The Forward Vertex upgrade detector for PHENIX

The PHENIX detector at RHIC has been built with a strong heavy quark particles identification capability. These unique probes of matter are essential to adequately understand in-medium energy loss and to test the basic properties of QCD. The current PHENIX heavy flavor physics program will be significantly enhanced by the addition of the Forward Silicon Vertex upgrade detector (FVTX) in the acceptance of the existing muon arm detectors (1.2<|y|<2.4). The proposed tracker is planned to be put into operation in FY2011. Each arm of the FVTX detector consists of 4 disks of silicon strip sensors combined with FPHX readout chips and provides a precision measurement of the radial coordinate of the track. The current status of the detector design and construction and expectations for the physics signal extraction will be presented.