Detection of the Crab Nebula with the 9.7 m Prototype Schwarzschild-Couder Telescope

TL;DR

This paper reports the successful detection of gamma-ray emission from the Crab Nebula using the prototype Schwarzschild-Couder Telescope, demonstrating its capability for high-resolution gamma-ray astronomy.

Contribution

It presents the first observational campaign with the 9.7 m prototype SCT and confirms its effectiveness in gamma-ray detection.

Findings

Crab Nebula detected with 8.6 sigma significance

First observational campaign of the prototype SCT

Validates the dual-mirror optical design for gamma-ray astronomy

Abstract

The Schwarzschild-Couder Telescope (SCT) is a telescope concept proposed for the Cherenkov Telescope Array. It employs a dual-mirror optical design to remove comatic aberrations over an $8^{\circ}$ field of view, and a high-density silicon photomultiplier camera (with a pixel resolution of 4 arcmin) to record Cherenkov emission from cosmic ray and gamma-ray initiated particle cascades in the atmosphere. The prototype SCT (pSCT), comprising a 9.7 m diameter primary mirror and a partially instrumented camera with 1536 pixels, has been constructed at the Fred Lawrence Whipple Observatory. The telescope was inaugurated in January 2019, with commissioning continuing throughout 2019. We describe the first campaign of observations with the pSCT, conducted in January and February of 2020, and demonstrate the detection of gamma-ray emission from the Crab Nebula with a statistical significance of $8.6\sigma$.