Gaia: segmented germanium detector for high-energy X-ray fluorescence and spectroscopic imaging
We present Gaia, a monolithic array of 96 high-purity germanium pixel detectors integrated with a custom low-noise application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) and a field-programmable gate array (FPGA)-based data acquisition system. The sensor operates at ∼100 K using a commercial closed-cycle cryocooler, with the in-vacuum electronics thermally isolated from the cold finger to ensure thermal stability. The system demonstrates an average energy resolution of 711 eV at 122 keV, measured using a <sup>57</sup>Co source, and 253 eV at 5.89 keV, measured with <sup>55</sup>Fe across all channels. The readout architecture incorporates a high-performance FPGA paired with a dual-core ARM processor, forming a complete embedded Linux-based computing platform. Communication between the processor and FPGA is handled via memory-mapped I/O, and data are streamed over high-speed gigabit Ethernet. A full-scale 384-pixel Gaia detector, based on this 96-element module, is currently under fabrication.
Authors
- T. Krings (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2212-7948)
- Nghia T. Vo (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3683-7377)
- M. Drakopoulos (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0007-5890-0764)
- J. Kuczewski
- Abdul K. Rumaiz (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9907-299X)
- Thomas A Caswell (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4692-608X)
- D. P. Siddons (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1482-9867)
- Katherine Koh (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7278-3804)
- A. Kuczewski (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0003-0566-5298)
- Carter L. Fitzgerald (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2011-6644)
- Ji Li (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0004-5702-5193)
- K. D. Finelli (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7979-9473)
- Zhong Zhong (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0001-9376-7571)
- Giovanni Pinaroli (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0000-6569-8145)
- Francesca Capocasa (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0004-4403-1797)
- Lorianne Shutlz-Johnson
Institutions
- Forschungszentrum Jülich (DE)
- Brookhaven National Laboratory (US)
- Savannah River National Laboratory (US)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Journal of Synchrotron Radiation
- Published
- 2025-11-11
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1107/s1600577525009294
- Primary Topic
- Particle Detector Development and Performance
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 0.00
Funders
- U.S. Department of Energy
- Office of Science
- National Nuclear Security Administration
- Office of Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation
- Brookhaven National Laboratory