Measurement of the scintillation efficiency for nuclear recoils in liquid argon under electric fields up to 3 kV/cm

Abstract: We present a measurement of scintillation efficiency for a few tens of keV nuclear recoils (NR) with a liquid argon time projection chamber under electric fields ranging from $0$ to $3\ {\rm kV/cm}$. The calibration data are taken with $^{252}{\rm Cf}$ radioactive source. Observed scintillation and electroluminescence spectra are simultaneously fit with spectra derived from Geant4-based Monte Carlo simulation and an NR model. The scintillation efficiency extracted from the fit is reported as a function of recoil energy and electric field. This result can be used for designing the detector and for the interpretation of experimental data in searching for scintillation and ionization signals induced by WIMP dark matter.