Energy partition in sapphire and BGO scintillating bolometers

Scintillating bolometers are particle detectors with a high particle discrimination power with many applications in nuclear and particle physics. This discrimination power is based on the different scintillation yield for different particles, and is strongly dependent on the target used. At the very low temperatures required for the operation of the bolometers, very few data about the scintillation yields are available. In this paper we present estimates of absolute light yields and energy partition among heat, light and trapping channels in Sapphire (Al(2)O(3)) and BGO (Bi(4)Ge(3)O(12)) scintillating bolometers operated at 20 mK. The estimate relies on the observed negative correlation between the light and heat signals produced by gamma-ray absorption in scintillating bolometers and on the study of the X-ray stimulated luminescence properties of BGO at temperatures down to 77 K. (C) 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.