The Fermi Large Area Telescope - Towards the (first) 10 years in orbit

The Fermi Large
Area Telescope
Towards the (first)
10 years in orbit
Luca Baldini
Università di Pisa and INFN–Sezione di
Pisa
luca.baldini@pi.infn.it
Pisa, September 25, 2014
Prelude: the Fermi Observatory
Large Area Telescope (LAT)
I Pair conversion telescope.
I Energy range: 20 MeV–> 300 GeV
I Large field of view (≈ 2.4 sr): 20% of
the sky at any time, all parts of the sky
for 30 minutes every 3 hours.
I Long observation time: 5 years
minimum lifetime, 10 years planned,
85% duty cycle.
Gamma-ray Burst Monitor (GBM)
I 12 NaI and 2 BGO detectors.
I Energy range: 8 keV–40 MeV.
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
Pisa, September 25, 2014
2 / 19
Fermi status and timeline
SR 2012
SR 2014
Prime phase
2008
2009
2010
2011
Extended phase
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
Year
0
10000
20000
# orbits
30000
×10
Distance traveled [km]
×10
# triggers
×10
# events downlinked
×10
# events @ FSSC
×10
# γ -ray candidates
6
0
500
1000
9
0
50
100
150
200
250
300
350
9
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
6
0
500
1000
1500
2000
6
0
0
0
50
25
10
100
50
20
75
150
0
10
5 0
12 15
30
200
5
17
40
250
0
20
300
5
25
50
60 70 80
22
0
5
27
# ATELs
# GCNs
Baseline: operate through FY 2018 (i.e., 10 years) TBR in 2016.
Full SR reports @ http://science.nasa.gov/astrophysics/documents/
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
Pisa, September 25, 2014
3 / 19
The Fermi science menu in a nutshell
A remarkably wide dynamic range
SNR
CRE
EGB
GRB
10-2
10-1
1
3
102
10
5
104
10
6
10
10
Energy [MeV]
GRB extended
GRB prompt
TGF
Solar flares
Pulsar periods
AGN flares
Binary systems
Pulsar substr.
-5
-3
-4
10
10
10
-2
10
-1
10
1
10
2
10
3
10
5
4
10
10
6
10
8
107
10
Time [s]
Sun
GRB
Moon
AGN
Earth limb
Galactic
TGF
CRE
6
10
8
10
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
10
10
12
10
14
10
16
10
18
10
Pisa, September 25, 2014
20
10
1022
1024
26
10
Distance [m]
4 / 19
Dark matter constraints from dSph
Ackermann et al., PRD 89, 42001 (2014)
I
Dwarf Spheroidal Galaxies among the cleanest targets for indirect
DM searches:
I
I
I
largely DM-dominated objects;
do not expect significant γ-ray emission through conventional
channels.
Stringent DM limits based on a combined analysis of 25 dSph.
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
Pisa, September 25, 2014
5 / 19
The Fermi bubbles
Ackermann et al., ApJ 793, 64 (2014)
I
I
First discovered by Su, Finkbeiner & Slatyer in 2010.
First Fermi-LAT publication on the topic.
I
I
I
Hard spectrum with cutoff at ∼ 110 GeV.
I
I
I
I
Based on 50 months of data.
Modeling of the diffuse emission is the foremost challenge.
No spectral variations in latitude stripes.
No energy dependence of the overall morphology.
Excess emission in the the South-East; no evidence for a jet.
Leptonic and hadronic interpretation of gamma-ray data possible.
I
Assuming association with microwave haze prefers leptonic models.
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
Pisa, September 25, 2014
6 / 19
The IGRB and EGB
(Re)Submitted to ApJ
I
Updated LAT measurement of IGRB spectrum.
I
I
I
I
50 months of data, dedicated event selection(s).
Extended energy range: 200 MeV–100 GeV → 100 MeV–820 GeV.
Roughly ∼ 1/2 of total EGB intensity above 100 GeV now resolved
into individual sources.
Significant high-energy cutoff feature around ∼ 250 GeV.
I
I
Consistent with simple source populations attenuated by EBL.
Reality might be more complex, with multiple populations
contributing.
