A Low Powered Single Board Multichannel Data Acquisition System for the ARIANNA Ultra-high Energy Neutrino Detector

A Low Powered Single Board Multichannel Data Acquisition System for the ARIANNA Ultra-high Energy Neutrino Detector PDF Author: Anirban Samanta
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781321452785
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 73

Get Book Here

Book Description
The ARIANNA experiment is an ultra-high energy neutrino detector designed to detect cosmogenic neutrinos. The experiment uses the Ross Ice Shelf to detect RF signals which are generated when the high energy neutrinos interact with the ice. The experiment plans to use a massive deployment of hundreds of antenna array stations to capture neutrino events over a large area. The stations use a data acquisition system to capture and store the data and subsequently transmit the data back to UCI. This thesis describes the design, functioning and results of the newest generation system which was deployed in the field in the 2014 season. The new system utilizes a new data digitization chip developed by the ARIANNA engineering group led by Dr. Stuart Kleinfelder. The new SST chip is a largely simplified and streamlined design compared to the previous generation chip and utilizes advanced circuitry to achieve fully synchronous operation while reducing the power usage by many factors. The new system makes substantial improvements over the previous generation system and introduces a number of new features, while providing a possible design solution for the final design requirements of the ARIANNA array systems.

A Low Powered Single Board Multichannel Data Acquisition System for the ARIANNA Ultra-high Energy Neutrino Detector

A Low Powered Single Board Multichannel Data Acquisition System for the ARIANNA Ultra-high Energy Neutrino Detector PDF Author: Anirban Samanta
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781321452785
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 73

Get Book Here

Book Description
The ARIANNA experiment is an ultra-high energy neutrino detector designed to detect cosmogenic neutrinos. The experiment uses the Ross Ice Shelf to detect RF signals which are generated when the high energy neutrinos interact with the ice. The experiment plans to use a massive deployment of hundreds of antenna array stations to capture neutrino events over a large area. The stations use a data acquisition system to capture and store the data and subsequently transmit the data back to UCI. This thesis describes the design, functioning and results of the newest generation system which was deployed in the field in the 2014 season. The new system utilizes a new data digitization chip developed by the ARIANNA engineering group led by Dr. Stuart Kleinfelder. The new SST chip is a largely simplified and streamlined design compared to the previous generation chip and utilizes advanced circuitry to achieve fully synchronous operation while reducing the power usage by many factors. The new system makes substantial improvements over the previous generation system and introduces a number of new features, while providing a possible design solution for the final design requirements of the ARIANNA array systems.

A High Speed and Multichannel Data Acquisition System for the ARIANNA High Energy Neutrino Detector

A High Speed and Multichannel Data Acquisition System for the ARIANNA High Energy Neutrino Detector PDF Author: Liang Zou
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 159

Get Book Here

Book Description
The ARIANNA (Anarctic Ross Ice-shelf ANtenna Neutrino Array) experiment is designed to detect high energy neutrinos in excess of 1017eV. It will consist of over nine hundred stations deployed on the Ross Ice Shelf in Antarctica. Each station includes radio frequency antennas, amplifiers and a data acquisition (DAQ) system. Each DAQ system contains four channel analog transient waveform digitizer (ATWD) circuits, two stages of the FPGA auxiliary circuitry, a 32 bit micro controller and both satellite and local-area wireless networking. Each station is powered by sun and wind. The ATWD circuitry, which is essentially an oscilloscope on a chip, operates with a 2 GHz sampling rate and achieves over 11 bits of dynamic range. The circuits sample continuously over a 128-deep switched capacitor sample and hold analog storage array arranged in a circular fashion. Unlike previous designs, the high-speed sample clocking is synchronous and has very high timing stability due to the use of a phase-locked loop, resulting in about 1 part per million RMS jitter. The core DAQ system comprises four channels of ATWD sampling with extensive supporting electronics. The four ATWD's acquire signals simultaneously and can produce a real-time trigger based on pattern matching of the incoming waveforms. A programmable logic array (PLA) in each chip searches for patterns in the incoming samples to find signals of interest, for example a bipolar impulsive waveform within a certain magnitude and frequency range. Each pattern can be any combination of 8 high (H), low (L), intermediate (I) or don't-care (X) conditions, using two thresholds, one high and one low. Thus, for example, a pattern such as "HILXXXXX" requires the first sample be above the high threshold, the next sample to be between the high and low threshold, the third sample to be below the low threshold, and any condition for the remaining samples. Up to 72 patterns can be searched for in parallel, leading to a great deal of flexibility in the sort of signals that can be searched for. Once an ATWD's trigger indicates that a match has been found, logic in the system's FPGA's can then look for timing coincidences that indicate multiple ATWD's have seen the same radio signal. If a programmed level of coincidence (e.g., three out of four ATWD's) occurs over a preset period of time, a master trigger is delivered and the ATWD's are halted. An on-board 32-bit embedded computer system then supervises the digitization of the ATWD's contents, and saves it in flash memory and/or transmits the resulting data to U.C. Irvine for further processing. This multi-level trigger system has the advantage over what a simple threshold could accomplish. The combination of the high and low thresholds, PLA patterns, and the use of coincidence logic in the system results in a multi-level, real-time smart triggering system, which is designed to positively identify genuine signals, and drastically decrease the number of the false triggers due to noise by perhaps three or more orders of magnitude.

