Dr. Wystan Benbow
Wednesday, March 17, 2021
10:00am Arizona Time
Pioneering Gamma-ray Astronomy: Fifty Fundamental Years at FLWO
The story of ground-based gamma-ray astronomy is deeply connected to the F.L. Whipple Observatory (FLWO) in southern Arizona. Most consider the Whipple 10-meter telescope, which was inaugurated in 1968, the field’s first major facility. Although it took approximately 20 years for this telescope to detect the first cosmic source of very-high-energy gamma rays, it paved the way for the major breakthroughs with the next generation of observatories. These facilities began operation in the 2000s and include FLWO’s VERITAS observatory, the current world leader. The next-generation observatory, the Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA), has been in development since 2006 and will come online later this decade. CTA is a global endeavor and will detect cosmic sources 100 times faster than VERITAS enabling dramatic new science. A novel prototype telescope for CTA was constructed at FLWO and experienced its first major successes in 2020. Dr. Benbow will discuss the history of gamma-ray astronomy at FLWO, highlight some key results from VERITAS, and summarize the status and future of this new, cutting-edge field of astronomy.
About Dr. Benbow
Dr. Wystan Benbow is the PI / Project Scientist of the VERITAS Gamma-ray Observatory.
VERITAS (Very Energetic Radiation Imaging Telescope Array System) is a stereoscopic array of four atmospheric-Cherenkov telescopes that are sensitive to very high energy (VHE; E> 100 GeV) gamma rays. Located at the F.L.Whipple Observatory in southern Arizona, USA, the array began operation in 2007, and is currently the most sensitive VHE observatory in the world. The VERITAS Collaboration, which consists of ~100 scientists from institutions in the U.S.A., Canada, the U.K., and Ireland, is carrying out observations that cover a broad range of science topics. VERITAS seeks to both identify new sources of VHE gamma rays, and to perform in-depth studies (e.g. spectral, temporal and morphological measurements) of the known VHE sources to better understand their underlying fundamental processes. The results of these studies often have broad implications beyond the physics of the objects. Other topics addressed include fundamental physics (e.g. the energy dependence of the speed of light), cosmology, the origin of cosmic rays, and the search for dark matter. VERITAS is a major contributor to the rapidly emerging field of gamma-ray astrophysics, where in the past 10 years the number of known astrophysical VHE sources has grown from 10 to more than 200.