Systematic Study of Acquisition Electronics with a High Dynamic Range for a Beam Loss Measurement System

A discrete components design for a current digitizer based on the current-to-frequency converter (CFC) principle is currently under development at CERN. The design targets at higher current inputs than similar designs, with a maximum equal to 100mA and a minimum of 1nA, as required by the ionization chamber that will be employed in the Proton Synchrotron and Booster accelerators as well as in the LINAC 4. It allows the acquisition of currents of both polarities without requiring any configuration and provides fractional counts through an ADC to increase resolution. Several architectural choices are considered for the front-end circuit, including charge balance integrators, dual-integrator input stages, integrators with switchable-capacitor. Design approach and measurements are discussed in this article.