XMASS experiment, dark matter search with liquid xenon detector

The XMASS Collaboration is developing liquid xenon detector for the purpose of direct detection of dark matter in the universe. A prototype detector was developed at Kamioka Observatory to test the basic performance of single phase liquid xenon detector. With the detector, the physical properties of liquid xenon were measured, and the performance of vertex and energy reconstruction and the self-shielding power of liquid xenon for background γ -rays were confirmed.