Recent results on Heavy-Ion induced reactions of interest for 0νββ decay

Journal of Physics: Conference Series PAPER • OPEN ACCESS Recent results on Heavy-Ion induced reactions of interest for 0νββ decay To cite this article: C. Agodi et al 2019 J. Phys.: Conf. Ser. 1308 012002 View the article online for updates and enhancements. You may also like Double beta decay experiments K Zuber - Recent results on heavy-ion direct reactions of interest for 0 decay at INFN - LNS M. Cavallaro, L. Acosta, P. Adsley et al. - The SNO+ experiment The SNO+ collaboration, V. Albanese, R. Alves et al. - This content was downloaded from IP address 150.214.182.235 on 03/02/2023 at 11:33 Content from this work may be used under the terms of theCreativeCommonsAttribution 3.0 licence. Any further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the title of the work, journal citation and DOI. Published under licence by IOP Publishing Ltd XLII Symposium on Nuclear Physics 2019 IOP Conf. Series: Journal of Physics: Conf. Series 1308 (2019) 012002 IOP Publishing doi:10.1088/1742-6596/1308/1/012002 1 Recent results on Heavy-Ion induced reactions of interest for 0νββ decay C. Agodi1, F. Cappuzzello1,3, L. Acosta20, C. Altana1, P. Amador-Valenzuela21, N. Auerbach27, J. Barea34, J.I. Bellone1, R. Bijker22, D. Bonanno2, T. Borello- Lewin14, I. Boztosun25, V. Branchina2,3, S. Brasolin4, G. Brischetto1,3,5, O. Brunasso4, S. Burrello1, S. Calabrese1,3, L. Calabretta1, D. Calvo4, V. Capirossi4,6, D. Carbone1, M. Cavallaro1, R. Chen33, L.E. Charon Garcia20, E .R. Chávez Lomelí20, I. Ciraldo1,3, M. Colonna1, G. D’Agostino1, H. Djapo25, G. De Geronimo32, F. Delaunay4,6,12, K. De Los Rios20, N. Deshmukh30, C. Ferraresi4,7, J.L. Ferreira15, J. Ferretti8,13, P. Finocchiaro1, S. Firat25, M. Fisichella4, A. Foti2, G. Gallo1,3, H. Garcia-Tecocoatzi8,9, A. Hacisalihoglu26, A. Huerta-Hernandez20, J. Kotila31, Y. Kucuk25, F. Iazzi4,6, L. La Fauci1,3, G. Lanzalone1,10, F. La Via11, J.A. Lay28 , H. Lenske23, R. Linares15,D. Lo Presti2,3, J. Lubian15, J. Ma33, D. Marín-Lámbarri20, J. Mas Ruiz20, N. H. Medina14, D.R. Mendes15, P. Mereu4, M. Moralles16, L. Neri1, J. R. B. Oliveira14, A. Pakou18, L. Pandola1, H. Petrascu29, N. Pietralla24, F. Pinna4,6, S. Reito2, P. Ries24, M.R.D. Rodrigues14, A. D. Russo1, G. Russo2,3, E. Santopinto8, R.B.B. Santos17, L. Serbina29, O. Sgouros1, M.A.G. da Silveira17 , S.O. Solakcı25, G. Souliotis19,V. Soukeras1, A. Spatafora1,3, D. Torresi1, S. Tudisco1, R.I.M. Vsevolodovna8,9 , H. Vargas Hernandez20 , J.S. Wang33, V. Werner24, Y.Y. Yang33, A. Yildirim25, V.A.B. Zagatto15 for the NUMEN collaboration 1 Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare, Laboratori Nazionali del Sud , Italy 2 Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare, Sezione di Catania, Italy 3 Dipartimento di Fisica e Astronomia “Ettore Majorana”, Università di Catania, Italy 4 Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare, Sezione di Torino, Italy 5 Centro Siciliano di Fisica Nucleare e Struttura della Materia, Italy 6 DISAT, Politecnico di Torino, Italy 7 DIMEAS, Politecnico di Torino, Italy 8 Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare, Sezione di Genova, Italy 9 Dipartimento di Fisica, Università di Genova, Italy 10 Università degli Studi di Enna "Kore", Italy XLII Symposium on Nuclear Physics 2019 IOP Conf. Series: Journal of Physics: Conf. Series 1308 (2019) 012002 IOP Publishing doi:10.1088/1742-6596/1308/1/012002 2 11 CNR-IMM, Sezione di Catania, Italy 12 LPC Caen, Normandie Université, ENSICAEN, UNICAEN, CNRS/INP3, France 13 Department of Physics, Yale University, USA 14 Instituto de Fisica, Universidade de Sao Paulo, Brazil 15 Instituto de Fisica, Universidade Federal Fluminense, Brazil 16 Instituto de Pesquisas Energeticas e Nucleares IPEN/CNEN, Brazil 17 Centro Universitario FEI Sao Bernardo do Campo, Brazil 18 Department of Physics and HINP, University of Ioannina, Greece 19 Department of Chemistry, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece 20 Instituto de Fìsica, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico 21 Instituto Nacional de Investigaciones Nucleares, Mexico 22 Instituto de Ciencias Nucleares, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico 23 Department of Physics, University of Giessen, Germany 24 Institut fur Kernphysik, Technische Universitat Darmstadt, Germany 25 Department of Physics, Akdeniz University, Turkey 26 Institute of Natural Sciences, Karadeniz Teknik University, Turkey 27 School of Physics and Astronomy, Tel Aviv University, Israel 28 Departamento de FAMN, University of Seville, Spain 29 Department of Nuclear Physics, Horia Hubulei National Institute of Physics and Nuclear Engineering, IFIN-HH, Romania 30 Nuclear Physics Division, Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics, India 31 University of Jyväskylä, Finland 32 Stony Brook University, USA 33 Institute of