ASAPP 2023 - Advances in Space AstroParticle Physics: frontier technologies for particle measurements in space

Europe/Rome
Perugia (IT)

Perugia (IT)

Via Deruta, 43, 06132 San Martino In Campo PG
Duranti, Matteo (Universita e INFN, Perugia (IT)), Vagelli, Valerio (Italian Space Agency (ASI) and INFN)
Description

Advances in Space AstroParticle Physics

Frontier technologies for particle measurements in space

ASAPP 2023


 

The call for hosting the ASAPP 2025 EDITION is open. Details

Deadline for hosting proposals: 30 April 2024

 


 

PROCEEDING SUBMISSION IS CLOSED.

 

The ASAPP 2023 International Conference aims in reviewing the progresses in design, development, integration and test of instrumentation for measurement of particles and high-energy radiation in Space. The deployment and operation of novel instrumentation for particle and high-energy radiation measurement in space will pave the road to future astroparticle missions for investigations of fundamental physics and the Cosmos (e.g., cosmic ray physics, search for Dark Matter, matter-antimatter asymmetry, multimessenger astronomy, ...); applications for monitoring of the space radiation environment; investigations of the impact of low energy ionizing particles on instrumentation, Space Weather, and Earth sciences.

 

This conference will be a unique opportunity in the international scenario to host a direct discussion between different experimental communities towards achieving common targets and foster synergies. The conference program will be consequently planned with plenary talks only with large slots dedicated to questions and discussions, taking advantage of the conference venue and social events to foster constructive discussions between participants in view of establishing nets of expertise.

The event is planned to be held with in-person participation. No remote connection will be provided unless specific exceptional events will require it.

SCIENTIFIC PROGRAM (in brief)

The conference organizers invite the community to submit abstract proposals on the topics listed below (see the Scientific Program page for details)

  • Instrumentation and missions for direct high-energy cosmic ray measurements in space
  • Instrumentation and missions for indirect high-energy cosmic ray measurements in space 
  • Instrumentation and missions for direct low-energy cosmic ray measurements in space
  • Instrumentation and missions for hard X-ray and γ-ray direct measurements in space
  • R&D of novel approaches and instruments for particle and high-energy radiation measurements in space, including (and not limited to):
    • Tracking detectors
    • Calorimetry detectors
    • Fast Time-of-Flight systems
    • Detectors for particle ID
    • High Temperature Superconducting magnets
    • FE and DAQ systems

In consideration of the variegate approaches that have been consolidating in the current era of space observations, contributions that target all opportunities of space platforms will be addressed, from cubesats and nanosatellite constellations up to large-size space missions, including stratospheric balloon flight missions. 


Scientific Chairpersons:

Matteo Duranti (INFN - Perugia)

Valerio Vagelli (ASI)

contacts: asapp-chair@lists.infn.it

Scientific Advisory Board

Local Organizing Committee

Oscar Adriani (University of Florence) Mattia Barbanera (INFN - Perugia)
Giovanni Ambrosi (INFN - Perugia) Claudio Brugnoni (University of Perugia)
Roberto Battiston (University of Trento) Paolo Cristarella Orestano (University of Perugia)
Bruna Bertucci (University of Perugia) Sara Cutini (INFN - Perugia)
Terri Brandt (SRON) Federico Donnini (INFN - Perugia)
Elisabetta Cavazzuti (ASI) Francesco Faldi (University of Perugia)
Enrico Costa (INAF) Yazou Jiang (University of Perugia)
Immacolata Donnarumma (ASI) Stefano Germani (University of Perugia)
Corrado Gargiulo (CERN) Maura Graziani (University of Perugia)
Elizabeth A. Hayes (NASA - GSFC) Gianluigi Silvestre (INFN - Perugia)
Pasquale Lubrano (INFN - Perugia) Nicola Tomassetti (University of Perugia)
Barbara Negri (ASI) Luca Tosti (INFN - Perugia)
Angela Olinto (University of Chicago)  
Nahee Park (Queen's University)  
Stefan Schael (RWTH Aachen)  
Eun Suk Seo (University of Maryland)  
Roberta Sparvoli (University of Rome Tor Vergata)  
Shoji Torii (University of Waseda)  
Philipp Von Doetinchem (University of Hawaii Manoa)  
Xin Wu (University of Geneva)  
Shuang-Nan Zhang (IHEP)  

Conference organized and with the patronage by:


With the patronage of:

 

 


Sponsorship:

 


Participants
  • Adriani, Oscar
  • Aloisio, Roberto
  • Ambrosi, Giovanni
  • Bandiera, Laura
  • Baracchini, Elisabetta
  • Barbanera, Mattia
  • Barbato, Felicia
  • Battiston, Roberto
  • Betti, Pietro
  • CARDENAS TRISTAN, ABRAHAM
  • Casolino, Marco
  • Cavazzuti, Elisabetta
  • Colalillo, Roberta
  • Costa, Enrico
  • Cristarella Orestano, Paolo
  • Cutini, Sara
  • Di Fino, Luca
  • Di Giovanni, Adriano
  • Di Salvo, Andrea
  • Dong, Yongwei
  • Donnini, Federico
  • Faldi, Francesco
  • Fariña, Luis
  • Fenu, Francesco
  • Fernandes Moita, Miguel
  • Feroci, Marco
  • Ferro, Lisa
  • Ferrulli, Simona
  • Filgas, Robert
  • Follega, Francesco Maria
  • Fontanella, Giulio
  • Gaitskell, Richard
  • Germani, Stefano
  • Grimani, Catia
  • Hunyadi, Mátyás
  • Iuppa, Roberto
  • Khan, Danish
  • Kugathasan, Thanushan
  • Lubrano, Pasquale
  • Mancini, Edoardo
  • Marrocchesi, Pier Simone
  • Mese, Marco
  • Murphy, David
  • Nicolaidis, Riccardo
  • Pacini, Lorenzo
  • Rauch, Brian
  • Serpolla, Andrea
  • Servoli, Leonello
  • Siddique, Iqra
  • Silvestre, Gianluigi
  • Soffitta, Paolo
  • Tomassetti, Nicola
  • Tomsick, John
  • Tosti, Luca
  • Ubaldi, Alessio
  • Vagelli, Valerio
  • Vigliano, Alessandro Armando
  • Von Doetinchem, Philip
  • Wiencke, Lawrence
  • Zuccon, Paolo
  • +43
Contacts and informations
    • 09:00
      Arrival & Registration
    • 13:10
      Lunch (on demand)
    • 14:30
      Arrival & registration
    • Welcome, Institutional and Conclusion talks: Welcome & Institutional talks
      Conveners: Duranti, Matteo (Universita e INFN, Perugia (IT)), Vagelli, Valerio (Italian Space Agency (ASI) and INFN)
      • 1
        Welcome by organizers
        Speakers: Duranti, Matteo (Universita e INFN, Perugia (IT)), Vagelli, Valerio (Italian Space Agency (ASI) and INFN)
      • 2
        Welcome by INFN Astroparticle Board
        Speakers: Cremonesi, Oliviero, Dr Cremonesi, Oliviero (INFN)
      • 3
        Welcome by local INFN
        Speakers: Cenci, Patrizia (INFN Perugia (IT)), Cenci, Patrizia (INFN Perugia (IT))
      • 4
        Welcome by local Physics&Geology Department
        Speaker: Perugini, Diego (Università degli Studi di Perugia)
    • 16:30
      Coffee break
    • Introductory talks
      Conveners: Duranti, Matteo (Universita e INFN, Perugia (IT)), Vagelli, Valerio (Italian Space Agency (ASI) and INFN)
      • 5
        Cosmic ray physics: current status and theoretical challenges

        In this talk we will discuss the state of the art on our understanding of the cosmic ray physics. Emphasis will be put on energies from about 100 MeV up to TeV, with some connection also to UHECRs.
        We will present the most relevant open problems in the nuclear and in the leptonic sector, and will discuss correlations and discovery potentials also in the gamma-ray sector.

        Speaker: Prof. Donato, Fiorenza (Torino University)
      • 6
        Measurements of cross sections of Astroparticle Physics relevance

        The current cosmic rays measurements have reached a level high level of accuracy.
        However a similar level of accuracy is not currently available for several crucial processes needed to properly model the cosmic rays propagation into the galaxy.
        A new campaign of ground measurement has started to fill this gap, but more effort is needed in this direction. I will briefly review the current experiments with particular accent on AMBER anti-p cross section measurements currently ongoing and then I will discuss idea for future possible measurements of nuclei cross section.

        Speakers: Zuccon, Paolo (INFN sezione di Perugia), Zuccon, Paolo (Universita degli Studi di Trento and INFN (IT))
      • 7
        Astroparticle physics in space: synergies with accelerator technologies

        In this talk I will review some possible applications for future space experiments of new technologies developed in the last few years for highly innovative accelerator based detectors.

        Speakers: Adriani, Oscar, Adriani, Oscar (Universita e INFN, Firenze (IT))
      • 8
        Perspectives on astroparticle physics in space

        Astroparticle physics in space has been steadily growing during the last couple of decades testing topics ranging from CMB, General Relativity, Cosmic Rays, Gamma Rays, Dark Matter and various kind of extreme astrophysics of exotic physics. Starting from a short review of the main results achieved so far I will review directions which could be followed during the coming years, exploiting new technologies: from nanosatellites constellations, to detectors on the moon, from superconducting magnets to interstellar probes, from exploiting the circumterrestrial space as detector or distant pulsars as clocks, there is “plenty of space up there” for extending our discovery reach.

        Speakers: Battiston, Roberto, Prof. Battiston, Roberto (Physics Department&INFN, Trento)
    • 19:30
      Welcome dinner
    • Direct High-Energy Cosmic Ray Measurements (Space and balloon-borne)
      Convener: Park, Nahee
      • 9
        Highlights from CALET on the ISS

        The CALorimetric Electron Telescope (CALET) is a high-energy multi-detector instrument collecting astroparticle physics science data on the International Space Station (ISS) since October 2015 with excellent and continuous performance. Developed and operated by JAXA in collaboration with ASI and NASA, it investigates on the possible presence of nearby sources of high-energy electrons, while carrying out direct measurements of observables sensitive to the acceleration and propagation of galactic cosmic rays and searching for potential dark matter signatures. In this paper we present a summary of the CALET latest results, including the electron + positron energy spectrum, the spectra of protons and light nuclei as helium, boron, carbon, oxygen, and of heavier elements up to iron and nickel. The measurements of the ratios of secondary-to-primary fluxes are also reported. A concise summary follows on the observations of solar modulation and gamma-ray bursts, as well as on the search of electromagnetic counterparts of LIGO/Virgo gravitational wave events.

        Speakers: Marrocchesi, Pier Simone (University of Siena and INFN Pisa (IT)), Marrocchesi, Pier Simone (University of Siena and INFN Pisa (IT))
      • 10
        DAMPE: mission status and prospects

        DAMPE (DArk Matter Particle Explorer) is calorimetric detector providing unprecedented acceptance and precession for direct detection of cosmic rays in space
        in the TeV - 100 TeV range. It has been in excellent operating condition since its successful launch in December 2015. A large amount
        a large amount of cosmic ray data has been collected and significant results have been published on interesting new features on the energy spectra of
        cosmic ray electron, proton, Helium above 1 TeV. The DAMPE mission is expected to continue its operation for at least several more years.

        In this talk the details of the DAMPE detector and its current status will be presented, as well as highlights of its majors results produced so far.

        Speaker: Wu, Xin (Universite de Geneve (CH))
      • 11
        The Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer on the International Space Station

        AMS-02 is a large acceptance magnetic spectrometer operating on the International Space Station since 19th May 2011. AMS-02 has provided precise measurements of the fluxes of individual cosmic ray species in the rigidity range from 1 GV to several TV. The excellent identification capabilities and accurate energy determination are based on a redundant, highly reliable, and flexible design that provides independent and complementary measurements allowing continuous performance optimization throughout its operation in space. These features have proven critical to attaining percent level precision in the measurements of the particle fluxes and the required background rejection in the search for faint signals of new physics in cosmic rays. In this presentation, we will review some of the features that have allowed AMS-02 to provide unprecedented results in the direct measurement of cosmic rays from space.

        Speaker: Casaus, Jorge (CIEMAT - Centro de Investigaciones Energéticas Medioambientales y Tec. (ES))
      • 12
        AMS-L0: upgrade status and prospects

        The Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) is a particle physics experiment on board the International Space Station (ISS) designed to accurately measure the principal and the rarest Cosmic Rays components in the rigidity range from 1 GV to several TV.

        Following a long period of construction and testing, AMS was launched to the ISS and installed on May 19, 2011, and since then collects data and it is supposed to take data for the whole life of the ISS, that currently extends to 2030.

        AMS has the unique capability of distinguishing matter from anti-matter, thanks to its capability of measuring the charge sign from the track deflection within its magnetic field. For this reason the Collaboration has decided to upgrade the silicon tracker and use at the best the remaining data taking time up to 2030. The proposed upgrade concerns the installation of an additional tracking layer on the top of the existing instrument whose main advantage would be the increase of a factor 3 of the acceptance in many analysis channels.

        In the presentation we will briefly discuss the advantages of the increased acceptance and then present the details of the design, construction, and installation of the additional tracking layer. We will highlight the technological choices and implementation needed to complete all the activities in about 3 years, for a launch foreseen early in 2025.

        Speaker: Ambrosi, Giovanni (Universita e INFN, Perugia (IT))
    • 10:40
      Coffee break
    • Direct High-Energy Cosmic Ray Measurements (Space and balloon-borne)
      Convener: Munini, Riccardo (INFN - Universita Studi Trieste)
      • 13
        The General AntiParticle Spectrometer - Search for Dark Matter using Cosmic-ray Antinuclei

        The GAPS experiment is designed to conduct a dark matter search by measuring low-energy cosmic-ray antinuclei with a novel detection approach. For the case of antiprotons, a high-statistics measurement in the unexplored low-energy range will be conducted. In contrast, not a single cosmic antideuteron has been detected by any experiment thus far. However, well-motivated theories beyond the standard model of particle physics contain viable dark matter candidates, which could significantly enhance the antideuteron flux due to the annihilation or decay of dark matter particles. This flux contribution is predicted to be especially large at low energies, leading to a high discovery potential for GAPS and making the antideuteron search essentially background free because the theoretically predicted antideuteron flux resulting from secondary interactions of cosmic rays with the interstellar gas is very low. Furthermore, the search for low-energy antihelium-3 and antihelium-4 promises an even lower secondary background and can also be performed with GAPS. The experiment is designed to achieve its goals via a series of long-duration balloon flights at high altitude in Antarctica. The GAPS team is currently performing system testing in preparation for the first flight by the end of 2023. The presentation will briefly review the theoretical status, introduce the GAPS experiment and its capabilities, and report the construction and instrument performance status.

