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Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope
The Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope (FGST, also FGRST), formerly called the Gamma-ray Large Area Space Telescope (GLAST), is a space observatory being used to perform gamma-ray astronomy observations from low Earth orbit. Its main instrument is the Large Area Telescope (LAT), with which astronomers mostly intend to perform an all-sky survey studying astrophysical and cosmological phenomena such as active galactic nuclei, pulsars, other high-energy sources and dark matter. Another instrument aboard Fermi, the Gamma-ray Burst Monitor (GBM; formerly GLAST Burst Monitor), is being used to study gamma-ray bursts and solar flares. Fermi, named for high-energy physics pioneer Enrico Fermi, was launched on 11 June 2008 at 16:05 UTC aboard a Delta II 7920-H rocket. The mission is a joint venture of NASA, the United States Department of Energy, and government agencies in France, Germany, Italy, Japan, and Sweden, becoming the most sensitive gamma-ray telescope on orbit, succeeding ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gamma-ray Astronomy
Gamma-ray astronomy is the astronomical observation of gamma rays,Astronomical literature generally hyphenates "gamma-ray" when used as an adjective, but uses "gamma ray" without a hyphen for the noun. the most energetic form of electromagnetic radiation, with photon energies above 100 keV. Radiation below 100 keV is classified as X-rays and is the subject of X-ray astronomy. In most known cases, gamma rays from solar flares and Earth's atmosphere are generated in the MeV range, but it is now known that gamma rays in the GeV range can also be generated by solar flares. It had been believed that gamma rays in the GeV range do not originate in the Solar System. As GeV gamma rays are important in the study of extra-solar, and especially extra-galactic, astronomy, new observations may complicate some prior models and findings. The mechanisms emitting gamma rays are diverse, mostly identical with those emitting X-rays but at higher energies, including electron–p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dark Matter
Dark matter is a hypothetical form of matter thought to account for approximately 85% of the matter in the universe. Dark matter is called "dark" because it does not appear to interact with the electromagnetic field, which means it does not absorb, reflect, or emit electromagnetic radiation and is, therefore, difficult to detect. Various astrophysical observationsincluding gravitational effects which cannot be explained by currently accepted theories of gravity unless more matter is present than can be seenimply dark matter's presence. For this reason, most experts think that dark matter is abundant in the universe and has had a strong influence on its structure and evolution. The primary evidence for dark matter comes from calculations showing that many galaxies would behave quite differently if they did not contain a large amount of unseen matter. Some galaxies would not have formed at all and others would not move as they currently do. Other lines of evidence include o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bismuth Germanate
Bismuth germanium oxide or bismuth germanate is an inorganic chemical compound of bismuth, germanium and oxygen. Most commonly the term refers to the compound with chemical formula (BGO), with the cubic evlitine crystal structure, used as a scintillator. (The term may also refer to a different compound with formula Bi12GeO20, an electro-optical material with sillenite structure, and .) Bi4Ge3O12 Bi4Ge3O12 has a cubic crystal structure (''a'' = 1.0513 nm, ''z'' = 4, Pearson symbol ''cI76'', space group I3d No. 220) and a density of 7.12 g/cm3. When irradiated by X-rays or gamma rays it emits photons of wavelengths between 375 and 650 nm, with peak at 480 nm it produces about 8500 photons per megaelectronvolt of the high energy radiation absorbed. It has good radiation hardness (parameters remaining stable up to 5.104 Gy), high scintillation efficiency, good energy resolution between 5 and 20 MeV, is mechanically strong, and is not hygroscopic. Its melting point ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sodium Iodide
Sodium iodide (chemical formula NaI) is an ionic compound formed from the chemical reaction of sodium metal and iodine. Under standard conditions, it is a white, water-soluble solid comprising a 1:1 mix of sodium cations (Na+) and iodide anions (I−) in a crystal lattice. It is used mainly as a nutritional supplement and in organic chemistry. It is produced industrially as the salt formed when acidic iodides react with sodium hydroxide. It is a chaotropic salt. Uses Food supplement Sodium iodide, as well as potassium iodide, is commonly used to treat and prevent iodine deficiency. Iodized table salt contains 10 ppm iodide. Organic synthesis Sodium iodide is used for conversion of alkyl chlorides into alkyl iodides. This method, the Finkelstein reaction, relies on the insolubility of sodium chloride in acetone to drive the reaction: ::R–Cl + NaI → R–I + NaCl Nuclear medicine Some radioactive iodide salts of sodium, including Na 125I and Na 131I, have radi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Compton Gamma Ray Observatory
The Compton Gamma Ray Observatory (CGRO) was a space observatory detecting photons with photon energy, energies from 20 kElectronvolt#Properties, eV to 30 GeV, in Earth orbit from 1991 to 2000. The observatory featured four main telescopes in one spacecraft, covering X-rays and gamma rays, including various specialized sub-instruments and detectors. Following 14 years of effort, the observatory was launched from Space Shuttle Atlantis, Space Shuttle ''Atlantis'' during STS-37 on April 5, 1991, and operated until its Atmospheric entry#Deorbit disposal, deorbit on June 4, 2000. It was deployed in low Earth orbit at to avoid the Van Allen radiation belt. It was the heaviest astrophysical payload ever flown at that time at . Costing $617 million, the CGRO was part of NASA's "Great Observatories program, Great Observatories" series, along with the Hubble Space Telescope, the Chandra X-ray Observatory, and the Spitzer Space Telescope. It was the second of the series t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Energetic Gamma Ray Experiment Telescope
