The background of the gas pixel detector and its impact on imaging X-ray polarimetry

Paolo Soffitta; Riccardo Campana; Enrico Costa; Sergio Fabiani; Fabio Muleri; Alda Rubini; Ronaldo Bellazzini; Alessandro Brez; Massimo Minuti; Michele Pinchera; Gloria Spandre

doi:10.1117/12.925385

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17 September 2012 The background of the gas pixel detector and its impact on imaging X-ray polarimetry

Paolo Soffitta, Riccardo Campana, Enrico Costa, Sergio Fabiani, Fabio Muleri, Alda Rubini, Ronaldo Bellazzini, Alessandro Brez, Massimo Minuti, Michele Pinchera, Gloria Spandre

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Proceedings Volume 8443, Space Telescopes and Instrumentation 2012: Ultraviolet to Gamma Ray; 84431F (2012) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.925385
Event: SPIE Astronomical Telescopes + Instrumentation, 2012, Amsterdam, Netherlands

Abstract

The background of the Gas Pixel Detector is expected to be negligible for polarimetry of point sources due to the intrinsic low atomic number and density of the He-DME mixtures and to its imaging properties. Also the background for extended sources is expected to be negligible at least down to the smallest flux for sensitive polarimetry in a reasonable observing time. However in the spatial distribution of the background in a laboratory environment we observed an accumulation on the edges of the sensitive plane due to the presence of the nearby cell walls. We recently developed gas pixel detectors with a new design of the gas cell having a larger distance of the walls from the sensitive plane. In this paper we compare the spatial distribution of the measured background for the two design and their residual systematics. Also the impact of the background in the case of SgrB2 a faint extended source in the galactic center region is evaluated.

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Paolo Soffitta, Riccardo Campana, Enrico Costa, Sergio Fabiani, Fabio Muleri, Alda Rubini, Ronaldo Bellazzini, Alessandro Brez, Massimo Minuti, Michele Pinchera, and Gloria Spandre "The background of the gas pixel detector and its impact on imaging X-ray polarimetry", Proc. SPIE 8443, Space Telescopes and Instrumentation 2012: Ultraviolet to Gamma Ray, 84431F (17 September 2012); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.925385

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