        Speaker: Von Doetinchem, Philip (University of Hawaii at Manoa)
      • 14
        A pressurized Helium calorimeter for Antideuteron identification.

        The search for low energy anti-deuterons in cosmic rays allows to address fundamental physics problems testing for the presence of primordial antimatter and the nature of Dark Matter.
        Anti Deuteron Helium Detector (ADHD) project is aiming to study the signature offered by a pressurized Helium calorimeter for the identification of anti-deuterons in cosmic rays.
        In particular exotic atoms are produced by stopping anti-protons/anti-deuterons in the gas and the captured particle can orbit the Helium nucleus for microseconds before the annihilation.
        This meta-stability is a unique feature for the Helium target and the characteristic delayed annihilation is a distinctive signature to identify the antimatter nature of the stopping particle.
        A possible configuration for the ADHD space/balloon detector consists of a pressurized helium scintillating calorimeter surrounded by plastic scintillator layers for velocity measurement.
        Anti-deuterons are identified by combining the spectrometric measurement of the stopping particle (velocity vs kinetic energy) with the delayed emission of the outgoing charged pions caused by the anti-deuteron annihilation.
        A prototype of the pressurized calorimeter, filled by 200 Bar Helium acting as a scintillator, has been characterized with cosmic muons and with 70-240 MeV proton beam in the INFN-TIFPA laboratory.
        The performances for anti-deuterons and anti-protons identification in cosmic rays with the ADHD technique will be summarized and the results of the measurement of the scintillating characteristics (timing, position and energy resolution) of the Helium calorimeter prototype will be shown.

        Speaker: Nozzoli, Francesco (Universita degli Studi di Trento and INFN (IT))
      • 15
        Status of HELIX, a balloon-borne magnet spectrometer

        HELIX (High Energy Light Isotope eXperiment) is a balloon-borne experiment designed to measure light cosmic-ray isotopes, including the propagation clock isotope Beryllium-10, in the energy range from 0.2 GeV/n to beyond 3 GeV/n. HELIX consists of a 1 Tesla superconducting magnet, a high-resolution gas drift chamber, a time-of-flight detector (ToF), and a ring imaging Cherenkov counter (RICH). The current detector configuration was chosen to achieve a good mass resolution within the energy range. A gas drift chamber was designed to reduce multiple scattering within the tracker. For efficient photon collection within the strong magnetic field, silicon photomultipliers are used for the ToF and RICH. The first long-duration balloon flight of HELIX is planned for 2024. I will present the design challenges and the current status of the HELIX payload.

        Speaker: Park, Nahee
      • 16
        SuperTIGER and TIGERISS mission status and prospects

        The Trans-Iron Galactic Element Recorder (TIGER) family of instruments are optimized to measure the relative abundances of the rare ultra-heavy Galactic cosmic rays (UHGCR) with Z ≥ 30. Observing the UHGCR places a premium on exposure that the balloon-borne SuperTIGER achieved with a large area detector (5.6 m$^{2}$) and two Antarctic flights totaling 83 days, while the smaller (~1 m$^{2}$) TIGER for the International Space Station (TIGERISS) aims to manage with more extended operations from one to several years. SuperTIGER uses scintillating optical fiber hodoscopes for trajectory reconstruction. For energy and charge determination the combination of compact wavelength shifter bar readout scintillator detectors with acrylic (n = 1.5) and silica aerogel (25% n = 1.024, 75% n = 1.04) Cherenkov light integration box detectors. TIGERISS will utilize silicon strip detectors (SSD) in place of both the hodoscopes and large area scintillator radiators for charge measurement that will provide improved detector linearity and charge resolution over SuperTIGER. The TIGERISS Cherenkov detectors will use silicon photomultipliers (SiPMs) in place of photomultiplier tubes (PMTs) for more compact readout and lower operating voltage, and the aerogel radiators with a single index of refraction (n = 1.04).

        SuperTIGER is now nearly entirely buried on the high plateau following only high priority and data recoveries after its 2019-2020 flight and its chances of recovery are uncertain at best. With the disposition of the payload and current backlog of Antarctic flight requests SuperTIGER has no plans for future flights. Fortunately for the franchise, extended UHGCR analysis from the first record setting 55-day SuperTIGER flight with abundances up to $_{56}$Ba suggested an additional cosmic-ray source or changed acceleration mechanism beyond the OB association origin model supported by previous analysis results through $_{40}$Zr. This suggestion of remaining UHGCR science led to TIGERISS being selected in the second round of the NASA Astrophysics Pioneers Program. TIGERISS has a planned 2026 launch and will in one year measure with comparable statistics to the SuperTIGER UHGCR abundances through $_{56}$Ba while having the extended dynamic range for the first preliminary single-element charge resolution measurements through $_{82}$Pb by an active detector. Extended operations would allow TIGERISS to make more significant UHGCR measurements that will cover elements produced in s-process and r-process neutron capture nucleosynthesis, adding to the multi-messenger effort to determine the relative contributions of supernovae (SN) and Neutron Star Merger (NSM) events to r-process nucleosynthesis.

        Speaker: Rauch, Brian
      • 17
        Search for Strange Quark Matter from the ISS with the ISS-SQM experiment

        The existence of a different state of hadronic matter other than the ordinary nuclear matter, called strange quark matter (SQM), was proposed for the first time in the 1980s. This kind of hadronic matter would be composed by a roughly equivalent number of u, d, and s quarks. SQM could be stable and may constitute the true ground state of hadronic matter. Quarks could therefore be lumped together, forming clusters whose size could range from that of heavy nuclei up to that of a compact star. SQM could have been produced in the Big Bang, be part of baryonic dark matter, exist as “strange quark stars” and is a candidate for Dark Matter. Lumps of SQM could be ejected in space because of binary star collisions or be produced in the early Universe Galaxy and reach Earth where they could be identified with cosmic-ray detectors or mass spectrometers.
        Various experiments (from space we mention Pamela and Mini-EUSO) have tried to search for SQM in different environments, on the ground, on balloons, and on satellites. From space, a method of looking for SQM is by searching for meteor like events burning in the atmosphere with a higher speed (about 200km/s) and with a longer track (due to the higher mass/area ratio).

        SQM-ISS is an Idea submitted to ESA which aims to search for SQM using a local compact detector composed by a stack of scintillators (to detect ionization by SQM) and a stack of metal plates (to read the vibration caused by the passage of SQM) coupled to time-of-flight system capable of measuring the speed of the particle. SQM is expected to cross the detector (unhindered by the ISS hull of the detector itself) a speed
        consistent with galactic orbital velocity of about 220 km/s. The signature of these particles can be in the ionization channel (if it is charged) in the phonon/vibration channel (if it is neutral or charged), but anyway the detection of a signal consistent with this speed and crossing the detector would be an unambiguous signature of a very dense, insofar undetected particle. The ISS is a unique environment since it provides a very stable microgravity environment thus removing the seismic noise of the ground and allows access to these particles before they could interact with the atmosphere.

        In this presentation we will present the detector, the science objectives and the perspectives fro flight in light of the ESA evaluation

        Speaker: Casolino, Marco
    • Rapid-Fire poster talk: Poster Introduction talks
      Conveners: Duranti, Matteo (Universita e INFN, Perugia (IT)), Vagelli, Valerio (Italian Space Agency (ASI) and INFN)
      • 18
        Collection of silicon detectors mechanical properties from static and dynamic characterization test campaigns
        Speaker: Mancini, Edoardo (Universita e INFN, Perugia (IT))
      • 19
        Charge resolution study on AMS-02 silicon Layer 0 prototype
        Speaker: Ubaldi, Alessio (Universita e INFN, Perugia (IT))
      • 20
        Performance Study on HERD sub-detectors: Silicon Charge Detector (SCD) Prototype
        Speaker: Jiang, Yaozu (University and INFN, Perugia)
    • 13:10
      Lunch
    • Poster session
      • 21
        Collection of silicon detectors mechanical properties from static and dynamic characterization test campaigns

        Physics research is constantly pursuing more efficient detectors, often trying to develop complex and optimized geometries resulting in non-trivial engineering challenges. Although critical for this optimization, silicon tiles' mechanical data are hardly present in the literature. For this reason, this work focuses on silicon detectors' mechanical characterization, aiming to provide engineers with input data for the design. In detail, this paper concerns a set of tests on single sides silicon detectors, dynamic tests on glued tiles, and severe stress of bonded ladders.

        Speakers: Mancini, Edoardo, Mancini, Edoardo (Universita e INFN, Perugia (IT))
      • 22
        Opportunities of Si-microstrip LGAD for next-generation Space detectors

        Low Gain Avalanche Diodes (LGAD) is a consolidated technology developed for particle detectors at colliders which allows for simultaneous and accurate time (<100 ps) and position (< 10 µm) resolutions with segmented Si-pixel sensors. It is a candidate technology that could enable for the first time 4D tracking (position and time) in space using LGAD Si-microstrip tracking systems. The intrinsic gain of LGAD sensors may also allow to decrease the sensor thickness while achieving signal yields similar to those of Si-microstrips currently operated in Space.

        In this contribution we discuss the possible applications and breakthrough opportunities in next generation large area cosmic ray detectors and sub-GeV gamma-ray detectors that could be enabled by LGAD Si-microstrip tracking detectors in Space. We propose the design of a cost-effective instrument demonstrator on a CubeSat platform to enable and qualify the operation of LGAD Si-microstrip detectors in Space.

        Speakers: Duranti, Matteo (Universita e INFN, Perugia (IT)), Vagelli, Valerio (Italian Space Agency (ASI) and INFN)
      • 23
        Nuclear Cross Sections for Cosmic Rays Astrophysics Theory and Experiments

        Measurement of nuclear cross section are crucial for astroparticle physics, both for the development of high-accuracy models, and for the understanding of the normalization of nuclei spectra for experimental measurements. For theory the most relevent cross section of nuclei incident over H and He (principal components of the interstellar medium), while for experiments are needed cross section for nuclei incident on passive and active detector material such as C or Al. Given the availability of high energy nuclei beams at the CERN SPS, used since long time for testing of cosmic ray experiments that operate in space, a program for measurement of cross section can be envisioned that can contribute to both fields.

        Speaker: Oliva, Alberto (Universita e INFN, Bologna (IT))
      • 24
        Charge resolution study on AMS-02 silicon Layer 0 prototype

        AMS-02 is a Cosmic Rays detector installed on the International Space Station in May 2011. The core of the instrument is a spectrometer made of a permanent magnet and 9 layers of silicon tracker aims to measures rigidity (momentum over charge) of the particles and the sign of their charge. In addition, it measures the specific energy loss of charged particles to determine the charge magnitude.
        For the end of 2024, AMS-02 will be upgraded by adding a plane of silicon tracker (called "L0") on top of the detector, increasing its acceptance by a factor 3 for the major part of the measurements. A L0 prototype has been exposed to ion beams at CERN. In this contribution, a preliminary study of L0 response to nuclei from helium up to the nitrogen will be presented. The applied procedure that allows to extract the charge resolution from the raw collected signal by silicon sensors will be shown. The obtained results will be compared with the actual AMS-02 charge reconstruction capabilities.

        Speaker: Mr Ubaldi, Alessio (INFN Perugia)
      • 25
        Performance Study on HERD sub-detectors: Silicon Charge Detector (SCD) Prototype

        The High Energy cosmic-Radiation Detection (HERD) facility is one of the Cosmic Lighthouse Program onboard China’s Space Station. HERD is designed for the direct measurement of high-energy electrons, gamma-rays and in general all the cosmic ray nuclear species. Is planned for operation starting around 2027 for about 10 years.

        HERD is composed of five sub-detectors: an homogeneous, deep, 3D segmented calorimeter (CALO), a FIber Tracker (FIT), a Plastic Scintillation Detector (PSD), a Silicon Charge Detector (SCD), and a Transition Radiation Detector (TRD). Thanks to its large acceptance and sensitivity, HERD will be able to extend the current measurements up to much higher energies.In this contribution, a preliminary study of the performance of Silicon Charge Detector (SCD) prototype, with the results from HERD prototype beam test at CERN SPS in 2022, will be presented. We’ll review the main evaluated performances, such as the Signal-to-Noise ratio, the charge resolution, and the spatial resolution.

        Speaker: Jiang, Yaozu (Universita e INFN, Perugia (IT))
    • Direct High-Energy Cosmic Ray Measurements (Space and balloon-borne)
      Convener: Adriani, Oscar (Universita e INFN, Firenze (IT))
      • 26
        Introduction of the HERD space mission

        The High Energy cosmic-Radiation Detection (HERD) facility has been proposed as one of several main space scientific experiments onboard the China Space Station. HERD is expected to be launched around 2027 and to be operating for at least 10 years. HERD is a China-led international space mission in collaboration with several European institutes from Italy, Switzerland and Spain. Its main scientific goals include accurate measurements of cosmic ray energy spectra up to the highest achievable energies in space (∼ few PeV), gamma-ray astronomy and transient studies, along with indirect searches for dark matter. HERD is uniquely configured to accept particles from both its top and four lateral sides. Due to its novel design, an order of magnitude increase in geometric acceptance is foreseen, compared to current generation cosmic-ray space experiments. HERD payload consists of several sub-detectors, including a 3D imaging calorimeter (CALO) with IsCMOS camera and photodiodes independent readout systems. The CALO comprises 7500 LYSO crystal cubes with a side length of 3 cm. The scintillating Fiber Tracker (FIT) covers the CALO and serves as track reconstruction of charged particles while inducing the conversion of gamma rays to electron/positron pairs. The plastic scintillator detector (PSD) envelopes both CALO and FIT sub-detectors and is used to discriminate incident photons from charged particles. The silicon charge detector (SCD) is the outermost detector and will provide a precise charge measurement of incoming particles in the range between Z=1 and Z=28. Additionally, a transition radiation detector (TRD) is placed on one of the lateral sides, for proton calibration in the energy range of several TeV. In this talk I will present current status of the mission and also development plans.

        Speaker: Prof. DONG on behalf of the HERD collaboration, Yong-wei (Institute of High Energy Physics, CAS)
      • 27
        AMS-100: The next generation magnetic spectrometer in Space

        The next generation magnetic spectrometer in space, AMS-100, is designed to have a geometrical acceptance of 100 m^2 sr and to be operated for at least ten years at the Sun–Earth Lagrange Point 2. Compared to existing experiments, it will improve the sensitivity for the observation of new phenomena in cosmic rays, and in particular in cosmic antimatter, by at least a factor of 1000. The magnet design is based on high temperature superconductor tapes, which allow the construction of a thin solenoid with a homogeneous magnetic field of 0.5 Tesla inside. The inner volume is instrumented with a silicon tracker reaching a maximum detectable rigidity of 70 TV and a calorimeter system that is 70 radiation lengths deep, equivalent to four nuclear interaction lengths, which extends the energy reach for cosmic-ray nuclei up to the PeV scale, i.e. beyond the cosmic-ray knee. Covering most of the sky continuously, AMS-100 will detect high-energy gamma-rays in the calorimeter system and by pair conversion in the thin solenoid, reconstructed with excellent angular resolution in the silicon tracker.

