3,305 research outputs found
Physics Potential of a Radio Surface Array at the South Pole (ARENA 2018)
A surface array of radio antennas will enhance the performance of the IceTop
array and enable new, complementary science goals. First, the accuracy for
cosmic-ray air showers will be increased since the radio array provides a
calorimetric measurement of the electromagnetic component and is sensitive to
the position of the shower maximum. This enhanced accuracy can be used to
better measure the mass composition, to search for possible mass-dependent
anisotropies in the arrival directions of cosmic rays, and for more thorough
tests of hadronic interaction models. Second, the sensitivity of the radio
array to inclined showers will increase the sky coverage for cosmic-ray
measurements. Third, the radio array can be used to search for PeV photons from
the Galactic Center. Since IceTop is planned to be enhanced by a scintillator
array in the near future, a radio extension sharing the same infrastructure can
be installed with minimal additional effort and excellent scientific prospects.
The combination of ice-Cherenkov, scintillation, and radio detectors at IceCube
will provide unprecedented accuracy for the study of highenergy Galactic cosmic
rays.Comment: Proceedings of 8th ARENA 2018, to appear in EPJ Wo
Enhancing the cosmic-ray mass sensitivity of air-shower arrays by combining radio and muon detectors
The muonic and electromagnetic components of air showers are sensitive to the
mass of the primary cosmic particle. The sizes of the components can be
measured with particle detectors on ground, and the electromagnetic component
in addition indirectly via its radio emission in the atmosphere. The
electromagnetic particles do not reach the ground for very inclined showers. On
the contrary, the atmosphere is transparent for the radio emission and its
footprint on ground increases with the zenith angle. Therefore, the radio
technique offers a reliable detection over the full range of zenith angles, and
in particular for inclined showers. In this work, the mass sensitivity of a
combination of the radio emission with the muons is investigated in a case
study for the site of the Pierre Auger Observatory using CORSIKA Monte Carlo
simulations of showers in the EeV energy range. It is shown, that the
radio-muon combination features superior mass separation power in particular
for inclined showers, when compared to established mass observables such as a
combination of muons and electrons or the shower maximum Xmax. Accurate
measurements of the energy-dependent mass composition of ultra-high energy
cosmic rays are essential to understand their still unknown origin. Thus, the
combination of muon and radio detectors can enhance the scientific performance
of future air-shower arrays and offers a promising upgrade option for existing
arrays
Air Shower Detection by Arrays of Radio Antennas (ISVHECRI 2018)
Antenna arrays are beginning to make important contributions to high energy
astroparticle physics supported by recent progress in the radio technique for
air showers. This article provides an update to my more extensive review
published in Prog. Part. Nucl. Phys. 93 (2017) 1 [arXiv: 1607.08781]. It
focuses on current and planned radio arrays for atmospheric particle cascades,
and briefly references to a number of evolving prototype experiments in other
media, such as ice. While becoming a standard technique for cosmic-ray nuclei
today, in future radio detection may drive the field for all type of primary
messengers at PeV and EeV energies, including photons and neutrinos. In
cosmic-ray physics accuracy becomes increasingly important in addition to high
statistics. Various antenna arrays have demonstrated that they can compete in
accuracy for the arrival direction, energy and position of the shower maximum
with traditional techniques. The combination of antennas and particles
detectors in one array is a straight forward way to push the total accuracy for
high-energy cosmic rays for low additional cost. In particular the combination
of radio and muon detectors will not only enhance the accuracy for the
cosmic-ray mass composition, but also increase the gamma-hadron separation and
facilitate the search for PeV and EeV photons. Finally, the radio technique can
be scaled to large areas providing the huge apertures needed for
ultra-high-energy neutrino astronomy.Comment: Proceedings of the 20th ISVHECRI 2018, Nagoya, Japan (to appear in
EPJ WoC
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