Frontend electronics for high-precision single photo-electron timing

Cardinali, M. et al. (2015) Frontend electronics for high-precision single photo-electron timing. Proceedings of Science, 213(TIPP14), 180. (doi: 10.22323/1.213.0180)

Abstract

The next generation of high-luminosity experiments requires excellent particle identification detectors, which calls for imaging Cherenkov counters with fast electronics to cope with the expected hit rates. A Barrel DIRC will be used in the central region of the Target Spectrometer of the planned PANDA experiment at FAIR. A single photo-electron timing resolution of better than 100 ps RMS is required for the Barrel DIRC to disentangle the complicated patterns created on the image plane. R&D studies have been performed to provide a design based on the TRB3 readout using FPGA-TDCs with a typical precision of 10 ps RMS and custom frontend electronics with high-bandwidth pre-amplifiers and fast discriminators. The discriminators also provide time-over-threshold information, thus enabling walk corrections to improve the timing resolution. Two types of frontend electronics cards optimised for reading out 64-channel PHOTONIS Planacon MCP-PMTs were tested: one based on the NINO ASIC and the other, called PADIWA, based on FPGA discriminators. Promising results were obtained in a full characterisation using a fast laser setup and in a test experiment at MAMI, Mainz, with a small scale DIRC prototype.

• Item Type: Articles
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Hoek, Mr Matthias and Montgomery, Dr Rachel and Rosner, Professor Guenther and Cowie, Dr Euan
• Authors: Cardinali, M., Dzhygadlo, R., Gerhardt, A., Götzen, K., Hohler, R., Kalicy, G., Kumawat, H., Lehmann, D., Lewandowski, B., Patsyuk, M., Peters, K., Schepers, G., Schmitt, L., Schwarz, C., Schwiening, J., Traxler, M., Ugur, C., Zühlsdorf, M., Dodokhov, V.K., Britting, A., Eyrich, W., Lehmann, A., Uhlig, F., Düren, M., Föhl, K., Hayrapetyan, A., Kröck, B., Merle, O., Rieke, J., Cowie, E., Keri, T., Montgomery, R., Rosner, G., Achenbach, P., Corell, O., Ferretti Bondy, M.I., Hoek, M., Lauth, W., Rosner, C., Sfienti, C., Thiel, M., Bühler, P., Gruber, L., Marton, J., and Suzuki, K.
• College/School: College of Science and Engineering > School of Engineering > Electronics and Nanoscale Engineering; College of Science and Engineering > School of Physics and Astronomy
• Journal Name: Proceedings of Science
• Publisher: PoS
• ISSN: 1824-8039
• ISSN (Online): 1824-8039
• Copyright Holders: Copyright © 2015 The Authors
• First Published: First published in Proceedings of Science 213(TIPP2014): 180
• Publisher Policy: Reproduced under a Creative Commons License