1. Instrumentation Division Seminar

    "A Roadmap for the Best PMTs and SiPM in Physics Research"

    Presented by Razmik Mirzoyan, Max Planck Institute for Physics, Germany

    Wednesday, January 23, 2019, 2:30 pm
    Large Conference Room, Bldg. 535

    Photomultiplier Tubes (PMT) are the most wide spread detectors for measuring fast and faint light signals. In cooperation with the companies Hamamatsu Photonics K.K. (Japan) and Electron Tubes Enterprises Ltd. (England) we pursued an improvement program for the PMTs for the Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA) project. CTA is the next major Imaging Atmospheric Cherenkov Telescopes (IACT) array for ground-based very high energy gamma-ray astrophysics. A total of ∼100 telescopes of sizes of 23m, 12m and 4m in diameter will be built in northern and southern hemispheres. The manufacturers succeeded producing 1.5′ PMTs of enhanced peak quantum efficiency of ∼38-42 % and after pulsing below 0.02% (threshold ≥ 4 photoelectrons). The novel 1.5′ PMTs have the world-wide best parameters. It is interesting to compare the performance of PMTs with the current generation of SiPMs. In the imaging camera of the MAGIC IACT, consisting of 1039 PMTs, since many months we are operating composite clusters of SiPMs from the three well-known manufacturers. A critical comparison of these two types of sensors will be presented. Prospects for further significant improvements of PMTs and SiPMs will be discussed, also in the frame of the supported by the EU SENSE Roadmap for the best fast light sensors.