PLUME collaboration: Ultra-light ladders for linear collider vertex detector

The PLUME (Pixelated Ladder with Ultra-Low Material Embedding) Collaboration is developing ultra-light ladders for the vertex detector for a future linear collider. The double-sided ladder will integrate the sensors, readout infrastructure and mechanical supports with the aim of total material budget of 0.3% of radiation length. The requirement of as light as possible construction is driven by physics, in particular by measurements requiring determination of the quark charge sign. The first prototype ladders were prepared and tested in the beam. The alignment issues for the ladders will be tested within the AIDA (Advanced European Infrastructures for Detectors at Accelerators) EU FP7 project.