Large-area scintillating-fiber time-of-flight/hodoscope detectors for particle astrophysics experiments

A new generation of detectors of ultra-heavy (UH) cosmic rays is being buil t which require the use of large-area, light-weight detector elements. In t his paper, we present the design and operation of a new type of scintillati ng optical fiber detector, which can serve as both a time-of-Eight (TOF) de tector and coded hodoscope (i.e. trajectory detector). We demonstrate that this type of detector can make TOF measurements with a time resolution of 4 8 ps. We also present results of position measurements from a large area TO F/hodoscope that was flown on a high-altitude balloon Eight in August, 1995 . Finally, we discuss areas of modification and improvements that can be ma de to these detectors to enable them to be more useful for making UH cosmic ray measurements. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.