Advances in liquid argon detectors

Abstract Liquid noble gas detectors have driven particle physics research and technology in many sub-fields for many years. Recently their impact as a target and detector medium has been applied to neutrino physics research. As new results and new questions appear in neutrino physics, new detector technologies in general have been explored to keep pace with the requirement of higher statistics, higher precision experiments. Liquid argon time projection chamber devices have emerged as the detector of choice for accelerator based, massive, precision, neutrino detection. In particular, in the last decade, results from test stands and experiments have driven the development of this technology towards large scales. From the MicroBooNE experiment, SBND, and ICARUS on the Short Baseline program at Fermilab to the scale required for the huge DUNE experiment, these detectors are enabling precision neutrino physics for neutrino oscillations. And if history is our guide, as a new detection technology, liquid argon time projection chambers will likely teach us unexpected things. In this paper we present the general features of liquid argon time projection chambers for neutrino physics, a brief history of the technology and details of recent research and development that is driving the design of the detectors under construction. Finally, some comments on future R&D envisioned and the impact of this work on other fields is described.

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