Ponente
Descripción
The General Antiparticle Spectrometer (GAPS) is a balloon-borne cosmic-ray experiment designed to search for light antinuclei at kinetic energies below 0.25 GeV/n, a largely unexplored range that may carry distinctive signatures of dark matter.
The instrument consists of a ten-layer lithium-drifted silicon tracker, cooled by a novel oscillating heat pipe thermal system, and is enclosed on all sides by a plastic scintillator-based time-of-flight (TOF) and trigger system with high-precision timing.
The experiment employs an innovative exotic-atom-based identification method: incoming antinuclei are slowed and captured in the tracker material, forming exotic atoms. The resulting de-excitation X-rays, along with dE/dx and velocity measurements and the unique annihilation product topology, enable clear identification of the antinucleus species.
GAPS will measure the antiproton flux with unprecedented statistics in a previously inaccessible energy regime, and it will be the first experiment optimized for the detection of cosmic antideuterons—a potential "smoking gun" for new physics. Additionally, it will provide leading sensitivity to antihelium.
GAPS is scheduled to launch during the Antarctic summer season 2025/26 and is currently sitting at the Long Duration Balloon facility at McMurdo Station, following an extensive ground calibration campaign completed in the 2024/25 season.
This talk will present an overview of the GAPS science goals, recent calibration results from Antarctica, and an outlook on the upcoming science flight and its potential impact on the fields of cosmic ray physics and dark matter detection.
