Speaker
Description
Neutrinoless double-$\beta$ decay (0$\nu\beta\beta$) is an experimentally sensitive avenue to probe the nature (Majorana versus Dirac) and exact mass of neutrinos. There are already intense activities worldwide committed to the experimental searches of 0$\nu\beta\beta$. This work [1] quantitatively explore the interplay between exposure and background levels in 0$\nu\beta\beta$ experiments at their design stage. In particular, background reduction will be playing increasingly important and investment-effective roles in future 0$\nu\beta\beta$ experiments. Although the primary goal of current running and projected experiments is to probe the inverted mass hierarchy, current neutrino oscillation experiments reveal a preference for non-degenerate (ND) normal mass hierarchy (NH). Therefore the strategy of scaling the summit of 0$\nu\beta\beta$ should also take this genuine possibility into account. Present work would explore the role of background suppression in alleviating the necessity of large exposure for future 0$\nu\beta\beta$ experiments with sensitivity goals of approaching and covering ND-NH. In particular, the roles of energy resolution in suppressing the irreducible background of 2$\nu\beta\beta$ will be discussed.
[1] M.K.Singh et al., Phys. Rev. D 101, 013006 (2020).