GRBAlpha: the smallest astrophysical space observatory -- Part 1: Detector design, system description and satellite operations
Abstract
Aims. Since launched on 2021 March 22, the 1U-sized CubeSat GRBAlpha operates and collects scientific data on high-energy transients, making it the smallest astrophysical space observatory to date. GRBAlpha is an in-obit demonstration of a gamma-ray burst (GRB) detector concept suitably small to fit into a standard 1U volume. As it was demonstrated in a companion paper, GRBAlpha adds significant value to the scientific community with accurate characterization of bright GRBs, including the recent outstanding event of GRB 221009A. Methods. The GRB detector is a 75x75x5 mm CsI(Tl) scintillator wrapped in a reflective foil (ESR) read out by an array of SiPM detectors, multi-pixel photon counters by Hamamatsu, driven by two separate, redundant units. To further protect the scintillator block from sunlight and protect the SiPM detectors from particle radiation, we apply a multi-layer structure of Tedlar wrapping, anodized aluminium casing and a lead-alloy shielding on one edge of the assembly. The setup allows observations of gamma radiation within the energy range of 70-890 keV with an energy resolution of ~30%. Results. Here, we summarize the system design of the GRBAlpha mission, including the electronics and software components of the detector, some aspects of the platform as well as the current way of semi-autonomous operations. In addition, details are given about the raw data products and telemetry in order to encourage the community for expansion of the receiver network for our initiatives with GRBAlpha and related experiments.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.2302.10048,
title = {GRBAlpha: the smallest astrophysical space observatory -- Part 1: Detector design, system description and satellite operations},
author = {András Pál and Masanori Ohno and László Mészáros and Norbert Werner and Jakub Řípa and Balázs Csák and Marianna Dafčíková and Marcel Frajt and Yasushi Fukazawa and Peter Hanák and Ján Hudec and Nikola Husáriková and Jakub Kapuš and Miroslav Kasal and Martin Kolář and Martin Koleda and Robert Laszlo and Pavol Lipovský and Tsunefumi Mizuno and Filip Münz and Kazuhiro Nakazawa and Maksim Rezenov and Miroslav Šmelko and Hiromitsu Takahashi and Martin Topinka and Tomáš Urbanec and Jean-Paul Breuer and Tamás Bozóki and Gergely Dálya and Teruaki Enoto and Zsolt Frei and Gergely Friss and Gábor Galgóczi and Filip Hroch and Yuto Ichinohe and Kornél Kapás and László L. Kiss and Hiroto Matake and Hirokazu Odaka and Helen Poon and Aleš Povalač and János Takátsy and Kento Torigoe and Nagomi Uchida and Yuusuke Uchida},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2302.10048},
year = {2023}
}
Comments
Accepted for publication in Astronomy & Astrophysics, 9 pages, 10 figures