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NASA NTRS1987

High-energy particle production in solar flares (SEP, gamma-ray and neutron emissions)

Electrons and ions, over a wide range of energies, are produced in association with solar flares. Solar energetic particles (SEPs), observed in space and near earth, consist of electrons and ions that range in energy from 10 keV to about 100 MeV and from 1 MeV to 20 GeV, respectively. SEPs are directly recorded by charged particle detectors, while X-ray, gamma-ray, and neutron detectors indicate the properties of the accelerated particles (electrons and ions) which have interacted in the solar atmosphere. A major problem of solar physics is to understand the relationship between these two groups of charged particles; in particular whether they are accelerated by the same mechanism. The paper reviews the physics of gamma-rays and neutron production in the solar atmosphere and the method by which properties of the primary charged particles produced in the solar flare can be deduced. Recent observations of energetic photons and neutrons in space and at the earth are used to present a current picture of the properties of impulsively flare accelerated electrons and ions. Some important properties discussed are time scale of production, composition, energy spectra, accelerator geometry. Particular attention is given to energetic particle production in the large flare on June 3, 1982.

Chupp, E. L.↗

NASA NTRS1990

Medium and high-energy neutrino physics from a lunar base

Neutrino astronomy at high energy levels conducted from the moon is treated by considering 'particle astronomy' as a part of physics and the moon as a neutrino detector. The ability to observe the Galactic center is described by means of a 1-1000 TeV 'window' related to the drop in flux of atmospheric neutrinos from the earth. The long-baseline particle physics which are described in terms of a lunar observatory are found to be possible exclusively from a lunar station. The earth's neutrinos can be eliminated for the observations of astrophysical sources, and other potential areas of investigation include neutrino oscillation and the moon's interior. Neutrino exploration of the earth-moon and antineutrino radionuclide imaging are also considered. The moon is concluded to be a significantly more effective orbital platform for the study of neutrino physics than orbiting satellites developed on earth.

Wilson, Thomas L.↗

NASA NTRS1997

The Gamma-ray Large Area Space Telescope (GLAST) Mission Concept Study

The Gamma-ray Large Area Space Telescope (GLAST), a next generation high-energy gamma-ray mission designed to observe cosmic sources of gamma-rays over the approximate energy range from 10 MeV to 300 GeV, was studied for possible flight in the next decade. The GLAST baseline mission studied will achieve a major advance in sensitivity beyond EGRET by the use of modern particle physics tracking technology. The baseline instrument design that has been extensively studied uses solid-state silicon strip detectors for particle tracking and efficient on-board data processing and event triggering to achieve more than an order of magnitude improvement in sensitivity compared to EGRET. Development of technology requirements and a technology development roadmap for the GLAST mission is presented.

Michelson, Peter F.↗

NASA NTRS2004

An Analysis Methodology for the Gamma-ray Large Area Space Telescope

The Large Area Telescope (LAT) instrument on the Gamma Ray Large Area Space Telescope (GLAST) has been designed to detect high-energy gamma rays and determine their direction of incidence and energy. We propose a reconstruction algorithm based on recent advances in statistical methodology. This method, alternative to the standard event analysis inherited from high energy collider physics experiments, incorporates more accurately the physical processes occurring in the detector, and makes full use of the statistical information available. It could thus provide a better estimate of the direction and energy of the primary photon.

