  Straw tube detectors are single wire proportional counters that are widely
used as a tracking device. We have carried out R$\&$D with a straw tube
detector prototype. The motivation of this work is to study the stability of
the performance in terms of gain and energy resolution of the straw tube
detectors under high rate radiation. Two different methods are incorporated to
perform this study. The gain and energy resolution of the detector are studied
along with its variation with ambient temperature and pressure. X-ray from a
radioactive source is used to irradiate the detector and the same source is
also used to monitor the energy spectra simultaneously for calculation of gain.
Variation of the gain and energy resolution of the straw tube detector under
X-ray irradiation in Ar/CO$_2$ gas mixture is discussed in this article. We
have also estimated the time resolution of the straw tube detectors that can be
best achieved with cosmic rays as trigger for the same gas mixture. The details
of the measurement process and the experimental results are presented in this
article.
