The coated cathode conductive layer chamber

We describe a gaseous detector consisting of thin anode strips vacuum-evaporated on one side of a 100 μm thick plastic layer, alternating on the back side of the same foil with wider parallel cathode strips. Ionization released in a drift space on the anode side is amplified and detected much in the same way as in the microstrip gas chamber; in our detector however spontaneous breakdown due to surface currents is completely avoided by the presence of the insulating layer between anodes and cathodes. To reduce surface and volume charging up, we have used polymer foils with a moderate volume resistivity. The first results show good efficiency, good plateaux and time resolution in detecting low-rate minimum ionizing electrons. Although not suited for high rate or good energy resolution applications, this kind of detector seems rather promising for realizing cheaply large active surfaces.