The dual-mirror Small Size Telescope for the Cherenkov Telescope Array

Abstract

In this paper, the development of the dual mirror Small Size Telescopes (SST) for the Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA) is reviewed. Up to 70 SST, with a primary mirror diameter of 4 m, will be produced and installed at the CTA southern site. These will allow investigation of the gamma-ray sky at the highest energies accessible to CTA, in the range from about 1 TeV to 300 TeV. The telescope presented in this contribution is characterized by two major innovations: the use of a dual mirror Schwarzschild-Couder configuration and of an innovative camera using as sensors either multi-anode photomultipliers (MAPM) or silicon photomultipliers (SiPM). The reduced plate-scale of the telescope, achieved with the dual-mirror optics, allows the camera to be compact (40 cm in diameter), and low-cost. The camera, which has about 2000 pixels of size 6x6 mm^2, covers a field of view of 10°. The dual mirror telescopes and their cameras are being developed by three consortia, ASTRI (Astrofisica con Specchi a Tecnologia Replicante Italiana, Italy/INAF), GATE (Gamma-ray Telescope Elements, France/Paris Observ.) and CHEC (Compact High Energy Camera, universities in UK, US and Japan) which are merging their efforts in order to finalize an end-to-end design that will be constructed for CTA. A number of prototype structures and cameras are being developed in order to investigate various alternative designs. In this contribution, these designs are presented, along with the technological solutions under study.

In Proceedings of the 33rd International Cosmic Ray Conference (ICRC2013), Rio de Janeiro (Brazil). All CTA contributions at arXiv:1307.2232

Cited by in corpus (13)

• Status of the technologies for the production of the Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA) mirrors
• Large amplitude tip/tilt estimation by geometric diversity for multiple-aperture telescopes
• The ASTRI mini-array within the future Cherenkov Telescope Array
• Monte Carlo Studies of medium-size telescope designs for the Cherenkov Telescope Array
• The ASTRI Mini-Array Software System
• The LHAASO PeVatron bright sky: what we learned
• Mirror production for the Cherenkov telescopes of the ASTRI Mini-Array and of the MST project for the Cherenkov Telescope Array
• The next generation Cherenkov Telescope Array observatory: CTA
• CTA telescopes as deep-space lasercom ground receivers
• Procedures for the relative calibration of the SiPM gain on ASTRI SST-2M camera
• Novel Silicon Photomultipliers suitable for Dual-Mirror Small-Sized Telescopes of the Cherenkov Telescope Array
• On the prospects of cross-calibrating the Cherenkov Telescope Array with an airborne calibration platform
• Interpreting the GeV-TeV Gamma-Ray Spectra of Local Giant Molecular Clouds using GEANT4 Simulation