Morris, Robin D.↗

NASA NTRS2001

Physical and biological studies with protons and HZE particles in a NASA supported research center in radiation health

NASA has established and supports a specialized center for research and training (NSCORT) to specifically address the potential deleterious effects of HZE particles on human health. The NSCORT in radiation health is a joint effort between Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) and Colorado State University (CSU). The overall scope of research encompasses a broad range of subjects from microdosimetric studies to cellular and tissue responses to initial damage produced by highly energetic protons and heavy charged particles of the type found in galactic cosmic rays (GCR) spectrum. The objectives of the microdosimetry studies are to determine the response of Tissue Equivalent Proportional Counter (TEPC) to cosmic rays using ground based accelerators. This includes evaluation of energy loss due to the escape of high-energy delta rays and increased energy deposition due to the enhanced delta ray production in the wall of the detector. In this report major results are presented for 56Fe at 1000, 740, 600 and 400 MeV/nucleon. An assessment of DNA repair and early development of related chromosomal changes is extremely important to our overall understanding of enhanced biological effectiveness of high LET particle radiation. Results are presented with respect to the fidelity of the rejoining of double strand breaks and the implications of misrejoining. The relationship between molecular and cytogenetic measurements is presented by studying damage processing in highly heterochromatic supernumerary (correction of sypernumerary) X chromosomes and the active X-chromosome. One of the important consequences of cell's inability to handle DNA damage can be evaluated through mutation studies. Part of our goal is the assessment of potential radioprotectors to reduce the mutation yield following HZE exposures, and some promising results are presented on one compound. A second goal is the integration of DNA repair and mutation studies. Results are presented on a direct comparison of initial double strand breaks induction, the time course and fidelity of double strand break rejoining, cell killing and mutation induction in the same human model system. In order to understand the carcinogenic potential of protons and HZE particles, the role of damaged microenvironment in this process must be understood. In this project it has been postulated that radiation affects the microenvironment, which then modifies cell interactions in a manner conducive to neoplastic progression. Both TGF-beta and FGF-2 are important components of microenvironment. A recent result on the assessment of the role of FGF-2 and its cross-talk with TGF-beta as a function of radiation quality is presented. Theoretical modeling has so far played a central role in analyzing and integrating experimental data on repair and mutation studies and predicting new phenomena. The integrated NSCORT program also provides a broad training experience for students and postdoctoral fellows in space radiation health.

NASA Discipline Radiation Health↗

NASA NTRS2007

Gamma-ray Astronomy and GLAST

The high energy gamma-ray (30 MeV to 100 GeV) sky has been relatively poorly studied. Most of our current knowledge comes from observations made by the Energetic Gamma Ray Experiment Telescope (EGRET) detector on the Compton Gamma Ray Observatory (CGRO), which revealed that the GeV gamma-ray sky is rich and vibrant. Studies of astrophysical objects at GeV energies are interesting for several reasons: The high energy gamma-rays are often produced by a different physical process than the better studied X-ray and optical emission, thus providing a unique information for understanding these sources. Production of such high-energy photons requires that charged particles are accelerated to equally high energies, or much greater. Thus gamma-ray astronomy is the study of extreme environments, with natural and fundamental connections to cosmic-ray and neutrino astrophysics. The launch of GLAST in 2008 will herald a watershed in our understanding of the high energy gamma-ray sky, providing dramatic improvements in sensitivity, angular resolution and energy range. GLAST will open a new avenue to study our Universe as well as to answer scientific questions EGRET observations have raised. In this talk, I will describe the GLAST instruments and capabilities and highlight some of the science we expect to address.

