110239538
Development and simulation results of a sparsification and readout circuit for wide pixel matrices
In future collider experiments, the increasing luminosity and centre of mass energy are rising challenging problems in the design of new inner tracking systems. In this context we develop high-efficiency readout architectures for large binary pixel matrices that are meant to cope with the high-stressing conditions foreseen in the innermost layers of a tracker [The SuperB Conceptual Design Report, INFN/AE-07/02, SLAC-R-856, LAL 07-15, Available online at: http://www.pi.infn.it/SuperB ]. We model and design digital readout circuits to be integrated on VLSI ASICs. These architectures can be realized with different technology processes and sensors: they can be implemented on the same silicon sensor substrate of a CMOS MAPS devices (Monolithic Active Pixel Sensor), on the CMOS tier of a hybrid pixel sensor or in a 3D chip where the digital layer is stacked on the sensor and the analog layers [V. Re et al., Nuc. Instr. and Meth. in Phys. Res. A, doi:10.1016/j.nima.2010.05.039 ]. In the presented work, we consider a data-push architecture designed for a sensor matrix of an area of about 1.3 cm 2 with a pitch of 50 microns. The readout circuit tries to take great advantage of the high density of in-pixel digital logic allowed by vertical integration. We aim at sustaining a rate density of 100 Mtrack ⋅ s −1 ⋅ cm −2 with a temporal resolution below 1 μs . We show how this architecture can cope with these stressing conditions presenting the results of Monte Carlo simulations.
123625473
Architecture of a general purpose embedded Slow-Control Adapter ASIC for future high-energy physics experiments
Abstract This work is aimed at defining the architecture of a new digital ASIC, namely Slow-Control Adapter (SCA), which will be designed in a commercial 130-nm CMOS technology. This chip will be embedded within a high-speed data acquisition optical link (GBT) to control and monitor the front-end electronics in future high-energy physics experiments. The GBT link provides a transparent transport layer between the SCA and control electronics in the counting room. The proposed SCA supports a variety of common bus protocols to interface with end-user general-purpose electronics. Between the GBT and the SCA a standard 100 Mb/s IEEE-802.3 compatible protocol will be implemented. This standard protocol allows off-line tests of the prototypes using commercial components that support the same standard. The project is justified because embedded applications in modern large HEP experiments require particular care to assure the lowest possible power consumption, still offering the highest reliability demanded by very large particle detectors.
46500747
Implementation of a bidimensional compressor for a high-energy physics experiment
CARLOSv3 is the third version of a chip that plays a significant role in the data acquisition chain of the A Large Ion Collider Experiment (ALICE) silicon drift detector (SDD). ALICE is one of the foremost high-energy physics experiments (HEPE) conducted within the Large Hadron Collider at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research in Geneva. CARLOSv3 was principally designed and built for the on-line compression of the input dataset originating from a physical bidimensional silicon sensor. To compress a bidimensional dataset, a bidimensional data compressor was required. The compressor was designed for the ALICE SDD Experiment but could be applied to all experiments in which an incoming stream dataset originates from a bidimensional sensor.
109494522
Design, realization and test of a rad-hard 2D-compressor and packing chip for high energy physics experiments
CARLOSv3 is a third version of a chip that plays a significant role in the data acquisition chain of the A Large Ion Collider Experiment Inner Tracking System experiment. It has been designed and realized with a 0.25 μm CMOS 3-metal rad-hard digital library. The chip elaborates and compresses, by means of a bi-dimensional compressor, data belonging to a so-called event. The compressor looks for cross-shaped clusters within the whole data set coming from the silicon detector. To test the chip a specific PCB has been designed; it contains the connectors for probing the ASIC with a pattern generator and a logic state analyzer. The chip is inserted on the PCB using a ZIF socket. This allows to test the 35 packaged samples out of the total amount of bare chips we have from the foundry. The test phase has shown that 32 out of 35 chips under test work well. It is planned to redesign a new version of the chip by adding extra features and to submit the final version of CARLOS upon the final DAQ chain will be totally tested both in Bologna and at CERN.
56367755
Design of an integrated particle detector-cell based on latchup effect
The paper describes an innovative idea for a silicon pixel detector. The principle is based on latchup effect that is common in to-date CMOS technologies working in a radiation environment. A prototype was constructed in the past with commercial components and here is described in detail an integrated version of the design. In principle the detector has low triggering and dead time, can operate at room temperature, does not require a high voltage power supply and is intrinsically tolerant to radiation. As a latchup-based detector can be constructed using state-of-the-art CMOS technologies, here it is presented a design of a prototype that will be implemented on a commercial 0.35 μm Bi-CMOS technology and tested at Electronics Department of Torino Politecnico.
109308730
Heavy-Ions induced SEE effects measurements for the STRURED ASIC
With the aim of developing a radiation-tolerant circuit, a digital test microelectronic device has been designed and fabricated by using a standard-cell library of a 130-nm CMOS technology, including three different architectures to correct circuit malfunctions induced by the occurrence of Single-Event Effects (SEEʼs). SEEʼs are one of the main reasons of failures affecting electronic circuits operating in harsh radiation environments, such as in experiments performed at High Energy Physics (HEP) colliders or in apparatus to be operated in Space. On the same digital circuit specifically designed, three redundant architectures added to a basic scheme have been implemented in order to evaluate their effectiveness to prevent SEE. This may give an indication on their usage in future digital circuits specifically designed for the above mentioned applications. We present the results of SEE cross section measurements performed on a test digital device exposed to a high energy heavy ion beam at the SIRAD irradiation facility of the INFN National Laboratories of Legnaro (Padova Italy).
