Modelling the behaviour of microbulk Micromegas in Xenon/trimethylamine gas

TL;DR

This paper models the response of microbulk Micromegas detectors in Xenon/trimethylamine gas mixtures, using microscopic electron trajectory simulations to understand gain and resolution, incorporating Penning transfers and recombination effects.

Contribution

It introduces a microscopic modeling approach for microbulk Micromegas in Xe/TMA gas, accounting for complex atomic interactions and field effects, advancing detector simulation accuracy.

Findings

Successful microscopic simulation of electron avalanches

Identification of Penning transfer effects on gain

Insights into charge recombination impacts

Abstract

We model the response of a state of the art micro-hole single-stage charge amplication device (`microbulk' Micromegas) in a gaseous atmosphere consisting of Xenon/trimethylamine at various concentrations and pressures. The amplifying structure, made with photo-lithographic techniques similar to those followed in the fabrication of gas electron multipliers (GEMs), consisted of a 100 um-side equilateral-triangle pattern with 50 um-diameter holes placed at its vertexes. Once the primary electrons are guided into the holes by virtue of an optimized field configuration, avalanches develop along the 50 um-height channels etched out of the original doubly copper-clad polyimide foil. In order to properly account for the strong field gradients at the holes' entrance as well as for the fluctuations of the avalanche process (that ultimately determine the achievable energy resolution), we abandoned the hydrodynamic framework, resorting to a purely microscopic description of the electron trajectories as obtained from elementary cross-sections. We show that achieving a satisfactory description needs additional assumptions about atom-molecule (Penning) transfer reactions and charge recombination to be made.