Speaker
Description
Observations of ultra-high-energy cosmic rays and astrophysical neutrinos from sub-orbital altitude can be achieved by exploiting the optical emission that extensive air showers produce as they propagate through the atmosphere.
PBR (POEMMA-Balloon with Radio) is a NASA super-pressure balloon mission that builds on this detection principle to study ultra-high-energy cosmic rays and very-high-energy neutrinos. The payload includes a telescope with a hybrid focal surface designed to detect two complementary optical signals: fluorescence light, emitted by extensive air showers (EAS) produced by ultra-high-energy cosmic rays (UHECRs), and Cherenkov light, generated by high-altitude horizontal air showers (HAHAs) induced by cosmic rays, as well as by upward-going EAS produced by Earth skimming neutrinos.
The focal surface consists of a Fluorescence Camera (FC) and a Cherenkov Camera (CC), the latter comprising 2048 SiPM pixels with an active area of 3×3 mm² each, a field of view of 12°×6°, and a spectral range of 320–900 nm. A bifocal optical design was adopted to suppress spurious triggers induced by low-energy direct cosmic ray hits on the focal surface.
The CC front-end electronics are based on the MIZAR ASIC developed by INFN Turin, which provides multi-channel signal processing and on-chip digitization. The ASIC performs local triggering and sends trigger requests to an FPGA responsible for event validation and data readout.
The data acquisition system is designed to operate within the strict power and mass constraints of a balloon-borne platform while ensuring continuous monitoring of the focal plane. The Cherenkov Camera furthermore operates in synergy with radio detectors of the PBR payload, enabling coordinated observations within a multi-messenger framework.
This contribution presents the current development status of the Cherenkov Camera electronics and discusses the expected detection performance for ultra-high-energy cosmic rays and neutrino-induced air showers.