The magnetized steel and scintillator calorimeters of the MINOS experiment

Abstract

The Main Injector Neutrino Oscillation Search (MINOS) experiment uses an acceleratorproduced neutrino beam to perform precision measurements of the neutrino oscillation parameters in the "atmospheric neutrino" sector associated with muon neutrino disappearance. This long-baseline experiment measures neutrino interactions in Fermilab's NuMI neutrino beam with a near detector at Fermilab and again 735 km downstream with a far detector in the Soudan Underground Laboratory in northern Minnesota. The two detectors are magnetized steel-scintillator tracking calorimeters. They are designed to be as similar as possible in order to ensure that differences in detector response have minimal impact on the comparisons of event rates, energy spectra and topologies that are essential to MINOS measurements of oscillation parameters. The design, construction, calibration and performance of the far and near detectors are described in this paper.

Cross sections forνμandν¯μinduced pion production on hydrocarbon in the few-GeV region using MINERvA

“…MINERvA uses a fine-grained, plastic-scintillator tracking detector [11] in conjunction with the magnetized MINOS near detector [12], to record interactions of neutrinos and antineutrinos from the high-intensity NuMI beam at Fermilab [13].…”

Interim Design Report

“…Assuming an output wavelength of 525 nm, a photo-detector quantum efficiency of ∼30% can be achieved (see figure 116 in section 3.2.2). A threshold of 4.7 photo electrons (pe) per view, as in MINOS [318], was assumed. Any voxel in which the two views do not make this threshold is cut.…”

“…Since the neutrino energy is reconstructed generally from the sum of the hadron shower and primary muon energies, and this reconstructed quantity is used in the kinematic cuts, uncertainty in the energy and direction resolution of the detector could contribute significantly to the systematic error in the efficiencies. Taking a 6% error as quoted for the energy scale uncertainty assumed by the MINOS collaboration [318] and varying the constants of the energy and direction smears by this amount, it can be seen (figure 94) that, to this level, the hadronic resolutions have little effect on the true neutrino-energy efficiencies. However, the hadronic direction resolution is likely to have far greater uncertainty and would be very sensitive to noise in the electronics.…”

“…Figure 109 shows the model (1/8th) that was used in the analysis. A 100 cm diameter hole for the STL was assumed and the MINOS steel [318] BH curve was assumed. For this analysis, an excitation Figure 104.…”

Measurement of the Muon Neutrino Inclusive Charged Current Cross Section on Iron using the MINOS Detector

“…Only one end of each strip is readout, the other end is coated with a highly reflective material. Further details of the MINOS detector construction can be found in [36].…”