McEnery, Julie↗

NASA NTRS2010

The Spectral Energy Distribution of Fermi Bright Blazars

We have conducted a detailed investigation of the broadband spectral properties of the gamma-ray selected blazars of the Fermi LAT Bright AGN Sample (LBAS). By combining our accurately estimated Fermi gamma-ray spectra with Swift, radio, infra-red, optical, and other hard X-ray /gamma-ray data, collected within 3 months of the LBAS data taking period, we were able to assemble high-quality and quasi-simultaneous spectral energy distributions (SED) for 48 LBAS blazars. The SED of these gamma-ray sources is similar to that of blazars discovered at other wavelengths, clearly showing, in the usual log v-log v Fv representation, the typical broadband spectral signatures normally attributed to a combination of low-energy synchrotron radiation followed by inverse Compton emission of one or more components. We have used these SED to characterize the peak intensity of both the low- and the high-energy components. The results have been used to derive empirical relationships that estimate the position of the two peaks from the broadband colors (i.e., the radio to optical, alpha(sub ro) , and optical to X-ray, alpha(sub ox), spectral slopes) and from the gamma-ray spectral index. Our data show that the synchrotron peak frequency (v(sup S) (sub peak)) is positioned between 10(exp 12.5) and 10(exp 14) Hz in broad-lined flat spectrum radio quasars (FSRQs) and between 10(exp 13) and 10(exp 17) Hz in featureless BL Lacertae objects. We find that the gamma-ray spectral slope is strongly correlated with the synchrotron peak energy and with the X-ray spectral index, as expected at first order in synchrotron-inverse Compton scenarios. However, simple homogeneous, one-zone, synchrotron self-Compton (SSC) models cannot explain most of our SED, especially in the case of FSRQs and low energy peaked (LBL) BL Lacs. More complex models involving external Compton radiation or multiple SSC components are required to reproduce the overall SED and the observed spectral variability. While more than 50% of known radio bright high energy peaked (HBL) BL Lacs are detected in the LBAS sample, only less than 13% of known bright FSRQs and LBL BL Lacs are included. This suggests that the latter sources, as a class, may be much fainter gamma-ray emitters than LBAS blazars, and could in fact radiate close to the expectations of simple SSC models. We categorized all our sources according to a new physical classification scheme based on the generally accepted paradigm for Active Galactic Nuclei and on the results of this SED study. Since the LAT detector is more sensitive to flat spectrum gamma-ray sources, the correlation between v(sup S) (sub peak) and gamma-ray spectral index strongly favors the detection of high energy peaked blazars, thus explaining the Fermi overabundance of this type of sources compared to radio and EGRET samples. This selection effect is similar to that experienced in the soft X-ray band where HBL BL Lacs are the dominant type of blazars.

Abdo, A. A.↗

NASA NTRS2012

PheniX: A New Vision for the Hard X-ray Sky

We are proposing a mission devoted to high energy X-ray astronomy that is based on a focusing telescope operating in the 1-200 keV energy range but optimized for the hard X-ray range. The main scientific topics concern: Physics of compact objects: The proximity of compact objects provides a unique laboratory to study matter and radiation in extreme conditions of temperature and density in strong gravitational environment. The emission of high energy photons from these objects is far from being understood. The unprecedented sensitivity in the high energy domain will allow a precise determination of the non-thermal processes at work in the vicinity of compact objects. The full 1-200 keV energy coverage will be ideal to disentangle the emission processes produced in the spacetime regions most affected by strong-gravity, as well as the physical links: disk-thermal emission-iron line-comptonisation-reflection-non-thermal emission-jets. Neutron stars-magnetic field-cyclotron lines: Time resolved spectroscopy (and polarimetry) at ultra-high sensitivity of AXP, milliseconds pulsars and magnetars will give new tools to study the role of the synchrotron processes at work in these objects. Cyclotron lines-direct measurement of magnetic filed-equation of state constraints-short bursts-giant flares could all be studied with great details. AGN: The large sensitivity improvement will provide detailed spectral properties of the high energy emission of AGN's. This will give a fresh look to the connection between accretion and jet emission and will provide a new understanding of the physical processes at work. Detection of high-redshift active nuclei in this energy range will allow to introduce an evolutionary aspect to high-energy studies of AGN, probing directly the origin of the Cosmic X-ray Background also in the non-thermal range (> 20 keV). Element formation-Supernovae: The energy resolution achievable for this mission (<0.5 keV) and a large high energy effective area are ideally suited for the 44Ti line study (68 and 78 keV). This radioactive nuclei emission will give an estimate of their quantities and speed in their environment. In addition the study of the spatial structure and spectral emission of SNR will advance our knowledge of the dynamics of supernovae explosions, of particles acceleration mechanisms and how the elements are released in the interstellar medium. Instrumental design: The progress of X-ray focusing optics techniques allows a major step in the instrumental design: the collecting area becomes independent of the detection area. This drastically reduces the instrumental background and will open a new era. The optics will be based on depth-graded multi-layer mirrors in a Wolter I configuration. To obtain a significant effective area in the hundred of keV range a focal length in the 40-50 meters range (attainable with a deployable mast) is needed. In addition such a mission could benefit from recent progress made on mirror coating. We propose to cover the 1-200 keV energy range with a single detector, a double-sided Germanium strip detector operating at 80 K. The main features will be: (a) good energy resolution (.150 keV at 5 keV and <.5 keV at 100 keV), (b) 3 dimensional event localization with a low number of electronic chains, (c) background rejection by the 3D localization, (d) polarisation capabilities in the Compton regime.

