Abstract
The advanced molybdenum-based rare process experiment (AMoRE) aims to search for neutrinoless double beta decay (0nu beta beta ) of ^{100}Mo with sim 100,hbox {kg} of ^{100}Mo-enriched molybdenum embedded in cryogenic detectors with a dual heat and light readout. At the current, pilot stage of the AMoRE project we employ six calcium molybdate crystals with a total mass of 1.9 kg, produced from ^{48}Ca-depleted calcium and ^{100}Mo-enriched molybdenum (^{48{{text {depl}}}}hbox {Ca}^{100}hbox {MoO}_{4}). The simultaneous detection of heat (phonon) and scintillation (photon) signals is realized with high resolution metallic magnetic calorimeter sensors that operate at milli-Kelvin temperatures. This stage of the project is carried out in the Yangyang underground laboratory at a depth of 700 m. We report first results from the AMoRE-Pilot 0nu beta beta search with a 111 kg day live exposure of ^{48{{text {depl}}}}hbox {Ca}^{100}hbox {MoO}_{4} crystals. No evidence for 0nu beta beta decay of ^{100}Mo is found, and a upper limit is set for the half-life of 0nu beta beta of ^{100}Mo of T^{0nu }_{1/2} > 9.5times 10^{22}~hbox {years} at 90% C.L. This limit corresponds to an effective Majorana neutrino mass limit in the range langle m_{beta beta }rangle le (1.2-2.1),hbox {eV}.
Highlights
Neutrinos, which correspond to a major portion of the elementary particles comprising the Universe, are still poorly understood
The advanced molybdenum-based rare process experiment (AMoRE)-Pilot detector modules are comprised of three main components, as shown in Fig. 1: a 48deplCa100MoO4 scintillating crystal, a phonon sensor based on a metallic magnetic calorimeter (MMC) that measures the temperature rise of the crystal induced by radiation absorption, and a photon detector with an MMC sensor that detects the amount of scintillation light produced in the crystal [33,34,35]
An upper limit of T10/ν2 > 9.5×1022 years is achieved with a background level of 0.55 counts/(keV kg year), which will be improved in succeeding measurements
Summary
Neutrinos, which correspond to a major portion of the elementary particles comprising the Universe, are still poorly understood. Searching for 0νββ decay is currently the only plausible experimental technique to test the Majorana nature of neutrinos and the validity of lepton number conservation. The discovery of this decay would provide major new insights into the nature of beyond-the-SM physics. CUPID-0 carried out a 82Se 0νββ decay search using the simultaneous heat and scintillation detection technique [26]. The advanced molybdenum-based rare process experiment (AMoRE) [28,29] aims to search for 0νββ decay of 100Mo using a simultaneous heat and scintillation detection technique with crystals operating at mK temperatures. The data sample used for the results reported here corresponds to a 52.1 kg day live exposure of 100Mo
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