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  • Prohira, S; de Vries, K D; Allison, P; Beatty, J; Besson, D; Connolly, A; Dasgupta, P; Deaconu, C; De Kockere, S; Frikken, D; Hast, C; E Huesca Santiago; C -Y Kuo; Latif, U A; Lukic, V; Meures, T; Mulrey, K; Nam, J; Nozdrina, A; Oberla, E; Ralston, J P; Sbrocco, C; Stanley, R S; Torres, J; Toscano, S; Van den Broeck, D; N van Eijndhoven; Wissel, S

    arXiv.org, 01/2022
    Paper, Journal Article

    The Radar Echo Telescope for Cosmic Rays (RET-CR) is a recently initiated experiment designed to detect the englacial cascade of a cosmic-ray initiated air shower via in-ice radar, toward the goal of a full-scale, next-generation experiment to detect ultra high energy neutrinos in polar ice. For cosmic rays with a primary energy greater than 10 PeV, roughly 10% of an air-shower's energy reaches the surface of a high elevation ice-sheet (\(\gtrsim\)2 km) concentrated into a radius of roughly 10 cm. This penetrating shower core creates an in-ice cascade many orders of magnitude more dense than the preceding in-air cascade. This dense cascade can be detected via the radar echo technique, where transmitted radio is reflected from the ionization deposit left in the wake of the cascade. RET-CR will test the radar echo method in nature, with the in-ice cascade of a cosmic-ray initiated air-shower serving as a test beam. We present the projected event rate and sensitivity based upon a three part simulation using CORSIKA, GEANT4, and RadioScatter. RET-CR expects \(\sim\)1 radar echo event per day.