        Speakers: Schael, Stefan (Rheinisch Westfaelische Tech. Hoch. (DE)), Siedenburg, Thorsten (Rheinisch Westfaelische Tech. Hoch. (DE))
      • 28
        ALADInO: Antimatter Large Acceptance Detector In Orbit

        A new generation magnetic spectrometer in space will open the opportunity to investigate properties of high energy cosmic rays and to precisely measure the amount of the rare antimatter component in cosmic rays beyond the reach of current missions, addressing with unprecedented accuracy open frontiers in multi-messenger and cosmic ray physics such as the matter-antimatter asymmetry, the indirect detection for Dark Matter and the detailed study of origin, acceleration and propagation of CRs and their interactions with the interstellar medium. We present the concept of the Antimatter Large Acceptance Detector In Orbit (ALADInO), a mission proposed in the context of the ESA's Voyage 2050 long-term plan to take over the legacy of direct measurements of cosmic rays in space performed by PAMELA and AMS-02. ALADInO features technological solutions conceived to overcome the current limitations of magnetic spectrometers in space with a design that provides an acceptance larger than 10 m$^2$ sr. A superconducting magnet coupled to precision tracking and time-of-flight systems will provide the required matter-antimatter separation capabilities and rigidity measurement resolution with a Maximum Detectable Rigidity better than 20 TV. The inner 3D-imaging deep calorimeter, designed to maximize the isotropic acceptance of particles, allows for the measurement of cosmic rays up to PeV energies with accurate energy resolution. The design of the instrument has been optimized in terms of layout, weight, dimensions, power consumption and expected data throughput to fit in the limits set for transport and operation in Earth-Sun Lagrange Point L$_2$ using a space vector opportunity already accessible nowadays. The operations of ALADInO in L$_2$ for at least 5 years would enable observations with groundbreaking discovery potentials in the field of astroparticle physics by precision measurements of electrons, positrons and antiprotons up to 10 TeV, of nuclear cosmic rays up to PeV energies, and by the possible unambiguous detection and measurement of low-energy antideuteron and antihelium components in cosmic rays.

        Speaker: Bertucci, Bruna (Universita e INFN, Perugia (IT))
      • 29
        New technologies for superconducting magnets in the space.

        Flying a superconducting magnet has been the dream of many experiments and projects, both for astroparticles detectors and for radiation shielding. The show stoppers have always been, among other difficulties more manageable, the cryogenics and protection. However the recent progress of the HTS (High Temperature Superconductors) have opened a new way. In particular, REBCO (Rear Earth Barium Copper Oxide) superconductor operating at 20 K in last years has become a real product available from various companies, with critical current exceeding the one of Nb-Ti or Nb3Sn , not to mention MgB2 that is confined to the low field (< 3 T) domain. In addition the new technologies of coil protection based on the surprising concept of non-insulated (NI) winding are now explored in a number of applications, including fusion, and they seem suitable to a steady state detector magnet. The talk will review the result of the NI race track coil, based on a REBCO NI winding, recently manufactured and successfully tested in a collaboration CERN-ASI-INFN. Its nearly 10 T peak field is the highest field reached in EU with REBCO coils in a non-solenoidal geometry.

        Speakers: Iuppa, Roberto (Universita degli Studi di Trento and INFN (IT)), Rossi, Lucio (Università degli Studi e INFN Milano (IT))
    • 16:10
      Coffee break
    • Direct High-Energy Cosmic Ray Measurements (Space and balloon-borne)
      Convener: Graziani, Maura (Universita e INFN, Perugia (IT))
      • 30
        The Plastic Scintillator Detector of HERD experiment

        The High Energy cosmic-Radiation Detector (HERD) is a proposed space as-
        tronomy payload for the China Space Station. Its main goal is to detect charged
        cosmic-rays with energies up to a few PeV and gamma-rays with energies above
        100 MeV. The Plastic Scintillator Detector (PSD) is a crucial component of
        HERD, and it is designed to identify photons and accurately measure the charge
        of incoming cosmic rays, ranging from protons to iron. The PSD must have high
        detection efficiency, a broad dynamic range, and optimal energy/charge resolu-
        tion to fulfill its requirements.
        The performance of the PSD detector was tested during 2022 and 2023
        through beam test sessions at CERN and the CNAO (Centro Nazionale di
        Adroterapia Oncologica) in Italy. Several PSD prototypes were tested to evalu-
        ate their performance with different particles at different momenta. The results
        of these tests will be presented and compared in terms of energy resolution and
        ion identification capability, which includes identification of ions with atomic
        numbers up to Z ∼26.

        Speaker: Gargano, Fabio (Universita e INFN, Bari (IT))
      • 31
        Double Photodiode read-out system for the calorimeter of the HERD experiment: challenges and new horizons in technology for the direct detection of high energy cosmic rays

        Direct detection of high energy cosmic rays is strongly constrained by the small effective geometric factors of detectors mainly due to costs and technology of bringing big payloads in orbit. The HERD experiment, a future space experiment which will be installed on the Chinese Space Station in 2026, will take advantage of its innovative geometry and readout systems to have an effective geometric factor for electrons and protons more than an order of magnitude bigger than that of the currently in orbit experiments. Thus, HERD will be able to measure proton and nuclei fluxes up to the cosmic ray knee region (about 1 PeV), and electron+positron flux up to tens of TeV.
        The detector is based on a 3D, homogeneous, isotropic, deep and finely segmented calorimeter, and it will be capable to detect particles coming from every direction. It will be composed by about 7500 LYSO cubic crystals. Every crystal is coupled with two independent read-out systems: the first is based on wavelength shifting fibers coupled to Intensified scientific CMOS, the second one is based on a system of two photodiodes coupled to a specifically designed front-end electronics. The two-photodiode read-out system features a dynamic range higher than $10^{7}$, in order to measure signals ranging from the small MIP energy deposit to typical releases caused by hadronic showers induced by PeV protons.
        In this talk we will discuss the main characteristics and the performance of the photodiode read-out system, highlighting its use in the HERD calorimeter and the new cosmic ray energy horizons opened by this detector.

        Speaker: Betti, Pietro (Universita e INFN, Firenze (IT))
      • 32
        The impact of crystal non-proportional light yield on the calibration of space calorimeters.

        Recent experiments measuring cosmic rays have shown discrepancies in the spectra among different observations. The electron spectrum in the region of hundreds of GeV and Carbon and Oxygen spectra were found to differ mostly in flux normalizations, and the discrepancies are larger than the reported experimental errors. Understanding the reasons for these differences is crucial for improving our understanding of cosmic rays and developing future experiments.
        One potential source of systematic errors is the calibration of the absolute energy scale of space calorimeters. During on-orbit operations, space calorimeters are typically calibrated using minimum ionizing particles (MIPs), which can lead to uncertainties related to the energy scale due to the non-linearity of the scintillating crystals light yield. This non-linearity is mainly related to the different ionization densities that MIPs produce compared to high-energy showers.
        To address this issue, the CaloCube collaboration exposed to ion beams various crystals (including BGO, LYSO, CsI(Tl), and others). A simplified model of the crystals light emission, tuned on ion
        beam data, was then included in Monte Carlo simulations of typical space calorimeters. The impact of the crystal response non-proportionality on the energy scale was evaluated, and the results suggest that if the non-proportionality is not properly accounted for, there could be a significant systematic error in the measurements of proton and electron flux.

        Speaker: Pacini, Lorenzo (Universita e INFN, Firenze (IT))
      • 33
        Energy Scale Calibration of Calorimeters in Space using Moon Shadow

        Calorimetric experiments in space of the current and of the next generation measure cosmic rays directly above 10 TeV on satellites in Low Earth Orbit. A common issue of these detectors is the determination of the absolute energy scale for hadronic showers at the highest energies since there are no available facilities for detector testing with particles with energies exceeding several hundreds of GeV. In this work, we propose the use of the Moon-Earth spectrometer technique, a technique used since the 1980s by ground experiments to derive limits on anti-proton flux, for the calibration of calorimeters in space. Essentially, the presence of the Moon creates a detectable lack of particles in the detected cosmic ray arrival directions. The position of this depletion has an offset with respect to the moon center due to the effect of the geomagnetic field on the cosmic rays. The developed simulation will explore if, with enough statistics, angular and energy resolutions, this effect can be used for the energy scale calibration of calorimeters on satellites in the proximity of the Earth.

        Speaker: Oliva, Alberto (Universita e INFN, Bologna (IT))
    • 18:15
      Enjoy the pool, the garden or the SPA!
    • 20:00
      Dinner
    • Direct hard-X-ray and γ-ray measurements
      Convener: Tomsick, John (Space Sciences Laboratory / University of California, Berkeley)
      • 34
        The Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer (IXPE) and new directions for the future

        The Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer is a NASA-ASI Small Explorer (SMEX) mission launched on 9$^{th}$ December 2021. It is equipped with three telescopes consisting on three light X-ray mirrors and three Detector Units at their focus. They host the polarization sensitive detectors designed, developed, tested and calibrated by the INAF and INFN teams. At the present time IXPE measured polarization resolved in energy, angle and time from dozens of X-ray sources, from almost all the classes, opening a new window in the X-ray sky. In this talk I will describe the mission, the detectors and report on the main astrophysical results obtained so far. Further I will describe possible future steps for X-ray polarimetry for the next upcoming or proposed missions.

        Speaker: Soffitta, Paolo
      • 35
        The enhanced X-ray Timing and Polarimetry mission

        The enhanced X-ray Timing and Polarimetry mission (eXTP) is a flagship observatory for X-ray timing, spectroscopy and polarimetry developed by an International Consortium led by the Chinese Academy of Science, with a large participation of European institutions.

        Thanks to its very large collecting area, good spectral resolution and unprecedented polarimetry capabilities, eXTP will explore the properties of matter and the propagation of light in the most extreme conditions found in the Universe. eXTP will investigate three fundamental science areas: the equation of state of ultra-dense matter, the effects of strong-field gravity, the astrophysics and physics of very strong magnetic fields.
        eXTP will, in addition, be a powerful, wide-ranging X-ray observatory.

        The scientific payload includes four instruments. The Spectroscopy Focusing Array (SFA) and Polarimetry Focusing Array (PFA) are based on grazing incidence X-ray mirrors, equipped with focal plane Silicon Drift Detectors (SDDs) and Gas Pixel Detectors, respectively.
        The Large Area Detector (LAD) is a 1-degree collimated instrument, based on large-area SDDs.
        The Wide Field Monitor is a coded aperture instrument also based on large-area SDDs, with a total field of view of about 4 steradians.
        The mission is currently undergoing its phase B study, targeting a launch in late 2020's.

        In this contribution I will present the mission and the current status of its development.

        Speaker: Feroci, Marco (INAF)
      • 36
        Scattering Polarimetry in the hard X-Ray range

        In the Soft/Medium energy X-Ray band photoelectric focal plane polarimetry resulted, with IXPE, in a break-through increase of sensitivity. Both data and models advocate for an extension to the hard X ray range. At higher energies where gas based detectors are transparent scattering polarimetry is in practice the only viable method. I discuss the difference between collimated and focal plane instruments and the trade-off between efficiency and background, in order to arrive to a decent throughput, with some hint on the needed technologic developments.

        Speaker: Costa, Enrico
      • 37
        Tracking detectors for X-rays

        X-rays are normally detected as single-hit energy deposits at their absorption point. A different technique, combining high efficiency photon to charge converters and fine-pitch, highly granular readout matrices of low-noise pixels with integrated smart amplifiers, can effectively track the low energy electrons resulting from the photon interaction, thus revealing details of the Compton scattering or the photo-electric absorption. Gas Pixel Detectors, which have enabled efficient polarimetry of soft X rays for the IXPE and Polarlight satellite missions are the first class of such devices. They are based on the XPOL custom readout ASIC built in CMOS technology coupled to a Gas Electron Multiplier for amplification of the primary photoelectrons generated in the gas. This talk reviews the concept underlying this method and its most promising implementations, starting from the advances offered by the latest generation of the XPOL chip.

        Speaker: Latronico, Luca (INFN Torino)
    • 10:40
      Coffee break
    • Direct hard-X-ray and γ-ray measurements
      Convener: Cutini, Sara (INFN sezione Perugia)
      • 38
        Perspectives for the next generation of MeV-GeV gamma-ray space missions

        The present generation of space-borne gamma-ray detectors have greatly improved our understanding of many astrophysical phenomena and have opened new opportunities for the investigation of the Universe. Data from the Fermi mission have demonstrated that the extreme processes that produce gravitational waves and accelerate neutrinos and cosmic rays also produce gamma rays. Multimessenger astrophysics is now one of the most exciting and rapidly advancing fields of science, and is poised to revolutionize our understanding of the extreme universe.

        The astrophysical community is actually focusing its efforts in the development of a new generation of gamma-ray telescopes for photons in the MeV-GeV energy range. Recent observations from the Fermi-GBM and from the LIGO/Virgo gravitational wave interferometers have demonstrated that short GRBs can be the electromagnetic counterparts of gravitational waves produced by neutron star merger events. A permanent wide-field-of-view observatory providing prompt localizations of gamma-ray transients would therefore play a key role in the study of the new physics associated with these phenomena. Another exciting field of investigation is the search for possible lines in the gamma-ray spectra, which could originate from standard processes, like the 511 keV line due to positron annihilations in the center of our Galaxy, the lines in the MeV band produced by radioactive nuclei in Supernova collapses, and possible exotic lines due to annihilation or decay of dark matter particles.

        The design of a next generation (sub)MeV-GeV gamma-ray detectors will be based on a multi-layer tracker-converter without passive layers (e.g. tungsten), an electromagnetic calorimeter and a surrounding anti-coincidence system based on plastic scintillators. In the case of low-energy gamma rays (<10 MeV), the cross sections of the Compton scattering and pair production processes are similar, and the design needs to be optimized to ensure that the detector will be sensitive to both processes. The requirements on the accuracy of the energy and position measurements will reflect on the design of the tracker-converter detector, i.e. its granularity and thickness.

