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The science goals of IceCube-Gen2 include multi-messenger astronomy, astroparticle and particle physics. To this end, the observatory will include several detection methods including a surface array and in-ice optical sensors. The array will have an approximately 8 km 2 surface coverage consisting of elevated scintillator panels and radio antennas to detect air showers in the energy range of several 100 TeV to a few EeV. The observatory's design is unique in that the measurements using the surface array can be combined with the observations of ≥ 300 GeV muons, produced in the hadronic cascades, using the optical detectors in the ice. This allows for an enhanced ability to study cosmic-ray and hadronic physics as well as to boost the sensitivity for astrophysical neutrinos from the southern sky by reducing the primary background, atmospheric muons. We will present the baseline design of the surface array and highlight the expected scientific capabilities.

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The IceCube-Gen2 Neutrino Observatory is proposed to extend the all-flavour energy range of IceCube beyond PeV energies. It will comprise two key components: I) An enlarged 8 km 3 in-ice optical Cherenkov array to measure the continuation of the IceCube astrophysical neutrino flux and improve IceCube's point source sensitivity above ∼ 100 TeV; and II) A very large in-ice radio array with a surface area of about 500 km 2 . Radio waves propagate through ice with a kilometer-long attenuation length, hence a sparse radio array allows us to instrument a huge volume of ice to achieve a sufficient sensitivity to detect neutrinos with energies above tens of PeV. The different signal topologies for neutrino-induced events measured by the optical and in-ice radio detector -the radio detector is mostly sensitive to the cascades produced in the neutrino interaction, while the optical detector can detect long-ranging muon and tau leptons with high accuracy -yield highly complementary information. When detected in coincidence, these signals will allow us to reconstruct the neutrino energy and arrival direction with high fidelity. Furthermore, if events are detected in coincidence with a sufficient rate, they resemble the unique opportunity to study systematic uncertainties and to cross-calibrate both detector components. We present the expected rate of coincidence events for 10 years of operation. Furthermore, we analyzed possible detector optimizations to increase the coincidence rate.

IceCube-Gen2 is a planned extension to the existing IceCube Neutrino Observatory and will provide an order of magnitude increase in the detection rate of cosmic neutrinos by deploying 10,000 sensors in a volume of 8 cubic kilometers. As part of the upcoming IceCube Upgrade, we are developing prototype IceCube-Gen2 sensors to test all components in-situ in preparation for mass production required for IceCube-Gen2. The novel IceCube-Gen2 module will contain up to eighteen 4-inch photomultiplier tubes (PMTs). The signals for each PMT are digitized with a 2-channel, 12-bit ADC (low-and high-gain) at a rate of 60 MSps. In addition, each module contains LED flashers for in-ice calibration, an FPGA for performing in-module local coincidence of PMT signals, and onboard 𝜇SD flash memory for buffering data before it is sent to the surface. In this contribution, we discuss the electronics and data acquisition system design.