TAIGA - an advanced hybrid detector complex for astroparticle physics, cosmic ray physics and gamma-ray astronomy

Budnev, Nikolai Mikhailovich; Kuzmichev, L.; Mirzoyan, R.; Astapov, I.; Bezyazeekov, Pavel; Blank, M.; Borodin, A.; Brückner, M.; Bulan, A.; Chiavassa, A.; Dyachok, A. N.; Gafarov, A. R.; Garmash, A.; Grebenyuk, V.; Gress, E.; Gress, O.; Gress, T. I.; Grinyuk, A.; Grishin, O.; Horns, Dieter; Igoshin, A.; L. Ivanova, A.; D. Ivanova, A.; Kalmykov, N.; Kindin, V.; Kiryuhin, S.; Kokoulin, R.; Kompaniets, K.; Korosteleva, E.; Kozhin, V. A.; Kravchenko, E.; Kryukov, Alexander; Lagutin, A.; Lemeshev, Y. E.; Lubsandorzhiev, B.; Lubsandorzhiev, N.; Lukyantsev, D.; Malakhov, S.; Mirgazov, R. R.; Monkhoev, R.; Osipova, E.; Pakhorukov, A.; Pankov, L.; Petrukhin, A.; Poddubnyi, I.; Poleschuk, V.; Ponomareva, V.; Popesku, M.; Popova, E.; Porelli, A.; Postnikov, E.; Prosin, V.; Ptuskin, V.; Pushnin, A.; Raikin, R.; Rubtsov, G.; Ryabov, E. V.; Sagan, Y.; Samoliga, V.; Sabirov, B.; Silaev, A.; Sidorenkov, Andrei; Skurikhin, A. V.; Slunecka, V.; Sokolov, A.; Sulakov, V.; Suvorkin, Y.; Sveshnikova, L.; Tabolenko, V. A.; Tarashchansky, B.; Tkachev, L.; Tluczykont, M.; Tanaev, A.; Ternovoy, M.; Togoo, R.; Ushakov, N.; Vaidyanathan, A.; Volchugov, P.; Voronin, D.; Wischnewski, R.; Zagorodnikov, A.; Zhaglova, A.; Zhurov, D.; Yashin, I.

doi:10.22323/1.395.0731

Abstract

The physical motivations and performance of the TAIGA (Tunka Advanced Instrument for cosmic ray physics and Gamma Astronomy) project are presented. The TAIGA observatory addresses ground-based gamma-ray astronomy at energies from a few TeV to several PeV, as well as cosmic ray physics from 100 TeV to several EeV and astroparticle physics. The pilot TAIGA complex locates in the Tunka valley, ~50 km West from the southern tip of the lake Baikal. It includes integrating air Cherenkov TAIGA-HiSCORE array with 120 wide-angle optical stations distributed over on area 1 square kilometer about and three the 4-m class Imaging Atmospheric Cherenkov Telescopes of the TAIGA-IACT array. The latter array has a shape of triangle with side lengths of about 300m, 400m and 500m. The expected integral sensitivity of the 1 km2 TAIGA detector will be about 2,5 × 10-13 TeV cm-2 sec-1 for detection of E ≥ 100 TeV gamma-rays in 300 hours of source observations. The combination of the wide angle Cherenkov array and IACTs could offer a cost effective-way to build a really large (up to 10 km2) array for very high energy gamma-ray astronomy. The reconstruction of a given EAS energy, incoming direction and the core position, based on the TAIGA-HiSCORE data, allows one to increase the distance between the relatively expensive IACTs up to 600-800 m. These, together with the surface and underground electron/Muon detectors will be used for selection of gamma-ray induced EAS. Present status of the project, together with the current array description and the first experimental results and plans for the future will be reported.