Study of the performance and capability of the new ultra-fast 2 GSample/s FADC data acquisition system of the MAGIC telescope

In February 2007 the MAGIC Air Cherenkov Telescope for gamma-ray astronomy was fully upgraded with an ultra fast 2 GSamples/s digitization system. Since the Cherenkov light flashes are very short, a fast readout can minimize the influence of the background from the light of the night sky. Also, the time structure of the event is an additional parameter to reduce the background from unwanted hadronic showers. An overview of the performance of the new system and its impact on the sensitivity of the MAGIC instrument will be presented.Comment: Contribution to the 30th ICRC, Merida Mexico, July 2007 on behalf of the MAGIC Collaboratio

Latest MAGIC discoveries pushing redshift boundaries in VHE Astrophysics

The search for detection of gamma-rays from distant AGNs by Imaging Atmospheric Cherenkov Telescopes (IACTs) is challenging at high redshifts, not only because of lower flux due to the distance of the source, but also due to the consequent absorption of gamma-rays by the extragalactic background light (EBL). Before the MAGIC discoveries reported in this work, the farthest source ever detected in the VHE domain was the blazar PKS 1424+240, at z>0.6. MAGIC, a system of two 17 m of diameter IACTs located in the Canary island of La Palma, has been able to go beyond that limit and push the boundaries for VHE detection to redshifts z~ 1. The two sources detected and analyzed, the blazar QSO B0218+357 and the FSRQ PKS 1441+25 are located at redshift z=0.944 and z=0.939 respectively. QSO B0218+357 is also the first gravitational lensed blazar ever detected in VHE. The activity, triggered by Fermi-LAT in high energy gamma-rays, was followed up by other instruments, such as the KVA telescope in the optical band and the Swift-XRT in X-rays. In the present work we show results on MAGIC analysis on QSO B0218+357 and PKS 1441+25 together with multiwavelength lightcurves. The collected dataset allowed us to test for the first time the present generation of EBL models at such distances.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure

Long term monitoring of bright TeV Blazars with the MAGIC telescope

The MAGIC telescope has performed long term monitoring observations of the bright TeV Blazars Mrk421, Mrk501 and 1ES1959+650. Up to 40 observations, 30 to 60 minutes each have been performed for each source evenly distributed over the observable period of the year. The sensitivity of MAGIC is sufficient to establish a flux level of 25% of the Crab flux for each measurement. These observations are well suited to trigger multiwavelength ToO observations and the overall collected data allow an unbiased study of the flaring statistics of the observed AGNs.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures, to appear in the proceedings of the 30th International Cosmic Ray Conference, Merida, July 200

Innovar la educación en ciencias a través de enseñar y aprender acerca de la naturaleza de Ciencia y Tecnología

Esta comunicación contribuye a lema del congreso tratando de mejorar la enseñanza de la ciencia a través de una propuesta innovadora parapromover la comprensión del funcionamiento actual de la ciencia y tecnología en la sociedad (CTS),transformando las propuestas de la investigación didácticaen instrumentos útiles para los profesores en el aula. Describe las líneas básicas de un proyecto de investigación (EANCYT, Enseñanza y aprendizaje de naturaleza de la ciencia y la tecnología, NdCyT) que afronta el problema educativo de enseñar NdCyT con calidad y eficacia en países latinos.Elpropósito central es presentar los aspectos comunesdel proyecto y del simposio, es decir, los fundamentos teóricos y didácticos para enseñarcontenidos de NdCyT, que se apoyan en tres ejes básicos: la investigación sobre NdCyT, sobre secuencias de enseñanza-aprendizaje y las teorías del aprendizaje de la ciencia.Los aspectos innovadores de la comunicación se centran en el diseño de las secuencias de enseñanza aprendizaje (SEA) a aplicar en el aula, los instrumentos de evaluación de la mejora del aprendizaje de los estudiantes y el diseño empírico de la investigación para la verificación de la eficacia de las SEAs