Introducing the CTA concept
(2013)
The Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA) is a new observatory for very high-energy (VHE) gamma rays. CTA has ambitions science goals, for which it is necessary to achieve full-sky coverage, to improve the sensitivity by about an order of magnitude, to span about four decades of energy, from a few tens of GeV to above 100 TeV with enhanced angular and energy resolutions over existing VHE gamma-ray observatories. An international collaboration has formed with more than 1000 members from 27 countries in Europe, Asia, Africa and North and South America. In 2010 the CTA Consortium completed a Design Study and started a three-year Preparatory Phase which leads to production readiness of CTA in 2014. In this paper we introduce the science goals and the concept of CTA, and provide an overview of the project.
Ground-based gamma-ray astronomy has had a major breakthrough with the impressive results obtained using systems of imaging atmospheric Cherenkov telescopes. Ground-based gamma-ray astronomy has a huge potential in astrophysics, particle physics and cosmology. CTA is an international initiative to build the next generation instrument, with a factor of 5-10 improvement in sensitivity in the 100 GeV-10 TeV range and the extension to energies well below 100 GeV and above 100 TeV. CTA will consist of two arrays (one in the north, one in the south) for full sky coverage and will be operated as open observatory. The design of CTA is based on currently available technology. This document reports on the status and presents the major design concepts of CTA.
In the present study, photophysical properties of [N]phenylenes were studied by means of stationary and time-resolved absorption and fluorescence spectroscopy (in THF at room temperature). For biphenylene (1) and linear [3]phenylene (2a), internal conversion (IC) with quantum yields ΦIC > 0.99 is by far the dominant mechanism of S1 state deactivation. Angular [3]phenylene (3a), the zig-zag [4]- and [5]phenylenes (3b), (3c), and the triangular [4]phenylene (4) show fluorescence emission with fluorescence quantum yieds and lifetimes between ΦF = 0.07 for (3a) and 0.21 for (3c) and τF = 20 ns for (3a) and 81 ns for (4). Also, compounds (3) and (4) exhibit triplet formation upon photoexcitation with quantum yields as high as ΦISC = 0.45 for (3c). The strong differences in the fluorescence properties and in the triplet fromation efficiencies between (1) and (2a) on one hand and (3) and (4) on the other are related to the remarkable variation of the internal conversion (IC) rate constants kIC. A tentative classification of (1) and (2a) as “fast IC compounds”, with kIC > 109 s-1, and of (3) and (4) as “slow IC compounds”, with kIC ≈ 107 s-1, is suggested. This classification cannot simply be related to Hückel’s rule-type concepts of aromaticity, because the group of “fast IC compounds” consists of “antiaromatic” (1) and “aromatic” (2a), and the group of “slow IC compounds” consists of “antiaromatic” (3b), (4) and “aromatic” (3a), (3c). The IC in the [N]phenylenes is discussed within the framework of the so-called energy gap law established for non-radiative processes in benzenoid hydrocarbons.