Radio detection of air showers with the Auger Engineering Radio Array

THE PIERRE AUGER COLLABORATION.; S. J. SCIUTTO

Rio de Janeiro

Conferencia; 33rd International Cosmic Ray Conference; 2013

International Union of Pure and Applied Physics (IUPAP)

The Auger Engineering Radio Array (AERA) is one of the low-energy extensions of the detectorsystems of the Pierre Auger Observatory. AERA is being used to study the emission of radio waves from extensiveair showers. It operates in the frequency range from 30 to 80MHz. Recently, AERA has been expanded to 124radio stations over an area of approximately 6km2. In 2014 we will deploy 36 additional stations, and by thisextend the area to at least 10km2. With this AERA160 setup we will be able to determine the measurementresolution for the arrival direction, the energy, and the mass-composition of primary cosmic rays with energieslarger than 1017:5 eV. In this paper, we describe the setup of AERA. We also present and discuss the first physicsresults and techniques that have been developed for AERA24, the first phase of AERA consisting of 24 stationsdistributed over an area of 0:5km2. In particular, we show a comparison of a measured event with simulations.