Prototype analog front-end for negative-ion gas and dual-phase liquid-Ar TPCs

• Published in: Journal of instrumentation Vol. 14; no. 1; p. T01008
• Main Authors: Nakazawa, M., Kishishita, T., Shoji, M., Sakashita, K., Ikeda, T., Ishiura, H., Battat, J.B.R., Nicoloff, C., Tanaka, M.M., Hasegawa, T., Miuchi, K.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Bristol IOP Publishing 01.01.2019
• Subjects: Argon; CMOS; Dark matter; Dynamic range; Low pressure; Neutrinos; Nucleons; Prototypes; Room temperature
• ISSN: 1748-0221; 1748-0221
• DOI: 10.1088/1748-0221/14/01/T01008

We report on the recent development of a versatile analog front-end compatible with a negative-ion μ-TPC for a directional dark matter search as well as a dual-phase, next-generation (10 kt) liquid argon TPC to study neutrino oscillations, nucleon decay, and astrophysical neutrinos. Although the operating conditions for negative-ion and liquid argon TPCs are quite different (room temperature vs. ∼88 K operation, respectively), the readout electronics requirements are similar. Both require a wide-dynamic range up to 1600 fC, and less than 2000–5000 e− noise for a typical signal of 80 fC with a detector capacitance of Cdet≈300 pF. In order to fulfill such challenging requirements, a prototype ASIC was newly designed using 180-nm CMOS technology. Here, we report on the performance of this ASIC, including measurements of shaping time, dynamic range, and equivalent noise charge (ENC). We also demonstrate the first operation of this ASIC on a low-pressure negative-ion μ-TPC.