Neutrino yield and neutron shielding calculations for a high-power target installed in an underground setting

Abstract

With the ever increasing beam power at particle accelerator-based facilities for nuclear and particle physics, radioactive isotope production, and nuclear engineering, targets that can withstand this power, and shielding of secondary particles are becoming increasingly important. Here we present Monte Carlo (MC) calculations using the well-established Geant4 software to optimise and predict the antineutrino yield of a $^8$Li Decay-At-Rest (DAR) source. The source relies on 600~kW of beam power from a continuous wave proton beam impinging on a beryllium target, where spallation neutrons capture on $^7$Li to produce the $^8$Li. We further present an in-depth treatment of the neutron shielding surrounding this target. We show that we can produce the high antineutrino flux needed for the discovery-level experiment IsoDAR, searching for ``sterile'' neutrinos (predicted new fundamental particles) and other beyond standard model physics, while maintaining a neutron flux in the detector that is below natural backgrounds. The methods presented in this paper are easily transferable to other high-power targets and their associated shielding.