Abstract

Lightwave links will constitute a key issue in the front-ends of tracking detectors in the experiments at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) presently under study at CERN, the European particle physics laboratory. The very large number of detector channels (over 10 M) will be preprocessed in the front-end electronics and multiplexed into fiberoptic links to readout stations at a distance of about 100 m. The severe constraints on the devices installed on the particle detectors include radiation hardness (10 Mrad and neutron fluence of 10¹⁴ n/cm² over 10 years), low power dissipation (a few mW per channel), small size and low mass, minimum cabling bulk.¹ Very limited accessibility will be possible only during machine shutdown periods.

© 1994 IEEE