CERN Accelerating science

Article
Report number	arXiv:1806.05880
Title	Interfacing Geant4, Garfield++ and Degrad for the Simulation of Gaseous Detectors
Related title	A Geant4/Garfield++ and Geant4/Degrad Interface for the Simulation of Gaseous Detectors
Author(s)	Pfeiffer, Dorothea (ESS, Lund ; CERN) ; De Keukeleere, Lennert (KU Leuven, Dept. Phys. Astron.) ; Azevedo, Carlos (Aveiro U.) ; Belloni, Francesca (Saclay) ; Biagi, Stephen (Liverpool U.) ; Grichine, Vladimir (Lebedev Inst.) ; Hayen, Leendert (KU Leuven, Dept. Phys. Astron.) ; Hanu, Andrei R. (NASA, Goddard) ; Hřivnáčová, Ivana (Orsay, IPN) ; Ivanchenko, Vladimir (CERN ; Tomsk State U.) ; Krylov, Vladyslav (Orsay, LAL ; Taras Shevchenko U.) ; Schindler, Heinrich (CERN) ; Veenhof, Rob (CERN ; Uludag U.)
Publication	2019-08-11
Imprint	2018-06-15
Number of pages	14
In:	Nucl. Instrum. Methods Phys. Res., A 935 (2019) 121-134
DOI	10.1016/j.nima.2019.04.110
Subject category	physics.comp-ph ; Other Fields of Physics ; physics.ins-det ; Detectors and Experimental Techniques
Abstract	For several years, attempts have been made to interface Geant4 and other software packages with the aim of simulating the complete response of a gaseous particle detector. In such a simulation, Geant4 is always responsible for the primary particle generation and the interactions that occur in the non-gaseous detector material. Garfield++ on the other hand always deals with the drift of ions and electrons, amplification via electron avalanches and finally signal generation. For the ionizing interaction of particles with the gas, different options and physics models exist. The present paper focuses on how to use Geant4, Garfield++ (including its Heed and SRIM interfaces) and Degrad to create the ionization electron-ion pairs in the gas. Software-wise, the proposed idea is to use the Geant4 physics parameterization feature, and to implement a Garfield++ or Degrad based detector simulation as an external model. With a Degrad model, detailed simulations of the X-ray interaction in gaseous detectors, including shell absorption by photoelectric effect, subsequent Auger cascade, shake-off and fluorescence emission, become possible. A simple Garfield++ model can be used for photons (Heed), heavy ions (SRIM) and relativistic charged particles or MIPs (Heed). For non-relativistic charged particles, more effort is required, and a combined Geant4/Garfield++ model must be used. This model, the Geant4/Heed PAI model interface, uses the Geant4 PAI model in conjunction with the Heed PAI model. Parameters, such as the lower production cut of the Geant4 PAI model and the lowest electron energy limit have to be set correctly. The paper demonstrates how to determine these parameters for certain values of the W parameter and Fano factor of the gas mixture. The simulation results of this Geant4/Heed PAI model interface are then verified against the results obtained with the stand-alone software packages.
Copyright/License	preprint: (License: arXiv nonexclusive-distrib 1.0) publication: © 2019 Published by Elsevier B.V.

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