Engineering topics

Carini, G

Publications and source records attributed to Carini, G.

5 records

DOE OSTI2025

Neutrinoless double beta decay sensitivity of the XLZD rare event observatory

The XLZD collaboration is developing a two-phase xenon time projection chamber with an active mass of 60–80 t capable of probing the remaining weakly interacting massive particle-nucleon interaction parameter space down to the so-called neutrino fog. In this work we show that, based on the performance of currently operating detectors using the same technology and a realistic reduction of radioactivity in detector materials, such an experiment will also be able to competitively search for neutrinoless double beta decay in 136 Xe using a natural-abundance xenon target. XLZD can reach a 3σ discovery potential half-life of 5.7 × 10 27 years (and a 90% CL exclusion of 1.3 × 10 28 years) with 10 years of data taking, corresponding to a Majorana mass range of 7.3–31.3 meV (4.8–20.5 meV). XLZD will thus exclude the inverted neutrino mass ordering parameter space and will start to probe the normal ordering region for most of the nuclear matrix elements commonly considered by the community.

2-phase xenon TPCs↗

DOE OSTI2022

Event driven readout architecture with non-priority arbitration for radiation detectors

A novel event driven readout architecture, EDWARD (Event Driven with Access and 8 Reset Decoder) architecture, for highly granular pixel detectors is presented. It incorporates, inter alia, an asynchronous arbitration tree based on Seitz' arbiters, removing the need for an imposed prioritization scheme. It also provides protection against glitches during readout. The system allows not only reading pixel activities, but also retrieving additional data, both analog and digital, from the pixels. A novel in-channel logic allows the entire readout process to be split into consecutive phases for additional flexibility. All operations are controlled by only one edge of the clock signal, seen as an acknowledge token, so there is no dead time between readouts.

47 OTHER INSTRUMENTATION↗

DOE OSTI2022

Peak Prediction Using Multi Layer Perceptron (MLP) for Edge Computing ASICs Targeting Scientific Applications

High data rate detectors play an integral part in scientific research and their development is actively pursued at High Energy Physics (HEP) facilities around the world. Edge Machine Learning (ML) offers the ability to reduce data rates by integrating ML algorithms into Application Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs) on the front end electronics. In this work, we explore a set of neural network architectures for predicting the peak amplitudes in the detector's sensor response. We have designed and synthesized several MLP based neural networks comparing their inference accuracy, power consumption, and area targeting for minimal latency. The neural networks are synthesized in a commercial 65nm process. The effect of quantizing the network's weights and biases on hardware performance and area is reported. We also conduct design space exploration to compare between design alternatives

47 OTHER INSTRUMENTATION↗

DOE OSTI2020

Evaluation of radiation hardness of semiconductor materials against alpha particles for an API detector

An Associated Particle Imaging (API) system consists of a high vacuum chamber where deuterium ions are accelerated on a tritium-loaded target, resulting in alpha particles and neutrons emitted back-to-back, the latter escaping the chamber and used, for example, for tomography of a high-Z sample. An accurate determination of the alpha position is crucial to determine the trajectory of the neutron. Existing API systems have several limitations which a semiconductor-based API detector placed inside the vacuum chamber should not present. The semiconductor material can be either silicon or diamond. In particular, large and fast signals are generated by the alpha interactions in these materials. A pixelated API detector will measure the time and hit position of the alphas produced in the reaction. However, during the lifetime of the generator, the semiconductor detector will be exposed to an intense flux of alpha particles that will degrade its performance over time. To assess the radiation hardness of silicon and diamond against the alpha particles, we exposed single diodes made of either of the two materials to a 5 MeV alpha flux generated by an 241Am radioactive source. During irradiation, the diodes were biased and mounted on current-sensitive preamplifier boards. We have therefore been able to measure insitu the evolution of the waveforms as the damage was accumulating in their substrates.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗

DOE OSTI2020

A 1.2-V 6-GHz Dual-Path Charge-Pump PLL Frequency Synthesizer for Quantum Control and Readout in CMOS 65-nm Process

This paper presents a low jitter dual-path chargepump phase locked loop (PLL) synthesizer in a CMOS 65-nm process for quantum readout applications. The PLL incorporates a programmable dual chargepump and a loop filter with both proportional and integral paths that can be driven independently providing flexible control of the loop bandwidth to achieve low jitter performance. The design is implemented at 300 K and critical blocks like voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO) and chargepump (CP) are analyzed at 77 K based on the characterized results. The LC-VCO is realized with the class-C NMOS only architecture with 5-bit coarse control and quadrature signals are generated with poly phase filter. The VCO is designed with the tuning range of 1 GHz around the center frequency of 6 GHz with Phase Noise of -123 dBc/Hz and -132 dBc/Hz at 1MHz offset at 300 K and 77 K temperature. The simulated PLL rms jitter is 125 fs at 6 GHz with a power consumption of 8 mW at the 1.2 V power supply.

47 OTHER INSTRUMENTATION↗