Mainz 2014 – wissenschaftliches Programm

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T: Fachverband Teilchenphysik

T 28: Kosmische Strahlung 1

T 28.7: Vortrag

Montag, 24. März 2014, 18:20–18:35, P5

Energy Measurement of cosmic-ray Helium with the Transition Radiation Detector of AMS-02 — •Michael Korsmeier — I. Physikalisches Institut B, RWTH Aachen University

AMS-02 is a particle detector installed on the International Space Station to perform precision measurements of cosmic radiation. Subdetectors that are important for this study are the tracking spectrometer, the electromagnetic calorimeter (ECAL) and the transition radiation detector (TRD). The TRD consists of 20 layers of straw tubes and fleece radiator. The main purpose of the TRD is to discriminate between electrons and protons, i.e. light particles with high Lorentz factor and heavy particles with low Lorentz factor.

Beyond doing particle identification CRN and TRACER showed, that TRDs can provide energy measurements at high Lorentz factors between 500 and 50 000. Here we apply this idea to the TRD of AMS-02. Protons, for which momentum is measured by the spectrometer, and electrons, for which energy is determined in the ECAL, are used to precisely calibrate the response curve of the TRD. The precision of the energy measurement of the TRD is then investigated for helium. This method may be used to greatly extend the energy range of the spectrometer especially for heavier nuclei like boron and carbon.