The electronics, trigger and data acquisition system for the liquid argon time projection chamber of the DarkSide-50 search for dark matter

P. Agnes (1) , I.F.M. Albuquerque (2) , T. Alexander (3) , A.K. Alton , K. Arisaka , D.M. Asner (3) , M. Ave , H.O. Back (3) , B. Baldin (4) , K. Biery (4) , V. Bocci , G. Bonfini , W. Bonivento , M. Bossa , B. Bottino , A. Brigatti , J. Brodsky , F. Budano , S. Bussino , M. Cadeddu , M. Cadoni , F. Calaprice , N. Canci , A. Candela , H. Cao , M. Caravati , M. Cariello , M. Carlini , S. Catalanotti , V. Cataudella , P. Cavalcante , A. Chepurnov , C. Cicaló , A.G. Cocco , G. Covone , L. Crippa , D. d'Angelo , M. d'Incecco , S. Davini , A. de Candia , S. de Cecco (5) , M. de Deo , G. de Filippis , G. de Rosa , M. de Vincenzi , A. Derbin , A. Devoto , F. Di Eusanio , C. Dionisi , G. Di Pietro , E. Edkins , A. Empl , A. Fan , G. Fiorillo , K. Fomenko , G. Forster (4) , D. Franco (1) , F. Gabriele , C. Galbiati , S. Giagu , C. Giganti (5) , G.K. Giovanetti , A.M. Goretti , F. Granato , L. Grandi , M. Gromov , M. Guan , Y. Guardincerri , B.R. Hackett , K.R. Herner , D. Hughes , P. Humble , E.V. Hungerford , Aldo Ianni , Andrea Ianni , I. James , T.N. Johnson , K. Keeter , C.L. Kendziora , V. Kobychev , G. Koh , D. Korablev , G. Korga , A. Kubankin , X. Li , M. Lissia , B. Loer , P. Lombardi , G. Longo , S. Luitz , Y. Ma , A. Machado , I.N. Machulin , A. Mandarano , S.M. Mari , J. Maricic , L. Marini , C.J. Martoff , P.D. Meyers , T. Miletic , R. Milincic , D. Montanari , A. Monte , M. Montuschi , M.E. Monzani , P. Mosteiro , B.J. Mount , V.N. Muratova , P. Musico , A. Navrer Agasson (5) , A. Nelson , S. Odrowski , A. Oleinik , M. Orsini , F. Ortica , L. Pagani , M. Pallavicini , E. Pantic , S. Parmeggiano , K. Pelczar , N. Pelliccia , A. Pocar , S. Pordes , D.A. Pugachev , H. Qian , K. Randle , G. Ranucci , M. Razeti , A. Razeto , B. Reinhold , A.L. Renshaw , M. Rescigno , Q. Riffard (1) , A. Romani , B. Rossi , N. Rossi , S.D. Rountree , D. Sablone , P. Saggese , R. Saldanha , W. Sands , S. Sangiorgio , C. Savarese , B. Schlitzer , E. Segreto , D.A. Semenov , E. Shields , P.N. Singh , M.D. Skorokhvatov , O. Smirnov , A. Sotnikov , C. Stanford , Y. Suvorov , R. Tartaglia , J. Tatarowicz , G. Testera , A. Tonazzo (1) , P. Trinchese , E.V. Unzhakov , M. Verducci , A. Vishneva , R.B. Vogelaar , M. Wada , S. Walker , H. Wang , Y. Wang , A.W. Watson , S. Westerdale , M.M. Wojcik , X. Xiang , X. Xiao , J. Xu , C. Yang , J. Yoo , S. Zavatarelli , A. Zec , W. Zhong , C. Zhu , G. Zuzel

1 APC (UMR_7164) - AstroParticule et Cosmologie
2 USP - Universidade de São Paulo = University of São Paulo
3 UMass Amherst - University of Massachusetts [Amherst]
4 Fermilab - Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory
5 LPNHE (UMR_7585) - Laboratoire de Physique Nucléaire et de Hautes Énergies

The DarkSide-50 experiment at the Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso is a search for dark matter using a dual phase time projection chamber with 50 kg of low radioactivity argon as target. Light signals from interactions in the argon are detected by a system of 38 photo-multiplier tubes (PMTs), 19 above and 19 below the TPC volume inside the argon cryostat. We describe the electronics which processes the signals from the photo-multipliers, the trigger system which identifies events of interest, and the data-acquisition system which records the data for further analysis. The electronics include resistive voltage dividers on the PMTs, custom pre-amplifiers mounted directly on the PMT voltage dividers in the liquid argon, and custom amplifier/discriminators (at room temperature). After amplification, the PMT signals are digitized in CAEN waveform digitizers, and CAEN logic modules are used to construct the trigger; the data acquisition system for the TPC is based on the Fermilab artdaq software. The system has been in operation since early 2014.

Keywords: time projection chamber: liquid argon; background: radioactivity; photomultiplier; data acquisition; trigger; dark matter: detector; Gran Sasso; amplifier; electronics: readout; electronics: design

Domains: Physics [physics]; Physics [physics]; Instrumentation and Detectors [physics.ins-det]; Physics [physics]; High Energy Physics - Experiment [hep-ex]

P. Agnes, I.F.M. Albuquerque, T. Alexander, A.K. Alton, K. Arisaka, et al.. The electronics, trigger and data acquisition system for the liquid argon time projection chamber of the DarkSide-50 search for dark matter. JINST, 2017, 12 (12), pp.P12011. ⟨10.1088/1748-0221/12/12/P12011⟩. ⟨hal-01669661⟩