The development, testing and characterisation of a straw tracking detector and readout system for the Fermilab muon g-2 experiment

Abstract

The anomalous magnetic moments of leptons can be both measured and theoretically predicted with high precision, and as such provide stringent tests of the Standard Model (SM) of particle physics. The anomalous magnetic moment of the muon, in particular offers sensitivity to new physics within the reach of current experiments. The current world’s best measurement of muon anomalous magnetic moment made at the Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL) deviates from the SM prediction by over 3σ, providing a tantalising but inconclusive hint that contributions from new physics may be present. A new muon anomalous magnetic moment experiment is currently under construction at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab), known as the Fermilab muon g-2 experiment. Due to commence in 2017, this new experiment is expected to improve the experimental measurement precision of the muon anomalous magnetic moment by a factor of 4, and is seeking to confirm or reject the current discrepancy. The experiment, like its BNL predecessor, will measure the precession of the muon spin in a magnetic storage-ring. This new experiment has three straw tracking detectors used to measure the beam profile of the stored muons, as well as other dynamic properties of the beam. This thesis describes the design of these detectors, and the data acquisition system and subsequent data processing systems that have been developed to read them out and make their data available for physics analysis. The performance of the straw trackers and the readout systems at a number of beam tests and test stands is presented, in addition to Monte-Carlo simulations of the trackers in the final experiment.