Design, calibration, and early results of a surface array for detection of ultrahigh energy cosmic rays

Title:	Design, calibration, and early results of a surface array for detection of ultrahigh energy cosmic rays
Author:	Allison, Patrick S.
Description:	The difficulties in understanding cosmic rays at ultrahigh energies have been a persistent problem in particle astrophysics for almost 50 years, due to insufficient statistics and large systematic errors. The design of a surface array for the Pierre Auger Observatory, which was intended to resolve these problems, will be discussed, along with its calibration. The surface detector is an array of 1600 water Cherenkov detectors, spaced 1.5 km apart for a total area of 3000 km ^2, planned to operate continuously for 20 years. The detectors therefore must be inexpensive, low power, easy to deploy, and have a high reliability. Each surface detector station is required to make a high precision measurement of the signal density produced by the air showers induced by cosmic rays over a wide dynamic range, and therefore a calibration system was developed for the array which creates a signal response uniform to within 3%. Finally, early results of the cosmic ray energy spectrum will be calculated, along with the future implications of the array for the field of cosmic ray astrophysics as well as physics in general.
Permanent Link:	http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1179849363 http://hdl.handle.net/2374.OX/4946
Date:	2007

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