Ultra-fast infrared detector for astronomy Drago, Alessandro; Pace, Emanuele; Bini, Simone ...
Nuclear instruments & methods in physics research. Section A, Accelerators, spectrometers, detectors and associated equipment,
March 2023, 2023-03-00, Volume:
1048
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
The advent of multi-messenger astronomy requires time-domain telescope detectors across the whole electromagnetic spectrum. Furthermore, astronomical fast transients such as FRBs (Fast Radio Bursts) ...and GRBs (Gamma Ray Bursts) lead to the concept of time-domain astronomy. FAIRTEL, an ultrafast infrared detector for ground-based telescopes, is under development thanks to funding from the Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare (INFN).
Gravitational waves were predicted by Albert Einstein in his most famous theory, the general theory of relativity, but it took almost a century for these waves to be detected and their existence ...proven. This book introduces gravitational waves and discusses some of their applications in five dimensions, this is all done in classical gravity. It also explains gravitational waves in quantum gravity (in which the universe is considered to be not continuous) and implications for trying to understand and explore dark energy and an expanding accelerated universe.
Gamma-ray astrophysics in the MeV range De Angelis, Alessandro; Tatischeff, Vincent; Argan, Andrea ...
Experimental astronomy,
06/2021, Volume:
51, Issue:
3
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
Open access
The energy range between about 100 keV and 1 GeV is of interest for a vast class of astrophysical topics. In particular, (1) it is the missing ingredient for understanding extreme processes in the ...multi-messenger era; (2) it allows localizing cosmic-ray interactions with background material and radiation in the Universe, and spotting the reprocessing of these particles; (3) last but not least, gamma-ray emission lines trace the formation of elements in the Galaxy and beyond. In addition, studying the still largely unexplored MeV domain of astronomy would provide for a rich observatory science, including the study of compact objects, solar- and Earth-science, as well as fundamental physics. The technological development of silicon microstrip detectors makes it possible now to detect MeV photons in space with high efficiency and low background. During the last decade, a concept of detector (“ASTROGAM”) has been proposed to fulfil these goals, based on a silicon hodoscope, a 3D position-sensitive calorimeter, and an anticoincidence detector. In this paper we stress the importance of a medium size (M-class) space mission, dubbed “ASTROMEV”, to fulfil these objectives.
Gravitational-wave astronomy: delivering on the promises Schutz, B. F.
Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series A: Mathematical, physical, and engineering sciences,
05/2018, Volume:
376, Issue:
2120
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
Open access
Now that LIGO and Virgo have begun to detect gravitational-wave events with regularity, the field of gravitational-wave astronomy is beginning to realize its promise. Binary black holes and, very ...recently, binary neutron stars have been observed, and we are already learning much from them. The future, with improved sensitivity, more detectors and detectors like LISA in different frequency bands, has even more promise to open a completely hidden side of the Universe to our exploration.
This article is part of a discussion meeting issue 'The promises of gravitational-wave astronomy'.
AGILE is a space mission launched in 2007 to study X-ray and gamma-ray phenomena through data acquired by different payload instruments. The AGILE Team developed an application called AGILEScience ...that allows to visualize information about the AGILE space mission from mobile devices, such as smartphones and tablets. The AGILEScience application can be downloaded freely for iOS and Android devices.
Beside sharing information about the AGILE space mission with the public for outreach purposes, similarly to what other applications do, the AGILEScience app offers some new and unique features in gamma-ray astrophysics: (i) it gives public access in nearly real-time to the sky view of a gamma-ray satellite for the first time, (ii) it interacts with the AGILE remote gamma-ray data storage and analysis system, allowing data analysis to be sent and results to be visualized, and (iii) it allows the AGILE Team to access a password-protected section of the app to view detailed AGILE pipeline results and submit advanced analyses. The last two features are critical to allow remote and easy access to the results of the AGILE automated pipelines.
In particular, the ability to visualize results and execute manual data analysis from mobile devices is key during the follow-up of transient events and to easily monitor the satellite status via smartphone.
Here we have investigated the main characteristics, including the merging rate, of the first population of black holes in order to improve the current assumptions in the context of the present and ...future gravitational wave observations. We made several simulations with different populations of black holes that we evolve in time so we can compare them with the present population of black holes. We identified the most suitable first population of black holes and we obtained not only the merging rate of black holes, but also its evolution with mass and in time. This information is very important for the next generation of gravitational waves observatories and specially for the LISA space mission.
High-energy neutrino astronomy is a fascinating new field of research, rapidly developing over recent years. It opens a new observation window on the most violent processes in the universe, fitting ...very well to the concept of multi-messenger astronomy. This may be exemplified by the recent discovery of the high-energy neutrino emissions from the γ-ray loud blazar TXS 0506+056. Constraining astrophysical neutrino fluxes can also help to understand the long-standing mystery of the origin of the ultra-high energy cosmic rays. Astronomical studies of high-energy neutrinos are carried out by large-scale next-generation neutrino telescopes located in different regions of the world, forming a global network of complementary detectors. The Baikal-GVD, being currently the largest neutrino telescope in the Northern Hemisphere and still growing up, is an important constituent of this network. This paper briefly reviews working principles, analysis methods, and some selected results of the Baikal-GVD neutrino telescope.
Electromagnetic transients known as kilonovae (KN), are among the photonic messengers released in the post-merger phase of compact binary objects, for example, binary neutron stars, and they have ...been recently observed as the electromagnetic counterpart of related gravitational-wave (GW) events. Detection of the KN signal plays a fundamental role in the multi-messenger astronomy entering in a sophisticated GW-detecting network. The KN light curve also delivers precious information on the composition and dynamics of the neutron-rich post-merger plasma ejecta (relying on
r
-process nucleosynthesis yields). In this sense, studying KN becomes of great relevance for nuclear astrophysics. Because of the highly heterogeneous composition, plasma opacity has a great impact both on radiative transport and spectroscopic observation of KN. Theoretical models attempting in encoding the opacity of this system often fail, due to the complexity of blending plethora of both light- and heavy-
r
nuclei transition lines, requesting for more complete atomic database. Trapped magneto-plasmas conceived in PANDORA could answer to these requests, allowing experimental in-laboratory measurements of optical properties and opacities, at plasma electron densities and temperatures resembling early-stage plasma ejecta’s conditions, contributing to shed light on
r
-process metallic species abundance at the blue-KN diffusion time. A numerical study has been recently performed, supporting the choice of first physics cases to be investigated and the design of the experimental setup. In this article, we report on the feasibility of metallic plasmas on the basis of the results from the systematic numerical survey on optical spectra computed under non-local thermodynamic equilibrium (NLTE) for several light-
r
nuclei. Results show the great impact of the NLTE regime of laboratory magneto-plasmas on the gray opacity contribution contrasted with those under the astrophysical LTE assumption. A first experimental attempt of reproducing ejecta plasma conditions has been performed on the operative Flexible Plasma Trap (FPT) at the INFN-LNS and here presented, together with first plasma characterization of density and temperature,
via
non-invasive optical emission spectroscopy (OES). The measured plasma parameters have supported numerical simulations to explore optical properties of NLTE gaseous and metallic plasmas, in view of the near-future plasma opacity measurements through spectroscopic techniques. The novel work so far performed on these under-dense and low-temperature magneto-plasmas, opens the route for the first-time to future in-laboratory plasma opacity measurements of metallic plasma species relevant for KN light curve studies.
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