Extreme Environment Astrophysics with H.E.S.S. Phase I 2007-2010

在过去的几年里，PPARC一直支持英国参与在西南非洲纳米比亚建造、调试和运行一个非常高能（VHE）伽马射线望远镜，称为H.E.S.S.阵列。该阵列的首批4台望远镜于2004年1月开始例行工作，向我们展示了大量充当巨大粒子加速器的天体——遥远星系中的超大质量黑洞、超新星遗迹和脉冲星。英国天文学家对这些物体的可变性特别感兴趣，特别是活跃的星系如何加速粒子，以及在我们自己的星系中被称为微类星体的这些物体的迷你版本，以及脉冲星中的粒子加速机制。我们也对过去100年最大的谜题之一的答案感兴趣，那就是宇宙射线的起源，它一直轰炸着我们。长期以来，人们一直怀疑它们是在超新星残骸中产生的，现在我们开始发现证据，证明情况很可能是这样的。然而，拼图的最后一部分需要来自更广泛的VHE伽马射线观测和其他波长的观测。除了分析来自望远镜的数据，英国科学家还负责一些技术任务，以确保整个合作能够从望远镜中获得科学结果。达勒姆小组负责与望远镜一起使用的校准系统，以确保达到完全的灵敏度。独特的是，在VHE伽马射线望远镜的情况下，大气实际上是探测器的一部分，所以我们必须了解大气，然后在计算机模拟中使用这些信息来计算入射伽马射线的能量。此外，数据经常需要根据大气变化进行校正，以便将这些数据与我们观察到的物体的伽马射线发射的变化区分开来，这显然对我们的科学兴趣有重要影响。利兹大学的吉姆·辛顿博士负责电子系统和软件的部分工作，以确保望远镜能够正常工作。这项拨款要求资助两名博士后科学家继续研究H.E.S.S.数据，并为合作执行重要的校准任务。

PPARC has supported for the past few years UK participation in the construction, commissioning and operation of a very high energy (VHE) gamma ray telescope in Namibia, South West Africa, called the H.E.S.S. array. The first 4 telescopes of the array began routine operations in January 2004, and are revealing to us a wealth of astronomical objects acting as huge particle accelerators - supermassive black holes in distant galaxies, supernova remnants and pulsars. UK astronomers are particularly interested in variability in such objects, particularly how active galaxies accelerate particles and in mini versions of these objects in our own galaxy known as microquasars, and in the mechanisms of particle acceleration in pulsars. We are also interested in the solution of one of the great puzzles of the last 100 years, which is the origin of the cosmic rays that bombard us all the time. It has long been suspected that they are produced in supernova remnants, and now we are beginning to find evidence that this might well be the case. However, the final pieces of the jigsaw need to come from more extensive VHE gamma ray observations and observations at other wavelengths. As well as analysing the data from the telescopes, UK scientists are responsible for some of the technical tasks that ensure the whole collaboration is able to get the scientific results from the telescopes. The Durham group is responsible for the calibration systems used with the telescopes in order to ensure that the achieve full sensitivity. Uniquely, in the case of VHE gamma ray telescopes, the atmosphere actually forms part of the detector, and so we have to understand the atmosphere and then use that information in computer simulations to calculate the energies of the incoming gamma rays. In addition, data often have to be corrected for atmospheric variations, so that these can be disentangled from variations in the gamma ray emission of the objects that we observe, which obviously has an important bearing on our scientfic interests. Dr. Jim Hinton at Leeds is responsible for parts of the electronic system and software that ensure the telescopes work properly together. This grant requests funding for two postdoctoral scientists to continue working on H.E.S.S. data and perform the important calibration tasks for the collaboration.