Development of a Micromegas TPC for Low Energy Heavy Ions Measurement for Nuclear Fission and Astrophysics Applications

Time Projection Chambers are widely used since many years for tracking and identification of charged particles in high energy physics. We present a new R&D project to investigate the feasibility of a Micromegas TPC for low energy heavy ions detection. Two physics cases are relevant for this project. The first is the study of the nuclear fission of actinides by measuring the fission fragments properties (mass, nuclear charge, kinetic energy) that will be performed at different installations and in particular at the NFS facility to be built in the framework of the SPIRAL2 project in GANIL. The second physics case is the study of heavy ion reactions, like (α,γ), (α,p), (α,n) and all the inverse reactions in the energy range between 1.5 and 3 AMeV using both stable and radioactive beams. These reactions have a key role in p process in nuclear astrophysics to explain the synthesis of heavy proton‐rich nuclei. Within the project, a large effort is devoted to Monte‐Carlo simulations and a detailed benchmark of d...