1. At the Doorway to UHE Cosmic Ray Astronomy—Recent Results from the Pierre Auger Observatory—.
- Author
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Kampert, K.-H.
- Subjects
- *
ASTRONOMICAL observatories , *PARTICLES (Nuclear physics) , *COSMIC rays , *CHERENKOV counters , *LARGE astronomical telescopes - Abstract
The Pierre Auger Observatory has been designed to measure the most energetic particles in nature. It is located on a plateau in the Province of Mendoza, Argentina, and covers an area of 3000 km2. The construction has been completed in June 2008 with more than 1600 water Cherenkov detectors positioned on a 1.5 km hexagonal grid and with 24 large area fluorescence telescopes erected at the perimeter of the array. Data taking has been started in 2004 with only 100 tanks and three telescopes taking data. After briefly sketching the design of the observatory, we shall discuss selected first results covering (i) the energy spectrum of cosmic rays with the observation of a flux suppression starting at the GZK energy-threshold, (ii) upper limits of the photon and neutrino flux, (iii) the chemical composition of cosmic rays, and (iv) studies of anisotropies in the arrival direction of cosmic rays including the observation of directional correlations to nearby AGNs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2008
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