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
Pisa, September 25, 2014
7 / 19
The 3FGL
Coming soon, and heading toward ∼ 3000 sources
I
4 years of reprocessed LAT data above 100 MeV:
I
I
I
vs. 2 years of (un-reprocessed) data for the 2FGL.
Front/Back handled separately (different isotropic and Earth limb).
More data and improved performance (due to reprocessing):
I
Better localization on average (error radius ∼ 15% smaller outside
the Galactic plane).
I
Improved interstellar model of Galactic diffuse (e.g., Fermi bubbles):
I
Association process improved.
I
I
Lower overall detection threshold.
Dedicated multiwavelength follow-up, new surveys.
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
Pisa, September 25, 2014
8 / 19
Prospects for the extended mission
Beating the square root of time
I
Time-domain astronomy (GRB, AGN, Solar Flares, TGFs, novæ).
I
I
I
Steady sources.
I
I
Large acceptance and FOV, all-sky coverage and long integration
time are key.
Fermi plays a prominent role, in synergy with other instruments and
observatories.
High-energy limiting sensitivity comes from photon counting
statistics (rather than the background).
Many specific LAT analyses rely on external inputs:
I
I
I
radio timing solutions for pulsar searches;
targets for indirect DM searches (e.g., dwarf spheroidal galaxies);
maps for modeling the gamma-ray diffuse emission (e.g., Planck).
I
Long-baseline measurements.
I
And Pass 8 (see next slides).
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
Pisa, September 25, 2014
9 / 19
Pass 8
Cover image: a 540 GeV simulated gamma ray
z
x
I
Long-term effort aimed at a comprehensive revision of the entire
LAT event-level analysis.
I
I
I
Simulation, reconstruction, background rejection, analysis methods.
Goals: extending the energy reach, maximizing the S/N, reducing
the systematic uncertainties.
Basic analysis components ready, now entering science validation.
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
Pisa, September 25, 2014
10 / 19
na
mi
eli
Pr
2
ry
1.5
P8_SOURCE prototype
P7REP_SOURCE_V15
1
Ratio (P8/P7)
0.5
0
Energy [MeV]
10
1
103
102
104
105
Containment angle [°]
3
2.5
Ratio (P7/P8)
Acceptance [m2 sr]
IRFs: Future vs. present
P7REP_SOURCE_V15 (on-axis 95%)
P8_SOURCE prototype (on-axis 95%)
P7REP_SOURCE_V15 (on-axis 68%)
P8_SOURCE prototype (on-axis 68%)
10
1
10
2
1.5
1
0.5
Pr
ry
na
mi
eli
-1
Energy [MeV]
102
103
Energy [MeV]
I
104
105
Energy [MeV]
Larger acceptance (effective area and field of view) at all energies.
I
Most notably below 100 MeV (×2 at 100 MeV and ×10 at 30 MeV)
I
Performing spectral analysis down to such low energies presents
significant challenges (e.g., energy dispersion).
I
Pass 8 will double the number of photons detected by the LAT
above 30 MeV.
I
Narrower PSF at moderate-to-high energies, with reduced tails.
I
I
I
For both archival data and future observations.
Can improve PSF further by tightening event selections.
Preliminary indications that an in-flight correction is not needed.
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
Pisa, September 25, 2014
11 / 19
Pass 8 at high energy
Energy [GeV]
New high-energy photons from GRBs
GRBs (Pass 6 and Pass 8)
GRBs (new in Pass 8)
BLLacs
FSRQs
102
Predicted optical depth (τ = 1)
for various EBL models
10
0.5
1
1.5
2
2.5
3
3.5
4
4.5
5
Redshift
I
∼ 20% acceptance increase at high energy.
I
I
I
I
And relatively (much) larger at large off-axis angles.
Re-analysis of the prompt phase of GRBs with measured redshift in
the first LAT GRB catalog.
Really testing the new event reconstruction.
4 photons above 10 GeV (previously discarded) recovered in Pass 8.
