Liquid Helium Scintillation

The phenomenon of liquid helium (LHe) scintillation due to passage

of charged particles was discovered in the late

1950’s. Since then rather extensive studies have been conducted,

motivated both by its intrinsic interest, including

an interest in illuminating the behavior of ions and neutrals

in superfluid helium, and by the application of liquid helium

as a particle detector. We have recently performed an

experiment to study the effect of an electric field on LHe

scintillation, as part of R&D for an experiment to search for

the permanent electric dipole moment of the neutron, which

will use LHe scintillation as part of the neutron spin analyzer.

In this seminar, the process of LHe scintillation production

due to passage of charged particle will be discussed, with an

emphasis on the implication of our data on the mechanisms

affecting scintillation in liquid helium.

Takeyasu Ito

Los Alamos National Laboratory