Science with Future Gamma-Ray Detectors

Name: Dingus, Brenda
Affiliation: LANL
Email: dingus@lanl.gov
Sent: Thursday, March 09, 2006 5:31 PM
Message:
At UCLA I was asked to organize the discussion on scientific motivations for future VHE observations. Almost everyone expressed interest in working on this project, so I’d like to divide this topic by classes of sources and ask people to sign up for 1-3 topics of interest. The list of topics is below. These groups won’t last forever, but are only to produce a beginning summary from which we can start to organize our thoughts and priorities. I hope that all subgroups voluntarily have at least 2-3 people, but if not, I will do some recruiting.

Can you please respond to me via email by March 17 about the topics to which you would like to contribute? I will post these subgroups on the Santa Fe meeting web page and assign someone from each topic to be a convener. I’d like the convener to organize their subgroup via conference call or email to produce a 2-3 page document (as described below) by May 1. The subgroups should also select someone who will attend the Santa Fe meeting to give a 15 minute presentation about their summary. I’d like to encourage the subgroups to also consult experts outside the TeV community to produce these documents. My idea is to eventually have something a bit like the GLAST Science Brochure or the APS Neutrino Study.

SubGroup Topics:
Active Galactic Nuclei
Supernova Remnants
Pulsars & Pulsar Wind Nebula
Gamma Ray Bursts
Galactic Diffuse Emission
Dark Matter, Primordial Black Holes, Other Exotica Other Galactic Sources Other Extragalactic Sources Extragalactic
Background Light & Cosmology EGRET and GLAST (and IceCube?) Sources

Format of Subgroup Document:
I’d like this to be a concise argument that emphasizes the most important aspects related to VHE astrophysics. I see this as a first draft that will have to be expanded later to give the more general information for a more general audience. But for right now, let’s skip some of the boiler plate descriptions that we all know anyway. I’d like these synopses to have two parts each of only approximately one page.

The first part should be aimed at explaining why VHE observations are important for understanding this astrophysical phenomena. This section is why astronomers would want us to make better VHE observations. What VHE observations are required to better understand these objects? What are the characteristics (sensitivity, field of view, duty factor, angular resolution, etc.) of the VHE observatory that are required to make the necessary VHE observations?

The second part (also only one page) should be to convince the physicists why VHE observations of this class of source will shed light on more fundamental questions, such as the “Quarks to Cosmos” type questions. I’m hoping that the different subgroups will have some overlapping issues that we can form into some overarching questions that VHE observations can answer.

And finally also include a list of a few key papers on the subject as well as other people who are experts in this subject, both within and outside the TeV community.