A system for collecting the scintillation light produced by the capture process of ultracold neutrons (UCN) on polarized 3 He is discussed and results from simulations of its performance are presented. This system will be implemented in nEDM@SNS, the experiment searching for the neutron electric dipole moment (nEDM) at the Spallation Neutron Source (SNS) at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Simulation results show that the light collection system collects on average 17 photoelectrons per UCN-3 He capture event (sufficient to generate a robust signal), reconstructs the event location in the beam direction to approximately 3 cm accuracy, detects capture events with a high and spatially uniform efficiency (0.95 with 1% variation), and rejects greater than 50% of beta decay background events.
K: Simulation methods and programs, Photon detectors for UV, visible and IR photons (vacuum) (photomultipliers, HPDs, others), Scintillators, scintillation and light emission processes (solid, gas and liquid scintillators)