Optical transmittance measurements of sheet resistors for the $\rm {CF}_4$ scintillating light in a gaseous time-projection chamber

Abstract

A gaseous time-projection chamber (TPC) with a reconstructable $z$ coordinate for nuclear recoil tracks has been developed for dark-matter searches and $\alpha$ particle imagings in a low radioactivity background. A TPC with a sheet-resistor field cage shows a potential to detect charge and photons produced by tracks if the sheet resistor has optical transmittance for visible light, and determine a drift length from a time difference between these signals. In this study, an optical transmittance of sheet resistors was measured to be $24.5\pm0.1_{\rm stat}\pm0.6_{\rm syst}\%$ for the $\rm {CF}_4$ gas scintillating light using an $\alpha$-particle source. The number of photoelectrons is observed to be $\rm\sim20~p.e.$ for 5.3~MeV$\alpha$ with the existence of a sheet resistor in the $\rm CF_4$ gas. Then, it is discussed how many photoelectrons to be observable by using multi-alkali-cathode phototubes and SiPMs for near-infrared light in order to detect lower energy tracks.