The Detector Control System for the magnetic field sensors in New Small Wheel phase I upgrade of ATLAS detector

In conjunction with the High Luminosity upgrade of the Large Hadron Collider accelerator at CERN, the ATLAS detector is also undergoing an upgrade to handle the significantly higher data rates. The muon end-cap system upgrade in ATLAS, lies with the replacement of the Small Wheel. The New Small Wheel (NSW) is expected to combine high tracking precision with upgraded information for the Level-1 trigger. To accomplish this, small Thin Gap Chamber (sTGC) and MicroMegas detector technologies are being deployed. Due to their installation location in ATLAS, the effects of Barrel Toroid and End-Cap Toroid magnets on NSW must be measured. For the final experiment at ATLAS, each sTGC large double wedge will be equipped with magnetic field Hall effect sensors to monitor the magnetic field near the NSW. The readout is done with an Embedded Local Monitor Board (ELMB) called MDT DCS Module (MDM). For the integration of this hardware in the experiment, first, a detector control system was developed to test the functionality of all sensors before their installation on the detectors. Subsequently, another detector control system was developed for the commissioning of the sensors. Finally, a detector control system based on the above two is under development for the expert panels of ATLAS experiment. In this paper, the sensor readout, the connectivity mapping and the detector control systems will be presented.

The Detector Control System of the New Small Wheel for the ATLAS experiment

The ATLAS Muon Spectrometer is going through an extensive Phase I upgrade to cope up with the future LHC runs of high luminosity of up to instantaneous luminosity of 7.5 × 1034cm−2s−1. The luminosity increase drastically impacts the ATLAS trigger and readout data rates. The present ATLAS Small Wheel Muon detector will be replaced with a New Small Wheel (NSW) detector which is expected to be installed in the ATLAS underground cavern by the end of the Long Shutdown 2 of the LHC. Due to its complexity and long-term operation, the NSW requires the development of a sophisticated Detector Control System (DCS). The use of such a system is necessary to allow the detector to function consistently and safely as well as to function as a seamless interface to all sub-detectors and the technical infrastructure of the experiment. The central system handles the transition between the probe’s possible operating states while ensuring continuous monitoring and archiving of the system’s operating parameters. Any abnormality in any subsystem of the detector triggers a signal or alert (alarm), which alerts the user and either adapts to automatic processes or allows manual actions to reset the system to function properly.

Software migration of the CMS ECAL Detector Control System during the CERN Large Hadron Collider Long Shutdown II

During the second long shutdown (LS2) of the CERN Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the Detector Control System (DCS) of the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) Electromagnetic Calorimeter (ECAL) is undergoing a large software upgrade at various levels. The ECAL DCS supervisory system has been reviewed and extended to migrate the underlying software toolkits and platform technologies to the latest versions. The resulting software will run on top of a new computing infrastructure, using the WinCC Open Architecture (OA) version 3.16 and newly developed communication drivers for some of the hardware. The ECAL DCS has been configured and managed from a different control version system and stored with more modern encoding and file formats. A new set of development guidelines has been prepared for this purpose, including conventions and recommendations from the CMS Central DCS and CERN Joint Controls Project (JCOP) framework groups. The large list of modifications also motivated the revision and reorganization of the software architecture, which is needed to resolve and satisfy additional software dependencies. Many modifications also aimed to improve the installation process, anticipating in some cases works for the next long shutdown upgrade.