Speaker
Dr
Andrew Smith
(University of Maryland, College Park)
Description
The High Altitude Water Cherenkov Observatory (HAWC) is a new and novel TeV gamma-ray detector that was recently completed and began full operation in March 2015. Located on the Sierra Negra volcano, Puebla, Mexico, at an elevation of 4,100m, HAWC is optimized for the detection of gamma rays in the 0.1 - 100~TeV range. It's 2sr field-of-view and >90% duty cycle make HAWC an ideal instrument for surveying the high-energy sky, searching for new sources, studying extended emission from diffuse sources and monitoring transient and variable sources such as GRBs and AGN. I will describe the HAWC detector and its performance characteristics and report initial results from the first months of operation.
Primary author
Dr
Andrew Smith
(University of Maryland, College Park)
