Nuclear emulsion scanning in opera: methods and results

The design of the OPERA experiment was also motivated and justified by the revival of nuclear emulsion handling and scanning in a modem, automatic fashion, as it took previously place, although at a smaller scale, for the CHORUS experiment. Nuclear emulsions are still the only detector to allow a very detailed topological study of an interaction/decay vertex at the sub-micrometer level. They are most suitable in experiments where topology is a non-ambiguous signature of a certain class of events. This is for instance the case of neutrino oscillation detection and measurement by the study of a tau-appearance signal. The design and performance of the two different scanning systems used in OPERA (ESS and S-UTS) are discussed. Their unique features in terms of speed, precision, background suppression, particle identification, and kinematical reconstruction are shown in close connection with the technical details that make them possible. Unequalled precision, almost vanishing background, and a wealth of information about each single event are the results presented.