Performance of a resistive plate chamber equipped with a new prototype of amplified front-end electronics

TL;DR

This paper evaluates a new amplified front-end electronics (FEERIC) for resistive plate chambers in the ALICE muon spectrometer, aiming to enhance performance and longevity amid increased LHC luminosity.

Contribution

Introduction and testing of a novel amplified front-end electronics (FEERIC) for RPCs in the ALICE experiment, improving rate capability and detector aging.

Findings

FEERIC shows comparable efficiency to ADULT electronics.

Reduced total charge per hit with FEERIC.

Stable performance in pp and Pb-Pb collisions.

Abstract

ALICE is the LHC experiment dedicated to the study of heavy-ion collisions. At forward rapidity a muon spectrometer detects muons from low mass mesons, quarkonia, open heavy-flavor hadrons as well as weak bosons. A muon selection based on transverse momentum is made by a trigger system composed of 72 resistive plate chambers (RPCs). For the LHC Run 1 and the ongoing Run 2 the RPCs have been equipped with a non-amplified FEE called ADULT. However, in view of an increase in luminosity expected for Run 3 (2021-2023) the possibility to use an amplified FEE has been explored in order to improve the counting rate limitation and to prevent the aging of the detector, by reducing the charge per hit. A prototype of this new electronics (FEERIC) has been developed and tested first with cosmic rays before equipping one RPC in the ALICE cavern with it. In this paper the most important performance indicators - efficiency, dark current, dark rate, cluster size and total charge - of an RPC equipped with this new FEE will be reviewed and compared to the others read out with ADULT, in pp collisions at 5 and 13 TeV and in Pb-Pb collisions at 5 TeV.