VAMOS: a Pathfinder for the HAWC Gamma-Ray Observatory

A. U. Abeysekara; R. Alfaro; C. Alvarez; J. D. \'Alvarez; F.; \'Angeles; R. Arceo; J. C. Arteaga-Vel\'azquez; A. Avila-Aroche; H. A. Ayala; Solares; C. Badillo; A. S. Barber; B. M. Baughman; N. Bautista-Elivar; J.; Becerra Gonzalez; E. Belmont; E. Ben\'itez; S. Y. BenZvi; D. Berley; A.; Bernal; M. Bonilla Rosales; J. Braun; R. A. Caballero-Lopez; K. S.; Caballero-Mora; I. Cabrera; A. Carrami\~nana; L. Casta\~neda-Mart\'inez; M.; Castillo; U. Cotti; J. Cotzomi; E. de la Fuente; C. De Le\'on; T. DeYoung; A.; Diaz-Azuara; L. Diaz-Cruz; R. Diaz Hernandez; J. C. D\'iaz-V\'elez; B. L.; Dingus; D. Dultzin; M. A. DuVernois; R. W. Ellsworth; A. Fernandez; D. W.; Fiorino; N. Fraija; A. Galindo; G. Garc\'ia-Torales; F. Garfias; A.; Gonz\'alez; L. X. Gonz\'alez; M. M. Gonz\'alez; J. A. Goodman; V. Grabski; M.; Gussert; C. Guzm\'an-Cer\'on; Z. Hampel-Arias; J. P. Harding; L.; Hern\'andez-Cervantes; C. M. Hui; P. H\"untemeyer; A. Imran; A. Iriarte; P.; Karn; D. Kieda; G. J. Kunde; R. Langarica; A. Lara; G. Lara; R. J. Lauer; W.; H. Lee; D. Lennarz; H. Le\'on Vargas; E. C. Linares; J. T. Linnemann; M.; Longo; R. Luna-Garcia; A. Marinelli; L. A. Mart\'inez; H. Mart\'inez; O.; Mart\'inez; J. Mart\'inez-Castro; M. Martos; J. A. J. Matthews; J. McEnery,; E. Mendoza Torres; P. Miranda-Romagnoli; E. Moreno; M. Mostaf\'a; J. Nava; L.; Nellen; M. Newbold; R. Noriega-Papaqui; T. Oceguera-Becerra; D. P. Page; B.; Patricelli; R. Pelayo; E. G. P\'erez-P\'erez; J. Pretz; I. Ram\'irez; A.; Renter; C. Rivi\`ere; D. Rosa-Gonz\'alez; F. Ruiz-Sala; E. L. Ruiz-Velasco,; J. Ryan; J. R. Sacahui; H. Salazar; F. Salesa; A. Sandoval; E. Santos; M.; Schneider; S. Silich; G. Sinnis; A. J. Smith; K. Sparks Woodle; R. W.; Springer; F. Suarez; I. Taboada; A. Tepe; P. A. Toale; K. Tollefson; I.; Torres; S. Tinoco; T. N. Ukwatta; J. F. Vald\'es Galicia; P. Vanegas; A.; V\'azquez; L. Villase\~nor; W. Wall; T. Weisgarber; S. Westerhoff; I. G.; Wisher; J. Wood; G. B. Yodh; P. W. Younk; D. Zaborov; A. Zepeda; H. Zhou

arXiv:1408.3477·astro-ph.IM·June 22, 2015

VAMOS: a Pathfinder for the HAWC Gamma-Ray Observatory

A. U. Abeysekara, R. Alfaro, C. Alvarez, J. D. \'Alvarez, F., \'Angeles, R. Arceo, J. C. Arteaga-Vel\'azquez, A. Avila-Aroche, H. A. Ayala, Solares, C. Badillo, A. S. Barber, B. M. Baughman, N. Bautista-Elivar, J., Becerra Gonzalez, E. Belmont, E. Ben\'itez, S. Y. BenZvi

PDF

TL;DR

VAMOS served as a prototype for the HAWC observatory, validating design and data acquisition methods, and analyzing cosmic events like Forbush decreases and gamma-ray bursts at high energies.

Contribution

This paper presents the design, construction, and operation of VAMOS, a prototype that informed the development of the HAWC gamma-ray observatory and demonstrated its scientific capabilities.

Findings

01

Detector response to Forbush decrease analyzed

02

Possible high-energy emission from gamma-ray bursts studied

03

Operational insights for HAWC development obtained

Abstract

VAMOS was a prototype detector built in 2011 at an altitude of 4100m a.s.l. in the state of Puebla, Mexico. The aim of VAMOS was to finalize the design, construction techniques and data acquisition system of the HAWC observatory. HAWC is an air-shower array currently under construction at the same site of VAMOS with the purpose to study the TeV sky. The VAMOS setup included six water Cherenkov detectors and two different data acquisition systems. It was in operation between October 2011 and May 2012 with an average live time of 30%. Besides the scientific verification purposes, the eight months of data were used to obtain the results presented in this paper: the detector response to the Forbush decrease of March 2012, and the analysis of possible emission, at energies above 30 GeV, for long gamma-ray bursts GRB111016B and GRB120328B.

Peer Reviews

No public reviews on file for this paper yet. If you reviewed it on a platform where reviews are public (OpenReview, ICLR, NeurIPS, ICML), you can paste yours below so the community can read it here.

Videos

No videos yet. Explain this paper in a talk, walkthrough, or lecture? Add one.