First results on the Spaghetti Calorimeter projective prototype
The performances of a projective lead/scintillating fibres (“spaghetti”) calorimeter made out of rectangular cross-section (32 × 32 mm 2 ) straight modules alternated with tapering modules at 2.5° are described. Beam test results on energy resolution, constant term suppression, lineshape, uniformity of response, shower position resolution, and electron-pion discrimination are presented. The readout of the fibres in the straight modules, which are sensitive to most of the electromagnetic showers and to part of the hadronic showers, is kept separate from the readout of the fibres of the wedged sections, which are sensitive only to hadronic showers. The lead-to-fibre volume ratio is kept at about 4 to 1 in order to obtain an equal-amplitude response from electrons and hadrons (usually called “compensation”). The origin of the energy resolution constant term has been better understood. This allowed the reduction of the constant term to 0.5%, down from 1.2% measured in older prototypes. The probability of faking abnormally large signals because of channelling effects is also discussed. The position resolution has been measured to range from 0.5 to 1 mm depending on the hit position of the particle. A comparison with the larger hexagonal module design is also made. The efficiency of a hardware thresholding of the wedges' signal as a level one trigger pion veto is discussed along with off-line electron/pion discrimination performances. Since the wedges start at 26 X 0 from the calorimeter front face they should show no signal for electromagnetic showers. It was found that electromagnetic showers of 50 GeV generate wedge signals of a maximum of a few tens of MeV. It was also found that the discriminating power is angle dependent, mainly because at small particle-to-fibre angles (≤ 1°) some electrons can penetrate the calorimeter through channeling, thus exciting a signal in the wedges. At slightly higher tilt angle it is possible to use a lower wedge threshold without loss in electron efficiency. With a beam-to-fibre angle of 3°, 99.6% of pions are rejected with a 98.5% electron efficiency. More recent and preliminary results on energy resolution at energies up to 100 GeV, and on radiation damage of scintillating fibres are also presented.

title: beta-delayed proton decay of Kr-69
abstract: The nuclide Kr-69 With T-z=-3/2, A=4n+1 produced in the Ca-40(S-32,3n) The nuclide Kr-69 With T-z=-3/2, A=4n+1 produced in the Ca-40(S-32,3n)

title: Hybrid photodiode tube
abstract: We report the first test results on a new breed of light detector based on a photocathode followed by a silicon diode working in the bombarding mode.

title: Proton branching ratios in the beta-delayed proton decay of Mo-87
abstract: The nuclide Mo-87 With A = 4n+3 and T-z=3/2 was reinvestigated via its The nuclide Mo-87 With A = 4n+3 and T-z=3/2 was reinvestigated via its

title: A note on on-shell recursion relation of string amplitudes
abstract: A bstractIn the application of on-shell recursion relation to string amplitudes, one challenge is the sum over infinite intermediate on-shell string states. In this note, we show how to sum these infinite states explicitly by including unphysical states to make complete Fock space.

title: Q value of the superallowed decay of Mg22 and the calibration of the Na21(p,γ) experiment
abstract: The masses of the radioactive nuclei {sup 22}Mg and {sup 22}Na have been measured with the Canadian Penning trap on-line mass spectrometer to a precision of 3x10{sup -8} and 1x10{sup -8}, respectively. A Q{sub EC} value of 4124.39(73) keV for the superallowed {beta} decay of {sup 22}Mg is obtained from the difference of these two masses. With this precise Q value, the Ft value for this decay is determined with improved precision and is found to be consistent with the existing precision data set of superallowed Fermi emitters. This provides an important test of the isospin symmetry-breaking corrections. If the mass of {sup 22}Mg determined here is used in the calibration of a recent {sup 21}Na(p,{gamma}){sup 22}Mg measurement, part of the discrepancy observed in that measurement is removed.

title: Performance of prototypes for the ALICE electromagnetic calorimeter
abstract: The performance of prototypes for the ALICE electromagnetic sampling calorimeter has been studied in test beam measurements at FNAL and CERN. A 4 × 4 array of final design modules showed an energy resolution of about 11 % / E ( GeV ) ⊕ 1.7 % with a uniformity of the response to electrons of 1% and a good linearity in the energy range from 10 to 100 GeV. The electromagnetic shower position resolution was found to be described by 1.5 mm ⊕ 5.3 mm / E ( GeV ) . For an electron identification efficiency of 90% a hadron rejection factor of > 600 was obtained.

title: Front-end electronics of the ALICE photon spectrometer
abstract: The photon spectrometer (PHOS) in the ALICE experiment at LHC is dedicated to measuring photons, π 0 's and η 's in a broad p T range from about 100 MeV/ c to 100 GeV/ c , providing the best possible energy and position resolution in order to narrow the π 0 and η mass peaks and thus to increase the signal to background ratio. The front-end electronics (FEE) of the PHOS is thus required to cover a large dynamic range, to have a timing resolution better than ∼ 2 ns in order to discriminate against 1–2 GeV/ c (anti-)neutrons, and to provide high p T trigger to select rare high p T events. In addition, to equalize the gains of individual detector channels, it is desired that the PHOS FEE can regulate the bias voltage of APD. In this paper, we will present the performance and status of the 32-channel low noise front-end electronics for the PHOS with a dynamic range of 14 bits. Measurements with LED pulse at laboratory and results from beam test with the first PHOS module at T10 of the CERN PS show that its performance fulfills the PHOS requirements.

title: Effects of galaxy mergers on the faint IRAS source counts and the background
abstract: Binary merging constitutes a complementary mode of galaxy evolution to the canonical hierarchical clustering theory. This merger-driven evolution not only influences the galaxy mass distribution function, but may drive the main galactic activity cycles, such as starbursts and the activity in the nuclei (AGNs). In this paper, we use galaxy aggregation dynamics together with a possible merger-driven starburst and AGN phenomena, to study the effects of evolution of these consequential activities for the faint IRAS source counts and the infra-red background. We find that the strong evolution of IRAS 60 mu m source count at flux range of 10 mJy similar to 1 Jy is difficult to be explained only by the merger rate decrease with cosmic time. We need to assume a redshift dependent infrared burst phase of ultraluminous infrared galaxies (ULIGs) from the gas rich mergers at high redshift and the gas poor mergers at low redshift. The background intensity at 60 mu m which we get from this aggregation evolution is a lower Limit of only 1.9 nW m(-2) sr(-1), about half of those estimated by some previous models, but close to the lower end of the range derived by Malkan & Stecker (1998).