A high pressure gas scintillation drift chamber to search for evidence of a massive neutrino in the beta decay spectrum of 14 C

Summary form only. A laboratory beta decay experiment is being conducted to search for a massive neutrino in the beta spectrum of ¹⁴C. There is controversial evidence for a 17-keV neutrino; this demands experimental initiatives using new detector technologies to decide the issue. An existing gas scintillation drift chamber has been modified to perform an innovative experiment to fill this void. This techique has the following merits: the imaging capabilities of the chamber permit fiducial cuts to eliminate events near chamber boundaries; the gaseous radioisotope source is spread uniformly throughout the active detector volume; the data rate is high; the background is low and systematically measurable; and high-pressure operation limits beta particle ranges and allows good energy resolution