A high-efficiency and high-resolution straw tracker for the LHCb experiment

The outer tracker detector for the LHCb experiment at CERN will provide accurate position information on the charged particles in B- decays. It is crucial to accurately and efficiently detect these particles, in the high-density particle environment of the LHC. For this, the outer tracker is being constructed, consisting of ~55,000 straw tubes, covering in total an area of 360 m/sup 2/ of double layers. At present, approximately 90% of the detector has been constructed and fully tested. In addition, a beam test has been performed at DESY, Hamburg, to validate the final read-out electronics, in terms of efficiency, position resolution, noise and cross talk.