Enhanced simulations on the Athena/WFI instrumental background

Tanja Eraerds; Valeria Antonelli; Chris Davis; David Hall; Oliver Hetherington; Andrew Holland; Jonathan Keelan; Norbert Meidinger; Eric Miller; Silvano Molendi; Emanuele Perinati; Daniel Pietschner; Arne Rau

doi:10.1117/12.2560932

13 December 2020 Enhanced simulations on the Athena/WFI instrumental background

Tanja Eraerds, Valeria Antonelli, Chris Davis, David Hall, Oliver Hetherington, Andrew Holland, Jonathan Keelan, Norbert Meidinger, Eric Miller, Silvano Molendi, Emanuele Perinati, Daniel Pietschner, Arne Rau

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 11444, Space Telescopes and Instrumentation 2020: Ultraviolet to Gamma Ray; 114443Y (2020) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2560932
Event: SPIE Astronomical Telescopes + Instrumentation, 2020, Online Only

Conference Poster

Abstract

The Wide Field Imager (WFI) is one of two focal plane instruments of the Advanced Telescope for High-Energy Astrophysics (Athena), ESA’s next large X-ray observatory, planned for launch in the early 2030’s. The current baseline halo orbit is around L2, the first Lagrangian point of the Sun-Earth system, L1 is under consideration. For both potential halo orbits the radiation environment, solar and cosmic protons, electrons and He-ions will affect the performance of the instruments. A further critical contribution to the instrument background arises from the unfocused cosmic hard X-ray background. It is important to understand and estimate the expected instrumental background and to investigate measures, like design modifications or analysis methods, which could improve the expected background level in order to achieve the challenging scientific requirement (< 5 × 10⁻³ cts/cm²/keV/s at 2 - 7 keV). Previous WFI background simulations1 done in Geant4 have been improved by taking into account new information about the proton flux at L2. In addition, the simulation model of the WFI instrument and its surroundings employed in GEANT4 simulations has been refined to follow the technological development of the WFI camera.

Citation Download Citation

Tanja Eraerds, Valeria Antonelli, Chris Davis, David Hall, Oliver Hetherington, Andrew Holland, Jonathan Keelan, Norbert Meidinger, Eric Miller, Silvano Molendi, Emanuele Perinati, Daniel Pietschner, and Arne Rau "Enhanced simulations on the Athena/WFI instrumental background", Proc. SPIE 11444, Space Telescopes and Instrumentation 2020: Ultraviolet to Gamma Ray, 114443Y (13 December 2020); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2560932

ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE

INSTITUTIONAL
Select your institution to access the SPIE Digital Library.

SELECT YOUR INSTITUTION

PERSONAL
Sign in with your SPIE account to access your personal subscriptions or to use specific features such as save to my library, sign up for alerts, save searches, etc.

PERSONAL SIGN IN

No SPIE Account? Create one

PURCHASE THIS CONTENT

SUBSCRIBE TO DIGITAL LIBRARY

50 downloads per 1-year subscription

Members: $195

Non-members: $335 ADD TO CART

25 downloads per 1 - year subscription

Members: $145

Non-members: $250 ADD TO CART

PURCHASE SINGLE ARTICLE

Includes PDF, HTML & Video, when available