Quartic: An Ultra-fast Time-of-flight Counter

Fast time-of-flight counters are planned to dramatically decrease backgrounds to events with a massive central system and forward/backward protons at the LHC. By using timing to confirm that the protons originated from the same vertex as the central system. QUARTIC's design uses an array of fused silica (quartz-like) bars aligned at an angle with respect to the beam. The protons pass through the bars and emit Cherenkov photons which are detected by a micro-channel plate photomultiplier tube at the end of the bars. In this work I present the results of the first stage of R&D efforts for the QUARTIC detector. Preliminary studies and results of simulations of several detector geometries are summarized. The experimental tools and analysis framework developed to allow testing of the first two prototypes in the Meson Test Beam Facility at Fermilab are described.