21 research outputs found
The Sensitivity of HAWC to High-Mass Dark Matter Annihilations
The High Altitude Water Cherenkov (HAWC) observatory is a wide field-of-view
detector sensitive to gamma rays of 100 GeV to a few hundred TeV. Located in
central Mexico at 19 degrees North latitude and 4100 m above sea level, HAWC
will observe gamma rays and cosmic rays with an array of water Cherenkov
detectors. The full HAWC array is scheduled to be operational in Spring 2015.
In this paper, we study the HAWC sensitivity to the gamma-ray signatures of
high-mass (multi- TeV) dark matter annihilation. The HAWC observatory will be
sensitive to diverse searches for dark matter annihilation, including
annihilation from extended dark matter sources, the diffuse gamma-ray emission
from dark matter annihilation, and gamma-ray emission from non-luminous dark
matter subhalos. Here we consider the HAWC sensitivity to a subset of these
sources, including dwarf galaxies, the M31 galaxy, the Virgo cluster, and the
Galactic center. We simulate the HAWC response to gamma rays from these sources
in several well-motivated dark matter annihilation channels. If no gamma-ray
excess is observed, we show the limits HAWC can place on the dark matter
cross-section from these sources. In particular, in the case of dark matter
annihilation into gauge bosons, HAWC will be able to detect a narrow range of
dark matter masses to cross-sections below thermal. HAWC should also be
sensitive to non-thermal cross-sections for masses up to nearly 1000 TeV. The
constraints placed by HAWC on the dark matter cross-section from known sources
should be competitive with current limits in the mass range where HAWC has
similar sensitivity. HAWC can additionally explore higher dark matter masses
than are currently constrained.Comment: 15 pages, 4 figures, version to be published in PR
VAMOS: a Pathfinder for the HAWC Gamma-Ray Observatory
VAMOS was a prototype detector built in 2011 at an altitude of 4100m a.s.l.
in the state of Puebla, Mexico. The aim of VAMOS was to finalize the design,
construction techniques and data acquisition system of the HAWC observatory.
HAWC is an air-shower array currently under construction at the same site of
VAMOS with the purpose to study the TeV sky. The VAMOS setup included six water
Cherenkov detectors and two different data acquisition systems. It was in
operation between October 2011 and May 2012 with an average live time of 30%.
Besides the scientific verification purposes, the eight months of data were
used to obtain the results presented in this paper: the detector response to
the Forbush decrease of March 2012, and the analysis of possible emission, at
energies above 30 GeV, for long gamma-ray bursts GRB111016B and GRB120328B.Comment: Accepted for pubblication in Astroparticle Physics Journal (20 pages,
10 figures). Corresponding authors: A.Marinelli and D.Zaboro
The High-Altitude Water Cherenkov (HAWC) Observatory in M\'exico: The Primary Detector
The High-Altitude Water Cherenkov (HAWC) observatory is a second-generation
continuously operated, wide field-of-view, TeV gamma-ray observatory. The HAWC
observatory and its analysis techniques build on experience of the Milagro
experiment in using ground-based water Cherenkov detectors for gamma-ray
astronomy. HAWC is located on the Sierra Negra volcano in M\'exico at an
elevation of 4100 meters above sea level. The completed HAWC observatory
principal detector (HAWC) consists of 300 closely spaced water Cherenkov
detectors, each equipped with four photomultiplier tubes to provide timing and
charge information to reconstruct the extensive air shower energy and arrival
direction. The HAWC observatory has been optimized to observe transient and
steady emission from sources of gamma rays within an energy range from several
hundred GeV to several hundred TeV. However, most of the air showers detected
are initiated by cosmic rays, allowing studies of cosmic rays also to be
performed. This paper describes the characteristics of the HAWC main array and
its hardware.Comment: Accepted for publications in Nuclear Inst. and Methods in Physics
Research, A (2023) 168253 (
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0168900223002437 ); 39
pages, 14 Figure
Milagro limits and HAWC sensitivity for the rate-density of evaporating Primordial Black Holes
postprin
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Observation of small-scale anisotropy in the arrival direction distribution of TeV cosmic rays with HAWC
The High-Altitude Water Cherenkov (HAWC) Observatory is sensitive to gamma rays and charged cosmic rays at TeV energies. The detector is still under construction, but data acquisition with the partially deployed detector started in 2013. An analysis of the cosmic-ray arrival direction distribution based on 4.9 × 1010 events recorded between 2013 June and 2014 February shows anisotropy at the 10-4 level on angular scales of about 10°. The HAWC cosmic-ray sky map exhibits three regions of significantly enhanced cosmic-ray flux; two of these regions were first reported by the Milagro experiment. A third region coincides with an excess recently reported by the ARGO-YBJ experiment. An angular power spectrum analysis of the sky shows that all terms up to l = 15 contribute significantly to the excesses
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HAWC Contributions to the 34th International Cosmic Ray Conference (ICRC2015)
List of proceedings from the HAWC Collaboration presented at the 34th
International Cosmic Ray Conference, 30 July - 6 August 2015, The Hague, The
Netherlands
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HAWC Contributions to the 34th International Cosmic Ray Conference (ICRC2015)
List of proceedings from the HAWC Collaboration presented at the 34th
International Cosmic Ray Conference, 30 July - 6 August 2015, The Hague, The
Netherlands