Advanced Pattern-matching Trigger System Design for the ARIANNA High Energy Neutrino Detector

Advanced Pattern-matching Trigger System Design for the ARIANNA High Energy Neutrino Detector PDF Author: Mahshid Roumi
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781321301267
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 105

Get Book Here

Book Description
A neutrino is one of the universe's essential ingredients. Neutrinos are very hard to detect because they have no electrical charges and interact little with other particles. Thus, extremely large and sensitive detectors are required to detect neutrinos. The Antarctic Ross Ice shelf ANtenna Neutrino Array (ARIANNA) is a proposed detector for Ultra High Energy (UHE) astrophysical neutrinos. It consists of a surface array of radio receivers and can observe 1 ns radio pulses generated by UHE neutrino interactions with oxygen and hydrogen nuclei in the ice of the Ross Ice Shelf. Each ARIANNA station has four radio frequency antennas, four amplifiers, and a data acquisition system (DAQ). The DAQ of each station has four acquisition channels consisting of four daughter cards and a motherboard. Each daughter card has a custom CMOS digitization and real-time triggering circuitry (ATWD chip), and a field programmable gate array (FPGA) device. The Motherboard has four slots to connect with acquisition cards, another FGPA device for trigger control and data buffering, an embedded CPU with solid-state data storage, and interfaces to an Iridium satellite short burst data transceiver and a long-range wireless communications module. Each acquisition card includes an Advanced Transient Waveform Digitizer (ATWD) chip; a high speed analog sampling, real time pattern matching triggering and digitizing integrated circuit. It has the ability to acquire the incoming waveforms at 2 GHz with over 11-bits of dynamic range. In each station, the acquisition cards receive detected amplified RF signals simultaneously and store them into 128 samples. In addition, the ATWD has the ability to compensate for the fixed pattern noise (FPN) of the sampling and trigger circuitry, which are generated by variations in the gate to drain capacitance in the chip, or variations in the input offsets of the trigger comparators. If left uncorrected, FPN causes variations in trigger thresholds, effectively adding noise in the trigger. Calibration and cancellation of FPN is accomplished by programming per-comparator digital to analog converters to null the FPN at each comparator. After calibration, the RMS trigger noise is reduced by a factor of 3 to 4. The data acquisition system is capable of accepting three types of triggers: external, forced, and thermal. An external trigger acts upon an external electrical input signal much like an oscilloscope's trigger and is used in the laboratory or in the field during experimental studies. A forced trigger is one that is caused by the acquisition system's CPU, and is typically used to force the periodic collection of data that is unbiased by the system's thermal trigger. These "thermal" triggers are the most interesting: they are generated by the signals that the data acquisition system is collecting. Noise - or the rare neutrino events ARIANNA is searching for - will at times cause input signals to exceed trigger thresholds. To allow for low thresholds while keeping trigger rates from being swamped by noise, the thermal trigger system is set up to accept only signal-like events rather than mere noise. This includes requiring bipolar triggers on a per-channel basis over a very brief (~4 ns) time period, plus a requirement that a majority of data acquisition channels (e.g., any 3 out of 4 channels) must all trigger within a brief time window (e.g., 64 ns). These more stringent requirements are expected to capture the vast majority of neutrino events while limiting the rate of "events" due solely to noise. After any triggering event, the sampling of incoming signal is halted, digitized data is read out from the acquisition cards and is stored locally in a solid-state memory card, and then it is transmitted to UC Irvine for further processing over Iridium satellite modem or long-distance wireless communication. This dissertation focuses on the data acquisition system for ARIANNA, most particularly on the design and performance of its trigger system, including FPN calibration and correction and trigger efficiency.

