Shielding Physics List: for shielding, underground and high energy applications

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Description

The Shielding physics list was originally developed for neutron penetration studies and ion-ion collisions, but it may also be used for high energy calorimetry and for underground or low background experiments. Its high energy part is taken from the FTFP_BERT physics list (now recommended by Geant4 for HEP) and radioactive decay has been added to deal with background radiation.

All of the Geant4 reference physics lists, including Shielding and FTFP_BERT, are templated code which makes it difficult to know which processes, models and cross sections are in use at a given energy for a given particle. A detailed description of the Shielding physics list is provided which includes this information.

Getting and Using the Physics List

The Shielding physics list has been part of the Geant4 release since version 9.4. It is located in the code at geant4/source/physics_lists/lists . It can be invoked from the main() of your application as follows:

#include "Shielding.hh"
G4RunManager* runManager = new G4RunManager;
runManager->SetUserInitialization(new Shielding);

Applications

The Shielding physics list has been adopted by the SuperCDMS collaboration and a slightly modified version of it is currently being used in their simulation. It has also been used for the SATIF intercode comparisons of shielding benchmarks.

Validation (not yet implemented)

Validation tests are provided to compare physics results from experiments and test beams. These are based on realistic detector geometries. For each test a set of comparison plots are maintained.


Dennis Wright