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A DUAL mission for nuclear astrophysics

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Abstract

DUAL will study the origin and evolution of the elements and explores new frontiers of physics: extreme energies that drive powerful stellar explosions and accelerate particles to macroscopic energies; extreme densities that modify the laws of physics around the most compact objects known; and extreme fields that influence matter in a way that is unknown on Earth. The variability of these extreme objects requires continuous all-sky coverage, while detailed study demands an improvement in sensitivity over previous technologies by at least an order of magnitude. The DUAL payload is composed of an All-Sky Compton Imager (ASCI), and two optical modules, the Laue-Lens Optic (LLO) and the Coded-Mask Optic (CMO). The ASCI serves dual roles simultaneously, both as an optimal focal-plane sensor for deep observations with the optical modules and as a sensitive true all-sky telescope in its own right for all-sky surveys and monitoring. While the optical modules are located on the main satellite, the All-Sky Compton Imager is situated on a deployable structure at a distance of 30 m from the satellite. This configuration not only permits to maintain the less massive payload at the focal distance, it also greatly reduces the spacecraft-induced detector background, and, above all it provides ASCI with a continuous all-sky exposure.

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Notes

  1. See Appendix.

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Acknowledgements

We acknowledge the support of THALES ALENIA Cannes, SENER Madrid and Bilbao, CANBERRA Lingolsheim in the preparation of the technical part of this proposal. The proposal has also benefit from the results of the phase 0 study conducted by CNES in the context of the MAX project, and from the results of the Technical Reference Study conducted by ESA in the context of the GRL project. Technical developments in the context of DUAL are financially supported by ASI (contract I/088/06/0), CNES (lens R&D contracts 02/0551/01-DPI120 and DCT/SA/AB No 07-3202, R-S06/- and R-S09/SU-0002-025, and R-S06/SU-0002-026), ESA (ESTEC contract 20357/07/NL/NR) and the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation. A.B. was supported by the RAS programms, Russian government grant 11.G34.31.0001 to the Saint-Petersburg State Politechnical University, and by the RFBR 11-02-12082-ofi-m-2011.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. IRAP, 9 avenue du Colonel-Roche, 31028, Toulouse, France

    Peter von Ballmoos, Pierre Jean & Jürgen Knödlseder

  2. IEEC/CSIC, Torre C5 Parell 2a Planta, 08193, Bellaterra, Barcelona, Spain

    Jose Alvarez, Margarita Hernanz & Jordi Isern

  3. Space Sciences Laboratory, University of California, 7 Gauss Way, Berkeley, CA, 94720-7450, USA

    Nicolas Barrière, Steve Boggs, John Tomsick & Andreas Zoglauer

  4. Ioffe Physical-Technical Institute, 26 Polytekhnicheskaya, 194021, St Petersburg, Russia

    Andrei Bykov

  5. Sener, Calle Severo Ochoa, 4, 28760, Tres Cantos, Madrid, Spain

    Juan Manuel Del Cura Velayos

  6. Universita di Ferrara, Via Savonarola, 9, 44121, Ferrara, Italy

    Filippo Frontera

  7. University College Dublin, Belfield, IE-Dublin 4, Ireland

    Lorraine Hanlon

  8. CNES, 18 Avenue Edouard Belin, 31401, Toulouse, France

    Emmanuel Hinglais

  9. Netherland Institute for Space Research, Sorbonnelaan 2, NL-3584, Utrecht, The Netherlands

    Lucien Kuiper

  10. Clemson University, 29634, Clemson, SC, USA

    Mark Leising

  11. Canberra, 1, Chemin Roseraie, 67380, Lingolsheim, France

    Benoît Pirard

  12. Thales Alenia Space, 100, Boulevard Midi, 06156, Cannes la Bocca, France

    Jean-Pierre Prost

  13. LIP, Departamento de Física, Universidade de Coimbra, 3004-516, Coimbra, Portugal

    Rui M. Curado da Silva

  14. Institute of Space and Astronautical Science, Yoshinodai Sagamihara, 229-8510, Kanagawa, Japan

    Tadayuki Takahashi

  15. Integral Science Data Center, 192, route de Vernier, CH-1214, Vernier, Geneva, Switzerland

    Roland Walter

Authors
  1. Peter von Ballmoos
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  2. Jose Alvarez
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  3. Nicolas Barrière
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  4. Steve Boggs
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  6. Juan Manuel Del Cura Velayos
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  8. Lorraine Hanlon
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  9. Margarita Hernanz
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  10. Emmanuel Hinglais
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  11. Jordi Isern
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  12. Pierre Jean
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  13. Jürgen Knödlseder
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  14. Lucien Kuiper
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  15. Mark Leising
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  16. Benoît Pirard
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  17. Jean-Pierre Prost
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  18. Rui M. Curado da Silva
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  19. Tadayuki Takahashi
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  20. John Tomsick
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  21. Roland Walter
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  22. Andreas Zoglauer
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Consortia

The DUAL Consortium

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The full author list and affiliations are given at the end of the paper.

Appendix

Appendix

Back-of-the-envelope estimate for the sensitivity improvement, comparing the SPI sensitivity with ASCI

 

mean  eff at 1 MeV

T obs

BGD at 1 MeV

Sensitivity gain

INTEGRAL/SPI

65 cm2

106 s

∼0.1 c/s·kev

 

DUAL/ASCI

∼51 cm2

9.5·107 s

∼7.3·10 − 3 c/s·kev

 

Improvement ∼ vasci/spi

0.88

9.7

3.7

32

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The DUAL Consortium., von Ballmoos, P., Alvarez, J. et al. A DUAL mission for nuclear astrophysics. Exp Astron 34, 583–622 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10686-011-9286-6

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