Long-term monitoring of blazars with dedicated Cherenkov telescopes? the DWARF network and the FACT telescope
Michael Backes
Technical University Dortmund
With the latest generation of imaging atmospheric Cherenkov telescopes
(IACTs), i.e. H.E.S.S., MAGIC, and VERITAS, the research field of very high
energy (VHE) gamma-ray astronomy has made a huge progress. A vast increase
in the instruments' sensitivity and, at the same time, a significant
lowering the energy threshold compared to their predecessors made it
possible to enhance the number of detected extragalactic sources from seven
to about fifty. Obviously, these telescopes are overbooked with discovery
observations at their sensitivity limit and hardly any time can be spent on
monitoring the long-term behavior of the strongest sources. Orthogonally
to this approach, we started to set up a global network of several small
IACTs for long-term monitoring of the TeV-brightest blazars, the Dedicated
Worldwide AGN Research Facility (DWARF). The first telescope which has
been built to be part of the DWARF network is a completely refurbished
former HEGRA telescope located on the Canary island of La Palma, the
First G-APD Cherenkov Telescope (FACT). Moreover, FACT is the very first
IACT that is equipped with a camera completely based on semi-conductors
(G-APDs) as photo sensors, making it a pathfinder experiment for future
Cherenkov telescopes like CTA.
In this talk, I will review the physical motivation of blazar monitoring,
give an overview of the status and perspectives of DWARF and outline the
technical aspects and first results of FACT.
Date: | Lundi, le 7 mai 2012 |
Heure: | 14:30 |
Lieu: | Université McGill |
| Ernest Rutherford Physics Building, R.E. Bell Conference Room (room 103) |
Contact: | Robert Rutledge |
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