Bottom-up Background Simulations of the 2016 COSI Balloon Flight

Fuente: arXiv
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Hauptverfasser: Gallego, Savitri, Oberlack, Uwe, Lommler, Jan, Karwin, Christopher M., Zoglauer, Andreas, Jean, Pierre, von Ballmoos, Peter, Kierans, Carolyn, Sleator, Clio, Tomsick, John A., Boggs, Steven E.
Format: Preprint
Veröffentlicht: 2025
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author Gallego, Savitri
Oberlack, Uwe
Lommler, Jan
Karwin, Christopher M.
Zoglauer, Andreas
Jean, Pierre
von Ballmoos, Peter
Kierans, Carolyn
Sleator, Clio
Tomsick, John A.
Boggs, Steven E.
author_facet Gallego, Savitri
Oberlack, Uwe
Lommler, Jan
Karwin, Christopher M.
Zoglauer, Andreas
Jean, Pierre
von Ballmoos, Peter
Kierans, Carolyn
Sleator, Clio
Tomsick, John A.
Boggs, Steven E.
contents The Compton Spectrometer and Imager (COSI) is a Compton telescope designed to survey the 0.2-5 MeV sky, consisting of a compact array of cross-strip germanium detectors. As part of its development, in 2016 COSI had a successful 46 day flight on board NASA's Super Pressure Balloon platform. This was a precursor to the COSI Small Explorer (COSI-SMEX) satellite mission that will launch in 2027 into a equatorial low Earth (530 km) orbit. The observation of MeV gamma-rays is dominated by background radiation, especially due to the activation of the detector materials induced by cosmic-ray interactions. Thus, background simulation and identification are crucial for the data analysis. Because the COSI-SMEX detectors will be similar to the ones used for the balloon flight, the balloon measurements provide an important tool for testing and cross-checking our background simulations for the upcoming space mission. In this work we perform Monte Carlo simulations of the background emission from the 2016 COSI balloon flight. Including a phenomenological shape correction, we obtain an agreement with the data at the 10-20% level for energies between 0.1-1.6 MeV, and we successfully reproduce most of the activation lines induced by cosmic ray interactions.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2503_02493
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Bottom-up Background Simulations of the 2016 COSI Balloon Flight
Gallego, Savitri
Oberlack, Uwe
Lommler, Jan
Karwin, Christopher M.
Zoglauer, Andreas
Jean, Pierre
von Ballmoos, Peter
Kierans, Carolyn
Sleator, Clio
Tomsick, John A.
Boggs, Steven E.
Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics
The Compton Spectrometer and Imager (COSI) is a Compton telescope designed to survey the 0.2-5 MeV sky, consisting of a compact array of cross-strip germanium detectors. As part of its development, in 2016 COSI had a successful 46 day flight on board NASA's Super Pressure Balloon platform. This was a precursor to the COSI Small Explorer (COSI-SMEX) satellite mission that will launch in 2027 into a equatorial low Earth (530 km) orbit. The observation of MeV gamma-rays is dominated by background radiation, especially due to the activation of the detector materials induced by cosmic-ray interactions. Thus, background simulation and identification are crucial for the data analysis. Because the COSI-SMEX detectors will be similar to the ones used for the balloon flight, the balloon measurements provide an important tool for testing and cross-checking our background simulations for the upcoming space mission. In this work we perform Monte Carlo simulations of the background emission from the 2016 COSI balloon flight. Including a phenomenological shape correction, we obtain an agreement with the data at the 10-20% level for energies between 0.1-1.6 MeV, and we successfully reproduce most of the activation lines induced by cosmic ray interactions.
title Bottom-up Background Simulations of the 2016 COSI Balloon Flight
topic Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2503.02493