A Specialized Processor for Track Reconstruction at the LHC Crossing Rate

A. Abba; F. Bedeschi; M. Citterio; F. Caponio; A. Cusimano; A. Geraci; P. Marino; M. J. Morello; N. Neri; G. Punzi; A. Piucci; L. Ristori; F. Spinella; S. Stracka; D. Tonelli

doi:10.1088/1748-0221/9/09/c09001

arXiv · 1406.7220

A Specialized Processor for Track Reconstruction at the LHC Crossing Rate

A. Abba·F. Bedeschi·M. Citterio·F. Caponio·A. Cusimano·A. Geraci·P. Marino·M. J. Morello·N. Neri·G. Punzi·A. Piucci·L. Ristori·F. Spinella·S. Stracka·D. Tonelli

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Abstract

We present the results of an R&D study of a specialized processor capable of precisely reconstructing events with hundreds of charged-particle tracks in pixel detectors at 40 MHz, thus suitable for processing LHC events at the full crossing frequency. For this purpose we design and test a massively parallel pattern-recognition algorithm, inspired by studies of the processing of visual images by the brain as it happens in nature. We find that high-quality tracking in large detectors is possible with sub-$\mu$s latencies when this algorithm is implemented in modern, high-speed, high-bandwidth FPGA devices. This opens a possibility of making track reconstruction happen transparently as part of the detector readout.

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A. Abba, F. Bedeschi, M. Citterio, F. Caponio, A. Cusimano, A. Geraci, P. Marino, M. J. Morello, N. Neri, G. Punzi, A. Piucci, L. Ristori, F. Spinella, S. Stracka, D. Tonelli. 2014-06-27. A Specialized Processor for Track Reconstruction at the LHC Crossing Rate. https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-0221/9/09/c09001

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