DIRC Cherenkov detectors will be the main devices for pi/K separation at the PANDA experiment at FAIR. Due to their advantageous properties in terms of time resolution and especially inside magnetic fields micro-channel plate photo multipliers (MCP-PMTs) are very attractive sensor candidates. In this paper we present the investigation of several types of multi-anode MCP-PMTs. The darkcount rate, the behavior inside a magnetic field of up to 2 T, the time resolution, the gain homogeneity and crosstalk of multi-pixel MCP-PMTs were found to be well suitable for the PANDA requirements. Even the rate capability of the latest models from Burle-Photonis and Hamamatsu is satisfactory. Although a big step forward was accomplished with these recently available MCP-PMTs, the lifetime is still not sufficient for the photon densities expected for the PANDA DIRCs.

The PANDA experiment at the new Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research in Europe (FAIR) at GSI, Darmstadt, will study fundamental questions of hadron physics and QCD using high-intensity cooled antiproton beams with momenta between 1.5 and 15 GeV/c. Efficient Particle Identification (PID) for a wide momentum range and the full solid angle is required for reconstructing the various physics channels of the PANDA program. Hadronic PID in the barrel region of the detector will be provided by a DIRC (Detection of Internally Reflected Cherenkov light) counter. The design is based on the successful BABAR DIRC with important improvements, such as focusing optics and fast photon timing. Several of these improvements, including different radiator geometries and optics, were tested in particle beams at GSI and at CERN. We will discuss the design and performance of the prototypes in the 2011 and 2012 test beam campaigns.

The PANDA experiment at the future Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (FAIR) at GSI, Darmstadt, aims at studying the strong interacting matter by precision spectroscopy. A detector system with excellent particle identification over a large range of solid angle and momentum is therefore mandatory. Charged hadron identification in the barrel region will be performed by a compact ring imaging Cherenkov detector based on the DIRC principle (Detection of Internally Reflected Cherenkov light), designed to separate pions from kaons with at least 3 standard deviations in the momentum range from 0.5 GeV/c to 3.5 GeV/c. We present details of the simulation of the PANDA Barrel DIRC and a study of the detector performance using a fast reconstruction algorithm to determine the single photon Cherenkov angle resolution and photon yield for several design options.