A new design for the gas pixel detector

The Gas Pixel Detector, developed and continuously improved by Pisa INFN in collaboration with INAF-IAPS, can visualize the tracks produced within a low Z gas by photoelectrons of few keV. By reconstructing the impact point and the original direction of the photoelectrons, the GPD can measure the linear polarization of X-rays, while preserving the information on the absorption point, the energy and the time of arrival of individual photons. The Gas Pixel Detector filled with He-DME mixture at 1 bar is sensitive in the 2-10 keV energy range and this configuration has been the basis of a number of mission proposals, such as POLARIX or XPOL on-board XEUS/IXO, or the X-ray Imaging Polarimetry Explorer (XIPE) submitted in response to ESA small mission call in 2012. We have recently improved the design by modifying the geometry of the absorption cell to minimize any systematic effect which could leave a residual polarization signal for non polarized source. We report on the testing of this new concept with preliminary results on the new design performance.