PHENIX↗

NASA NTRS2016

The e-astrogam Gamma-Ray Space Mission

e-ASTROGAM is a gamma-ray space mission to be proposed as the M5 Medium-size mission of the European Space Agency. It is dedicated to the observation of the Universe with unprecedented sensitivity in the energy range 0.2-100 MeV, extending up to GeV energies, together with a groundbreaking polarization capability. It is designed to substantially improve the COMPTEL and Fermi sensitivities in the MeV-GeV energy range and to open new windows of opportunity for astrophysical and fundamental physics space research. e-ASTROGAM will operate as an open astronomical observatory, with a core science focused on (1) the activity from extreme particle accelerators, including gamma-ray bursts and active galactic nuclei and the link of jet astrophysics to the new astronomy of gravitational waves, neutrinos, ultra-high energy cosmic rays, (2) the high-energy mysteries of the Galactic center and inner Galaxy, including the activity of the supermassive black hole, the Fermi Bubbles, the origin of the Galactic positrons, and the search for dark matter signatures in a new energy window; (3) nucleosynthesis and chemical evolution, including the life cycle of elements produced by supernovae in the Milky Way and the Local Group of galaxies. e-ASTROGAM will be ideal for the study of high-energy sources in general, including pulsars and pulsar wind nebulae, accreting neutron stars and black holes, novae, supernova remnants, and magnetars. And it will also provide important contributions to solar and terrestrial physics. The e-ASTROGAM telescope is optimized for the simultaneous detection of Compton and pair-producing gamma-ray events over a large spectral band. It is based on a very high technology readiness level for all subsystems and includes many innovative features for the detectors and associated electronics.

Compton and pair creation telescope↗

NASA NTRS2017

Kinetic Theory and Fast Wind Observations of the Electron Strahl

We develop a model for the strahl population in the solar wind - a narrow, low-density and high-energy electron beam centred on the magnetic field direction. Our model is based on the solution of the electron drift-kinetic equation at heliospheric distances where the plasma density, temperature and the magnetic field strength decline as power laws of the distance along a magnetic flux tube. Our solution for the strahl depends on a number of parameters that, in the absence of the analytic solution for the full electron velocity distribution function (eVDF), cannot be derived from the theory. We however demonstrate that these parameters can be efficiently found from matching our solution with observations of the eVDF made by the Wind satellite's SWE strahl detector. The model is successful at predicting the angular width (FWHM) of the strahl for the Wind data at 1 au, in particular by predicting how this width scales with particle energy and background density. We find that the strahl distribution is largely determined by the local temperature Knudsen number γ ∼ |T dT/dx|/n, which parametrizes solar wind collisionality. We compute averaged strahl distributions for typical Knudsen numbers observed in the solar wind, and fit our model to these data. The model can be matched quite closely to the eVDFs at 1 au; however, it then overestimates the strahl amplitude at larger heliocentric distances. This indicates that our model may be improved through the inclusion of additional physics, possibly through the introduction of 'anomalous diffusion' of the strahl electrons.

