Development of the Advance Energetic Pair Telescope (AdEPT) for medium-energy gamma-ray astronomy

Stanley D. Hunter; Peter F. Bloser; Michael P. Dion; Mark L. McConnell; Georgia A. de Nolfo; Seunghee Son; James M. Ryan; Floyd W. Stecker

doi:10.1117/12.857298

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29 July 2010 Development of the Advance Energetic Pair Telescope (AdEPT) for medium-energy gamma-ray astronomy

Stanley D. Hunter; Peter F. Bloser; Michael P. Dion; Mark L. McConnell; Georgia A. de Nolfo; Seunghee Son; James M. Ryan; Floyd W. Stecker

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Proceedings Volume 7732, Space Telescopes and Instrumentation 2010: Ultraviolet to Gamma Ray; 773221 (2010) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.857298
Event: SPIE Astronomical Telescopes + Instrumentation, 2010, San Diego, California, United States

Abstract

Progress in high-energy gamma-ray science has been dramatic since the launch of INTEGRAL, AGILE and FERMI. These instruments, however, are not optimized for observations in the medium-energy (~0.3< E_γ < ~200 MeV) regime where many astrophysical objects exhibit unique, transitory behavior, such as spectral breaks, bursts, and flares. We outline some of the major science goals of a medium-energy mission. These science goals are best achieved with a combination of two telescopes, a Compton telescope and a pair telescope, optimized to provide significant improvements in angular resolution and sensitivity. In this paper we describe the design of the Advanced Energetic Pair Telescope (AdEPT) based on the Three-Dimensional Track Imager (3-DTI) detector. This technology achieves excellent, mediumenergy sensitivity, angular resolution near the kinematic limit, and gamma-ray polarization sensitivity, by high resolution 3-D electron tracking. We describe the performance of a 30×30×30 cm³ prototype of the AdEPT instrument.

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Stanley D. Hunter, Peter F. Bloser, Michael P. Dion, Mark L. McConnell, Georgia A. de Nolfo, Seunghee Son, James M. Ryan, and Floyd W. Stecker "Development of the Advance Energetic Pair Telescope (AdEPT) for medium-energy gamma-ray astronomy", Proc. SPIE 7732, Space Telescopes and Instrumentation 2010: Ultraviolet to Gamma Ray, 773221 (29 July 2010); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.857298

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