Observations of Galactic TeV Sources with VERITAS

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Our Galaxy contains astrophysical systems that accelerate particles to energies beyond the reach of any accelerator built by humans. What drives these accelerators is a major question in astrophysics, and understanding these accelerators has broad implications. This award will fund studies using the Very Energetic Radiation Imaging Telescope Array System (VERITAS) to image flashes of Cherenkov light produced when highly energetic photons strike Earth's atmosphere. Observations in the TeV band are a sensitive probe of the most energetic physical processes occurring in a variety of Galactic objects. There has been a long-standing suggestion that the main accelerators of cosmic rays are the shock waves created in supernova explosions, but direct observational confirmation is lacking. Images and spectra of supernova remnants in the TeV band should resolve this question. With this award, VERITAS, a ground-based TeV telescope array, will be used to study Galactic particle accelerators including supernova remnants, jets from stellar-mass black holes and rapidly rotating, young neutron stars, and unidentified gamma-ray sources. This group will operate and maintain the pointing monitor system that enhances the performance of VERITAS in regard to source localization and mapping of extended objects. The scientific results of this program will advance our understanding of the origin of cosmic rays, relativistic particle acceleration, the interaction of relativistic particles with their environment, and the physical nature of relativistic particle accelerators within the Milky Way. Progress in these areas, particularly the nature of cosmic rays and the interactions of relativistic jets with their environment, is important to advance our understanding in several areas of astrophysics.An integral part of the proposed Broader Impacts activity will be the broad dissemination of information on very high energy gamma-ray astronomy to college and high school students and the general public making use of material developed in the VERITAS education and outreach program being led by the Adler Planetarium and Astronomy Museum. Undergraduates will participate in research on the gamma-ray science and hardware of VERITAS.