2012
Concept of a small satellite for sub-MeV & MeV all sky survey: the CAST mission
SPACE TELESCOPES AND INSTRUMENTATION 2012: ULTRAVIOLET TO GAMMA RAY
- Volume
- 8443
- Number
- Language
- English
- Publishing type
- Research paper (international conference proceedings)
- DOI
- 10.1117/12.926164
- Publisher
- SPIE-INT SOC OPTICAL ENGINEERING
MeV and sub-MeV energy band from similar to 200 keV to similar to 2 MeV contains rich information of high-energy phenomena in the universe. The CAST (Compton Telescope for Astro and Solar Terrestrial) mission is planned to be launched at the end of 2010s, and aims at providing all-sky map in this energy-band for the first time. It is made of a semiconductor Compton telescope utilizing Si as a scatterer and CdTe as an absorber. CAST provides all-sky sub-MeV polarization map for the first time, as well. The Compton telescope technology is based on the design used in the Soft Gamma-ray Detector (SGD) onboard ASTRO-H, characterized by its tightly stacked semiconductor layers to obtain high Compton reconstruction efficiency. The CAST mission is currently planned as a candidate for the small scientific satellite series in ISAS/JAXA, weighting about 500 kg in total. Scalable detector design enables us to consider other options as well. Scientific outcome of CAST is wide. It will provide new information from high-energy sources, such as AGN and/or its jets, supernova remnants, magnetors, black-hole and neutron-star binaries and others. Polarization map will tell us about activities of jets and reflections in these sources, as well. In addition, CAST will simultaneously observe the Sun, and depending on its attitude, the Earth.
- Link information
- ID information
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- DOI : 10.1117/12.926164
- ISSN : 0277-786X
- eISSN : 1996-756X
- Web of Science ID : WOS:000312391600011