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
Pisa, September 25, 2014
12 / 19
Pass 8 at low energy
Crab (30-60 MeV)
P8_SOURCE prototype
nsource = 23480, H = 6097
ry
na
mi
eli
Pr
Pulse phase
P7REP_SOURCE_V15
nsource = 4049, H = 1489
Counts/bin
450
400
350
300
250
200
250
200
150
100
50
0
800
700
600
500
400
300
200
600
500
400
300
200
100
0
0
Pulse phase
P7REP_SOURCE_V15
nsource = 8961, H = 6307
15
10
GRB100826A
(30-60 MeV)
Preliminary
P8_TRANSIENT prototype
nevts = 81
GRB100826A
(60-100 MeV)
Preliminary
P8_TRANSIENT
Time sinceprototype
trigger
nevts = 18
P7REP_TRANSIENT_V15
nevts = 16
5
phase
P8_SOURCEPulse
prototype
nsource = 27941, H = 18444
Crab (60-100 MeV)
ry
na
mi
eli
Pr
Counts/bin
Counts/bin Counts/bin Counts/bin
Counts/bin
Periodic and transient sources
0
5
4
3
[s]
P7REP_TRANSIENT_V15
nevts = 9
2
1
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
1
1.2
1.4
1.6
1.8
2
0
-300
-200
-100
0
Pulse phase
100
200
I
Substantially improved sensitivity for pulsar searches:
I
Substantially improved sensitivity for time-domain astronomy:
I
I
300
Time since trigger [s]
blind and epoch-folding pulsar searches.
transient searches (e.g., GRB).
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
Pisa, September 25, 2014
13 / 19
More Pass 8 at low energy
Counts/bin
Solar flares
10
SFR2010-06-12
8
Preliminary
P8_SFR prototype
P7_REP_TRANSIENT_V15
6
4
2
0
-100
-80
-60
-40
-20
0
20
40
60
80
100
Time since flare (sec)
I
Dedicated event selection for Solar Flares:
I
I
alleviate the effect of X-ray pile up in the impulsive phase;
increase the number of flare for localization studies.
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
Pisa, September 25, 2014
14 / 19
Looking after Fermi
Spaced-based gamma-ray astronomy
I
The Fermi LAT has its sweet spot between ∼ 1 and ∼ 10 GeV.
I
I
The high-energy frontier:
I
I
I
several projects being actively developed: CALET, DAMPE,
Gamma-400, HERD (in order of appearance);
all of them are gamma-ray and cosmic-ray instruments.
Here we should keep in mind our ground-based big cousins!
I
I
Hard to do significantly better there without an instrument
significantly bigger.
Both the current generation of IACTs and the forthcoming CTA.
The low-energy frontier:
I
several concepts, both in the Compton and in the pair-production
regime: AdEPT, COMPAIR, GammaCube, GAMMA-LIGHT,
HARPO, LArGO, PANGU (in alphabetical order).
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
Pisa, September 25, 2014
15 / 19
Primary protons
AMS01 (Aguilar et al. 2002)
Pamela (Adriani et al. 2011)
ATIC-2 (Panov et al. 2006)
CREAM (Yoon et al. 2011)
104
103
102
Primary positrons
Pamela (Adriani et al. 2008)
10
103
102
1
-2
10-1
10
10
10-2
10-3
10-4
10-5
1 particle/hour
Gamma-ray all-sky intensity
Fermi LAT (unpublished)
1 particle/day
Gamma-ray extragalactic diffuse
Fermi LAT (Abdo et al. 2010)
10-3
10-4
10-5
1 particle/month
1
10
102
103
Rigidity (GV) or Energy (GeV)
10-6
Statistics is the main limiting factor!
Is high-energy gamma-ray astronomy really IACT playground?
I
I
104
10
1
10-1
I
105
-1
10-6
I
Primary electrons
AMS01 (Aguilar et al. 2002)
Pamela (Adriani et al. 2011)
Fermi LAT (Abdo et al. 2010)
H.E.S.S. (Aharonian et al. 2008)
Integral rate of particles crossing the LAT (Hz)
Integral flux above a given energy (m -2 s-1 sr -1)
High energy: acceptance
Possibly not, e.g., wide FOV sky monitoring and diffuse emission.