Modern Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Lanzhou, China 34 Departamento de Fìsica, Universidad de Conception, Chile [email protected] Abstract. An updated overview of recent results on Heavy-Ion induced reactions of interest for neutrinoless double beta decay is reported in the framework of the NUMEN project. The NUMEN idea is to study heavy-ion induced Double Charge Exchange (DCE) reactions with the aim to get information on the nuclear matrix elements for neutrinoless double beta (0νββ) decay. Moreover, to infer the neutrino average masses from the possible measurement of the halflife of 0νββ decay, the knowledge of the nuclear matrix elements is a crucial aspect. XLII Symposium on Nuclear Physics 2019 IOP Conf. Series: Journal of Physics: Conf. Series 1308 (2019) 012002 IOP Publishing doi:10.1088/1742-6596/1308/1/012002 3 1. Introduction The search for neutrinoless double beta decay (0νββ) addresses fundamental questions in physics, related to the absolute neutrinos mass scale, whether neutrinos are Majorana particles or how many neutrino species are there. Moreover 0νββ search has implications for the understanding of the matterantimatter asymmetry in the universe. The design of the 0νββ search experiments themselves require detailed understanding of nuclear physics, as background critically depend on nuclear decay chain and nuclear matrix elements are needed to link observed rates to neutrino properties. In this framework the NUMEN project propose an innovative and original tool: to use Heavy-Ions Double Charge Exchange Reactions (HI-DCE) to access quantitative information for Nuclear Matrix Element towards 0ββ decay. 2. The NUMEN Project The NUMEN main goal is the extraction from measured cross-sections of “data-driven” information on Nuclear Matrix Elements for all the systems candidate for 0νββ. Crucial for the experimental challanges is the INFN Laboratori Nazionali del Sud (LNS) facility, made up by the Superconducting Cyclotron (CS) and the MAGNEX magnetic spectrometer. The experimental measurements of HIDCE reactions present a number of challenging aspects, since they are characterized by very low cross sections and, in the same experimental conditions, they must be identified with respect to competitive reaction channels. It is well known that the 0νββ half-life can be factorized in three terms at different physics scale: the phase-space factor, connected with Atomic physics, the Matrix Element (NME) related with Nuclear physics and a term, related to Particle physics, in which it is supposed there are the answers to the unsolved questions, related to new physics beyond the Standard Model. For evaluation of NME several methods have been used, based on different nuclear models, an updated comparison of the results of NME calculations, obtained within various nuclear structure frameworks [1-4], indicates that significant differences are indeed found. In addition, some assumption common to different competing approaches could cause overall systematic uncertainties. NUMEN [5, 6] propose a novel way to address experimentally-driven information on the NMEs of 0νββ, based on DCE cross section measurements. These reactions are characterized by the transfer of two charge units, leaving the mass number unchanged, and can proceed either by a sequential multinucleon-transfer mechanism or by meson-exchange. Despite 0νββ decays and HI-DCE reactions are mediated by different interactions, they present a number of similarities. The main ones are: i) the initial and final state wave functions in the two processes are the same, ii) the transition operators are similar, in both cases Fermi, Gamow-Teller and rank-two tensor components are present, iii) a large linear momentum (100 MeV/c) is available in the virtual intermediate channel, iv) the two processes are non-local and are characterized by two vertices localized in a pair of valence nucleons, v) they take place in the same nuclear medium, vi) a relevant off-shell propagation through virtual intermediate channels is present. The descriptions of NMEs for DCE and 0νββ decay present the same degree of complexity, with the advantage for DCE to be “accessible” in laboratory. However, a simple relation between DCE cross sections and 0νββ decay half-lives is not trivial and needs to be explored. At the MAGNEX facility of the INFN-LNS we demostrate the feasibility of this kind of DCE cross sections measurements. MAGNEX is a large acceptance magnetic system able to provide high resolution in energy, mass and angle [7] and an accurate control of the detection efficiency. The implementation of trajectory reconstruction technique is the key feature of MAGNEX, which XLII Symposium on Nuclear Physics 2019 IOP Conf. Series: Journal of Physics: Conf. Series 1308 (2019) 012002 IOP Publishing doi:10.1088/1742-6596/1308/1/012002 4 guarantees the above mentioned performance and its relevance