Development and optimization of simulation software tools for the Coordinator Detector in Jefferson Lab’s Hall A

Abstract

The Coordinate Detector is an arrangement of 2352 plastic scintillators that detects recoil electrons, or other charged particles, originating from collisions of a high-energy electron beam on a hydrogen target within Hall A of Jefferson Lab in Newport News, Virginia, USA. Exploiting the Coordinate Detector’s arrangement of scintillator detectors to study nucleon structure through electron-scattering requires modelling the response of the entire detector to the desired scattered particles, alongside other charged particle sources. This thesis details the optimization of existing simulation software for the Coordinate Detector, focusing on construction, data generation and analysis algorithms, including new algorithms. Four projects were undertaken: expanding the simulation from one subunit to the entire detector; optimizing and expanding the scope of simulated particle generation; using scintillator timing information to determine the horizontal angle of incident particles; and, building an event display to provide an intuitive view of the particle hit-patterns across the detector.