High Density Low Cost Readout Electronics for Large Scale Radiation Detectors

Major upgrades or new constructions at the nations nuclear research facilities require continuing development of the state-of-the-art instrumentation, detectors and readout electronics. As nuclear physicists increasingly design large scale radiation detectors, there are growing needs for high density low cost readout electronics. However, existing off-the-shelf readout electronics are prohibitively expensive for large scale radiation detectors. Affordable digital readout electronics with good time and energy resolution are critically needed to address this need. In this project, we propose to develop a high density, low cost digital spectrometer module that can address the needs in the nuclear physics community to instrument large scale radiation detectors at relatively low cost. The module will be a true spectrometer: able to capture waveforms and provide good energy and timing resolution while its cost per channel can be reduced by as much as a factor of 10 compared to that of existing digital readout modules. In Phase I, different architectures for the proposed high density low cost module were compared and an optimal architecture was chosen for building a Phase II prototype. A prototype circuit board was built to verify Gigabit per second connectivity between multi-channel analog-to-digital converters and low cost field programmable gate arrays. Gamma-ray spectroscopic performances of chosen multi-channel analog- to-digital converters were measured. The goals of the Phase II research are to build a prototype for the proposed high density low cost module; develop firmware and software to operate the module; characterize its gamma-ray spectroscopic performances in XIAs laboratories; and test it at potential customers sites (e.g. national laboratories, universities) to verify its performance with large scale radiation detectors. Commercial Applications and Other Benefits: The proposed instrument has a wide area of applications in various scientific experiments. The increasing needs for improved time, position, and energy resolution in nuclear physics experiments have spurred the rapid development of commercial off-the-shelf high speed, high resolution digitizers or spectrometers. However, it is impractical to use existing readout electronics to instrument experiments involving hundreds to thousands of radiation detectors due to their high cost per channel. The proposed instrument will fill an important need for affordable electronics that can instrument large scale radiation detectors at relatively low cost.