AbstractWe present the design and initial flight results of a balloon-borne hard X-ray spectrometer for observing solar flares. The instrument is designed for quantitative observation of nonthermal and thermal components of solar flare hard X-ray emission, and has an energy range of 15–120 keV and an energy resolution of 3 keV. The instrument is a small (gondola weight 70 kg) system equipped with sixteen 10×10×0.5 mm CdTe detectors, and designed for a 1-day flight at 41 km altitude. Detector temperature of −15 °C was achieved through radiative cooling alone. Pre-flight tests confirmed that all detectors exceeded the target 3 keV resolution. No flares were observed during the 2001 flight, but the second flight on May 24, 2002 succeeded in observing a class M1.1 flare. Preliminary analysis indicates the observed spectrum is consistent with a purely thermal plasma at an unusually high temperature of 47 mK.
Observation of solar flare hard X-ray spectra using CdTe detectors
Advances in Space Research ; 33 , 10 ; 1786-1789
2003-05-02
4 pages
Article (Journal)
Electronic Resource
English
Observation of Solar Flare Hard X-ray Spectra Using CdTe Detectors
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