Resistive Plate Chamber Digitization in a Hadronic Shower Environment

The CALICESemi-Digital Hadron Calorimeter(SDHCAL) technological prototype is a sampling calorimeterusing Glass Resistive Plate Chamber detectors with a three-threshold readout as the active medium. This technology is one of the two options proposed for the hadron calorimeterof the International Large Detector for the International Linear Collider. The prototype was exposed to beams of muons, electrons and pions of different energies at the CERN Super Proton Synchrotron. To be able to study the performance of such a calorimeterin future experiments it is important to ensure reliable simulation of its response. In this paper we present our prototype simulation performed with GEANT4 and the digitization procedure achieved with an algorithm called SimDigital. A detailed description of this algorithm is given and the methods to determinate its parameters using muon tracks and electromagnetic showersare explained. The comparison with hadronic showerdata shows a good agreement up to 50 GeV. Discrepancies are observed at higher energies. The reasons for these differences are investigated.