TPC in gamma-ray astronomy above pair-creation threshold

TL;DR

This paper evaluates the performance of a Time Projection Chamber (TPC) as a gamma-ray telescope above pair-creation threshold, demonstrating significant improvements in sensitivity and angular resolution over existing detectors in the MeV to GeV range.

Contribution

It provides analytical and numerical analysis of TPC performance as a gamma-ray telescope, highlighting improvements in sensitivity and angular resolution compared to current technologies.

Findings

TPCs significantly improve sensitivity in the MeV - GeV range.

Gas TPCs can achieve about ten times better angular resolution.

Analytical models are validated with numerical examples.

Abstract

We examine the performance of a TPC as a gamma-ray telescope above the pair-creation threshold. The contributions to the photon angular resolution are studied and their dependence on energy is obtained. The effective area per detector unit mass for such a thin detector is the conversion mass attenuation coefficient. The differential sensitivity for the detection of a point-like source is then derived. Finally, the measurement of track momentum from deflections due to multiple scattering is optimized. These analytical results are exemplified numerically for a few sets of detector parameters. TPCs show an impressive improvement in sensitivity with respect to existing pair-creation-based telescopes in the [MeV - GeV] energy range, even with the modest detector parameters of this study. In addition, gas TPCs allow an improvement in angular resolution of about one order of magnitude.