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How structures of various scales formed and evolved from the early Universe up to present time is a fundamental question of astrophysical cosmology. EDGE (Piro et al., ) will trace the cosmic history of the baryons from the early generations of massive stars by Gamma-Ray Burst (GRB) explosions, through the period of galaxy cluster formation, down to the very low redshift Universe, when between a third and one half of the baryons are expected to reside in cosmic filaments undergoing gravitational collapse by dark matter (the so-called warm hot intragalactic medium). In addition EDGE, with its unprecedented capabilities, will provide key results in many important fields. These scientific goals are feasible with a medium class mission using existing technology combined with innovative instrumental and observational capabilities by: (a) observing with fast reaction Gamma-Ray Bursts with a high spectral resolution. This enables the study of their star-forming and host galaxy environments and the use of GRBs as back lights of large scale cosmological structures; (b) observing and surveying extended sources (galaxy clusters, WHIM) with high sensitivity using two wide field of view X-ray telescopes (one with a high angular resolution and the other with a high spectral resolution). The mission concept includes four main instruments: a Wide-field Spectrometer (0.1–2.2 eV) with excellent energy resolution (3 eV at 0.6 keV), a Wide-Field Imager (0.3–6 keV) with high angular resolution (HPD = 15”) constant over the full 1.4 degree field of view, and a Wide Field Monitor (8–200 keV) with a FOV of ¼ of the sky, which will trigger the fast repointing to the GRB. Extension of its energy response up to 1 MeV will be achieved with a GRB detector with no imaging capability. This mission is proposed to ESA as part of the Cosmic Vision call. We will outline the science drivers and describe in more detail the payload of this mission. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ATHENA is a large X-ray observatory, planned to be launched by ESA in 2028 towards an L2 orbit. One of the two instruments of the payload is the X-IFU: a cryogenic spectrometer based on a large array of TES microcalorimeters, able to perform integral field spectrography in the 0.2-12 keV band (2.5 eV FWHM at 6 keV). The X-IFU sensitivity is highly degraded by the particle background expected in the L2 orbit, which is induced by primary protons of both galactic and solar origin, and mostly by secondary electrons. To reduce the particle background level and enable the mission science goals, the instrument incorporates a Cryogenic AntiCoincidence detector (CryoAC). It is a 4 pixel TES based detector, placed < 1 mm below the main array. In this paper we report a scientific assessment of the CryoAC observational capabilities in the hard X-ray band (E > 10 keV). The aim of the study has been to understand if the present detector design can be improved in order to enlarge the X-IFU scientific capability on an energy band wider than the TES array. This is beyond the CryoAC baseline, being this instrument aimed to operate as anticoincidence particle detector and not conceived to perform X-ray observations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]