Laboratory and test beam results from a large-area silicon drift detector

A very large-area (6.75 x 8 cm(2)) silicon drift detector with integrated high-voltage divider has been designed, produced and fully characterised in the laboratory by means of ad hoc designed MOS injection electrodes. The detector is of the "butterfly" type, the sensitive area being subdivided into two regions with a maximum drift length of 3.3 cm. The device was also tested in a pion beam (at the CERN PS) tagged by means of a microstrip detector telescope. Bipolar VLSI front-end cells featuring a noise of 250 e(-) rms at 0 pF with a slope of 40 e(-)/pF have been used to read out the signals. The detector showed an excellent stability and featured the expected characteristics. Some preliminary results will be presented. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.