Ricerc@Sapienza

CYGNO experiment is working at the construction of one cubic meter TPC, based on Optical Readout of Gas Electron Multipliers (GEMs), for Directional Dark Matter search. This kind of research demands for very long dataacquisition runs and thus for high operation stability and reliability. This is one of the key elements of INITIUM project (ERC-2018-COG). The performance of such an approach was studied with a 7 liter sensitive volume detector.

The aim of the CYGNO project is the construction and operation of a 1 m3 gas TPC for directional dark matter searches and coherent neutrino scattering measurements, as a prototype toward the 100-1000 m3 (0.15-1.5 tons) CYGNUS network of underground experiments. In such a TPC, electrons produced by dark-matter-or neutrino-induced nuclear recoils will drift toward and will be multiplied by a three-layer GEM structure, and the light produced in the avalanche processes will be readout by a sCMOS camera, providing a 2D image of the event with a resolution of a few hundred micrometers.

Modern imaging sensors can be used to detect the scintillation light produced in Micro Pattern Gaseous Detectors (MPGDs) during electron avalanche multiplication. Gas mixtures with scintillation light spectra compatible with the quantum efficiency of CCD or CMOS cameras, can be used to implement an optical readout and to build 2D images of the events. Cygno project aims at developing an optical Time Projection Chamber (TPC) for directional dark matter searches and neutrino scattering measurements.