A gateless charge integrator for Borexino energy measurement

Abstract

A gateless charge integrator designed for the energy measurement in the Borexino experiment is described and the results of various tests performed on prototypes are shown. The circuit integrates always its input taking advantage of the AC coupling to the photomultipliers that equalizes to zero the charge associated with each event signal. A double sampling of the integrator output allows to perform a charge measurement in principle without dead time, avoiding the use of gate signals and baseline restoration networks and permitting a precise detection of the fast correlated events (delayed coincidences due to the decay of a nuclide producing a daughter having a lifetime in the tens of ns time range). The precision of the charge measurement is discussed together with the performances of the front end Borexino board where the integrator is mounted.