in the research for heavy-ion physics [8-10], also taking advantage of its coupling to the EDEN neutron detector array [11,12]. The 40Ca(18O,18Ne)40Ar reaction was studied at 15 MeV/u, showing that high mass, angular and energy resolution energy spectra and accurate absolute cross sections are at our reach, even at very forward angles, see ref. [13]. In addition, a schematic analysis of the reaction cross sections demonstrated that relevant quantitative information on DCE matrix elements can be extracted from the data. This result demonstrated that the previous experimental limitations are almost overcome and that high resolution and statistically significant experimental data can be measured for DCE processes. In the present experimental conditions, due to the limitation arising from the tiny cross-sections of the processes of interest, only very few systems can be measured within the 5-years project. In order to systematically explore all the nuclei candidates for 0νββ, a beam intensity at least two orders of magnitude higher than the present must be achieved. The NUMEN project is conceived in a long-range time perspective, in view of a comprehensive study of many candidate systems for 0νββ decay. Moreover, the project promotes a renewal of the INFN-LNS research infrastructure [14] with a specific R&D activity on detectors, materials and instrumentation. As a consequence, major upgrades of the detector technologies (3D ion tracker, particle-identification wall, gamma-ray array, ...) must be developed [15, 20]. Also the target technology must be upgraded, to avoid the damage of the thin films due to the high temperature involved [21, 23]. Moreover, a deep and complete investigation of the theoretical aspects connecting nuclear reaction mechanisms and nuclear matrix elements must be carried out [24, 26]. 2.1. An updated overview NUMEN experimental activity consists of two main classes of experiments, corresponding to the exploration of the two directions of isospin transfer τ− τ− and τ+ τ+, characteristic of β−β− and β+β+ decays, respectively. In particular, the β+β+ direction in the target is investigated using a 18O beam and measuring the (18O,18Ne) DCE induced transitions, together with the other reaction channels involving the same beam and target. Similarly, the β−β− direction is explored via the (20Ne,20O) reaction, using a 20Ne beam and detecting the reaction products of the DCE channel along with other open channels characterized by the same projectile and target. With the actual facility and experimental setup we perform some long run at LNS with MAGNEX, choosing few isotopes, candidates for 0νββ, already at our reach in terms of energy resolution and availability of thin targets. In particular, we performed for the first time experimental investigations of the (20Ne,20O) DCE reaction on 116Cd,76Ge and 130Te targets. These are the first measurements of such a kind of reaction: no data are available in literature. A 20Ne10+ cyclotron beam at 15 AMeV was delivered by the CS of INFN-LNS and impinged on 116Cd rolled target of 1370 μg/cm2 thickness and 76Ge (386 μg/cm2 thickness) and 130Te (247 μg/cm2 thickness) both evaporated on a C backing of 50 μg/cm2. The thickness of the various targets was carefully chosen in order to obtain an energy resolution which allows to distinguish the transition to the residual nucleus ground state from its first excited state. Indeed, the selected thickness of 116Cd is much higher than that of 76Ge and 130Te, because the first excited state in 116Sn case is at 1.293 MeV, to be compared to 0.559 MeV in 76Se and 0.536 MeV in 130Xe. The MAGNEX spectrometer was placed at forward angles including zero degrees in the full acceptance mode (50 msr). Despite the experimental limitations, we were able to measure energy spectra and absolute cross sections for the DCE reaction channel. Moreover, we measured also other reaction channels: one- and two-proton transfer, one- and two-neutron transfer and Single Charge Exchange, in order to estimate the role of the sequential multi-nucleon transfer routes on the diagonal DCE process. XLII Symposium on Nuclear Physics 2019 IOP Conf. Series: Journal of Physics: Conf. Series 1308 (2019) 012002 IOP Publishing doi:10.1088/1742-6596/1308/1/012002 5 3. Conclusions and outlook Pioneering experiments on (18O,18Ne) and (20Ne,20O) DCE performed at INFN-LNS Laboratory in Catania have shown that accurate cross sections measurements at very forward angles can be done. The main activity characterizing the NUMEN project is the measurement of DCE absolute cross sections, with the related processes, and the extraction of relevant NMEs. The NUMEN “Holy Grail” is to find a connection between the NMEs extracted from DCE reactions and those characterizing 0νββ decay, at least in the nuclei in which this process is energetically allowed. 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