while simultaneously studying and developing new approaches that can use RPCs in outdoor applications.
In particular, four detectors were deployed in the field at the Pierre Auger Observatory in 2019 remained inactive, awaiting the commissioning of support systems. During the pandemic the detectors were left without gas flow for more than two years, but were recently reactivated with no major problems.
The LouMu project combines particle physics and geophysics in order to map meter-scale geologic structures, using Muon Tomography. Transmission muography is sensitive to the total amount of matter crossed by the muons, allowing to separate targets of different densities. In this exploratory project, it serves to identify unconsolidated rock zones, like geological faults and ore masses around an old Pyrite mine, now converted into a science center. The general goal is to compare how effective is the muographic survey when compared with the more standard geophysical techniques. The development of the RPC system used and the data from the last two years will be presented.
Finally, recent advances in a large area (1 m2) double gap-sealed RPC will be presented.