The ultralight DEPFET pixel detector of the Belle II experiment

An upgrade of the existing Japanese flavor factory (KEKB in Tsukuba, Japan) is under construction and foreseen for commissioning by the end of 2017. This new e(+)e(-) machine (SuperKEKB) will deliver an instantaneous luminosity 40 times higher than the luminosity world record set by KEKB. To fully exploit the increased number of events and provide high precision measurements of B-meson decay vertices in such a harsh environment, the Belle detector will be upgraded to Belle II, featuring a new silicon vertex detector with two pixel layers close to the interaction point based on the DEPFET (DEpleted P-channel Field Effect Transistor) technology. This technology combines particle detection together with in-pixel amplification by integrating a field effect transistor into a fully depleted silicon bulk. In Belle II, DEPFET sensors thinned down to 75 gm with low power consumption and low intrinsic noise will be used. The first large thin multi-chip production modules have been produced and characterization results on both large modules as well as small test systems will be presented in this contribution. (C) 2016 Published by Elsevier B.V.