The DArk Matter Particle Explorer mission

Abstract

The DArk Matter Particle Explorer (DAMPE), one of the four scientific space science missions within the framework of the Strategic Pioneer Program on Space Science of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, is a general purpose high energy cosmic-ray and gamma-ray observatory, which was successfully launched on December 17th, 2015 from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center. The DAMPE scientific objectives include the study of galactic cosmic rays up to $\sim 10$ TeV and hundreds of TeV for electrons/gammas and nuclei respectively, and the search for dark matter signatures in their spectra. In this paper we illustrate the layout of the DAMPE instrument, and discuss the results of beam tests and calibrations performed on ground. Finally we present the expected performance in space and give an overview of the mission key scientific goals.Comment: 45 pages, including 29 figures and 6 tables. Published in Astropart. Phy

The performance of DAMPE for gamma-ray detection

“…A digitzation algorithm has been developed and can be used for converting energy hits into ADC counts which has same format with the raw fight data. To reflect the electronic response of each sub-detector, the digitization algorithm takes into account the on-orbit calibration results such as pedestal noise, PMT gains, non-uniformities etc [2].…”

“…The simulation procedure mimics real data production during both round tests and in-flight observation, by using the proper input particle fluxes and fully modeling the detector geometry and readout chain [2]. The MC data can be processed by the same reconstruction algorithms and the DAMPE simulation can provide a accurate representation of the instrument response for analysis.…”

“…The DArk Matter Particle Explorer (DAMPE), is a space mission to measure electron/positron, gamma-ray, proton, helium nuclei and other heavy ions in wide energy ranges with good energy resolution and large acceptance [1,2]. DAMPE is composed of four sub-detectors, a Plastic Scintillator strip Detector (PSD), a Silicon-Tungsten tracKer-converter(STK), a BGO imaging calorimeter and a NeUtron Detector (NUD).…”

“…DAMPE is composed of four sub-detectors, a Plastic Scintillator strip Detector (PSD), a Silicon-Tungsten tracKer-converter(STK), a BGO imaging calorimeter and a NeUtron Detector (NUD). The PSD provides charged-particle background rejection for gamma rays (anticoincidence detector) and measures the charge of incident particles; the STK measures the charges and the trajectories of charged particles, and allows to reconstruct the directions of incedent photons converting into e + e − pairs; the BGO calorimeter, with a total depth of about 32 radiation lengths, allows to measure the energy of incident particles with high resolution and to provide electron/hadron identification; finally, the NUD provides a further improvement of the electron/hadron identification [1,2].…”

Simplified TeV leptophilic dark matter in light of DAMPE data

“…In past years, several DM satellite experiments, such as AMS-02, PAMELA, HEAT and Fermi-LAT, have been launched and reported some intriguing DM evidences. The DArk Matter Particle Explorer (DAMPE) is a new cosmic ray detector [1,2], which has great energy resolution (better than 1.5%@TeV for electrons and gamma rays) and good hadron rejection power (higher than 10 5 ). Very recently, DAMPE released their first results about cosmic-ray e + + e − flux up to 5 TeV [3].…”