Probe station for testing of ALICE silicon drift detectors

Large area, 7.25 cm×8.76 cm silicon drift detectors have been developed and are in production for the ALICE experiment at LHC. An active area of the detector of more than 50 cm2 imposes high demands on the quality of processing and raw material. Automated testing procedures have been developed to test detectors before mounting them on the ladders. Probe stations for ALICE SDD testing were designed and built at INFN, Trieste and Ohio State University (OSU). Testing procedures, detector selection criteria and some details of the OSU probe station design are discussed.