The Pierre Auger observatory and its fluorescence detector

Abstract The Pierre Auger Cosmic Ray Observatory is designed to elucidate the origin and nature of Ultra High Energy Cosmic Rays (UHECR). With an unprecedented aperture and sensitivity, and with the use of a hybrid technique, it will be able to collect and characterize a large number of Extensive Air Showers generated by primaries with energies greater than 1019 eV. In this paper we describe the Fluorescence Detector and its operation during the first phase of the experiment, called Engineering Array

The Offline Software Framework of the Pierre Auger Observatory

The Pierre Auger Observatory is designed to unveil the nature and the origins of the highest energy cosmic rays. The large and geographically dispersed collaboration of physicists and the wide-ranging collection of simulation and reconstruction tasks pose some special challenges for the offline analysis software. We have designed and implemented a general purpose framework which allows collaborators to contribute algorithms and sequencing instructions to build up the variety of applications they require. The framework includes machinery to manage these user codes, to organize the abundance of user-contributed configuration files, to facilitate multi-format file handling, and to provide access to event and time-dependent detector information which can reside in various data sources. A number of utilities are also provided, including a novel geometry package which allows manipulation of abstract geometrical objects independent of coordinate system choice. The framework is implemented in C++, and takes advantage of object oriented design and common open source tools, while keeping the user side simple enough for C++ novices to learn in a reasonable time. The distribution system incorporates unit and acceptance testing in order to support rapid development of both the core framework and contributed user code.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures, presented at IEEE NSS/MIC, 23-29 October 2005, Puerto Ric