Operation of the HAWC Gamma-Ray Observatory

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The High Altitude Water Cherenkov (HAWC) Gamma-ray Observatory is a wide field-of-view, continuously operating, teraelectronvolt (TeV) gamma-ray telescope that will explore the origin of cosmic rays, study the acceleration of particles in extreme physical environments, and search for new TeV physics. HAWC is under construction at an elevation of 4100 meters above sea level in Mexico by a collaboration of US and Mexican institutions. This award will fund operations that will begin in August 2013 even while construction is being completed. At the beginning of operations HAWC, with 100 Water Cherenkov Detectors, will be the most sensitive wide-field detector in the TeV range. During the first year of operation, HAWC's sensitivity will steadily increase as more detectors are brought online. When completed in the Fall of 2014 HAWC will consist of an array of the 250-300 detectors and will be more than an order of magnitude more sensitive than its predecessors. HAWC will monitor the northern sky and make coincident observations with other observatories including VERITAS, HESS, Magic, IceCube and the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope for multi-wavelength and multi-messenger studies of the high-energy sky. HAWC will observe Galactic sources in the TeV energy range, detect diffuse emission from regions of the Galactic plane, observe known TeV active galactic nuclei and the brightest known gigaelectronvolt (GeV) gamma-ray bursts, and with its significant increase in sensitivity it is poised to discover new high-energy phenomena in the Universe.Broader Impacts: HAWC is an all-sky instrument that will serve as a TeV 'finder' telescope for ground-based observatories, and it can be used to extend measurements of satellite-discovered sources to TeV energies. HAWC will build on the strong outreach record of Milagro to bring the high-energy astrophysics field to students and the general public. Since HAWC is a joint Mexican-American project, it presents an opportunity to attract Hispanic-American students to science and to particle astrophysics.