Speaker
Description
ALPACA is a project to construct an air shower array near the Chacaltaya mountain at an altitude of 4,740m in Bolivia. A 83,000 m^2 surface area is covered by 400 scintillating counters of 100cmx100cmx5cm (thick). In addition to this conventional surface array, underground muon detectors covering total 4,000 m^2 allow clear identification of muon components in air showers. Using this array ALPACA will explore sub-PeV gamma-ray sky first time in the Southern hemisphere. The prime target of ALPACA is to reveal PeV cosmic-ray accelerators presumably existing in the galactic plane, including the galactic center. In early 2021, a prototype array ALPAQUITA consisting of 97 surface counters and 1000 m^2 muon detectors is under construction and planned to start data taking in 2021. The next extension to the 200 counters and 4000 m^2 muon detectors named half ALPACA is scheduled in 2022. In this contribution, a general introduction to ALPACA, the current status of ALPAQUITA with its infrastructure, and extension plan after 2022 are presented.
Keywords
Air shower array, gamma-ray astronomy, sub-PeV gamma ray, galactic sources
| Subcategory | Experimental Methods & Instrumentation |
|---|---|
| Collaboration | other (fill field below) |
| other Collaboration | ALPACA |