        Several payloads have been proposed for low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites. These proposals include ASTROGAM, in response to the ESA M call, and AMEGO, in response to the ASTRO 2020 and MIDEX NASA calls. The design of both instruments is based on the heritage from previous successful space missions, such as AGILE, Fermi, Pamela, and AMS. To accomplish a precise reconstruction of both Compton scattering and pair production events, double-sided strip detectors or pixel detectors have been proposed for the tracker system. A different approach has been proposed by the The Advanced Particle-astrophysics Telescope (APT) collaboration for an instrument operating in the L2 position. APT is a wide area detector consisting of a light tracker, based on scintillating fibers, and an active calorimeter, based on a 5 mm thick CsI(Na) crystal coupled with crossed WLS fibers readout. With the addition of foam radiators, the CsI detectors could also detect the transition radiation X-rays from very-high-energy light cosmic rays. In this talk the status of the on-going projects will be reviewed.

        Speaker: Mazziotta, Nicola (Universita e INFN, Bari (IT))
      • 39
        COSI mission status and prospects

        The Compton Spectrometer and Imager (COSI) is a NASA Small Explorer (SMEX) satellite mission in development with a planned launch in 2027. COSI operates as a Compton telescope in the 0.2-5 MeV gamma-ray bandpass, it has an instantaneous field of view of >25%-sky, and it obtains coverage the entire sky every day. COSI provides imaging, spectroscopy, and polarimetry of astrophysical sources, and its germanium detectors have excellent energy resolution for emission line measurements. Science goals for COSI include studies of 0.511 MeV emission from antimatter annihilation in the Galaxy, mapping radioactive elements from nucleosynthesis, determining emission mechanisms and source geometries with polarization measurements, and detecting and localizing multimessenger sources. Much of the COSI instrumentation was demonstrated via flights on high-altitude balloons, and I will describe how the instrumentation has been adapted for a satellite mission. This presentation will also include updates on the hardware and software efforts and the general status of the mission.

        Speaker: Tomsick, John (Space Sciences Laboratory / University of California, Berkeley)
      • 40
        Gamma Ray Burst localization with GECCO's BGO anticoincidence shields.

        The ability to observe transient events with good angular and energy resolutions is currently lacking in MeV gamma-ray astrophysics.
        The Galactic Explorer with a Coded Aperture Mask Compton Telescope (“GECCO”) will provide these capabilities thanks to the innovative use of a deployable coded aperture mask in combination with a Compton telescope mode.
        For effective observation of transient sources it is necessary to promptly obtain the location of the sources to be repointed within the coded mask achievable field of view.
        The spatial arrangement of GECCO's thick and efficient BGO anticoincidence shields can be used to quickly estimate the localization of transient events, allowing a prompt slew of the telescope.
        GECCO is provided with 8 heavy-scintillator shields panels, arranged on the sides of an octagon. The ratios between the counts recorded by the panels depends on the direction of the signal with respect to the telescope axis. Simulations were conducted to assess the localization capabilities of the BGO shields, simulating the detection of GRB signals from the Fermi-GBM catalog with various spectral shapes and time profiles, in order to assess the evolution of their localization error radius with time.
        The results show how the GECCO shields can achieve localization radii of a few degrees in a short time, allowing the telescope to be repointed in time to capture the transient signal.

        Speaker: Vigliano, Alessandro Armando (University of Udine & Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare (INFN), sezione di Trieste.)
      • 41
        COMCUBE: A compact Compton telescope in a 6U CubeSat

        The radiation produced by gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) is generated in highly relativistic jets. The nature of the central engines producing these jets, their physical composition, and the processes of energy dissipation and radiation in them, are still poorly understood, more than 50 years after the discovery of GRBs. Gamma-ray polarimetry is a powerful diagnostic of the high-energy physics processes at work in cosmic sources emitting collimated outflows and jets, and/or with large-scale ordered magnetic fields. The combination of polarisation information with temporal and spectroscopic data can break model degeneracies and provide new insights into these long-standing questions in astrophysics. Polarimetry is a challenging technique in gamma-ray astrophysics with no consensus yet as to the fraction of GRBs with high polarisation. A prototype compact Compton Telescope (COMCUBE) is being developed to realise a design that offers GRB polarimetric capability in the few hundred keV energy range using a combination of double-sided silicon strip detectors and scintillator plus silicon photomultiplier calorimeter modules. Performance assessment has been carried out by simulations, and construction of the prototype is underway with a planned high altitude balloon flight in Q3 2023.

        Speaker: Murphy, David (University College Dublin)
      • 42
        Gamma-ray performance of the HERD trigger system

        The High Energy cosmic-Radiation Detection (HERD) facility has been proposed as one of the main experiments on board the China Space Station. Herd is scheduled to be installed around 2027, and to operate for at least 10 years. Its main stated scientific goals are the study of the cosmic ray spectrum and composition up to the ~PeV energy range, indirect dark matter detection, and all-sky gamma-ray observation in the 100 MeV - 100 GeV energy range.

        HERD will feature a novel design in order to optimize its acceptance per weight. It is composed of a central 3D imaging calorimeter (CALO), surrounded on top and on its four lateral sides of its faces by complementary subdetectors: the fiber tracking detector (FIT), the plastic scintillator detector (PSD), and the silicon charge detector (SCD). A transition radiation detector (TRD) is installed on one of its faces for calibration.

        An dedicated trigger, dubbed the ultra-low-energy gamma-ray (ULEG) trigger, is required to enable the detection of energy gamma rays down to $\sim 100$ MeV. The ULEG trigger design is based upon the search for energy deposition patterns on the FIT and PSD, compatible with the conversion of a gamma-ray within the FIT volume, and resulting in enough FIT hits to allow for a good-quality gamma-ray direction reconstruction. We describe the current status of the design of the ULEG trigger system, and of its hardware implementation. We also characterize its performance in detecting gamma-rays, as inferred from Monte Carlo studies.

        Speaker: Fariña, Luis (IFAE-BIST)
    • Rapid-Fire poster talk
      Conveners: Duranti, Matteo (Universita e INFN, Perugia (IT)), Vagelli, Valerio (Italian Space Agency (ASI) and INFN)
      • 43
        Dwarf Galaxy Dark Matter Annihilation Gamma Ray Signals and Backgrounds
        Speaker: Sytov, Alexei (Universita e INFN, Ferrara (IT))
      • 44
        The Crystal Eye X and gamma-ray detector for space missions: first prototypes and results
        Speaker: Colalillo, Roberta
      • 45
        Firmware development of a compact Compton telescope for flight on a high-altitude balloon
        Speaker: Mc Kenna, Caimin (University College Dublin)
      • 46
        ASTENA mission concept: an Advanced Surveyor for Transient Events and Nuclear Astrophysics
        Speaker: Ferro, Lisa (University of Ferrara)
      • 47
        Polarimetric prospects of the Narrow Field Telescope aboard the ASTENA mission concept
        Speaker: Fernandes Moita, Miguel
    • 13:10
      Lunch
    • Poster session
      • 48
        Dwarf Galaxy Dark Matter Annihilation Gamma Ray Signals and Backgrounds

        Dwarf galaxies have long been considered an ideal target in the search of annihilation from wimp-like dark matter particles. As has been shown by Fermi, few dwarf galaxies have shown indications of an excess at the 3-4 sigma, typically limited by the amplitude of the background, and the angular resolution of the detector. I will discuss the advantages of a pencil-like detector approach in the search for a signal from dwarf galaxies and demonstrate the advantages and utility of such technologies in other faint astrophysical sources.

        Speaker: Sytov, Alexei (Universita e INFN, Ferrara (IT))
      • 49
        EIRSAT-1: A 2U CubeSat with a compact, novel gamma-ray detector

        EIRSAT-1 is a 2U CubeSat which has been designed, built, and tested by an interdisciplinary team of students and staff at University College Dublin. The project is supported by the Education Office of the European Space Agency (ESA) as part of the Fly Your Satellite (FYS) programme. The flight model of the spacecraft has passed a series of stringent reviews and is now flight-ready with a scheduled launch on a Vega rocket this year.

        Among the many goals of the project is in-orbit demonstration of novel gamma-ray detector technologies. EIRSAT-1’s primary payload is GMOD, a compact gamma-ray spectrometer consisting of a 25 mm × 25 mm × 40 mm cerium bromide scintillator paired with a custom array of Sensl (OnSemi) silicon photomultipliers. Readout of the detector is achieved using an application specific integrated circuit known as SIPHRA. Low power consumption digital signal processing is achieved using a Xilinx Coolrunner complex programmable logic device (CPLD) and a Texas Instruments MSP microcontroller.

        Based on the successful qualification of the instrument, design heritage is being applied to next-generation missions. The imminent launch and upcoming in-orbit operation of EIRSAT-1 and GMOD will provide further valuable insight and feedback. This poster will provide an overview of the EIRSAT-1 spacecraft and mission, and in particular the role of the GMOD payload and its prospects as a technological demonstrator for future missions.

        Speaker: Murphy, David (University College Dublin)
      • 50
        The Crystal Eye X and gamma-ray detector for space missions: first prototypes and results

        The Crystal Eye is an innovative space based X and γ-ray future all sky monitor active from 10keV up to 30MeV, an energy range still under-explored. The full detector consists of a 40cm diameter hemisphere made by 112 pixels. It combines a wide FOV, a good sky localization capability and a large effective area, 6 times higher than Fermi-GBM at 1 MeV. Each pixel consists of two scintillating LYSO crystals, read by SiPM-arrays, equipped with segmented anticoincidence for photon tagging and charged Cosmic Ray (CR) identification. Preliminary studies about the materials to be used and the DAQ concept has been made thanks to a breadboard prototype. Recently, an Engineering Model, consisting of 3 pixels, has been realized to perform further tests and optimize the parameters for the realization of the Crystal Eye pathfinder for the Space Rider mission. Three operation mode are planned: a space and an earth observation mode and a calibration mode. Decisions taken on materials, geometry and electronics will be presented together with the first results of the calibration procedure, based on the emission spectrum of LYSO crystals, and the first measurements performed with radioactive sources.

        Speaker: Colalillo, Roberta
      • 51
        Firmware development of a compact Compton telescope for flight on a high-altitude balloon.

        Gamma-ray bursts are amongst the most luminous transients in the universe, yet the processes which drive these highly energetic objects are still poorly understood. Measurement of gamma-ray polarisation, when combined with spectroscopic and temporal measurements, may be one of the keys to unlocking the mystery behind these processes and the central engine which drives them. Polarimetry measurements can also allow for a more complete understanding of other gamma-ray sources, such as pulsars and blazars.

        A compact Compton Telescope (COMCUBE) is being developed to perform these measurements in the keV range, with a view to being deployed as a payload on a 6U CubeSat. A scaled-down prototype detector is currently under development for flight on a high-altitude balloon in Q3 of this year.

        This compact instrument combines two sets of double-sided silicon strip detectors (DSSSDs) with scintillator calorimeter modules. These calorimeter modules are read out by arrays of silicon photomultipliers (SiPMs) interfaced with a readout ASIC. All of the detector electronics are interfaced with a ARM-based FPGA-SoC module, for which a custom firmware has been developed. This firmware performs interfacing and time-stamping on the incoming science data, and identifies coincident events between detector modules. These time-tagged events are then further processed before being streamed to the SoC cores for downlinking. Here, this firmware along with it’s design drivers are described. An in-depth description of the techniques used to optimise its data throughput and resource efficiency, and on the data chain of one of the calorimeter modules, is also given.

        Speaker: Mc Kenna, Caimin (University College Dublin)
      • 52
        ASTENA mission concept: an Advanced Surveyor for Transient Events and Nuclear Astrophysics

        Hard X- and gamma-ray astronomy is a crucial field for transient, nuclear, and multimessenger astrophysics. However, at energies above 80 keV imaging capabilities and sensitivity of current non-focusing instruments are very limited. To overcome these limitations, we have proposed the ASTENA mission concept, submitted to the ESA program “Voyage 2050”, that includes a wide field monitor with imaging and spectroscopic capabilities (WFM-IS) operating in 2 keV to 20 MeV, along with a narrow field telescope (NFT) based on a focusing Laue lens, with energy passband from 50 to 700 keV and 20 m focal length, which will represent a breakthrough in this energy band in terms of sensitivity and angular resolution.
        Given the relatively low weight of NFT, we intend to propose it to ASI as a mission for a small Italian satellite. A 3D position sensitive detector with high spectroscopic and polarization capabilities will be positioned in the focal plane. In this poster we will present the main NFT capabilities and some of the most important science goals that can be pursued with unprecedented resolution and sensitivity.

        Speaker: Ferro, Lisa (University of Ferrara)
      • 53
        Polarimetric prospects of the Narrow Field Telescope aboard the ASTENA mission concept

        The measurement of the polarization of the high-energy emission (>100 keV) from cosmic gamma-ray sources has now become a key observational parameter for understanding the production mechanisms and the geometry of the regions involved. Therefore, a mandatory requirement for new instrumentation in this energy range will be to get high sensitivity for polarimetric measurements. For several years our group has studied the performance of CdTe/CZT pixel spectrometers as scattering polarimeters. However, in order to achieve the sensitivities required by the next generation of instrumentation at energies higher than 100 keV, a promising solution is now offered by a broadband Laue lens telescope paired to a spectrometer with very good three-dimensional spatial resolution. This configuration is proposed for the narrow field telescope (NFT) of the ASTENA mission concept currently under study also in the framework of the AHEAD European project. In this poster we will report on the results of a Monte Carlo study devoted to evaluate the polarimetric performances of the NFT while presenting scientific cases in which a next generation hard X-/soft gamma ray mission can provide significant advances.

        Speaker: Fernandes Moita, Miguel
    • Direct hard-X-ray and γ-ray measurements
      Convener: Costa, Enrico
      • 54
        The HERMES Pathfinder and SpIRIT constellation: design and development

        HERMES (High Energy Rapid Modular Ensemble of Satellites) Pathfinder is a space-borne mission based on a constellation of six nano-satellites flying in a low-Earth orbit (LEO). The 3U CubeSats, to be launched mid-2024, host miniaturized instruments with a hybrid Silicon Drift Detector/GAGG:Ce scintillator photodetector system, sensitive to X-rays and gamma-rays in a large energy band (~3 keV to ~2 MeV).
        The HERMES constellation will operate in conjunction with the Space Industry Responsive Intelligent Thermal (SpIRIT) 6U CubeSat, with a launch foreseen in late 2023. SpIRIT is an Australian-Italian mission for high-energy astrophysics that will carry in a Sun-synchronous orbit an actively cooled HERMES detector system payload. The projects are funded by the Italian Ministry of University and Research and by the Italian Space Agency, and by the EU Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Program under Grant Agreement No. 821896.
        HERMES will probe the temporal emission of bright high-energy transients such as Gamma-Ray Bursts (GRBs), ensuring a fast transient localization in a field of view of several steradians exploiting the triangulation technique. HERMES intrinsically modular transient monitoring experiment represents a keystone capability to complement the next generation of gravitational wave experiments.
        Here we will provide an outline of the HERMES and SpIRIT scientific case and payload design, integration and test, emphasizing the innovative technical solutions adopted to in the detector design, as well as an update on the current instrument performance, calibration and programmatic status.