Characterizing the Search for Ultra-high Energy Neutrinos with the ARIANNA Detector

Characterizing the Search for Ultra-high Energy Neutrinos with the ARIANNA Detector PDF Author: Kamlesh Dookayka
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781267079695
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 265

Get Book Here

Book Description
The Antarctic Ross Ice-shelf ANtenna Neutrino Array (ARIANNA) experiment exploits unique properties of the Ross Ice Shelf, namely its radio transparency and reflectivity at the ice-water boundary beneath the shelf, to search for ultra-high energy neutrinos. It consists of an array of detectors embedded just beneath the surface with antennas facing down to listen to characteristic radio Cherenkov pulses generated by neutrino interactions in the ice. A simulation tool has been developed and used for optimization studies and to evaluate ARIANNA's energy-dependent aperture (effective volume & times steradians). This metric can be used to estimate the expected number of neutrinos detected from a given model prediction. The software and its physics, as well as the enhancements and additions to the original version, are described. We have included an improved treatment of the firn layer with an updated parametrization (based on latest measurements) of its graded index which impact signal path and polarization. Tau-neutrino interactions now take into account regeneration from their passage through Earth, and an approximation of the 'double-bang' effect. The antenna response is more accurately represented by averaging the relative gain in both E and H-planes. Studies show that ARIANNA can detect ~ 35 events/year from the GZK mechanism using the ESS model prediction. The high sensitivity results from nearly six months or more of continuous yearly operation, low energy threshold (> 3 x 1017 eV), large volume (513 km3), and a view of slightly more than half the sky (declination +30° to -90°). The rates of background events are consistent with thermal noise fluctuations. A new reconstruction framework has been devised for the energy and direction of a detected neutrino using measured parameters from a single station, such as relative time differences between antenna and signal amplitudes. Using simulated data, the energy and angular resolutions with a single station is calculated as delta E/ E ~ 2.2, sigma (theta) ~ 2.9°, sigma (phi) ~ 2.5° respectively. In addition to ARIANNA's potential for diffuse flux studies, these capabilities bode well for future UHE neutrino point source studies.

Development of a Low-power, Low-cost Front End Electronics Module for Large Scale Distributed Neutrino Detectors

Development of a Low-power, Low-cost Front End Electronics Module for Large Scale Distributed Neutrino Detectors PDF Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

Get Book Here

Book Description
A number of concepts have been presented for distributed neutrino detectors formed of large numbers of autonomous detectors. Examples include the Antarctic Ross Ice Shelf Antenna Neutrino Array (ARIANNA) [Barwick 2006], as well as proposed radio extensions to the IceCube detector at South Pole Station such as AURA and IceRay. [Besson 2008]. We have focused on key enabling technical developments required by this class of experiments. The radio Cherenkov signal, generated by the Askaryan mechanism [Askaryan 1962, 1965], is impulsive and coherent up to above 1 GHz. In the frequency domain, the impulsive character of the emission results in simultaneous increase of the power detected in multiple frequency bands. This multiband triggering approach has proven fruitful, especially as anthropogenic interference often results from narrowband communications signals. A typical distributed experiment of this type consists of a station responsible for the readout of a cluster of antennas either near the surface of the ice or deployed in boreholes. Each antenna is instrumented with a broadband low-noise amplifier, followed by an array of filters to facilitate multi-band coincidence trigger schemes at the antenna level. The power in each band is detected at the output of each band filter, using either square-law diode detectors or log-power detectors developed for the cellular telephone market. The use of multiple antennas per station allows a local coincidence among antennas to be used as the next stage of the trigger. Station triggers can then be combined into an array trigger by comparing timestamps of triggers among stations and identifying space-time clusters of station triggers. Data from each station is buffered and can be requested from the individual stations when a multi-station coincidence occurs. This approach has been successfully used in distributed experiments such as the Pierre Auger Observatory. [Abraham et al. 2004] We identified the filters as being especially critical. The frequency range of interest, ≈200 MHz to ≈1.2 GHz, is a transitional region where the lumped circuit element approach taken at low frequencies begins to reach limitations due to component tolerances, component losses, and parasitic effects. Active circuits can help to mitigate against these effects at the cost of added power consumption that becomes prohibitive for distributed experiments across the band of interest. At higher frequency microstrip, stripline, and other microwave techniques come to the fore. We have developed designs and design tools for passive filters extending the high frequency techniques to the frequency range of interest. Microstrip and stripline techniques are not usually attractive here because of the large physical dimensions of the resulting circuits, but in this application the tradeoff of size against power consumption favors this choice. These techniques are also intrinsically low-cost, as the filter is built into the circuit boards and the cost of components and their assembly onto the board is avoided. The basic element of the filter tree is an impedance matched wideband diplexer. This consists of a pair of low pass and high pass filters with a shared cutoff frequency and complementary frequency responses. These are designing the lowpass filter as a high order LC filter, which can be implemented as a series of transmission line segments of varying width. This can be transformed in to a CL high pass filter with a complementary frequency response. When the two filters are coupled to a common input, the input impedances of the networks add in parallel to give a constant input impedance as a function of frequency, with power flowing into one leg or the other of the filter pair. These filters can be cascaded to divide the band into the frequency ranges of interest; the broadband impedance matching at the inputs makes coupling of successive stages straightforward. These circuits can be produced in quantity at low cost using standard PCB fabrication techniques. We have determined that to achieve best performance the circuits should be built on a low loss-tangent RF substrate. We are working in cooperation with our colleagues in condensed matter who also have a need for this capability to purchase the equipment for in-house fabrication of prototype quantities of these circuits. We plan to continue the work on these filtersusing internal funds, and produce and characterize the performance of prototypes. We also participated in deployment of a prototype detector station near McMurdo Station, Antarctica in collaboration with colleagues at UCLA and UC-Irvine. The prototype station includes a single-board computer, GPS receiver, ADC board, and Iridium satellite modem powered by an omnidirectional solar array. We operated this station in the austral summer of 2006-2007, and used the Iridium SMS mode to transmit the status of the station until the end of the daylight season.

