The GCT camera for the Cherenkov Telescope Array

TL;DR

The GCT camera for the Cherenkov Telescope Array is a compact, high-performance, cost-effective camera with a wide field-of-view, enabling advanced gamma-ray observations with the CTA.

Contribution

This paper introduces the design and first prototype of the GCT camera, a novel compact camera with dual-mirror optics for the CTA's Small-Sized Telescopes.

Findings

First Cherenkov images recorded by a Schwarzschild-Couder telescope

Successful commissioning of the CHEC-M prototype in 2015

Demonstrated wide field-of-view and waveform capabilities

Abstract

The Gamma-ray Cherenkov Telescope (GCT) is proposed for the Small-Sized Telescope component of the Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA). GCT's dual-mirror Schwarzschild-Couder (SC) optical system allows the use of a compact camera with small form-factor photosensors. The GCT camera is ~0.4 m in diameter and has 2048 pixels; each pixel has a ~0.2 degree angular size, resulting in a wide field-of-view. The design of the GCT camera is high performance at low cost, with the camera housing 32 front-end electronics modules providing full waveform information for all of the camera's 2048 pixels. The first GCT camera prototype, CHEC-M, was commissioned during 2015, culminating in the first Cherenkov images recorded by a SC telescope and the first light of a CTA prototype. In this contribution we give a detailed description of the GCT camera and present preliminary results from CHEC-M's commissioning.