Radon Daughter Plate-out onto Teflon

Understand

Radiopure materials for detector components in rare event searches may be contaminated after manufacturing with long-lived $^{210}$Pb produced by the decay of atmospheric radon.

• Charged radon daughters deposited on the surface or implanted in the bulk of detector materials have the potential to cause noticeable backgrounds within dark matter regions of interest.
• Understanding the mechanics governing these background signals is therefore a paramount concern in dark matter experiments in order to distinguish a real signal from internal detector backgrounds.
• Teflon ($i.e.$ PTFE) is a specific material of interest because it makes up the walls of the inner detector of many liquid noble detectors such as the LUX-ZEPLIN experiment.