The Performance and Initial Results of the ARIANNA Prototype

The Performance and Initial Results of the ARIANNA Prototype PDF Author: Jordan Christian Hanson
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781267979490
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 294

Get Book Here

Book Description
The Antarctic Ross Ice-shelf Antenna Neutrino Array (ARIANNA) experiment exploits serendipitous properties of the Ross Ice Shelf in Western Antarctica. The ice shelf forms the fiducial volume of an ultra-high energy (UHE) neutrino detector capable of observing cosmogenic neutrinos with energies in excess of 10^17 eV. The clarity of the shelf ice and the reflectivity of the ocean-ice interface enhance the detection of radio-frequency (RF) elec- tromagnetic pulses created by neutrino interactions via the Askaryan effect. An array of autonomous electronics stations outfitted with radio antennas listen for these pulses. A prototype station was designed in 2009, using sustainable power and RF trigger and dig- itization electronics. It was deployed in Moore's Bay in December 2009 during the Austral summer, and additional data was collected in two subsequent seasons after the system re- booted automatically during Austral spring. This data located and helped to remove local anthropogenic noise. A total of 90.4 days of live-time was achieved, with thermal noise as the single background. Additionally, data characterizing the environment of Moore's Bay was collected and used in the development of future power systems and RF electronics. The depth and dielectric properties of the ice beneath the detectors were calculated using data taken during the expeditions. The linear fit to the frequency-dependent, temperature- averaged attenuation length of radio waves is L = (500 ± 30 - (0.18 ± 0.05)f[MHz]) m, and the reflection coefficient at the oceanic interface is 0.70

Multi-Gigahertz Synchronous Sampling and Triggering (SST) Circuit with Picosecond Timing Resolution

Multi-Gigahertz Synchronous Sampling and Triggering (SST) Circuit with Picosecond Timing Resolution PDF Author: Edwin Y. Chiem
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780355308075
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 156

Get Book Here

Book Description
The Antarctic Ross Ice shelf ANtenna Neutrino Array (ARIANNA) particle physics experiment aims to detect ultra-high energy neutrinos originating outside our solar system. A second generation detector prototype for the experiment has been developed and successfully deployed in Antarctica. The second generation detector is based on the Synchronous Sampling and Triggering (SST) integrated circuit. This dissertation focuses on the design and performance of the SST chip.Fabricated in a 0.25microm CMOS process, the SST is a low power data acquisition circuit that monitors for potential neutrino signals and preserves candidate signals. The waveform capture is performed with a 256-cell time-interleaved sampling array. Continuous sampling operation is achieved through circular cycling across the array. The synchronous sampling clock generation allows for sampling rates that span six orders of magnitude (i.e. ranging between 2.0 KHz and 2.0 GHz). The analog bandwidth (-3dB frequency) of the SST reaches 1.5 GHz, allowing for the capture of frequency components up to the Nyquist frequency. The SST integrates four channels of waveform capture functionality into a single chip.Each SST channel includes event triggering to initiate the signal capture of neutrino events, and to reject random noise signals. Events are triggered based on outputs from a pair of high speed comparators that monitor for bipolar threshold crossings. Multiple triggering options are available on the SST, including direct output of the comparator signals and triggering on dual threshold crossings occurring within a programmable time window.The SST chip utilizes an external low jitter LVDS oscillator to synchronously generate an internal sampling clock with low timing jitter. The fixed pattern timing noise was characterized through two different approaches: a stochastic zero crossing method and a Monte Carlo based simulated annealing method. After calibrating for fixed pattern timing noise, the SST achieves inter channel timing resolutions between 1.15 ps (RMS) and 2.36 ps (RMS).