Most future instruments putting emphasis on the energy resolution,
instead.
I
(And most of them smaller than the Fermi LAT.)
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
Pisa, September 25, 2014
16 / 19
0
0.
25
50
0.
LAT
0.
00
10
2.
00
1.
Energy resolution [%]
0.
12
An example: Line-search sensitivity
Gamma-400 (CC)
4.
00
CALET
DAMPE
Gamma-400
HERD
8.
00
1
1
102
10
Exposure factor [m2 sr year]
I
The basic figure of merit Q is
ns
Q=√ ∝
nb
I
s
E
.
σE /E
Better energy resolution is obviously beneficial.
I
But the sensitivity is really a trade-off between exposure and energy
resolution.
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
Pisa, September 25, 2014
17 / 19
PSF 68% containmnent [°]
Low energy: point-spread function
10
Fermi-LAT (back)
Fermi-LAT (total)
Fermi-LAT (front)
Kinematic limit
1
10-1
10-2
10-1
1
10
102
Energy [GeV]
I
Can we get closer to the limit dictated by nuclear recoil?
I
I
I
I
I
Silicon only, no converters (GAMMA-LIGHT, COMPAIR).
Go to gas/liquid (AdEPT, HARPO, LArGO).
Measure single-track energies (PANGU).
What about ∼ 1 m3 of scintillator (GammaCube)?
At low energy statistics is not so much of an issue.
I
Trading acceptance for PSF can be advantageous.
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
Pisa, September 25, 2014
18 / 19
Conclusions
I
Fermi has been operating in space flawlessly for more than six years.
I
I
I
No sign of performance degradation.
On track for the original goal of a ten year mission.
More results to come in the next few years.
I
And more than one would expect just based on the deeper exposure.
I
Path forward for space-based gamma-ray astronomy not as clear as
for the ground-based instruments. . .
I
. . . but definitely a lot of margin for improvements and many clever
ideas around.
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
Pisa, September 25, 2014
19 / 19
Spare slides
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
Pisa, September 25, 2014
Spare slides
√
Faster than the
t: steady sources
—Low energy
—High energy
Bkg. dominated
√
∝ t
Photon counting
nearly ∝ t
I
Envelope of the minimum detectable power-law spectra over the full
band, varying the spectral index.
I
I
(i.e, not a differential sensitivity plot.)
High-energy limiting sensitivity comes from photon counting
statistics (rather than the background).
I
Increase nearly linear with time, rather than
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
Pisa, September 25, 2014
√
t.
Spare slides
Something fading out. . .
The 130 GeV line, see arXiv:1303.1798
Expected for signal (1–2σ)
Data
Expected for pure noise (1–2σ)
Fix signal hypothesis
I
Weniger’s updated results are consistent with the results from the
recent LAT line-search paper.
I
I
Likely that the original putative line signal was a statistical
fluctuation.
More data and Pass 8 will hopefully give the final word.
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
Pisa, September 25, 2014
Spare slides
And a continuing challenge
DM from the Galactic center? arXiv:1402.6703
I
I
I
“The Characterization of the Gamma-Ray Signal from the Central
Milky Way: A Compelling Case for Annihilating Dark Matter”
Example of a clever analysis of public LAT data performed outside
the collaboration.
The Inner Galaxy is notoriously a very complicated region.
I
I
Modeling the diffuse emission is the foremost challenge.
The LAT collaboration is targeting a presentation (and paper) for
the Fermi Symposium in October.
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
Pisa, September 25, 2014
Spare slides
60
θ68 = 0.15°
10
40
20
0
1
-20
-40
-60
-80
PSF 68% containment [°]
80
Integral flux > 10 GeV within θ68 [m-2 year-1]
Latitude [°]
DGE: interplay between aeff and PSF
10
Tobs = 10 years
PSF-limited
E0 =
100 G
eV
1
E0 =
10
GeV
LAT
10-1
Statistics-limited
10-1
-150
-100
-50
0
50
100
150
Longitude [°]
Luca Baldini (UNIPI and INFN–Pisa)
10-1
Pisa, September 25, 2014
1
10
Acceptance [m2 sr]
Spare slides