Test and characterization of a prototype silicon-tungsten electromagnetic calorimeter

TL;DR

This paper presents the design, construction, and testing of a silicon-tungsten electromagnetic calorimeter prototype optimized for high-energy physics experiments, demonstrating promising performance and agreement with simulations.

Contribution

It introduces a novel Si-W calorimeter design optimized for gamma/pi0 discrimination and validates its performance through experimental testing and simulation comparison.

Findings

Linear energy deposition response observed

Prototype performance aligns with GEANT-4 simulations

Effective gamma/pi0 discrimination potential

Abstract

New generation high-energy physics experiments demand high precision tracking and accurate measurements of a large number of particles produced in the collisions of lementary particles and heavy-ions. Silicon-tungsten (Si-W) calorimeters provide the most viable technological option to meet the requirements of particle detection in high multiplicity environments. We report a novel Si-W calorimeter design, which is optimized for $\gamma/\pi^0$ discrimination up to high momenta. In order to test the feasibility of the calorimeter, a prototype mini-tower was constructed using silicon pad detector arrays and tungsten layers. The performance of the mini-tower was tested using pion and electron beams at the CERN Proton Synchrotron (PS). The experimental results are compared with the results from a detailed GEANT-4 simulation. A linear relationship between the observed energy deposition and simulated response of the mini-tower has been obtained, in line with our expectations.