Remote data acquisition with wireless communication for a quad-GEM detector

The advantages of remote data acquisition (DAQ) in experimental setup are manifold. It is useful to store the time series data continuously without human intervention. Moreover, specific modification in the experimental setup for remote DAQ is also beneficial to avoid proximity to the radiation zone in the high energy physics experiments, and thus radiation exposure is minimized. In this article, a novel method of DAQ is explored for Gas Electron Multiplier (GEM) detectors employing HC-12 wireless serial communication module following both SCPI and non-standard protocols. Dedicated Laboratory Virtual Instrument Engineering Workbench (LabVIEW) based software interfacing is also developed for communication and control. As a proof of concept of the feasibility of the proposed method, the typical gain of a quad-GEM detector is estimated. Measuring instruments (a quad-scaler built in-house and a commercially procured picoammeter) are interfaced with the wireless transmission system for this purpose. Data transferred through wireless communication are utilized for estimating the normalized gain of a quad-GEM detector for a given interval of time. The details of the design of the wireless communication system, fabrication procedure, remote DAQ system, experimental arrangement, and results are presented in this article.