High-gain microstrip gas counters for soft X-ray detection

This study describes development work in which systematic changes in the pitch of the electrode pattern of a Microstrip Gas Counter (MSGC) are explored in the search for higher gas gains and enhanced stability. We investigated the gas gain, soft X-ray energy resolution and the detector noise with pitch values set between 300 μm and 1200 μm. With the cathode width set to half of the pitch and anode width at 5 μm, gas gains exceeding 50,000 were comfortably achieved. We present the optimised MSGC geometry which permits radiation detection in the sub-keV X-ray region.