The Energetic Gamma Ray Experiment Telescope (EGRET) was one of four instruments outfitted on NASA's Compton Gamma Ray Observatory satellite. Since lower energy gamma rays cannot be accurately detected on Earth's surface, EGRET was built to detect gamma rays while in space. EGRET was created for the purpose of detecting and collecting data on gamma rays ranging in energy level from 30 MeV to 30 GeV. To accomplish its task, EGRET was equipped with a spark chamber, calorimeter, and plastic scintillator anti-coincidence dome. The spark chamber was used to induce a process called electron-positron pair production as a gamma ray entered the telescope. The calorimeter on the telescope was then used to record the data from the electron or positron. To reject other energy rays that would skew the data, scientists covered the telescope with a plastic scintillator anti-coincidence dome. The dome acted as a shield for the telescope and blocked out any unwanted energy rays. The telescope ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Electronvolt
In physics, an electronvolt (symbol eV, also written electron-volt and electron volt) is the measure of an amount of kinetic energy gained by a single electron accelerating from rest through an electric potential difference of one volt in vacuum. When used as a unit of energy, the numerical value of 1 eV in joules (symbol J) is equivalent to the numerical value of the charge of an electron in coulombs (symbol C). Under the 2019 redefinition of the SI base units, this sets 1 eV equal to the exact value Historically, the electronvolt was devised as a standard unit of measure through its usefulness in electrostatic particle accelerator sciences, because a particle with electric charge ''q'' gains an energy after passing through a voltage of ''V.'' Since ''q'' must be an integer multiple of the elementary charge ''e'' for any isolated particle, the gained energy in units of electronvolts conveniently equals that integer times the voltage. It is a common unit of ene ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Photon
A photon () is an elementary particle that is a quantum of the electromagnetic field, including electromagnetic radiation such as light and radio waves, and the force carrier for the electromagnetic force. Photons are massless, so they always move at the speed of light in vacuum, (or about ). The photon belongs to the class of bosons. As with other elementary particles, photons are best explained by quantum mechanics and exhibit wave–particle duality, their behavior featuring properties of both waves and particles. The modern photon concept originated during the first two decades of the 20th century with the work of Albert Einstein, who built upon the research of Max Planck. While trying to explain how matter and electromagnetic radiation could be in thermal equilibrium with one another, Planck proposed that the energy stored within a material object should be regarded as composed of an integer number of discrete, equal-sized parts. To explain the photoelectric ef ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pair-conversion
A pair-conversion instrument detects high-energy gamma rays by providing an environment—generally a thin foil of dense metal, commonly tungsten—in which they tend to generate electron-positron pairs, and then using standard particle-physics techniques such as a microstrip detector A microstrip detector is a particle detector that consists of a large number of identical semiconductor strips laid out along one axis of a two-dimensional structure, generally by lithography. The geometrical layout of the components allows to acc ... to detect these particles. Usually there are several stacks of conversion foils and particle detectors placed on top of one another, so that the electron-positron pairs can be tracked as they pass through consecutive detectors; and at the bottom of the stack one commonly finds a calorimeter capable of measuring the energy of the electron and the positron and inferring the energy of the incoming gamma ray. An anticoincidence shield of some kind is ne ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
GLAST On The Payload Attach Fitting
GLAST may refer to: * Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope, formerly the Gamma-ray Large Area Space Telescope * GLutamate ASpartate Transporter Excitatory amino acid transporter 1 (EAAT1) is a protein that, in humans, is encoded by the ''SLC1A3'' gene. EAAT1 is also often called the GLutamate ASpartate Transporter 1 (GLAST-1). EAAT1 is predominantly expressed in the plasma membrane, a ..., a protein in humans * GLAST (tokamak), a set of fusion research reactors of the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC) {{disambig ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
CERN
The European Organization for Nuclear Research, known as CERN (; ; ), is an intergovernmental organization that operates the largest particle physics laboratory in the world. Established in 1954, it is based in a northwestern suburb of Geneva, on the France–Switzerland border. It comprises 23 member states, and Israel (admitted in 2013) is currently the only non-European country holding full membership. CERN is an official United Nations General Assembly observer. The acronym CERN is also used to refer to the laboratory; in 2019, it had 2,660 scientific, technical, and administrative staff members, and hosted about 12,400 users from institutions in more than 70 countries. In 2016, CERN generated 49 petabytes of data. CERN's main function is to provide the particle accelerators and other infrastructure needed for high-energy physics research — consequently, numerous experiments have been constructed at CERN through international collaborations. CERN is the site of th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
INTEGRAL
In mathematics, an integral assigns numbers to functions in a way that describes displacement, area, volume, and other concepts that arise by combining infinitesimal data. The process of finding integrals is called integration. Along with differentiation, integration is a fundamental, essential operation of calculus,Integral calculus is a very well established mathematical discipline for which there are many sources. See and , for example. and serves as a tool to solve problems in mathematics and physics involving the area of an arbitrary shape, the length of a curve, and the volume of a solid, among others. The integrals enumerated here are those termed definite integrals, which can be interpreted as the signed area of the region in the plane that is bounded by the graph of a given function between two points in the real line. Conventionally, areas above the horizontal axis of the plane are positive while areas below are negative. Integrals also refer to the concept ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