Horaites, Konstantinos↗

NASA NTRS2019

The Solar Neutron TRACking (SONTRAC) Instrument for the Detection of Fast Neutrons

The detection of fast neutrons has important applications in several fields including solar, Geospace and planetary physics. Neutrons are challenging to detect and measurements of them typically suffer from high background rates. High-energy neutrons (>50 MeV) pose even more challenges, because the traditional double-scatter technique based on a time-of-flight (ToF) measurement is limited by short flight paths and small detector sizes characteristic of small satellite platforms. It is now possible to perform high-energy neutron measurements inside a large monolithic detector by imaging the recoil proton tracks, thus eliminating the need for a measure of the time-of-flight. The concept is based on a spectrometer assembled from numerous thin hydrogenous scintillating fibers that allow ionization track imaging. Fine grained readout is now possible with arrays of1-mm pitch silicon photomultipliers (SiPMs). The Solar Neutron TRACking (SONTRAC) instrument, equipped with scintillating fibers readout with SiPMs sensors, provides high-resolution, fine grained, imaging of fast (between 20-200 MeV) neutron scatters in a compact, low-power design ideal for small satellite(and aircraft) platforms. We discuss below applications of this technology and performance characteristics of the prototype SONTRAC instrument.

de Nolfo, Georgia A.↗

NASA NTRS2021

SMD Technology Highlights

Six technology highlights from the Science Mission Directorate (SMD) Heliophysics, Astrophysics, Earth, and Biological and Physical Sciences divisions. Technologies featured include 1. the 1653 m2 Solar Cruiser Solar Sail Propulsion system to enable missions to reach novel and otherwise difficult or impossible destinations for observing the Sun. 2. Technology sponsored by NASA and developed by MIT Space Nanotechnology Lab is developing high-performance space instrumentation for more powerful future X-ray telescopes that will study the dynamics of the high-energy universe. 3. Active thermal control technology that will help enable large ultra-stable telescopes needed to detect and characterize Earth-like planets around other stars. 4. SMD sponsored high-performance infrared sensors with reduced requirements for cooling onboard satellites and these sensors could potentially be flown on small satellite platforms like CubeSats. 5. A new technology that will utilize electron beams/ultraviolet light to remove dust that could help protect future space assets and astronauts from dangerous effects that arise from Moon/Mars dust exposure. 6. Studies using model organisms on ISS to understand the impact of the spaceflight environment on organisms in preparation for long-duration missions.

solar sail↗

NASA NTRSDate not supplied

The Marshall 100-Meter X-ray Beamline

The Marshall 100-Meter X-ray Beamline is a user facility for x-ray and EUV optics and instrumentation calibration, located at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. Also known as the Stray Light Test Facility, the Marshall-100 provides a range of focal plane detectors, x-ray sources, translation stages, cleanrooms, and high-vacuum level capability to the high-energy astrophysics community. Facility time is made available to Astronomy and Physics Research and Analysis (APRA) funded projects and is also available to the broader community upon request made to beamline management. The beamline has successfully been employed in the calibration of larger scope projects such as the Spectrum-Roentgen-Gamma Astronomical Roentgen Telescope X-ray Concentrator (ART-XC) telescope and the Small Explorer (SMEX) class Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer (IXPE) Space Telescope. Additionally, the Marshall-100 is instrumental in supporting testing related to MSFC’s high-angular resolution optics development program.

