Absolute calibration of microchannel plate detector for carbon ions up to 250 MeV

Abstract

A 375TW 40fs pulse was used at the ASTRA GEMINI facility located at the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory U.K. for investigating novel ion acceleration regimes employing ultrathin foil targets. An online detection system consisting of a Thomson Parabola Spectrometer (TPS)—Microchannel Plate (MCP) was used to determine maximum energies and spectra per species. The response of the MCP was calibrated for absolute particle (carbon) number per steradian using CR-39 up to 21 MeV/nucleon. This calibration provides a useful reference for a widely used diagnostic arrangement.