15853720
Galaxy number counts and fractal correlations
We report the correlation analysis of various redshift surveys which shows that the available data are consistent with each other and manifest fractal correlations (with dimension D 2) up to the present observational limits ( ≈ 150 h−1Mpc) without any tendency towards homogenization. This result points to a new interpretation of the number counts that represents the main subject of this letter. We show that an analysis of the small-scale fluctuations allows us to reconcile the correlation analysis and the number counts in a new perspective which has a number of important implications.
14466810
Basic properties of galaxy clustering in the light of recent results from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey
We discuss some of the basic implications of recent results on galaxy correlations published by the SDSS collaboration. In particular we focus on the evidence which has been recently presented for the scale and nature of the transition to homogeneity in the galaxy distribution, and results which describe the dependence of clustering on luminosity. The two questions are in fact strictly entangled, as the stability of the measure of the amplitude of the correlation function depends on the scale at which the mean density becomes well defined. We note that the recent results which indicate the convergence to well defined homogeneity in a volume equivalent to that of a sphere of radius 70 Mpc/h, place in doubt previous detections of luminosity bias from measures of the amplitude of the correlation function. We emphasize that the way to resolve these issues is to first use, in volume limited samples corresponding to different ranges of luminosity, the unnormalized two point statistics to establish the scale (and value) at which the mean density becomes well defined. We note also that the recent SDSS results for these statistics are in good agreement with those obtained by us through analyses of many previous samples, confirming in particular that the galaxy distribution is well described by a fractal dimension D 2 up to a scale of at least 20 Mpc/h. We discuss critically the agreement of this new data with current theoretical models.
6446445
Generation of primordial cosmological perturbations from statistical mechanical models
The initial conditions describing seed fluctuations for the formation of structure in standard cosmological models, i.e. the Harrison-Zeldovich distribution, have very characteristic ‘‘super-homogeneous’’ properties: they are statistically translation invariant and isotropic, and the variance of the mass fluctuations in a region of volume V grows more slowly than V. We discuss the geometrical construction of distributions of points in R 3 with similar properties encountered in tiling and in statistical physics, e.g. the Gibbs distribution of a onecomponent system of charged particles in a uniform background @one-component plasma ~OCP!#. Modifications of the OCP can produce equilibrium correlations of the kind assumed in the cosmological context. We then describe how such systems can be used for the generation of initial conditions in gravitational N-body simulations.
119113467
A Dynamical Classification of the Range of Pair Interactions
We formalize a classification of pair interactions based on the convergence properties of the forces acting on particles as a function of system size. We do so by considering the behavior of the probability distribution function (PDF) P(F) of the force field F in a particle distribution in the limit that the size of the system is taken to infinity at constant particle density, i.e., in the “usual” thermodynamic limit. For a pair interaction potential V(r) with V(r→∞)∼1/rγ defining a bounded pair force, we show that P(F) converges continuously to a well-defined and rapidly decreasing PDF if and only if the pair force is absolutely integrable, i.e., for γ>d−1, where d is the spatial dimension. We refer to this case as dynamically short-range, because the dominant contribution to the force on a typical particle in this limit arises from particles in a finite neighborhood around it. For the dynamically long-range case, i.e., γ≤d−1, on the other hand, the dominant contribution to the force comes from the mean field due to the bulk, which becomes undefined in this limit. We discuss also how, for γ≤d−1 (and notably, for the case of gravity, γ=d−2) P(F) may, in some cases, be defined in a weaker sense. This involves a regularization of the force summation which is generalization of the procedure employed to define gravitational forces in an infinite static homogeneous universe. We explain that the relevant classification in this context is, however, that which divides pair forces with γ>d−2 (or γ<d−2), for which the PDF of the difference in forces is defined (or not defined) in the infinite system limit, without any regularization. In the former case dynamics can, as for the (marginal) case of gravity, be defined consistently in an infinite uniform system.
33686678
Force distribution in a randomly perturbed lattice of identical particles with 1/r2 pair interaction.
We study the statistics of the force felt by a particle in the class of a spatially correlated distribution of identical pointlike particles, interacting via a 1/r2 pair force (i.e., gravitational or Coulomb), and obtained by randomly perturbing an infinite perfect lattice. We specify the conditions under which the force on a particle is a well-defined stochastic quantity. We then study the small displacements approximation, giving both the limitations of its validity and, when it is valid, an expression for the force variance. The method introduced by Chandrasekhar to find the force probability density function for the homogeneous Poisson particle distribution is extended to shuffled lattices of particles. In this way, we can derive an approximate expression for the probability distribution of the force over the full range of perturbations of the lattice, i.e., from very small (compared to the lattice spacing) to very large where the Poisson limit is recovered. We show in particular the qualitative change in the large-force tail of the force distribution between these two limits. Excellent accuracy of our analytic results is found on detailed comparison with results from numerical simulations. These results provide basic statistical information about the fluctuations of the interactions (i) of the masses in self-gravitating systems like those encountered in the context of cosmological N -body simulations, and (ii) of the charges in the ordered phase of the one-component plasma, the so-called Coulomb or Wigner crystal.