The Innovative Design of the Endcap Disc DIRC Detector for PANDA at FAIR

TL;DR

This paper introduces the Endcap Disc DIRC, a novel Cherenkov detector designed for the PANDA experiment at FAIR, enhancing particle identification capabilities in the forward detector region.

Contribution

The paper presents the design, simulation, and validation of the Endcap Disc DIRC, a new Cherenkov detector for improved hadron identification in PANDA.

Findings

Achieved separation power of at least 3 standard deviations for π/K up to 4 GeV/c.

Validated detector performance through testbeam campaigns at CERN and DESY.

Designed to operate effectively within the polar angle range of 5° to 22°.

Abstract

The key component of the future PANDA experiment at FAIR is a fixed-target detector for collisions of antiprotons with a proton target up to a beam momentum of 15 GeV/c and is designed to address a large number of open questions in the hadron physics sector. In order to guarantee an excellent PID for charged hadrons in the polar angle range between $5^\circ$ and $22^\circ$, a new type of Cherenkov detector called Endcap Disc DIRC (EDD) has been developed for the forward endcap of the PANDA target spectrometer. The desired separation power of at least 3 s.d. for the separation of $\pi^\pm$ and $K^\pm$ up to particle momenta of 4 GeV/c was determined with simulation studies and validated during various testbeam campaigns at CERN and DESY.