CAPACITY laboratory

The CAPACITY laboratory was born in 2019 from the collaboration between the Italian National Institute of Nuclear Physics (INFN) and the Università degli Studi della Campania “Luigi Vanvitelli” (UniCampania). This infrastructure was possible thanks to the PACK project (Potenziamento Appulo-Campano di KM3NeT) that aims to the strengthening of the laboratories at INFN Bari, INFN Naples and UniCampania to enlarge the ARCA telescope. Thanks to the KM3NeT4RR project, the laboratory is bound to be enlarged and enriched with new experimental facilities.

Within the KM3NeT Collaboration the CAPACITY laboratory has a unique feature: it is the only laboratory where all the integration and calibration steps, from the photomultiplier to the Digital Optical Module, from the Base Module to the Detection Units are performed.

The instrumentation and facilities available at the CAPACITY laboratory are:

  • System for the characterization of photodetectors in terms of quantum efficiency and effective area.
  • Dark box for the measurement of dark counts and time-characteristics of photosensors.
  • Single photon camera (Hamamatsu SPIS Single Photon Imaging System)
  • Infrared camera (FLIR T560-24 FLIR T560 w/24° Lens, 640×480, -20°C to 1500°C)
  • Dark box for PMT calibration.
  • Instrumentation to build and test optical fibre transmission systems.
  • Pool for detector calibration in salted and temperature-controlled water by using atmospheric muons.
  • Hyperbaric camera for detector pressure tests up to 450 bar
  • Climatic chamber optimized for photosensor studies.
  • Experimental area of 400m2 with bridge-crane for up to 5 tons for the integration of huge experimental devices.
  • Mechanical workshop for small components.
  • Heavy lifting systems and forklifts.
  • Storage space of a few hundred m2.

The CAPACITY laboratory is a research infrastructure open to host Astroparticle experiments. In such context a collaboration with groups of the Università degli Studi di Napoli “Federico II” (UniNa) and INFN-Napoli for the HyperKamiokande experiment has been established.