The “Carpet-3” air shower array to search for diffuse gamma rays with energy Eγ>100TeV

Abstract

At present an experiment for measuring the flux of cosmic diffuse gamma rays with energy higher than 100 TeV (experiment “Carpet-3”) is being prepared at the Baksan Neutrino Observatory of the Institute for Nuclear Research, Russian Academy of Sciences. The preparation of the experiment implies considerable enlargement of the area of both muon detector and surface part of the shower array. At the moment the plastic scintillation counters with a total continuous area of 410 m2 are installed in the muon detector (MD) underground tunnels, and they are totally equipped with electronics. Adjusting of the counters and their electronic circuits is in progress. Six modules of shower detectors (out of twenty planned to be installed) have already been placed on the surface of the MD absorber. A new liquid scintillation detector is developed for modules of the ground –surface part of the array, whose characteristics are presented. It is shown that the “Carpet-3” air shower array will have the best sensitivity to the flux of primary gamma rays with energies in the range 100TeV – 1PeV, being quite competitive in gamma-ray astronomy at such energies.