Thesis

Measurement of isotopic composition of cosmic rays with the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer

• Call:

  IDPASC Portugal - PHD Programme 2017

• Academic Year:

  2017 / 2018

• Domains:

  Experimental Particle Physics | Astroparticle Physics

• Supervisor:

  Fernando Barao

• Co-Supervisor:

  Laurent Derome

• Institution:

  Instituto Superior Técnico

• Host Institution:

  Laboratório de Instrumentação e Física Experimental de Partículas

• Abstract:

  The Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) aims to precisely measure the different components of cosmic ray. The detector has been installed on the international space station on May 2011 and is since running constantly, more than 100 billion of events have been recorded so far by the data acquisition system. The isotopic composition of cosmic ray nuclei is a key observable which can be used to understand the physical processes related to the propagation of cosmic rays in the Galaxy. Particularly, the 10Be/9Be ratio can be used to constrain the size of the diffuse halo in the Galaxy. The measurement is challenging since it requires to reconstruct the mass of the particles going trough the detector. The goal of the thesis is to develop the analysis tools aiming to reconstruct the isotopic composition of nuclei with AMS and to study the constrains which can be derive from these measurements on the propagation models of cosmic rays in the Galaxy.