        Speaker: Campana, Riccardo (INAF/OAS)
      • 55
        Crystal Eye: a wide sight on the Universe for X and gamma ray detection

        Crystal Eye is a new concept of space-based telescope for the observation of 0.1-10 MeV
        photons exploiting a new detection technique, which foresees enhanced localization
        capability with respect to current instruments.
        This is now possible thanks to the use of new materials and sensors.
        The primary scientific goal is the detection of the electromagnetic signal of extreme
        phenomena in the Universe. In order to enhance their study with many messengers, the
        satellite will provide an alert to both space and ground based experiments.
        A full scale model of the Crystal Eye detector is now under design and construction.
        Moreover, a smaller prototype has been set up to fly aboard of the Space RIDER (ESA)
        on a LEO orbit (400 km, 5.3° of inclination) for two months in late 2024.
        We present here the Crystal Eye mission concept and performance.

        Speaker: Barbato, Felicia (Gran Sasso Science Institute (IT))
      • 56
        LIGHT-1: A 3U Cubesat Mission for the detection of Terrestrial Gamma-Ray Flashes

        Serendipitously discovered by the BATSE mission in the nineties, Terrestrial Gamma-ray Flashes (TGFs) represent the most intense and energetic natural emission of gamma rays form our planet. TGFs consist of sub-millisecond bursts of gamma rays (energy up to one hundred MeV) generated during powerful thunderstorms by lightenings (average ignition altitude of about 10 km) and are in general companions of several other counterparts (electron beams, neutrons, radio waves). The ideal observatory for TGF is therefore a fast detector, possibly with spectral abilities and orbiting around Earth in LEO (Low Earth Orbit). To date, the benchmark observatory is ASIM, an instrument flying onboard the International Space Station (ISS). LIGHT-1 was a 3U Cubesat mission launched in December 21st, 2021 and deployed from the ISS on February 3rd, 2022. Communications were lost after 11 months of operations (about twice the expected lifetime of the mission). The LIGHT-1 payload consisted of two similar instruments conceived to effectively detect TGF at few hundred nanoseconds timescale. The detection unit was composed of a scintillating crystal organised in four optically independent channels, read out by as many photosensors. The detection unit was surrounded by a segmented plastic scintillator layer that acted as a VETO for charged particles. The customised electronics consisted of three different boards embedding the power supplies and detector readout, signal processing, detector controls and interface with the bus of the spacecraft. LIGHT-1 used two different scintillating crystals, namely low background Cerium Bromide and Lanthanum Bromo Chloride, and two different photo sensing technologies based on PhotoMultiplier Tubes (R11265-200 manufactured by Hamamatsu) and Silicon Photomultipliers (ASD-NUV1C-P manufactured by Advansid and S13361-6050AE-04 manufactured by Hamamatsu). The LIGHT-1 payload will be described in detail in this talk, along with the payload performances and the preliminary results of the LIGHT-1 mission.

        Speaker: Di Giovanni, Adriano (Gran Sasso Science Institute (IT))
      • 57
        The technology roadmap of the XGIS instrument for the THESEUS mission and other mission opportunities

        We describe the design and the expected performances of the X/Gamma-ray Imaging Spectrometer (XGIS) which is a GRBs and transients monitor developed and studied for the THESEUS mission now in Phase 0 evaluation for the selection of ESA M7. XGIS is capable of covering an unprecedented wide energy band (2 keV - 10 MeV), with imaging capabilities and location accuracy <15 arcmin up to 150 keV over a Field of View of 2sr, a few hundreds eV energy resolution in the X-ray band (<30 keV) and timing resolution down to a few ${\mu}$s. XGIS exploits the coupling between Silicon Drift Detectors (SDD) with crystal scintillator bars and a very low-noise distributed front-end electronics (ORION ASICs). The XGIS particular configuration also allows 3D position sensitive detection which also enables hard x-ray polarimetric capability. Here we also describe the possible improvements that can be applied to this technology in order to further improve the performance of the instrument. Thanks to its modular design, the XGIS instrument can be easily rescaled/reshaped and adapted for fitting the available resources and specific scientific objectives of future high-energy astrophysics missions, and especially those aimed at fully exploiting GRBs and high-energy transients for multi-messenger astrophysics and fundamental physics.

        Speaker: Virgilli, Enrico (Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica - INAF OAS Bologna)
    • 16:10
      Coffee break
    • Direct hard-X-ray and γ-ray measurements
      Convener: Cavazzuti, Elisabetta
      • 58
        Xray-CMOS: a large field of view X-ray polarimeter

        We are going to present the prospects of the Xray-CMOS project (recently funded as Progetto di Ricerca di Rilevante Interesse Nazionale PRIN 2020), for the development of a TPC for large field of view X-ray polarimetry, in which no requirement is imposed to the orientation of the incoming X-ray with respect to the drift field. This could open a new window of observation on the Universe through the study of rapid transient phenomena, like gamma ray bursts, soft gamma repeaters and transient black holes, among the many.
        The Xray-CMOS project will capitalize on the innovative optical 3D readout approach for TPCs recently developed by the CYGNO/INITIUM collaboration in the context of directional Dark Matter searches. This is based on the use of a scientific CMOS (sCMOS) camera and a PMT to readout the secondary scintillation light produced in the TPC amplification stage (typically, by a GEMs stack). Thanks to the proper optics, current sCMOS can readout 100 x 100 mm2 with each pixel imaging a 45 x 45 um2 effective area, improving on nearly two order of magnitude with respect to the area of the detectors installed on IXPE. The time profile of the scintillation light measured by the PMT provide the track pattern along the drift direction (dZ), complementing the X-Y projection provided by the sCMOS for 3D track reconstruction. The use of low diffusion gas mixtures can allow to extend the drift region to about 10 cm without significant degradation of the performances. We will present the experimental results achieved with the CYGNO/INITIUM project and discuss the expected performances of a Xray-CMOS detector based on such principles for X-ray polarimetry.

        Speakers: Baracchini, Elisabetta, Mr Dho, Giorgio
      • 59
        Ultracompact space-borne telescope for VHE gamma rays detection

        When a beam of electrons/photons is aligned with the crystalline axes or planes in an oriented crystal, the probability of bremsstrahlung/pair production is strongly enhanced. This results in a shortening of the radiation length, X0, and thereby of the electromagnetic shower extent, as experimentally demonstrated recently by our team for tungsten [1] and high-Z scintillator (PWO) crystals [2]. This effect is under study to develop ultra-compact photon converters/calorimeters for high-energy physics [3].
        Here we present the possibility to employ the X0 reduction for a satellite based gamma module made of a converter/tracker&calorimeter system fully composed of oriented crystals. In case of pointing strategy, the enhancement of pair production cross section would improve the detector sensitivity; one may therefore consider to reduce the total convert-tracker length. At the same time, the e.m. showers initiated by gamma-rays with energies from few GeV up to hundreds GeV - multi-TeV would be contained in a much smaller volume in a calorimeter composed of oriented crystal scintillators if compared to standard detectors [4]. This results in reducing the necessary weight and cost to contain most of the shower length, with a decrease of the calorimeter leakage and improvement in the energy resolution. Furthermore, we experimentally demonstrated that the shower enhancement in PWO scintillator crystals occurs for direction of gamma-rays within about a mrad (0.06°) with the crystallographic axis, thereby increasing the signal-to-background discrimination in such a small angular size. This could be exploited to deeply investigate interesting astrophysical objects with a fine angular resolution and enhanced sensitivity, with no need of a complex tracker system. Last but not least, such an apparatus will continue to operate in a standard way in the absence of pointing.
        Several fields of gamma-ray astrophysics in the range from few to hundreds of GeV, which are not perfectly covered in resolution by either the Fermi telescope or ground Cerenkov facilities, could be explored using the pointing strategy, such as pointing of the Galactic Center (in either Milky Way [5] or dwarf galaxies [6]) for Dark Matter discrimination, observation of unidentified FERMI gamma-ray sources, follow-up of transient and multimessenger sources.

        [1] M. Soldani et al., Eur. Phys. J. C 83 (2023) 101
        [2] L. Bandiera et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 121 (2018) 021603
        [3] HIKE, High Intensity Kaon Experiments at the CERN SPS, arXiv:2211.16586
        [4] L. Bandiera, V. Haurylavets and V. Tikhomirov Nucl. Instrum. Methods Phys. Res. A 936 (2019) p.124-126
        [5] Mattia Di Mauro Phys. Rev. D 103 (2021) 063029
        [6] A. Geringer-Sameth, S.M. Koushiappas et al. arXiv:1807.08740v1

        Speaker: Bandiera, Laura (Universita e INFN, Ferrara (IT))
      • 60
        High Angular Resolution Satellite Array for Dark Matter Annihilation Gamma Ray Detection

        Future high-sensitivity observations of possible dark matter annihilation signals from dwarf galaxies will benefit from large-area (10-100 m$^2$ or greater) and high-angular resolution (~mrad) gamma ray observation. The angular resolution is necessary to further improve the signal-to-background for faint gamma signals. Large areas will allow for significant gains in candidate gamma events statistics from sources.

        It would be possible to create the new telescope by flying many thin-plane detectors as coordinated arrays of satellites. The perpendicular dIstances between detector planes could range from 10 m to 1 km or more. The effective area of a telescope array could be incremented by adding satellites laterally. This would require the flying of satellite-based detector planes in coordination, and accepting only gamma events from a very narrow-angle observation region. The inherent modularity of the design and potential for incremental improvement in array performance match well with the much-improved assembly-to-launch cadence in modern satellite campaigns.

        The detector active target materials would take advantage of the highly anisotropic acceleration of electromagnetic shower development in detector crystals such as Lead Tungstate (PbWO4) [see contribution #77 by L. Bandiera et al.] . This can be exploited to provide enhanced angular resolution for signal vs background determination and enhance gamma signal flux sensitivity.

        The gamma ray direction, energy shower reconstruction, and particle background rejection would be based on hit geometry and signal timing in multiple widely spaced planes. The detector planes are populated by large scintillator crystal pixels (>3 cm linear dimension), which also act as the gamma conversion medium.

        Speaker: Gaitskell, Richard
      • 61
        X-ray Polarimetry with Machine Learning: A Hybrid Approach for Tracks Reconstruction in Gas Pixel Detectors

        We present our study on the reconstruction of photo-electron (PE) tracks in Gas Pixel Detectors (GPDs) used for astrophysical X-ray polarimetry. The GPD exploits photo-electric effect to measure the polarization state of incident photons by reconstructing the properties of the track of emitted photo-electrons. The standard state-of-the-art algorithm developed by Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer (IXPE) collaboration consists in an analytic reconstruction of the tracks to determine the polarization properties of the incident photons.
        Our work is aimed to detect X-ray polarization using a Machine Learning approach, by developing a Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) for reconstructing the PE track parameters. We showed that adopting a hybrid CNN-analytic approach both improves the performance of the standard algorithm and naturally mitigates a subtle effect appearing in polarization measurements of bright sources.

        Speaker: Cibrario, Nicolo'
      • 62
        The Antarctic Demonstrator for the Advanced Particle-astrophysics Telescope (ADAPT)

        The Antarctic Demonstrator for the Advanced Particle-astrophysics Telescope (ADAPT) is a project to build a prototype telescope to detect low energy astrophysical gamma rays in the MeV energy range. The instrument will consist of four layers of a scintillating fiber tracker plus an active converter tracker made of CsI scintillating crystals read out by wavelength shifting (WLS) fibers. Both scintillating and WLS fiber signals will be detected with Silicon Photomultipliers (SiPM). Fast and low power front-end electronics (FEE) are being developed based on the SMART ASIC for the SiPM signal amplification and the ALPHA ASIC for their digitization. The ADAPT project will serve as a technology demonstrator for the larger Advanced Particle-astrophysics Telescope (APT) mission, which will have a much larger area of 3x3 m$^2$. The ADAPT instrument will feature a 30-day balloon flight, with the possibility of detecting prompt signal from Gamma-Ray Bursts (GRBs) with degree-scale localization and polarization constraints. In this contribution, we will present the ADAPT project and its status, with a particular focus on the FEE development.

        Speakers: Di Venere, Leonardo (Universita e INFN, Bari (IT)), Di Venere, Leonardo (INFN - National Institute for Nuclear Physics)
    • 18:25
      Enjoy the pool, the garden or the SPA!
    • 20:00
      Dinner
    • Direct Low-energy Cosmic-Ray Measurements
      Convener: Wu, Xin (Universite de Geneve (CH))
      • 63
        Status and future prospects of the Limadou HEPD on board the CSES satellite.

        CSES (China Seismo-Electromagnetic Satellite) is a sophisticated multi-channel space observatory. The main scientific objectives of the missions are: the extension of Cosmic Ray measurements at low energy, the investigation of perturbations in the ionosphere/magnetosphere caused by natural sources or anthropic emitters and the study of solar-terrestrial interactions.
        The first satellite CSES-01 was launched on the 2nd of February 2018 on a Sun-Synchronous orbit at an altitude of ~500 km. It carries a suite of instruments among which there is the Italian High Energy Particle Detector (HEPD-01). This payload is the main contribution of the Limadou collaboration, and it is optimized to detect charged particles: mostly 3-100 MeV electrons and 30-200 MeV protons, with good capabilities in the identification of heavier nuclei. The instrument is composed of a silicon micro-strip tracking system, a trigger made by a segmented layer of plastic scintillator, a calorimeter made by a tower of plastic scintillators and an array of LYSO crystals and a veto system.
        A second satellite CSES-02 will be launched at the end of 2023, and will carry HEPD-02, a new high energy particle detector. This instrument has been recently integrated, and it is now performing an extensive test campaign for space qualification and calibration. It presents important upgrades with respect to its predecessor: it will be the first instrument carrying a CMOS pixel tracker in space, designed to reach a 5 micrometer resolution; it will mount an electromagnetic calorimeter including six of the largest LYSO crystals ever used in space (15x5x2.5 cm^3); additionally a new trigger system will allow to adapt the data acquisition scheme depending on the orbital zone and on the presence of impulsive events.
        In this contribution a synthetic status report about CSES-Limadou project will be given. HEPD-02 will be shown in detail, with a particular focus on the design choices. The new technologies used to improve the performance of its predecessor will be described and the future perspectives briefly discussed.

