Linear discriminant analysis for Gamma-hadron separation using AugerPrime observables.

JAIME ALVAREZ-MUÑIZ; RICARDO VAZQUEZ; HANSEN PATRICIA ; E. ZAS

Malargue

Encuentro; Auger Collaboration Meeting, Malargue, (March-2017).; 2017

The Pierre Auger Observatory will upgrade its surface detector array by adding scintillator planesabove the existing Water-Cherenkov detectors. This new phase of the Observatory - dubbed Auger-Prime - will provide additional discrimination of the electromagnetic and muonic components ofthe air showers. This discrimination plays an important role in the determination of the masscomposition of the ultrahigh-energy cosmic rays (UHECR). In this note we explore how these newdetectors improve the separation of primary proton and gamma-induced air showers. We study thediscrimination power of observables accessible to AugerPrime that are sensitive to the mass of theprimary particles. We also combine several of these observables in a linear discriminant multivariateanalysis and evaluate the discrimination power of the new parameters. Special emphasis will be puton the degradation of the discrimination power due to detector effects and uncertainties in the reconstructionof the observables. This work complements an earlier work in which the discriminationbetween proton and iron primaries with AugerPrime was also studied.