The Borexino scintillator and solvent procurement

The Borexino experiment for solar neutrino physics and other rare phenomena requires an extremely low radioactive background to disentangle the very few events due to neutrino interactions. Therefore, the Borexino scintillator has to satisfy the most stringent radiopurity requirements, being about eight orders of magnitude less radioactive than an ordinary material. This was achieved by means of scintillator purification techniques and of a special care during all the production, handling and procurement of the scintillator solvent. This paper describes the methodology and the quality control procedures that were employed during the production, handling and shipping of the solvent.

Borexino: Low background techniques adopted during the installation

Borexino achieved radiopurity world records. During each phase of the Experiment, starting from the fabrication up to the commissioning, various techniques to reach this important result have been adopted. A special care has been taken in the material screening and selection, in the component cleaning and installation and in the scintillator purification and handling. In this paper, the installation part will be described.