X-ray Beamline, Test Facility, X-ray Calibration↗

DOE OSTI2024

Search for Heavy Neutral Leptons at the MINER$\nu$A detector

Heavy Neutral Leptons (HNL) are particles hypothesised to provide a mass generation mechanism for the active (observed) neutrino species, which are known to have nonzero mass from the definitive observation of neutrino oscillations. HNL are eigenstates of mass of the order $\mathcal{O}(0.1 − 1\,\,\mathrm{GeV}/c^{2})$, which mix into the active flavour eigenstates through the extended leptonic mixing matrix. Apart from neutrino mass, they could provide a natural dark matter candidate and a mechanism for matter-antimatter asymmetry in the early Universe, giving rise to today’s matter-dominated cosmos. Searches for HNL typically attempt to either confirm the existence of HNL through an excess in data that is most compatible with an HNL hypothesis, or by setting limits on the HNL parameter space $\left(M_{N4}, \left|U_{\alpha 4}\right|^{2}\right)$ in the case of statistically insignificant excess. Such searches are intensifying as part of a global research programme at both colliders and accelerator / atmospheric neutrino experiments. One such setting is the MINER$\nu$A experiment, located in the NuMI beamline at Fermilab. MINER$\nu$A has collected a large amount of data over seven years of operation to measure the cross-sections of neutrino-nucleus interactions necessary to drive systematic uncertainties down, in order for neutrino oscillation experiments to achieve sensitivity to CP violation in the neutrino sector. With the high-energy, high-intensity NuMI beam, and with good timing, position, and angular resolution leading to sensitivity to HNL decays, MINER$\nu$A is fertile ground for an HNL search, which is performed in this thesis. Specifically, a novel, experiment-agnostic and general simulation of HNL production and decay is presented and deployed; this simulation has been incorporated in the ubiquitous GENIE neutrino event generator for use with neutrino experiments in the future. The event selection and background characterisation is discussed in detail, including the primary background coming from charged-current coherent and diffractive pion production from neutrino-nucleus interactions, and constraints on the background using control regions from MINER$\nu$A data are derived. Finally, by means of a fake-data study given a background of $\mathcal{O}(500)$ events, the discovery potential and limit-setting capacity of MINER$\nu$A is demonstrated, and ways to improve this capacity are expounded upon.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗

DOE OSTI2025

MAIA: A new detector concept for a 10 TeV muon collider

Muon colliders offer a compelling opportunity to explore the TeV scale and conduct precision tests of the Standard Model, all within a relatively compact geographical footprint. This paper introduces a new detector concept, MAIA (Muon Accelerator Instrumented Apparatus), optimized for $\sqrt{s}=10$ TeV $\mu\mu$ collisions. The detector features an all-silicon tracker immersed in a 5T solenoid field. High-granularity silicon-tungsten and iron-scintillator calorimeters surrounding the solenoid capture high-energy electronic and hadronic showers, respectively, and support particle-flow reconstruction. The outermost subsystem comprises an air-gap muon spectrometer, which enables standalone track reconstruction for high-momentum muons. The performance of the MAIA detector is evaluated in terms of differential particle reconstruction efficiencies and resolutions. Beam-induced background (BIB) simulations generated in FLUKA are overlaid with single particle gun samples to assess detector reconstruction capabilities under realistic experimental conditions. Even with BIB, reconstruction efficiencies exceed 95% for energetic tracks, photons, and neutrons in the central region of the detector. This paper outlines promising avenues of future work, including forward region optimization and opportunities for enhanced flavor/boosted object tagging, and addresses the technological assumptions needed to achieve the desired detector performance.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗

DOE OSTI2025

Large Neutrino "Collider"

We propose using current and future large-volume neutrino telescopes as ``Large Neutrino Colliders" (L$ν$Cs) to explore TeV-scale physics beyond the Standard Model. Cosmic neutrinos with energies above 100 PeV colliding with nucleons in the detector reach center-of-mass energies beyond the 14 TeV limit of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). Using recently predicted and measured high-energy and ultra-high-energy neutrino fluxes from IceCube and KM3NeT, we estimate mass-scale sensitivities for representative new physics scenarios at 1--30 km$^3$ L$ν$Cs. Our results demonstrate that L$ν$Cs provide a novel avenue to probe multi-TeV particles with sensitivities comparable to, or even surpassing, those of the LHC.

