PAMELA is a satellite-borne experiment designed and optimized to measure with high precision the antiproton and positron components of the cosmic radiation. The relative low abundance of antiparticles respect to the dominant proton flux makes necessary a deep understanding of any source of uncertainty which can affect the delicate spectrum measurement. In particular, the contamination from negatively charged pions originated in interactions of cosmic ray protons with the upper parts of the payload represents the main uncertainty in antiprotons measurements between about 1¥10 GeV , where the combined information from the several PAMELA subdetectors are not sufficient to allow an unequivocal pion-antiproton discrimination. The residual pion background has been evaluated by means of a dedicated simulation, developed to reproduce flight conditions with very high accuracy.
Estimate of the pion contamination in the PAMELA antiproton measurements / Bruno, A.; Adriani, O.; Barbarino, G.C.; Bazilevskaya, G.A.; Bellottik, R.; Boezio, M.; Bogomolov, E.A.; Bonechi, L.; Bongi, M.; Bonvicini, V.; Bottai, S.; Cafagna, F.; Campana, D.; Carlson, P.; Casolino, M.; Castellini, G.; De Santis, C.; De Simone, N. De Pascale; De Rosa, G.; Di Felice, V.; Galper, A.M.; Grishantseva, L.; Hofverberg, P.; Koldashov, S.V.; Krutkov, S.Y.; Kvashnin, A.N.; Leonov, A.; Marcelli, L.; Menn, W.; Mikhailov, V.V.; Mocchiutti, E.; Nikonov, N.; Osteria, G.; Papini, P.; Peroni, M.; Pearce, M.; Picozza, P.; Ricci, M.; Ricciarini, S.B.; Simon, M.; Sparvoli, R.; Spillantini, P.; Stozhkov, Y.I.; Vacchi, A.; Vannuccini, E.; Vasilyev, G.; Voronov, S.A.; Yurkin, Y.T.; Zampa, G.; Zampa, N.; Zverev, V.G.. - ELETTRONICO. - (2009), pp. 1-4. (Intervento presentato al convegno 31st International Cosmic Ray Conference, ICRC 2009 tenutosi a Lodz, pol nel 2009).
Estimate of the pion contamination in the PAMELA antiproton measurements
ADRIANI, OSCAR;BONGI, MASSIMO;
2009
Abstract
PAMELA is a satellite-borne experiment designed and optimized to measure with high precision the antiproton and positron components of the cosmic radiation. The relative low abundance of antiparticles respect to the dominant proton flux makes necessary a deep understanding of any source of uncertainty which can affect the delicate spectrum measurement. In particular, the contamination from negatively charged pions originated in interactions of cosmic ray protons with the upper parts of the payload represents the main uncertainty in antiprotons measurements between about 1¥10 GeV , where the combined information from the several PAMELA subdetectors are not sufficient to allow an unequivocal pion-antiproton discrimination. The residual pion background has been evaluated by means of a dedicated simulation, developed to reproduce flight conditions with very high accuracy.
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