        Speaker: Follega, Francesco Maria (Universita degli Studi di Trento and INFN (IT))
      • 64
        The PMT acquisition and trigger generation system of the HEPD-02 calorimeter for the CSES-02 satellite

        We present the acquisition and trigger system for the HEPD-02 calorimeter that will be used onboard the CSES-02 satellite for the CSES/Limadou mission.

        This mission arises from the collaboration between the Chinese Space Agency (CNSA) and the Italian Space Agency (ASI) and foresees the first constellation of satellites which will monitor ionospheric parameters that could be related to earthquakes. It will also monitor the solar activity and its interaction with the magnetosphere and study the cosmic rays in low energy ranges, extending data from PAMELA and AMS.

        The CSES-02 satellite will be equipped with various instruments, among which the High Energy Particle Detector (HEPD-02), designed to measure the dynamics of particles trapped within the Van Allen belts.

        Signals from the HEPD-02 are acquired and digitized by an electronic board which also provides the trigger for the experiment. This board represents an enhancement of the previous version used for HEPD-01, on board of the CSES-01 satellite.

        One of the improvements consists of the use of a new generation ASIC (CITIROC) for the amplification, shaping and recording of PMT signals.

        The new ASIC allows using the peak detector feature, optimizing the acquisition of signals with different temporal characteristics, such as plastic scintillators and LYSO.

        Along with this, new algorithms for trigger generation have been developed, providing trigger pre-scaling, concurrent trigger masks and Gamma Ray Burst detection.

        Using pre-scalers it will be possible to lower the trigger rate in regions with high particle rates, allowing the study of high rate regions of a satellite’s orbit such as the South Atlantic Anomaly and polar regions.

        Concurrent triggers will be used to allow the detection of rare events (such as GRBs) while still monitoring particle bursts.

        In this contribution, the recent progress of this work will be presented, along with the measurements and tests made on the Flight Model unit before final integration in the HEPD2 detector .

        Speaker: Mese, Marco
      • 65
        Results and perspectives of Timepix detectors in Spacs from radiation monitoring in low earth orbit to astroparticle physics

        Hybrid pixel detectors (HPD) of Timepix [1,2] technology have become increasingly interesting for space applications. While up to date, common space radiation monitors rely on silicon diodes, achieving particle (mainly electron and proton) separation by pulse-height analysis, detector stacking, shielding or electron removal by a magnetic field, the key advantage of HPDs is that, in addition to the energy deposition measurement, particle signatures in the sensor are seen as tracks with a rich set of features. These track characteristics can be exploited for identification of particle type, energy, and its trajectory. Determining these pieces of information on a single layer bypasses the need for sensor stacking or complex shielding geometries, so that HPD based space radiation devices provide science-class data with a large field of view at an order of magnitude lower weight and approximately half of the power consumption compared with commonly used space radiation monitors. The first Timepix (256 x 256 pixels, 55 µm pitch) used in open space is SATRAM (Space Application of Timepix Radiation Monitor), attached to the Proba-V satellite launched to low earth orbit (LEO, 820 km, sun-synchronous) in 2013. It will celebrate 10 years in orbit in May, 2023. During this time, it has been providing data for mapping out the fluxes of electrons and protons trapped in the Van-Allen radiation belts [3], e.g. by in-orbit maps of the ionizing dose rate dominated by electrons in polar horn regions, as well as protons in the South Atlantic Anomaly. Noiseless detection of individual particles allows to detect even rare signatures of highly ionizing events from galactic cosmic rays. In the present contribution, we will discuss different data analysis methodology, relying on extraction and characterization of track features, novel machine learning approaches (e.g. [5]) and using statistical interpolation. Based on the success of SATRAM, advanced and miniaturized space radiation monitors based on Timepix3 [2] and Timepix2 [4] technology have been developed for the European Space Agency (ESA). These will be flown on the GOMX-5 mission (launch in 2023) and used within the European Space Radiation Array.
        Large area Timepix3 detectors (512 x 512 pixels, 55 µm pitch) were developed for the demonstrator of the penetrating particle analyzer [5] (mini.PAN), a compact magnetic spectrometer (MS) designed to measure the properties of cosmic rays in the 100 MeV/n – 20 GeV/n energy range in deep space with unprecedented accuracy, thus providing novel results to investigate the mechanisms of origin, acceleration and propagation of galactic cosmic rays and of solar energetic particles, and producing unique information for solar system exploration missions.
        Precise per-pixel time measurement together with a high spatial segmentation allows its use a single layer Compton camera, thus making it an interesting tool also for directional gamma-ray detection and polarization measurement.

        References:
        [1] X. Llopart et al., NIM A 581 (2007), pp. 485-494.
        [2] T. Poikela et al., JINST 9 (2014) C05013.
        [3] St. Gohl et al., Advances in Space Research 63 (2019), Issue 1, pp. 1646-1660.
        [4] W. Wong et al., Rad. Meas. 131 (2021), 106230.
        [5] M. Ruffenach et al., in IEEE TNS 68 (2021), Issue 8, 1746-1753.
        [6] X. Wu et al., Advances in Space Research, 63 (2019), Issue 8, pp 2672-2682.

        Speakers: Bergmann, Benedikt, Bergmann, Benedikt Ludwig (Czech Technical University in Prague (CZ))
      • 66
        PAN: mission status and prospects

        The Penetrating Particle Analyzer (PAN) is an instrument conceived to precisely measure the flux, composition and arrival direction of highly penetrating particles in space of energy ranging from 100 MeV/n to 20 GeV/n. Precise measurements of their energy spectra and composition are of great interest to study Solar Modulation of Cosmic Rays, to characterise SEPs, as well as the radiation environment around planets and to improve Space Weather predictions for Deep Space travels.
        The design is based on a modular magnetic spectrometer of small size, reduced power consumption and weight which make it suitable for deep space and interplanetary missions. The high-field permanent magnet sectors are instrumented with high resolution silicon micro-strip detectors, Time-Of-Flight scintillator counters readout by SiPMs, and active Pixel detectors to maintain the detection capabilities in high rate conditions occurring during solar energetic particle events (SEPs) or when traversing radiation belts around planets. After the description of the PAN instrument, the development and tests of the mini.PAN demonstrator will be presented in this contribution.

        Speaker: Azzarello, Philipp (Universite de Geneve (CH))
      • 67
        Deep space mission REMEC for GCR monitoring

        The Radiation Environment Monitor for Energetic Cosmic rays (REMEC) is one of the missions selected by ESA in the frame of Czech ambitious missions programme to conduct phase 0, A, B studies of missions built and operated by Czech companies and research organizations. REMEC is a microsatellite proposed to be placed outside of Earth’s magnetosphere in Sun-Earth L2 point where it will precisely measure and monitor the flux, composition and direction of cosmic radiation with energies from 10 MeV/n to 10 GeV/n. The main scientific payload is the novel magnetic spectrometer Pix.PAN based on Timepix4 technology, complemented by HardPix Timepix3-based radiation monitor. REMEC will study properties of galactic cosmic rays, provide new input to improve current SEP physics models and monitor penetrating particles presenting a serious hazard for long term human space travel and lunar habitation.

        Speaker: Filgas, Robert (Czech Technical University in Prague)
    • 11:05
      Coffee break
    • Direct Low-energy Cosmic-Ray Measurements
      Convener: Sparvoli, Roberta
      • 68
        Innovative detector systems for space habitat radiation monitoring

        The detector systems required to study the radiation environment in a space habitat share several features with detector technologies used in the studies of cosmic radiation. However, being the properties of radiation fields inside space habitats different than those in open space, space habitat radiation monitoring instruments require different optimization strategies.
        The major technological peculiarities that drive the development of these classes of detectors are: operation in a habitat (where temperature, pressure, etc are controlled and similar to those on Earth with the exception of external area monitoring in planetary bases) and reduced availability of budgets (power and volume/mass). Furthermore, the field under investigation, relevant for the aforementioned applications, consists of ions (mostly 1≤Z≤26) with energies from few tens of MeV/n and not exceeding $10^{10}$ eV/n (due to the extremely low fluxes at higher energies), and also neutrons produced by the interactions with the shielding materials.
        The measurement of the LET (Linear Energy Transfer, the energy released by the ion for unit path length) is mandatory to measure dose equivalent, an important parameter for risk evaluation. The ability of tracking the particle is in this case needed. Finally, nuclear charge identification and velocity measurement are further capabilities required to assess parameters which are becoming of increasing importance for the newest risk model.
        The next missions to the Moon and to Mars are now requiring more performant detectors to monitor the radiation field in human habitats with the double goals of investigating these environments and the expected radiation fluxes and dose dynamics, and to provide valuable information to validate radiation and transport models.
        In this talk the most advanced radiation detector system for habitats (LIDAL) also featuring time-of-flight measurements, providing most of the capabilities mentioned above, will be briefly presented, together with some of the results obtained during its operations inside ISS. Based on the LIDAL heritage, possible developments for new detector approaches will be sketched, including possible adoption of recent detector technologies and measurement strategies from synergic scientific fields (e.g., LGAD, MAPS, …) and innovative materials to achieve advances in reduction of mass/volume and power budgets, and for an overall improvement of detection performances.

        Speaker: Dr Di Fino, Luca (Italian Space Agency)
      • 69
        HASPIDE-SPACE for solar, magnetar and gamma-ray burst monitoring

        Space Weather investigations mainly focus on the Sun’s activity and solar-terrestrial relationships. However, ionospheric perturbations are also observed during periods of absent solar activity. Galactic magnetar flaring and gamma-ray bursts are observed to be at the origin of these ionospheric disturbances. We discuss the possible applications for high-energy astrophysics of a hydrogenated amorphous silicon detector designed for solar activity monitoring within the INFN HASPIDE project.

        Speaker: Prof. Grimani, Catia (University of Urbino Carlo Bo)
      • 70
        The Zirè instrument on board the NUSES space mission

        NUSES is a new space mission aiming to test innovative observational and technological approaches related to the study of low energy cosmic and gamma rays, high energy astrophysical neutrinos, Sun-Earth environment, Space weather and magnetosphere-ionosphere-lithosphere coupling (MILC). The satellite will host two payloads: Terzina and Zirè.
        While Terzina will focus on space based detection of ultra high energy cosmic ray or neutrino induced extensive air showers, Zirè will perform measurements of electrons, protons and light nuclei from few up to hundreds MeV, also testing new tools for the detection of cosmic MeV photons. Monitoring of possible MILC signals will also be possible extending the sensitivity down to very low energy threshold with a dedicated Low Energy Module (LEM). Innovative technologies for space-based particle detectors, e.g. exploiting Silicon Photo Multipliers (SiPMs) for the light readout system, will be adopted. In this work, a general overview of the scientific goals, the design activities, and the overall status of Zirè will be presented.

        Speaker: De Mitri, Ivan (Gran Sasso Science Institute (IT))
      • 71
        A compact particle detector for Space-Based applications: Development of the Low Energy Module (LEM) for the NUSES space mission

        Two scientific payloads will be hosted onboard the NUSES space mission: Terzina and Zirè.
        Terzina will be an optical telescope readout by SiPM arrays, for the detection and study of Cerenkov light emitted by Extensive Air Showers generated by high energy cosmic rays and neutrinos in the atmosphere.
        Zirè will focus on the detection of protons and electrons up to few hundred MeV and to 0.1-10 MeV photons, and will include the Low Energy Module (LEM).
        The LEM will be a particle spectrometer devoted to the observation of fluxes of low-energy electrons in the 0.1-7 MeV range and protons in the 3-50 MeV range along the Low Earth Orbit (LEO) followed by the hosting platform. The detection of Particle Bursts (PBs) in this Physics channel of interest could give new insight in the understanding of complex phenomena such as eventual correlations between seismic events or volcanic activity with the collective motion of particles in the plasma populating van Allen belts.
        Within this picture, the Low Energy Module will be a particle spectrometer based on the consolidated experimental $\Delta E - E$ technique. With the measurement of the partial energy deposition in the thinner Silicon Detector (SD) and the total energy deposition in the thicker SD and the plastic scintillators, it will be possible to perform event-based Particle IDentification (PID).
        With its compact sizes and limited acceptance, the LEM will allow the exploration of hostile environments such as the South Atlantic Anomaly (SAA) and the inner van Allen belt, in which are expected electron fluxes of the order of $10^{6-7} \text{cm}^{-2} \text{sr}^{-1} \text{s}^{-1}$. With respect to the vast literature of space-based particle spectrometers, the innovative aspect of the LEM resides in its compactness, within 10x10x10 cm3, and in its “active collimation” approach dealing with the problem of multiple scattering at these very low energies. In this work, the geometry of the detector, its detection concept, its operation modes and the hardware adopted will be presented. Some preliminary results from the MonteCarlo simulation (Geant4) will be shown.

        Speakers: Nicolaidis, Riccardo (Universita degli Studi di Trento and INFN (IT)), Nicolaidis, Riccardo (Universita degli Studi di Trento and INFN (IT))
    • Indirect Cosmic Ray Measurements (Space and balloon-borne)
      Convener: Sparvoli, Roberta
      • 72
        EUSO-SPB2: Mission Status and Prospects

        Utra high energy cosmic rays are the highest energy subatomic particles known to exist. Very high energy neutrinos also carry information about the most extreme environments in the universe, and being neutral point, back to their creation point. The Extreme Universe Space Observatory on a Super Pressure Balloon II (EUSO-SPB2) has been built to PeV energy neutrinos from steady-state and transient astrophysical sources and will measure PeV and EeV cosmic rays. To do this EUSO-SPB2 will fly two astroparticle telescopes that use optical methods and specialized camera systems to measure light from extensive air showers in the atmosphere. A fluorescence telescope will point down to measure scintillation light from EeV cosmic ray interactions. A Cherenkov telescope will point toward the earth’s limb. It can be tilted a few degrees above the limb to observe Cherenkov emission from PeV energy cosmic rays or tilted below the limb to search for Cherenkov emission from air showers induced through neutrino interactions in the earth’s limb. The gondola can be rotated in azimuth to point the CT to observe sources of interest just before they rise or just after they set. The FT camera features a 12x36 degree field of view with a 1 MHz digitization rate. The CT features a 12.8x6.4 degree field of view with a 100 MHz digitization rate. Both telescopes use Schmidt optics with 1 m diameter entrance pupils. At the time this abstract was written, the payload is in preparation for launch at the NASA balloon launch site in Wanaka NZ. The expected launch date is April or May 2023. The targeted flight duration is up to 100 days. This exploratory mission of opportunity is a pathfinder for a space observatory such as the Probe of Extreme Multi Messenger Astrophysics (POEMMA) that would apply methods that EUSO-SPB2 will pioneer from sub-orbital space.

