GAMAR II Electronics and Control System Design

MAYA, JAVIER; D. YELÓS; B. GARCIA; BIGNERT, M; BREST, F.; A. CANCIO; CHIRINO LL; CORREA LUST J; A. MANCILLA; PEREZ S; SANTA MARA D; SUAREZ F; VIDELA M; VEGA M

2014-01-03/2015-05-02

Electrónica

Ciencia y cultura-Ciencia y tecnologia

The definition of astrophysical scenarios for the explanation of events associated to high-energy particles is an interesting field of study in Astronomy.This Technical Report presents part of the the design devoted to the installation and testing of new equipment to take data in this field, where Astrophysics and Technology have contact points.The new technologies permit the development of new systems through the use of standard instruments, reducing design costs and manufacturing,but with the possibility of adapting in a novel way to special situations for which they were not created or tested. As this project has the ultimate aim of detecting and analyze gamma radiation we will design, build and launch a Cherenkov light detecting system from the restoration of 3 small Cherenkov telescopes 1 located at the Complejo Astron ́omico El Leoncito (CASLEO), in the province of San Juan,Argentina. These telescopes were used in the 90s of 20th century to study the galactic center (Rovero et al., 1997). The detected energies were on the order of TeV. The energy threshold was estimated by the events rate, comparing it with the known rates of primary cosmic rays and was approximately 3.75 TeV. In order to estimate the event rate, Montecarlo simulations also were performed. A Cherenkov telescope is a parabolic mirror that allows the concentration of the incident light upon its focus, in which it is a chamber formed by one or more photodetectors and electronics that allows amplification, digitization and storage of the pulse produced During the mentioned studies, no statistical evidence of significant emission in the region studied was found, however, was successfully observed the atmospheric Cherenkov radiation. We estimate that new detectors with modern technology will allow to make more accurate observations and eventually give rise to new lines of research, in basic and applied sciences. While studies in the region of the electromagnetic spectrum range for atmospheric Cherenkov observations have advanced significantly since the last decade of 20th century (Veritas (Weekes et al., 2002), Magic (Lorenz,2004), HESS (Hinton, 2004)), it is possible to develop new lines of studies from the design of new design. The level of development achieved by the new solid state photo-detectors (or SiPM ?Silicon Photo Multipliers?) and the speed with which they improve some features that are problematic for the moment, allows them to be currently considered as a possible replacement for traditional photo-multiplier tubes (PMT) in various applications, as the new generation of Cherenkov telescopes. Some advantages are: less weight and volume of the device, a much lower supply voltage, resistance to high light levels (allowing increased time for data collection), immunity to magnetic fields and is expected that soon the quantum and photo-detection efficiency levels can exceed the traditional levels of the PMT, which could generate more precise observations. Finally, the telescopes operating system will become part of CASLEO and the Observatory will manage the observation time requirements.