Development And Characterization Of Gas Electron Multiplier Chambers For A Digital Hadron Calorimeter In The International Linear Collider

Gas Electron Multiplier, or GEM, technology provides an attractive option for high precision jet energy measurements for future high energy physics experiments at the International Linear Collider. High voltage settings and gas mixture ratios are determined to optimize double GEM chamber gain and efficiency performance. Electronics readout using QPAO2 chipset and the analog KPIX system developed by Stanford Linear Accelerator Center are used at different stages of the development and characterization of double GEM chambers. The results presented in this thesis are performed primarily at UTA using radioactive sources and cosmic ray particles but also include results from test beam studies using 120 GeV protons at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory. Plans for the development of GEM technology as a future digital hadron calorimeter and possible medical imaging device are also discussed.