Tests of a new digital calorimeter prototype based on the ALPIDE pixel chip

Abstract

In the moments after the Big Bang the universe was in a state which we call a Quark Gluon Plasma. The study of this state of matter is the primary objective at the ALICE detector in the LHC. ALICE has a proposed upgrade called FoCal (Forward Calorimeter) which will give us a new window into this state of matter. For the research and development of FoCal we built a prototype which uses the ALPIDE chip as the sensors. The ALPIDE chip can be configured using analog settings, which will influence the sensitivity of the chip. The influence of these settings on the noise rate and cluster size of cosmic ray particles has been measured. From the cosmic ray particles that were detected there has been made a selection on the muons, which produce straight tracks in the prototype, to produce an alignment procedure. From the resulting alignment graphs and research it was found that the procedure used only gives a first order correction and a better alignment algorithm should be used.