A front-end ASIC for use with large-pixel array detectors
An Integrated Circuit (IC) readout chip with four channels arranged so as to receive input charge from the corners of the chip was designed for use with 5- to 7-mm pixel detectors. This Application Specific IC (ASIC) can be used for cold neutron imaging, for study of structural order in materials using cold neutron scattering or for particle physics experiments. The ASIC is fabricated in a 0.5-/spl mu/m n-well AMI process. The design of the ASIC and the test measurements made will be reported. Noise measurements will also he reported.
TGV32: a 32-channel preamplifier chip for the Multiplicity Vertex Detector at PHENIX
The TGV32, a 32-channel preamplifier-multiplicity discriminator chip for the Multiplicity Vertex Detector (MVD) at PHENIX, is a unique silicon preamplifier in that it provides both an analog output for storage in an analog memory and a weighted summed-current output for conversion to a channel multiplicity count. The architecture and test results of the chip are presented. Details about the design of the preamplifier, discriminator, and programmable digital-analog converters performance as well as the process variations are presented. The chip is fabricated in a 1.2-/spl mu/m, n-well, CMOS process.
Control of the homopause level
Abstract This paper reviews the hypothesis that internal gravity wave breaking in the factor responsible for upper atmosphere turbulence generation and control of the number density at the homopause level. Available data from Mars and Earth support the hypothesis, originally introduced by Lindzen, that breaking thermal tides are responsible for the necessary turbulence. The lowest-order, equatorially trapped, westward-propagating diurnal tidal mode is the primary cause on the Earth, and lower-order westward-propagating semidiurnal modes are the primary cause on Mars. The frequencies and vertical wavenumbers of the responsible modes determine the eddy diffusion coefficients; energy density is only indirectly involved by determining which modes can break. A general scale relationship between tidal heating and velocity amplitude can be used to assess the breaking potential of tidal modes, and is used here as the basis for arguing that the number density at the Martian homopause is likely to have been stable over much of geologic time. Difficulties with this approach arise in the cases of Venus and Titan because of their peculiar zonal winds. For Jupiter and Saturn, internal gravity waves generated by nontidal mechanisms probably control the homopause.