Technical Design Report for the PANDA Barrel DIRC Detector

TL;DR

This paper presents the technical design and performance evaluation of the Barrel DIRC detector for the PANDA experiment, demonstrating its capability for effective hadron identification over a wide angular and momentum range.

Contribution

It introduces an improved Barrel DIRC design based on BaBar's successful system, optimized through simulations and prototype testing for enhanced particle identification.

Findings

Achieves at least 3 standard deviations in π/K separation across the entire phase space.

Design validated with prototype tests at GSI and CERN.

Performance meets or exceeds the initial PID goals.

Abstract

This documents describes the technical design and the expected performance of the Barrel DIRC detector for the PANDA experiment. The Barrel DIRC will provide hadronic charged particle identification in the polar angle range of $22^\circ$ to $140^\circ$ for particle momenta between 0.5 GeV/c and 3.5 GeV/c. The design is based on the successful BaBar DIRC with several key improvements. The performance and system cost were optimized in detailed detector simulations and validated with full system prototypes using particle beams at GSI and CERN. The final design meets or exceeds the PID goal of clean $\pi/K$ separation with at least 3 standard deviations over the entire phase space of charged kaons in the Barrel DIRC.