Single Wire Detector Performance Over One Year of Operation

Abstract When ionizing radiation passes through gas chambers in single wire detectors gas molecules separate into ions and electrons. By applying a strong localized electric field near the single wire an avalanche of electrons is created and it can be collected. The current produced in the wire is then proportional to the energy of the particle detected. Nevertheless, many factors can contribute to detector aging effects which are visible in a loss of gain caused by deposition of contaminants on the collecting wire. This study consists on novel data analysis techniques used to process large amounts of data produced by two simultaneously running single wire detectors. Aging effects are analyzed while environmental fluctuations are corrected for. A series of scripts carry out data filtering, data matching, corrections, and finally trend plotting by using ROOT’s extensive libraries developed at CERN.