A High Spatial Resolution Muon Tomography Prototype System based on Micromegas Detector

TL;DR

This paper presents a high-resolution muon tomography system using Micromegas detectors with innovative multiplexing, achieving sub-millimeter spatial resolution and capable of imaging small objects and differentiating materials.

Contribution

The paper introduces a scalable, high-resolution muon tomography prototype with multiplexed readout, significantly reducing electronics complexity while maintaining imaging quality.

Findings

Spatial resolution reaches hundreds of micrometers.

System successfully images 2-cm objects.

Able to distinguish different materials.

Abstract

Cosmic ray muon has strong penetrating power and no ionizing radiation hazards, which makes it an ideal probe for detecting special nuclear materials. In this paper, a high spatial resolution muon tomography system based on Micromegas detectors is proposed to optimize the imaging time and quality. The proposed system includes eight Micromegas detectors based on the thermal bonding technique and a scalable readout system. In addition, a multiplexing method based on position encoding is developed to reduce the number of electronics channels by order of magnitude. The spatial resolution of the proposed system with encoding readout can reach a value of hundred micrometers. Finally, a tomography test is performed, and test results show that this proposed system can image 2-cm objects and distinguish different materials.