Development of a highly sensitive hollow waveguide based Raman system for the compositional analysis of the KATRIN tritium source gas

The Karlsruhe Tritium Neutrino experiment (KATRIN) is designed to measure the neutrino mass with a sensitivity of 0.2 eV (90% C.L.) by investigating the beta spectrum of tritium. This requires continuous monitoring of the tritium gas composition. The aim of this work was to develop a tritium-compatible Raman system suitable for in situ gas analysis at low pressures. Based on a hollow waveguide approach, a detection limit of 10^(-3) mbar was achieved in less than 60 s acquisition time.