Bai, Yang [Wisconsin U., Madison; Argonne]↗

DOE OSTI2025

A Novel Measurement of the Anomalous Muon Spin Precession Frequency in the Muon $g-2$ Experiment at Fermilab

The Muon $g-2$ Experiment operated at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (FNAL, or Fermilab) between 2018 and 2023 to produce the world's most precise measurement of the muon's \textit{anomalous magnetic moment}, $a_\mu = \frac{g_\mu - 2}{2}$, which expresses the relative deviation in the muon's $g$-factor from a baseline theoretical expectation that $g_\mu = 2$. In the Standard Model of particle physics, $g_\mu > 2$ and hence $a_\mu > 0$ by a calculable amount that depends on all possible interactions between the muon and all other fundamental particles, including any potentially undiscovered interactions beyond the Standard Model. For this reason, measurements of the electron anomaly $a_e$ and later the muon anomaly $a_\mu$ have helped guide the development of the Standard Model since the inception of quantum field theory, and the measured value of $a_\mu$ provides a valuable constraint for new hypotheses that extend the Standard Model. As of 2006, the leading measurement and Standard Model prediction for $a_\mu$ exhibited tension at the level of about three standard deviations, motivating an improved measurement at Fermilab that could test the tension more precisely. The experiment functions by storing a polarized beam of $\mu^+$ in a uniform magnetic field, which simultaneously induces circular motion and spin precession. As the stored muons undergo the Michel decay $\mu^+ \to e^+ + \nu_e + \bar{\nu}_\mu$, mediated by the parity-violating weak interaction, the rest-frame $e^+$ emission direction is correlated with the parent $\mu^+$ spin orientation. Boosting into the laboratory frame encodes this correlation in the decay $e^+$ energy, which is higher when the emission (i.e. $\mu^+$ spin direction) is aligned with the $\mu^+$ momentum, and lower when opposite. Detectors then count the rate of high-energy decay $e^+$, which modulates at the difference between the $\mu^+$ revolution and spin precession frequencies. This observed frequency, called the \textit{anomalous spin precession frequency} $\omega_a$, is directly proportional to $a_\mu$. The extraction of $\omega_a$ proceeds by fitting the time spectrum of detected $e^+$, which requires precise modeling of the $\omega_a$ oscillation as well as any perturbations from beam dynamics and detector acceptance. Using the $\omega_a$ analysis presented in this work, based on Runs 4 -- 6 of the Muon $g-2$ Experiment at Fermilab, we find that $a_\mu = 0.001\,165\,920\,738(162)$ with a relative uncertainty of 139 parts per billion.

Barrett, Tyler [Cornell U.]↗

DOE OSTI2025

Automating Testing of DUNE Electronics via a Finite State Machine

The Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE) is a flagship international collaboration designed to study neutrinos—tiny, nearly massless particles that may hold answers to fundamental questions about the Universe. Fermilab’s Robotic Test Stand (RTS) plays a critical role in ensuring the quality of approximately 50,000 Application-Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC) chips that will be used in DUNE’s massive liquid argon detectors. These electronics will be inside the cryostat; therefore, they will need to have a high yield of working chips and low noise. To improve the automation and reliability of the RTS, this project focused on designing and implementing a Python-based finite state machine (FSM) to manage chip handling workflows. The FSM was developed as a modular software framework to coordinate robotic arm movements, manage chip tray positions, and monitor system states during testing. Key features include robust error handling routines, a pause/resume system for safe mid-cycle interruptions, and a simulation mode for iterative testing without hardware dependencies. The system was designed to prepare for seamless integration with RTS hardware components such as the robotic arm and vision system. This integration will streamline collaboration and enable efficient deployment of updates across the six institutions performing testing. The outcomes of this internship contribute to Fermilab’s mission to advance high-energy physics and support the DOE’s national goals by directly improving the testing of equipment to be used in DUNE. The project also provided valuable experience in software design and contributing to the success of DUNE.

Kang, Caleb [Fermilab]↗