OuroborosBEM: a fast multi-GPU microscopic Monte Carlo simulation for gaseous detectors and charged particle dynamics

Abstract

The design of gaseous detectors for accelerator, particle and nuclear physics requires simulations relying on multi-physics aspects. In fact, these simulations deal with the dynamics of a large number of charged particles interacting in a gaseous medium immersed in the electric field generated by a more or less complex assembly of electrodes and dielectric materials. We report here on a homemade software, called ouroborosbem, able to tackle the different features involved in such simulations. After solving the electrostatic problem for which a solver based on the boundary element method (BEM) has been implemented, particles are tracked and will microscopically interact with the gas medium. Dynamical effects have been included such as the electron-ion recombination process, the charging-up of the dielectric materials and other space charge effects that might alter the detector performances. These were made possible thanks to the nVidia CUDA language specifically optimised to run on Graphical Processor Units (GPUs) to minimize the computing times. Comparisons of the results obtained for parallel plate avalanche counters and GEM detectors to literature data on swarm parameters fully validate the performances of ouroborosbem. Moreover, we were able to precisely reproduce the measured gains of single and double GEM detectors as a function of the applied voltage.