An improved design of spark-protected microstrip gas counters (R-MSGC)

Abstract

We have developed microstrip gas counters manufactured on standard printed circuit board and having the following features: resistive cathode strips, thin (10 micron) metallic anode strips and electrodes protected against surface discharges by a Coverlay layer at their edges. These features allow the detector to operate at gas gains as high as can be achieve with the best microstrip gas counters manufactured on glass substrates. We believe that after further developments this type of detectors can compete in some applications with other micropattern detectors, for example MICROMEGAS.Comment: Presented at the 7th RD51 Collaboration meeting, CERN, April 201