Calibration of the Gerda experiment.
M AgostiniG AraujoA M BakalyarovM BalataI BarabanovL BaudisC BauerE BellottiS BelogurovA BettiniL BezrukovV BiancacciE BossioV BotheV BrudaninR BrugneraA CaldwellC CattadoriA ChernogorovT ComellatoV D'AndreaE V DemidovaN Di MarcoE DoroshkevichF FischerM FominaA GangapshevA GarfagniniC GoochP GrabmayrV GurentsovK GusevJ HakenmüllerS HemmerR HillerW HofmannJ HuangM HultL V InzhechikJ Janicskó CsáthyJ JochumM JunkerV KazalovY KermaïdicH KhushbakhtT KihmI V KirpichnikovA KlimenkoR KneißlK T KnöpfleO KochetovV N KornoukhovP KrauseV V KuzminovM LaubensteinM LindnerI LippiA LubashevskiyB LubsandorzhievG LutterC MacolinoB MajorovitsW ManeschgL ManzanillasM MiloradovicR MingazhevaM MisiaszekP MoseevY MüllerI NemchenokL PandolaK PelczarL PertoldiP PiseriA PulliaC RansomL RauscherS RiboldiN RumyantsevaC SadaF SalamidaS SchönertJ SchreinerM SchüttA-K SchützO SchulzM SchwarzB SchwingenheuerO SelivanenkoE ShevchikM ShirchenkoL ShtembariH SimgenA SmolnikovD StukovA A VasenkoA VeresnikovaC VignoliK von SturmT WesterC WiesingerM WojcikE YanovichB ZatschlerI ZhitnikovS V ZhukovD ZinatulinaA ZschockeA J ZsigmondK ZuberG Zuzelnull nullPublished in: The European physical journal. C, Particles and fields (2021)
The GERmanium Detector Array (Gerda) collaboration searched for neutrinoless double- β decay in 76 Ge with an array of about 40 high-purity isotopically-enriched germanium detectors. The experimental signature of the decay is a monoenergetic signal at Q β β = 2039.061 ( 7 ) keV in the measured summed energy spectrum of the two emitted electrons. Both the energy reconstruction and resolution of the germanium detectors are crucial to separate a potential signal from various backgrounds, such as neutrino-accompanied double- β decays allowed by the Standard Model. The energy resolution and stability were determined and monitored as a function of time using data from regular 228 Th calibrations. In this work, we describe the calibration process and associated data analysis of the full Gerda dataset, tailored to preserve the excellent resolution of the individual germanium detectors when combining data over several years.