High Speed, Multi-channel, User Programmable Digital Data Acquisition System

High Speed, Multi-channel, User Programmable Digital Data Acquisition System PDF Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

Get Book Here

Book Description
As applications for radiation detection become more demanding, and in turn improvements are made in the technology of radiation detection, there is a need for high speed digital detector readout electronics matching these improvements. Specifically, full control over the on-line processing resources of modern digital electronics is desirable so that researchers can develop custom algorithms for special applications. In the proposed effort, the 500 MHz digital readout electronics previously developed by our company will be redesigned to allow user access to the on-line processing resources. In Phase I, the division of online processing into vendor and user firmware sections has been studied on existing hardware. In Phase II, the hardware will be upgraded to better facilitate the division, and the firmware will be restructured into a robust vendor logic block (providing standard functions such as host I/O, on-board memory I/O, energy computation, MCA spectra, timestamps, waveform capture, run statistics, and triggering and timing) and a user logic block for custom algorithms (with templates and examples for frequently used functions). Investigating several options to divide online processing, it was determined that the most promising approach is to?partition? a single FPGA integrated circuit into a vendor and user section, which is supported in newer devices. The analog front end of the existing electronics proved suitable for most applications, in particular high rate measurements with germanium detectors. The design architecture for new electronics was developed, combining one of the new FPGA device with the analog front end.

Acoustic Detection of Ultra-high Energy Neutrinos

Acoustic Detection of Ultra-high Energy Neutrinos PDF Author: Naoko Kurahashi
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

Get Book Here

Book Description
Understanding the origin and evolution of cosmic accelerators by measuring ultra-high energy cosmic rays is one of the main goals of astroparticle physics. UHE neutrinos are thought to be better indicators of cosmic accelerators since they travel from their source undeflected by magnetic fields and unimpeded by interactions with the cosmic microwave background. Both cosmic rays and neutrinos have extremely low fluxes at these energies, which makes measurements difficult. Neutrino measurements have the added challenge of a longer interaction length that makes the atmosphere not suitable as a target. Here, we present the Study of Acoustic Ultra-high energy Neutrino Detection (SAUND) which uses an underwater acoustic sensor array spanning 1500 cubic kilometers to search for UHE neutrinos interacting in the ocean. A description of the data acquisition system, results of the background noise study, and an analysis based on an integrated 130 days of data are presented here. Two events are found to have properties compatible with UHE-neutrino-induced particle showers. Since our understanding of transient backgrounds is limited, a flux upper limit is set providing the most sensitive limit to date on UHE neutrinos using the acoustic technique.

A Scalable Parallel Open Architecture Data Acquisition System for Low to High Rate Experiments, Test Beams and All SSC (Superconducting Super Collider) Detectors

A Scalable Parallel Open Architecture Data Acquisition System for Low to High Rate Experiments, Test Beams and All SSC (Superconducting Super Collider) Detectors PDF Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 6

Get Book Here

Book Description
A new era of high-energy physics research is beginning requiring accelerators with much higher luminosities and interaction rates in order to discover new elementary particles. As a consequences, both orders of magnitude higher data rates from the detector and online processing power, well beyond the capabilities of current high energy physics data acquisition systems, are required. This paper describes a new data acquisition system architecture which draws heavily from the communications industry, is totally parallel (i.e., without any bottlenecks), is capable of data rates of hundreds of GigaBytes per second from the detector and into an array of online processors (i.e., processor farm), and uses an open systems architecture to guarantee compatibility with future commercially available online processor farms. The main features of the system architecture are standard interface ICs to detector subsystems wherever possible, fiber optic digital data transmission from the near-detector electronics, a self-routing parallel event builder, and the use of industry-supported and high-level language programmable processors in the proposed BCD system for both triggers and online filters. A brief status report of an ongoing project at Fermilab to build the self-routing parallel event builder will also be given in the paper. 3 figs., 1 tab.