The IRFU and the Astroparticles group of the University of Zaragoza collaborate intensely with the goal of summing the experience in gaseous detectors and Rare Events Searches (dark matter, axions, double beta decay…). The Zaragoza group has led the research in the Canfranc Underground Laboratory (Spanish Pyrenees) during the last 25 years and several of their members has been, and currently they are, post-doc researchers at IRFU.
While developing different projects, checking ideas, or even analyzing already running experiments – as micromegas in CAST (the CERN axion helioscope) – Monte Carlo applications based in GEANT4 have been improved by the Zaragoza, group becoming more specialized but also generating tools which are useful for any simulation of a gaseous detector. A simulation of a gaseous detector needs to provide detailed topological information, but can also be asked for the physical origin of the event. Common process in gaseous detectors (charge generation, drift, diffusion, amplification) must be implemented in routines independent of the GEANT4 application. Finally the readout features have to be taken into account if we are thinking in the design of a new detector.
University of Zaragoza