Upgrading the ATLAS barrel tracker for the super-LHC

Abstract

It has been proposed to increase the luminosity of the large hadron collider (LHC) at CERN by an order of magnitude, with the upgraded machine dubbed super-LHC. The ATLAS experiment will require a new tracker for this high-luminosity operation due to radiation damage and event density. In order to cope with the order of magnitude increase in pile-up backgrounds at the higher luminosity, an all-silicon tracker is being designed. The new strip detector will use significantly shorter strips than the current silicon tracker in order to minimize the occupancy. As the increased luminosity will mean a corresponding increase in radiation dose, a new generation of extremely radiation-hard silicon detectors is required. An R&D program is underway to develop silicon sensors with sufficient radiation hardness. New front-end electronics and readout systems are being designed to cope with the higher data rates. The challenges facing the sensors and the cooling and mechanical support will be discussed. A possible tracker layout will be described.