Study of eco-friendly HFO-based gas mixtures for triple GEM detectors

Gaseous detectors are key components of particle detection in High Energy Physics experiments. The GEM is one such detector being used in HEP experiments due to its good timing and spatial resolution, and radiation tolerance. The optimal performance of gaseous detector depends on the choice of gases being used as ionising medium. Fluorine (F)-based gases, specially CF₄ are commonly used in particle detectors as it leads to time resolution of a few nanoseconds(ns). But due to environmental concerns, F-based gases are no longer considered appropriate for detectors. As a result, there is need to find environment friendly alternatives while maintaining the performance of the detector. In this direction, we have studied the possibility of using HFO as a replacement for CF₄ in Ar/CO₂ based gas mixture in GEM detectors. We performed this study to evaluate the gain and timing resolution of the GEM detectors. The timing resolution of GEM detectors with only Ar/CO₂ mixtures is around 10 ns. In our study, we evaluate the possibility of improving the timing resolution with the use of HFO.