        Speaker: Wiencke, Lawrence (Colorado School of Mines)
    • Rapid-Fire poster talk
      Conveners: Duranti, Matteo (Universita e INFN, Perugia (IT)), Vagelli, Valerio (Italian Space Agency (ASI) and INFN)
      • 73
        The fiber tracker of the Zirè instrument on board NUSES
        Speaker: Pillera, Roberta (Universita e INFN, Bari (IT))
      • 74
        Real-time monitoring of Solar Energetic Particles using the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer on the International Space Station
        Speaker: Serpolla, Andrea (Universita e INFN, Perugia (IT))
    • 13:30
      Lunch
    • Poster session
      • 75
        Radiation spectrometer HardPix

        HardPix is a miniature radiation monitor based on the Timepix3 sensor and developed for space application by the Institute of Experimental and Applied Physics, Czech Technical University in Prague (IEAP CTU). Its low volume (<0.1 U), mass (<150 g), power consumption (~2 W) and cost make it ideal even for small cubesats and networks of space weather monitoring satellites. Thanks to the built-in onboard processing it can provide particle identification, energy spectra, flux and dose rates using minimum data transfer rates. It is building upon the space heritage of SATRAM, our radiation monitor onboard ESA Proba-V satellite celebrating 10 years of ongoing operation in space this year, as well as REM units onboard ISS. Space agencies and commercial companies are already showing interest in HardPix, one unit will be launched onboard D-Orbit ION satellite in June 2023 and two units will be part of ESA’s European Radiation Sensors Array (ERSA) onboard Lunar Gateway, with several more missions already in preparation.

        Speaker: Filgas, Robert (Czech Technical University in Prague)
      • 76
        The fiber tracker of the Zirè instrument on board NUSES

        NUSES is a low Earth orbit pathfinder satellite for innovative particle detectors dedicated to the study of cosmic radiation, astrophysical neutrinos, Sun-Earth environment, space weather and magnetosphere-ionosphere-lithosphere coupling. The satellite will host two instruments: Terzina and Zirè. While Terzina will focus on space based detection of ultra high energy extensive air showers, Zirè will perform measurements of electrons, protons and light nuclei from few up to hundreds MeV, also testing new tools for the detection of cosmic MeV photons, and monitoring possible MILC signals.

        Zirè will consist of a scintillating fiber tracker, a stack of plastic scintillator counters and an array of LYSO crystals. An active veto system and a Low Energy Module (LEM) are also part of the payload. In this work we present the design of a novel tracker prototype based on plastic scintillating fibers coupled with SiPM linear arrays. The preliminary results obtained in a beam test with a concept module will be presented.

        Speaker: Pillera, Roberta (Universita e INFN, Bari (IT))
      • 77
        Real-time monitoring of Solar Energetic Particles using the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer on the International Space Station

        The International Space Station (ISS) orbits in the Low Earth Orbit (LEO) and is continuously occupied by astronauts.
        With an average altitude of $400\ \mathrm{km}$, the Station is shielded from cosmic radiation by the residual atmosphere and the geomagnetic field.
        However, that protection is not always complete.

        The solar activity can emit sporadic bursts of energetic particles, with energies between $\sim 10\ \mathrm{keV}$ and several $\mathrm{GeV}$.
        Solar Energetic Particle (SEP) events can last for hours or even days and can represent an actual risk for ISS occupants and equipment.

        The Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) was installed on the ISS in 2011 and is expected to take data until the decommission of the Station itself, after 2030.
        The instrument measures CR flux continuously and can be used to detect SEPs in real-time.

        An algorithm for SEPs identification has been developed measuring sudden excesses in the trigger rates of AMS, using moving averages for the quiet level defintion.
        In the custom algorithm, the McIlwain's $L$-parameter is used to characterize the data taking areas.

        A real-time monitoring and alert system for SEPs near the ISS has been realized processing data from the AMS Monitoring Interface (AMI) database.

        Speaker: Serpolla, Andrea (Universita e INFN, Perugia (IT))
    • Indirect Cosmic Ray Measurements (Space and balloon-borne)
      Convener: Casolino, Marco (INFN - National Institute for Nuclear Physics)
      • 78
        The Terzina instrument onboard the NUSES satellite

        NUSES is a new space mission aiming to test innovative observational and technological approaches related to the study of low energy cosmic and gamma rays, high energy astrophysical neutrinos, Sun-Earth environment, Space weather and magnetosphere-ionosphere-lithosphere coupling (MILC). The satellite will host two payloads: Terzina and Zirè. In this talk I will discuss the Terzina instrument, devoted to the detection of the Cherenkov radiation emitted by extensive air showers (EAS) due to high-energy cosmic radiation via its interaction with both the Earth and its atmosphere. TERZINA is a small (about 0.1 m$^2$ mirror) Cherenkov telescope, designed as a technological pathfinder for future space-based missions for the detection of upward going EAS induced by tau-leptons and muons, resulting from Earth skimming high-energy astrophysical neutrinos. We will discuss the most relevant technical details of the instrument, its capabilities and detection potential.

        Speakers: Aloisio, Roberto, Aloisio, Roberto (Gran Sasso Science Institute and INFN)
      • 79
        A SiPM based camera for the Terzina telescope on board the NUSES space mission

        NUSES is a pathfinder satellite project containing two detectors, one Tezrina dedicated to studying Ultra High Energy Cosmic Rays above 100 PeV and the Zirè focusing on the study of protons and electrons below 250 MeV and MeV gamma rays.
        This work is focused on the description of the Cherenkov camera, composed of SiPMs, for the Terzina telescope.
        Cherenkov light produced by Extensive Air Showers induced by Ultra High Energy Cosmic Rays in the atmosphere could be detected from space, thus ensuring huge exposures.
        The Terzina telescope is being designed to detect such light. It has an effective surface of about 0.1 m^2 and an equivalent focal lens of about 930 mm with a diameter of the circle containing 80 % of the photons of less than 1 mm^2. The photo-detection plane is composed of 2x5 SiPM arrays with 8x8 channels of 3x3 mm^2 pixels each.
        We aim to detect very low light levels keeping the data acquisition dead time as low as 1-2 %. Therefore effective trigger logic is crucial to reach the physics goal of the experiment and is described within this work.
        To increase the data-taking period NUSES orbit will be sun-synchronous (with a height of about 550 km) thus allowing Terzina to point always towards the atmosphere limb in the night.
        The sun-synchronous orbit requires small distances to the poles and as a consequence the expected dose received by the SiPMs will be 10 Gy per year, while the NUSES mission will last about three years. About 70 % of the integral dose is delivered by the electrons and secondary gammas created in the mechanical structure and about 30 % from protons. This estimation is done with the Geant4 simulation of the preliminary Telescope geometry, using a conservative approach.
        The FBK research institute has recently developed low optical cross-talk SiPMs which spectral sensitivity is optimized for Cherenkov light detection. They are the candidate for the implementation of the photon camera. Therefore we study these detectors under the irradiation received by the 50 MeV protons up to 30 Gy of total integrated dose corresponding to the 9 years of the operation.

        Speaker: Dr Burmistrov, Leonid (University of Geneva)
      • 80
        Mini-EUSO on board the ISS: mission status and prospects

        The telescope Mini-EUSO is observing - since 2019 - the Earth in the ultraviolet band (290-430~nm) through a nadir-facing UV-transparent window in the Russian Zvezda module of the International Space Station.

        The instrument has a square field of view of 44$^{\circ}$, a spatial resolution on the Earth surface of 6.3 km and a temporal sampling rate of 2.5 microseconds. The optics is composed of two 25 cm diameter Fresnel lenses and a focal surface consisting of 36 multi-anode photomultiplier tubes, 64 pixels each, for a total of 2304 channels. In addition to the main camera, Mini-EUSO also contains two cameras in the near infrared and visible ranges, a series of silicon photomultipliers sensors and UV sensors to manage night-day transitions.

        Its triggering and on-board processing allow the telescope to detect UV emissions of cosmic, atmospheric and terrestrial origin on different time scales, from a few microseconds up to tens of milliseconds. This makes it possible to investigate a wide variety of events: the study of atmospheric phenomena (lightning, Transient Luminous Events (TLEs) such us ELVES and sprites), meteors, and meteoroids; the search for nuclearites and strange quark matter; the observation of artificial satellites and space debris. Mini-EUSO is also potentially capable of observing extensive air showers generated by ultra-high-energy cosmic rays with an energy above 10$^{21}$ eV and can detect artificial flashing events and showers generated with lasers from the ground.

        The instrument has been integrated and qualified in 2019 in Rome Tor Vergata, with additional tests in Moscow and final, pre-launch tests in Baikonur.
        Operations involve periodic installation in the Zvezda module of the station with observations during the crew night time, with periodic downlink of data samples, and the full dataset being sent to the ground via pouches containing the data discs. Mission planning involves the selection of the optimal orbits to maximize the science return of the instrument, the fine tuning of the observational parameters and the planning of ground-based flashing events for the end-to-end calibration of the instrument.

        In this presentation we will discuss the mission status and the main scientific results obtained so far, in light of future observations with this and similar instruments.

        Speaker: Marcelli, Laura
      • 81
        POEMMA: the Probe Of Extreme Multi-Messenger Astrophysics

        Developed as a NASA Astrophysics Probe-class mission, the Probe Of Extreme Multi- Messenger Astrophysics (POEMMA) observatory is designed to identify the sources of ultra- high energy cosmic rays (UHECRs) and measure cosmic neutrinos. In stereo extensive air shower (EAS) fluorescence mode, POEMMA will measure, the spectrum, composition, and full- sky distribution of the UHECRs with sensitivity above 20 EeV and with high statistics. Once alerted, POEMMA will slew to point the telescopes near the Earth’s limb to observe neutrino transient events with sensitivity above 20 PeV by observing the Cherenkov radiation produced by upward-moving EAS induced from tau neutrino interactions in the Earth. By using the Earth as an immense neutrino converter, POEMMA has exceptional neutrino flux sensitivity to models of both short-duration transients, such as short-gamma-ray bursts (sGRBs), and long-duration sources, including binary neutron star (BNS) mergers. The POEMMA observatory consists of two spacecraft orbiting in a loose formation at 525 km altitudes and oriented to view a common atmospheric volume. Each spacecraft includes a large, wide-FoV Schmidt telescope with a hybrid focal plane optimized to observe both the UV fluorescence signal and the beamed, optical Cherenkov signals. In this presentation, POEMMA’s UHECR and cosmic neutrino measurement capabilities in the context of POEMMA’s science goals and instrument and mission designs will be detailed.

        Speakers: Krizmanic, John (USRA/CRESST/NASA/GSFC), Krizmanic, John Francis (NASA-Natl. Aeronaut. & Space Admin. (US))
      • 82
        Study and development of silicon photomultipliers for space within the JEM-EUSO Program

        The JEM-EUSO program aims to study ultra-high energy cosmic rays from space. To achieve this goal, it has realized a series of experiments installed on ground (EUSO-TA), various on stratospheric balloons (the most recent one is EUSO-SPB2) and inside the International Space Station (Mini-EUSO), in light of future missions such as K-EUSO and POEMMA.

        At nighttime, they monitor the Earth’s atmosphere measuring fluorescence and Cherenkov light produced by atmospheric air showers generated both by very high-energy cosmic rays from outside the atmosphere and by tau neutrino decays. As the two light components differ in duration (order of microseconds for fluorescence light and a few nanoseconds for Cherenkov light) they each require specialized sensors and acquisition electronics. So far, the sensors used for the fluorescence camera are the Multi-Anode Photomultiplier Tubes (MAPMTs), while for the Cherenkov one, new systems based on Silicon PhotoMultipliers (SiPMs) have been developed.

        In this work, a brief description of the experiments is followed by the discussion of the tests performed on the optical sensors. Particular attention is paid to the development, test and calibration conducted on SiPMs, also in view to optimize the geometry, mass, and weight in light of installation of mass-critical applications such as balloon- and space-borne instrumentation.

        Speaker: Bisconti, Francesca (INFN Roma Tor Vergata)
    • 16:35
      Coffee break
    • 16:50
      Excursion to Perugia oldtown
    • 20:00
      Social dinner in Perugia oldtown - Ristorante del Sole Ristorante del Sole

      Ristorante del Sole

      Via della Rupe, 1, 06121 Perugia PG
    • Research and Development of novel instrumentation for particle meaurements in space
      Convener: Iuppa, Roberto (Universita degli Studi di Trento and INFN (IT))
      • 83
        MAPS in Space: Opportunities and Challenges

        Monolithic Active Pixel Sensors (MAPS) are a rapidly growing technology to equip low-power, low-material budget, high spatial resolution particle detectors. Their notable latest large-scale instalment, a 10 m2 detector made from 24 thousand sensors ("ALPIDE") in the ALICE experiment at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN marks an important milestone in the maturity of the technology.

        Driven by a large-scale industrial and commercial demand for producing (near-)visible imaging sensors, the technology is quickly advancing towards deeper sub-micron nodes and higher integration densities. In particular, over the last decade, a number of features could be integrated into these sensors that were previously only possible with hybrid technologies. Examples are complex in-pixel front-ends and in-matrix data sparsification, but, importantly, also radiation hardness to total ionising dose (TID), non-ionising doses (NIEL) and single event effects (SEU, SEL). The latter were improved by orders of magnitude, making the technology suitable for demanding applications at the hearts of collider experiments – but also making them very appealing for space missions, that are in fact facing similar requirements.

        Exemplarily, the low power consumptions of MAPS, achieved through an intrinsically small detector capacitance (O(1-5fF)) and hence large Q/C ratio, makes the devices particularly attractive for power critical applications, allowing to "pixelate" detectors that previously had to revert to strip detectors to fit into the power budget.

        This contribution will review the state of the art of MAPS, highlighting recent examples and results achieved in 180nm and 65nm CMOS processes and will give an outlook towards future developments in the field.

        Speaker: Mager, Magnus (CERN)
      • 84
        Depleted monolithic CMOS sensors and very low power readout architectures

        The implementation of fully-depleted monolithic active sensors on a commercial CMOS technology paves the way for the development of innovative and cost-effective solutions for photon and charge particle detection.
        The INFN ARCADIA Collaboration developed sensor technology, CMOS IP and scalable architectures on a 110nm technology node at LFoundry, deploying pixel and strip test structures with pixel size in the range 10-50um and substrate thickness from 100 up to 400um. The design and experimental results of a MAPS demonstrator, featuring a 512x512 25um pixel matrix and a data push readout, and a monolithic pixelised strip demonstrator featuring an analogue readout, will be presented. We will discuss the opportunities for the use of the ARCADIA FD-MAPS technology in future timing, tracking and X-ray detection systems in space instruments.

