Paolo Finocchiaro
Paolo Finocchiaro has been working at INFN-LNS since 1984, after getting his degree in Nuclear Physics in 1982. He was a member of the MEDEA collaboration, developing a 4π BaF2 detector for gamma rays and light charged particles, that was first employed in 1989-1993 at GANIL (Caen, France) and then moved to LNS Catania where it is still in operation.Throughout the years he dealt with experimental heavy-ion physics and several related technologies. This allowed him to build and use devices, systems and apparatuses of increasing complexity, ranging from software/hardware for data acquisition to electronics, and from single detectors to complete detection systems.
During the last years he also devoted a considerable fraction of his time to research, development and engineering of innovative devices for particle beam diagnostics, particularly for cases where very low energy and/or very low intensity beams need to be detected and imaged, as it is the case for unstable beams.
He also developed new sensors for micro-beams, which were successfully used for the lithographic production of micro-opto-mechanical systems with ion beams (DLI, Deep Lithography with Ions) in close collaboration with the Free University of Brussels (VUB).
Since 1996 he is a member of the HADES collaboration as responsible of the Time Of Flight Wall subdetector.
In 2003 he started to be involved in the development of innovative solid state single photon sensors, named SPAD, in close collaboration with STMicroelectronics. In this framework he coordinated the efforts to achieve the important goal of a working Silicon PhotoMultipier (SiPM) with single photon resolution. In October 2006 he was elected Chairman of the HADES Collaboration Board for 2 years. In 2010 Paolo Finocchiaro was invited to join the european network DITANET about advanced beam diagnostics.
Currently he is also collaborating in the TOPEM experiment, aimed at demonstrating the feasibility of a miniaturized Time-Of-Flight Positron Emission Tomography system for prostate cancer diagnosis and follow-up.
His activity today is also focused onto radioactive waste online monitoring, as he is leading the DMNR project in collaboration between INFN-Energy and Ansaldo Nucleare.
Summary of current and previous activity fields:
• online monitoring of nuclear waste repositories
• low energy and low intensity beam diagnostics with detectors
• miniaturized Time-Of-Flight prostate PET with LSO crystals and Silicon PhotoMultipliers
• single photon silicon avalanche detectors
• Deep Lithography with Ions: production of micro-opto-mechanical devices
• dilepton spectrometry with HADES
• scintillators; ion, particle and photon detectors
• digital radiography with thin scintillating screens
• heavy ion collisions
• simulations
• data acquisition systems (software & hardware)
• data replay & analysis software
• hardware event building and triggering
• high level digital triggers