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Performance of the EUSO-Balloon optics

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Abstract

EUSO-Balloon is the first balloon pathfinder of the JEM-EUSO (Joint Experiment Missions - Extreme Universe Space Observatory) framework. It is an ultraviolet (UV) telescope designed to test the key technologies and methods necessary for the indirect detection of Ultra High Energy Cosmic Rays (UHECR) by observing from above the fluorescence emission produced by Extensive Air Showers (EAS) in the 290-430 nm band. The instrument was launched on the 24th of August, 2014 by the French space agency (CNES) from the stratospheric balloon base in Timmins, Canada and performed an 8 hour night time flight. One of the key technologies of EUSO-Balloon is the refractive optical system which consists of two large aspherical Fresnel lenses (≈ 1 m2) and aims at focusing the UV light into a detector plane formed by an array of Multi-Anode Photomultiplying tubes. This work presents a description of the optical system, the test bench and methods used to characterize its performance and the global efficiency. The measured performance can be understood through the addition of a semi-empirical diffusion model to the classic ray-tracing model of the optics.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institut de Recherche en Astrophysique et Planetologie, 9 Av. du Colonel Roche, Toulouse Cedex 4, 31028, France

    A. Díaz Damian, C. Catalano, P. Von Ballmoos, C. Smith, G. Durando & B. Bouvet

  2. RIKEN, 2-1 Hirosawa, Wako-shi, 351-0198, Japan

    N. Sakaki & Y. Takizawa

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  1. A. Díaz Damian
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  2. C. Catalano
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  3. P. Von Ballmoos
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  4. N. Sakaki
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  5. Y. Takizawa
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  6. C. Smith
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  7. G. Durando
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  8. B. Bouvet
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Correspondence to A. Díaz Damian.

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This work was supported by the “Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales” (CNES) [N° 2707] and Mecano ID [N°MID-DIR-16053-RBL-ZNG] joint research grant. The authors would like to acknowledge the JEM-EUSO collaboration members for their support of this study.

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Damian, A.D., Catalano, C., Ballmoos, P.V. et al. Performance of the EUSO-Balloon optics. Exp Astron 48, 245–263 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10686-019-09645-9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10686-019-09645-9

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