Imaging Gaseous Detector based on Micro Processing Technology

The development of gaseous detectors has been exciting again since the appearance of a MicroStrip Gas Chamber(MSGC) in 1988, which is made using a micro-electronics technology. These days lots of variations of the advanced gaseous detectors are being intensively studied in the world. We have developed the two-dimensional MSGC having a 10 cm square detection area and the ultra fast readout system for a real time X-ray imaging. The MSGC was made using Multi-Chip Module (MCM) technology, and has a very thin substrate of 17 $\mu$m, lots of thin anodes and back strips both with 200 $\mu$m pitches. This enables us to get fast digital X-ray images with recording both the timing and an energy of each X-ray photon. In addition, an intermediate gas multiplier has been realized using a capillary plate having a conductive surface of a capillary. The MSGC combined with the conductive capillary plate can be steadily operated with a high gain under intense irradiation. Here we also report new approaches of X-ray crystal structure analyses using timing information obtained by the MSGC.Comment: 14 papges, 10 figures, to appear in the proceedings of Solid State Detectors for 21st Century (Nucl. Instru. and Meth. A

Particle Acceleration and Cosmic-Ray Origin in the Galaxy

In 1990's Very High Energy Gamma-ray Astrophysics has dramatically advanced due to the Imaging Air \v{C}erenkov Telescopes(IACTs). After the first detection of TeV gamma-ray emission from the Crab nebula in 1989, several type of TeV gamma-ray sources, Active Galactic Nuclei(AGN), young pulsar, and SuperNova Remnant(SNR), have been detected. In those discoveries, recent detections of both synchrotron X-rays and TeV gamma-ray emissions from several SNRs are very significant. SNR has been widely believed to be an unique candidate of galactic cosmic-ray origin since the beginning of cosmic-ray physics, whereas little observational evidences have been reported so far. Those are expected to be a clue of not only the galactic cosmic-ray origin but also the understanding of the particle acceleration due to a diffusive shock. Here I present the recent results obtained by our group, CANGAROO, about the evidences of electron and proton acceleration in SNRs.Comment: 9 pages, 9 figures, to appear in proceedings of the conference " The International Symposium on Science of Super-Strong Field Interactions" held in Japan Hayama, March 200

Reanalysis of Data Taken by the CANGAROO 3.8 Meter Imaging Atmospheric Cherenkov Telescope: PSR B1706-44, SN 1006, and Vela

We have reanalyzed data from observations of PSR B1706-44, SN 1006, and the Vela pulsar region made with the CANGAROO 3.8 m imaging atmospheric Cherenkov telescope between 1993 and 1998 in response to the results reported for these sources by the H.E.S.S. collaboration. In our reanalysis, in which gamma-ray selection criteria have been determined exclusively using gamma-ray simulations and OFF-source data as background samples, no significant TeV gamma-ray signals have been detected from compact regions around PSR B1706-44 or within the northeast rim of SN 1006. We discuss reasons why the original analyses gave the source detections. The reanalysis did result in a TeV gamma-ray signal from the Vela pulsar region at the 4.5 sigma level using 1993, 1994, and 1995 data. The excess was located at the same position, 0.13 deg. to the southeast of the Vela pulsar, as that reported in the original analysis. We have investigated the effect of the acceptance distribution in the field of view of the 3.8 m telescope, which rapidly decreases toward the edge of the field of the camera, on the detected gamma-ray morphology. The expected excess distribution for the 3.8 m telescope has been obtained by reweighting the distribution of HESS J0835-455 measured by H.E.S.S. with the acceptance of the 3.8 m telescope. The result is morphologically comparable to the CANGAROO excess distribution, although the profile of the acceptance-reweighted H.E.S.S. distribution is more diffuse than that of CANGAROO. The integral gamma-ray flux from HESS J0835-455 has been estimated for the same region as defined by H.E.S.S. from the 1993-1995 data of CANGAROO to be F(> 4.0 +/- 1.6 TeV) = (3.28 +/- 0.92) x 10^{-12} photons cm^{-2} s^{-1}, which is statistically consistent with the integral flux obtained by H.E.S.S.Comment: Published in ApJ, minor improvement

Performance of large area Micro Pixel Chamber

A novel gaseous two-dimensional imaging detector "Micro Pixel Chamber (micro-PIC)" has been developed. This detector is based on double sided printed circuit board (PCB). We have developed large area (10cm x 10cm) micro-PICs with 65536 pixel anodes of 400um pitch on a 100um thick insulating substrate. Achieved energy resolution was 30% (FWHM) at 5.9keV, and a gas gain of 7000 was obtained with argon ethane (8:2) gas mixture. This gain is high enough to detect minimum ionizing particles with such a small electrode pitch. Although several discharges occurred during 65 hours continuous operation, the detectors have kept stable operation with high gain. The micro-PIC is a useful detector for many applications e.g. X-ray, gamma ray, and charged particle imaging. The micro electrode structure allows us to measure directions of primary electrons due to incident X-rays or gamma rays, which provide a strong method for X-ray polarimetry and gamma-ray imaging.Comment: 4 pages, 8 figures, to appear in the proceedings of 6th International Conference on Position Sensitive Detectors, 9-13 Sep 2002, Leicester, UK (Nucl. Instr. and Meth. A

Development of an advanced Compton camera with gaseous TPC and scintillator

A prototype of the MeV gamma-ray imaging camera based on the full reconstruction of the Compton process has been developed. This camera consists of a micro-TPC that is a gaseous Time Projection Chamber (TPC) and scintillation cameras. With the information of the recoil electrons and the scattered gamma-rays, this camera detects the energy and incident direction of each incident gamma-ray. We developed a prototype of the MeV gamma-ray camera with a micro-TPC and a NaI(Tl) scintillator, and succeeded in reconstructing the gamma-rays from 0.3 MeV to 1.3 MeV. Measured angular resolutions of ARM (Angular Resolution Measure) and SPD (Scatter Plane Deviation) for 356 keV gamma-rays were $18^\circ$ and $35^\circ$, respectively.Comment: 4 pages, 5 figures. Proceedings of the 6th International Workshop On Radiation Imaging Detector

Studies of the performance of different front-end systems for flat-panel multi-anode PMTs with CsI(Tl) scintillator arrays

We have studied the performance of two different types of front-end systems for our gamma camera based on Hamamatsu H8500 (flat-panel 64 channels multi-anode PSPMT) with a CsI(Tl) scintillator array. The array consists of 64 pixels of $6\times6\times20{\rm mm}^3$ which corresponds to the anode pixels of H8500. One of the system is based on commercial ASIC chips in order to readout every anode. The others are based on resistive charge divider network between anodes to reduce readout channels. In both systems, each pixel (6mm) was clearly resolved by flood field irradiation of $^{137}$Cs. We also investigated the energy resolution of these systems and showed the performance of the cascade connection of resistive network between some PMTs for large area detectors.Comment: 9 pages, 6 figures, proceedings of the 7th International Workshop on Radiation Imaging Detectors (IWORID7), submitted to NIM