MAGIC (telescope)

The two MAGIC telescopes (English: Major Atmospheric Gamma - Ray Imaging Cherenkov Telescopes ) are the world's biggest air - Cherenkov telescopes. They stand at the Roque de los Muchachos in over 2200 m altitude on the Canary island of La Palma. As part of the Roque- de-los Muchachos observatory are located in its vicinity a number of other telescopes, including the predecessor experiment HEGRA. The first MAGIC telescope ( MAGIC today I) was commissioned in 2004. Since 2009 works in the immediate vicinity of the sister telescope MAGIC II

Magics instruments are able to observe cosmic gamma radiation in the range between 30 GeV and 30 TeV indirectly. You hereby close the gap between the large ground-based gamma-ray telescopes (detection range above 300 GeV ) and the satellites, which are used for the detection of gamma radiation between a few keV and a few GeV. Gamma radiation in this range is usually issued by rotating black holes and neutron stars. The observation of dark matter particles is here in the realm of possibility.

MAGIC detected in the gamma particles triggered by cosmic particle showers in the atmosphere, the so-called Cherenkov light. Using the different shape of these Cherenkov flashes of only a few milliseconds duration gamma particles and other triggering particles can be distinguished. The cameras of MAGIC are able to detect single Cherenkov photons.

Objectives

The MAGIC project is to investigate the order, a number of objectives:

  • Active galactic nuclei ( AGN Active Galactic Nuclei )
  • Supernova remnants
  • Various unidentified sources with lower energy
  • GRBs (Gamma Ray Bursts )

Specifications

Most of the instruments used were some time ago not yet available and have been developed in part specifically for MAGIC. Particular detection methods are used that have been so far used mainly in Teilchenbeschleunigerexperimenten. This refers particularly effective components of the network, computer, electronic, and data processing needed to handle the very large amounts of data to some extent.

Key figures for the individual MAGIC telescope

  • Active mirror surface 239 m2, consisting of 50 cm × 50 cm aluminum mirrors
  • Lightweight and stable structure made ​​of carbon fiber
  • Detector with a diameter of 1.05 m
  • Suspension of the detector with thin cables and in an aluminum frame
  • Data transmission from the detector via fiber optic
  • Detector as light as possible, containing only amp and laser control
  • Digitalised with an AD converter with a sampling rate of 2 GHz
  • Mass of the entire telescope approximately 40,000 kg
  • Reaction time 20 seconds, at which the telescope can be aligned with each point in the sky

Detector

The detector is composed of a circular area containing at the center of 396 individual hexagonal detection areas each 2.54 cm in diameter, which are then surrounded by the detection surface 180 with a diameter of 3.81 cm. The detector surfaces consist of photomultipliers, respectively.

Improvement by MAGIC II

Add 85 m to the MAGIC Telescope another Cherenkov telescope ( MAGIC II) was built by June 2009. It is identical with MAGIC I, except for the aluminum reflectors. These have 1 m side length and therefore have four times the area. The aim of this extension is to improve the low photon yield of low energy showers. The parallel observation of air showers with two telescopes, the detection limit of Cherenkov flashes is improved by a factor of 3, which also weaker gamma-ray sources can be detected.

Members of the co-

At the MAGIC telescope project various institutions and groups working together:

  • Instituto de Astrofisica de Andalucia, Granada
  • Institut de Física d' Altes Energies, Barcelona
  • Autonomous University of Barcelona
  • University of Barcelona
  • Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias
  • INAF - National Institute for Astrophysics, Rome
  • Croatian MAGIC consortium, Zagreb
  • Deutsches Elektronen -Synchrotron (DESY) Zeuthen
  • Technical University of Dortmund
  • Institut de ciencies de l' Espai ( IEEC - CSIC), Bellaterra, Spain
  • Division of Experimental Physics, University of Lodz
  • Complutense University of Madrid, Madrid
  • Max Planck Institute for Physics, Munich
  • Dipartimento di Fisica, University of Padova and INFN sez. di Padova, Italy
  • Dipartimento di Fisica, University of Siena and INFN sez. di Pisa, Italy
  • Institute for Nuclear Research and Nuclear Energy, Sofia
  • Tuorla Observatory, Pikkiö, Finland
  • Dipartimento di Fisica - University of Udine and INFN Trieste, Italy
  • University of Würzburg
  • Institute for Particle Physics, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich
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