        Speakers: Da Rocha Rolo, Manuel Dionisio, Da Rocha Rolo, Manuel Dionisio (Universita e INFN Torino (IT))
      • 85
        Recent development of Multi-Pixel Photon Counter (MPPC) for direct detection around NUV/VUV, new qCMOS image sensor for single photon counting and photon number resolving

        High sensitivity Multi-Pixel Photon Counter (MPPC) is suitable device for direct detection in near ultraviolet (NUV) or vacuum ultraviolet (VUV). We propose NUV sensitivity enhanced MPPCs for scintillation or Cherenkov light detection.
        Furthermore, we developed MPPCs array with high NUV sensitivity using through silicon via technology (TSV) to maximize the sensitive region. VUV sensitivity enhanced MPPCs are one promising candidate for particle physics experiments that uses the noble liquid gas (Xenon, Argon) as scintillating medium.

        Indirect conversion type XPC detector that combines a scintillator and Multi-Pixel Photon Counter (MPPC) has excellent characteristics in terms of high inter-channel separation , high stopping power, and low drive voltage – all merit factor in applications fields such as medical imaging, in-line inspection, infrastructure inspection and cargo inspection.
        Indirect conversion XPC detectors typically have the problem of low maximum count rate because of the scintillator’s decay time. To address this problem, we developed an XPC module using a high luminescence and short decay time scintillator and an MPPC.

        The qCMOS (quantitative CMOS) is a CMOS image sensor that has the ability to detect and identify the number of both single and multiple photoelectrons. Orca quest is the world’s first camera to incorporate qCMOS image sensor and able to resolve the number of photoelectrons using a newly developed dedicated technology. The four keys features that enable Orca Quest to achieve quantitative imaging are extreme low noise performances, realization of photon number resolving (PNR) output, back illuminated structure and high resolution, realization of a large number of pixels and high speed readout.

        Speaker: Ferrulli, Simona
      • 86
        a-Si:H as active material for the detection of different radiations observed during the evolution of Solar Energetic Particle events.

        A new type of detector based on hydrogenated amorphous silicon (a-Si:H) as active material is discussed to monitor space solar flares and the evolution of large energetic proton events up to hundreds of MeV. The a-Si:H presents excellent radiation hardness and finds application in harsh radiation environments for medical purposes, particle beam characterization, and space weather science. The material could detect both X-ray and accelerated charged particles emitted during the evolution of intense solar events (SEPs). Experimental results on the sensitivity of existing a-Si:H devices will be presented with an evaluation of the critical flux detection thresholds for all components of solar emissions: X-rays, soft gamma rays, electrons and protons.

        Speaker: Servoli, Leonello (Universita e INFN, Perugia (IT))
      • 87
        Charged-particle induced radioluminescence of copper-halide perovskite films and detector assemblies for spaceborne measurements

        Scintillators have long been powerful tools in radiation detection, however, cannot offer a practical alternative to solid-state detectors in conventional particle telescopes applied in spaceborne measurements of solar energetic particles. The two main reasons are related to the common experience of their poor energy resolution, and technological obstacles of producing thin-film scintillators that obey criteria for long-term stability and high luminescence yield.

        The experimental goal of our work was to revisit the functional and stability concerns, and offer a novel solution for thin-film scintillators in order to be competitive with present detection techniques in the targeted energy range 1-100 MeV/nucleon. Our choice for scintillation material was copper-halide perovskites, which have been tested for ion-beam induced radioluminescence by characterizing their spectroscopic and timing performance. A simplified spray-deposition technique has also been developed to produce thin films on transparent substrates in the size range of 1-100 $\mu$m. The layers were built with a polycrystalline morphology intentionally avoiding subtle procedures of high-purity crystal growth, which had no deterioration effect on the luminescence behaviour due to the strong quantum confinement in the reduced-dimensional structure of copper-halide compositions, as well as the favorable reorganization of excitonic and surface trap states. The measured scintillation yield for the brightest $\mathrm{Cs_3Cu_2I_5}$ composition was nearly 30000 photons/MeV for electrons and 10000 photons/MeV for $\alpha$-particles, the FWHM energy resolution for 5 MeV $\alpha$-particles was 5.5%, and a net timing spread of $<$300 ps was found by using SiPM as photon detector.

        The utilization of $\mathrm{Cs_3Cu_2I_5}$ thin films with a thickness optimized for simultaneous particle transmission and sufficient light production is proposed as an efficient $\Delta$E-detector in telescopes taking into account our findings of high radiation tolerance, weak temperature dependence of scintillation yield, and low fabrication costs in contrast to solid-state detectors. We have tested the scintillation performance of $\mathrm{Cs_3Cu_2I_5}$ thin films in a pilot telescope assembly using accelerated ion beams from protons to selected heavy ions. The characterization of the detector performance involving particle mass discrimination, trajectory reconstruction, and sensitivity limits will also be presented.

        Speaker: Dr Hunyadi, Mátyás (Institute for Nuclear Research, Debrecen, Hungary)
    • 10:55
      coffee break
    • Research and Development of novel instrumentation for particle meaurements in space
      Convener: Ionica, Maria (INFN Perugia)
      • 88
        Challenges towards Low-Power and Fast-Timing MAPS

        Monolithic Active Pixel Sensors (MAPS) are an attractive solution for scientific applications that require excellent position and time resolution. MAPS integrate both sensor matrix and readout circuitry on a single silicon wafer, making them cost-effective and efficient.

        The ALPIDE sensor, initially designed for the ALICE Inner Tracking System (ITS2) at CERN, was the base for applications to space-based tracking detectors, with the Limadou HEPD-02 marking the first implementation of MAPS technology in space. ALPIDE implements a 30 $\mu$m pixel pitch with an analog power of 5 mW/cm$^{2}$ to achieve 1 $\mu$s time resolution. The total power consumption is dependent on the data transmission rate and can be kept below 15 mW/cm$^{2}$. This makes it an ideal choice for space-based applications with limited power budgets and heat dissipation capabilities. The ALPIDE evolution for the new ITS3 is a 300mm wafer-scale MAPS, where options are explored to tune balance between power consumption and timing performance.

        In the exploration for achieving the ultimate time resolutions, the MONOLITH project has made significant progress towards sub-10 ps resolution using MAPS based on BiCMOS Si-Ge technology. A prototype implementing a 100 $\mu$m pixel pitch proven 40 mW/cm$^{2}$ analog power operation to achieve 80 ps resolution and 360 mW/cm$^{2}$ to achieve 30 ps resolution. This remarkable advancement has the potential to expand the applications of MAPS and open up new possibilities for research and development across multiple fields.

        This talk will cover the challenges in developing MAPS with low power consumption and fast timing capabilities, as well as showcase the latest developments.

        Speaker: Kugathasan, Thanushan (Universite de Geneve (CH))
      • 89
        Development of LGADs for the 4D tracking of charged particles in Space Experiments

        The astroparticle physics experiments operating in space measuring the charged cosmic rays (CCRs) include a tracker and a calorimeter to identify the incoming primary CCRs. These experiments face challenges in separating primary particles from the back-scattered particles entering the tracker from the calorimeter. The timing measurement of each hit can be used to distinguish between the primary and secondary particles. In recent years, Low Gain Avalanche Detectors (LGADs) has emerged as a technological solution for precise timing measurements in the tens of ps range for High Energy Physics and other applications. The typical channel size of a silicon sensor for strip geometry in space application is 60-100 cm in length with 100 $\mu\rm{m}$ pitch, resulting in a channel area of about 1 cm$^2$ whereas, the typical LGAD channel size is $O(1~\rm{mm}^2$). This work evaluates the use of LGADs for timing in space and discusses the challenges in making large-area LGAD sensors. The TCAD simulations to achieve a gain of about 100 are presented, which is thought to improve the time resolution for larger channel sensors. Preliminary timing measurements of the pad sensors with dimensions $1~\rm{cm} \times 1~\rm{cm}$ (with and without gain) are presented.

        Speaker: Bisht, Ashish
      • 90
        Characterization of a large area hybrid pixel detector of Timepix3 technology for space applications

        A large area Timepix3 [1] hybrid pixel detector (262,144 pixels, pixel pitch 55 µm) was mainly developed for application in the penetrating particle analyser (PAN), i.e., a magnetic spectrometer for the measurement of galactic cosmic ray (GCR) fluxes, including their kinetic energies and to determine the GCR antimatter content in deep space [2]. The pixel detector provides an accurate measurement of particle position and energy losses (dE/dX) while its low material budget is essential to reduce the impact of multiple low angle scattering on the particle energy determination. A time-stamp resolution in the nano-second scale additionally provides means to reconstruct 3D coordinates of interactions within semiconductors (solid-state TPC) with a precision of 30 µm [3]. This opens the possibility to use them as compact Compton cameras for location of hard X- and gamma-ray sources [4], while simultaneously obtaining the photon polarization. However, the use of Timepix3 devices in space comes with challenges for carrier board, readout electronics and firmware design. For example, operation in vacuum requires proper cooling schemes; printed carrier boards and mechanics should be light weight while providing enough strength to survive vibration and shock; limited resources on the spacecraft impose strict limits on power consumption; and low downlink rates require data pre-processing capabilities. These issues are addressed in the present contribution.

        A redesign of the Katherine [5] readout was used to study the Timepix3 tracking module’s response to a 120 GeV/c hadron beam at the Super-Proton-Synchrotron (SPS) at CERN and to protons of 100-230 MeV at the Danish Center for Proton Therapy (DCPT). “Low” power operation was achieved by changing the settings of Timepix3 (in the analog part) and further by reducing the matrix clock (see [6]). We present a comprehensive study of the impact of the changes on the particle tracking performance, as well as the energy and time resolutions. The power consumption of 6 W with standard settings was reduced to 4 W by changing the Timepix3 DACs. While these changes did not affect the energy measurement resolution, the time stamping precision was reduced from 1.8 ns to 5.6 ns due to slower pulse shaping. Further reduction of the power consumption was achieved by reducing the matrix clock. At a matrix clock of 5 MHz, we achieved a power consumption of 1.6 W. The dependence of the energy measurement on temperature will be presented for ambient temperatures between -20° and 50° C.

        [1] T. Poikela et al., JINST 9 (2014) C05013.
        [2] X. Wu et al., Advances in Space Research, 63 (2019), Issue 8, pp 2672-2682.
        [3] B. Bergmann, et al., “3D track reconstruction capability of a silicon hybrid active pixel detector,” Eur. Phys. J. C 77, 421 (2017).
        [4] D. Turecek et al 2020 JINST 15 C01014
        [5] P. Burian et al., JINST 12 (2017) C11001.
        [6] P. Burian et al., JINST 14 (2019) C01001

        This project has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 862044. The work was carried out in the Medipix collaboration. This work has been done using the INSPIRE Research Infrastructures and is part of a project that has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 730983.

        Speaker: Farkaš, Martin (University of West Bohemia (CZ))
      • 91
        A mixed-signal read out ASIC for silicon micro-strip detectors

        ASTRA-64 (Adaptable Silicon sTrip Read-out Asic) is a 64-channel mixed-signal ASIC mainly designed to read-out micro-strip silicon detectors. Its first target application is the Silicon Charge Detector of the HERD facility, to be installed onboard the Chinese space station to provide tracking and complementary charge measurement.

        ASTRA-64 is designed in 110nm technology and consists of two identical mirrored blocks, each of which has 32 channels. Each channel includes a Charge Sensitive Amplifier, with 2 programmable gain settings suited for both input signal polarities, followed by a shaper with programmable peaking time to optimize the noise performance according to the detector capacitance. The front-end gain has been set to provide a linear charge measurement of up to 160 fC in standard gain configuration and up to 80 fC for high gain configuration.

        ASTRA-64 allows for two readout modes. In the analog readout mode, the sampled voltages stored in each channel are sent off-chip using an analog multiplexer coupled with a differential output buffer. In the digital readout mode, each channel employs its Wilkinson ADC to digitize the sampled voltages and a common serializer to send off-chip the digital information using an SLVS driver.

        In addition, a fast shaper is coupled with a leading-edge hysteresis discriminator and the outputs of the 32 channels discriminators are combined in a FAST-OR logic to deliver a fast trigger signal off-chip. This signal can be employed by the DAQ system to perform trigger logic operations and eventually send it back to the ASIC as the HOLD signal to perform the charge measurement. The ASIC dissipates less than 600 μW per channel to cope with the very strict constraints on power consumption for space applications.

        Speaker: Barbanera, Mattia (Universita e INFN, Perugia (IT))
      • 92
        A Configurable 64-channel ASIC for Cherenkov Radiation Detection

        This paper discusses the implementation of a 64-channel ASIC designed within the Extreme Universe Space Observatory - Super Pressure Balloon 2 (EUSO-SPB2) mission. The electronics is used to readout a camera plane formed of Silicon Photo-Multipliers (SiPMs) where the Cherenkov signal emitted by Extensive Air Showers (EASs) is focused. The EAS signal is produced by Ultra-High Energy Cosmic Rays (UHECRs) and Cosmic Neutrinos (CNs) interactions in the atmosphere. The chip is developed in a commercial 65 nm CMOS technology and each channel is equipped with a dual-polarity current amplifier which output is distributed among an array of 256 cells. A single cell hosts an analog memory, a Wilkinson Analog-to-Digital Converter (ADC) with a nominal resolution of 12-bits and a digital memory to locally save the converted data, working at a sampling frequency of 200 MS/s. The array is segmented into smaller partitions of 32 cells each to derandomize the input signal. The comparators of the front-end provide a hitmap of the events that can be elaborated by an FPGA. If the mapping is externally validated, the data can be converted and sent off-chip. The readout is carried out with a serializer running at 400 MHz in Double Data Rate (DDR). The ASIC is suitable for several applications besides the objectives of the SPB2 mission due to its high configurability. Indeed the chip can be programmed to operate with slices of 32, 64 or 256 cells. The resolution is configurable by the user in the range of 8-12 bits. This feature ensures that both conversion time and power are saved, providing an adequate granularity for different applications.

        Speaker: Di Salvo, Andrea (Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare)
    • Welcome, Institutional and Conclusion talks: Conclusion
      • 93
        Conclusion
        Speakers: Duranti, Matteo (Universita e INFN, Perugia (IT)), Vagelli, Valerio (Italian Space Agency (ASI) and INFN), Vagelli, Valerio
      • 94
        Best presentation award
        Speakers: Duranti, Matteo (Universita e INFN, Perugia (IT)), Vagelli, Valerio (Italian Space Agency (ASI) and INFN)
    • 13:10
      Lunch
    • 14:30
      Departure