Contributor info: Mr Fahim Varsi

D. Pattanaik, S. Ahmad, M. Chakraborty, S. R. Dugad, U. D. Goswami, S. K. Gupta, B. Hariharan, Y. Hayashi, P. Jagadeesan, A. Jain, P. Jain, S. Kawakami, H. Kojima, S. Mahapatra, P. K. Mohanty, R. Moharana, Y. Muraki, P. K. Nayak, T. Nonaka, A. Oshima, B. P. Pant, M. Rameez, K. Ramesh, L. V. Reddy, S. Shibata, F. Varsi, M. Zuberi

SciPost Phys. Proc. 13, 033 (2023) · published 29 September 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

GRAPES-3 is an extensive air shower array located at Ooty (11.6$^\circ$N, 76.7$^\circ$E, 2200 m a.s.l.) in southern India. Recently, the angular resolution of the GRAPES-3 array has been improved by correcting the shower front curvature based on the shower size and age. Here, we present the results of the angular resolution and pointing accuracy of the array through observation of the Moon shadow. We have analyzed the data for the period of 2014-2016 containing $\sim$ 3$×$10$^9$ air shower events with a median energy of 15 TeV. A significant improvement in the angular resolution has been observed compared to the earlier analysis by the group through the Moon shadow method and is comparable to the arrays located at a 2 km higher altitude than the GRAPES-3 experiment.

F. Varsi, S. Ahmad, M. Chakraborty, A. Chandra, S. R. Dugad, U. D. Goswami, S. K. Gupta, B. Hariharan, Y. Hayashi, P. Jagadeesan, A. Jain , P. Jain, S. Kawakami, H. Kojima, S. Mahapatra, P. K. Mohanty, R. Moharana, Y. Muraki, P. K. Nayak, T. Nonaka, A. Oshima, B. P. Pant, D. Pattanaik, G. Pradhan, M. Rameez, K. Ramesh, L. V. Reddy, R. Sahoo, R. Scaria, S. Shibata, K. Tanaka, M. Zuberi

SciPost Phys. Proc. 13, 031 (2023) · published 29 September 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

Here, we present the updated results on the cosmic ray energy spectrum and composition analysis from the GRAPES-3 experiment over the energy range of 50 TeV to 1000 TeV since ICRC 2021. The simulation of cosmic ray showers was performed using the post-LHC high energy hadronic interaction model QGSJetII-04 and low energy hadronic model FLUKA. A detailed GEANT4 simulation of the GRAPES-3 muon telescope was performed. The composition was obtained by fitting simulated muon multiplicity distributions for proton, helium, nitrogen, aluminium, and iron primaries to the observed data. The energy spectrum connects to the direct measurements with a fairly good agreement in flux.

Hariharan Balakrishnan, S. Ahmad, M. Chakraborty, S.R. Dugad, U.D. Goswami, S.K. Gupta, Y. Hayashi, P. Jagadeesan, A. Jain, P. Jain, S. Kawakami, H. Kojima, S. Mahapatra, P.K. Mohanty, R. Moharana, Y. Muraki, P.K. Nayak, T. Nonaka, A. Oshima, D. Pattanaik, B.P. Pant, M. Rameez, K. Ramesh, L.V. Reddy, S. Shibata, F. Varsi, M. Zuberi

SciPost Phys. Proc. 13, 021 (2023) · published 28 September 2023 | Toggle abstract · pdf

The GRAPES-3 experiment is a unique, extensive air shower experiment consisting of 400 scintillator detectors spread over 25000 m$^2$ and a 560 m$^2$ muon telescope. The experiment located at Ooty, India, has been collecting data for the past two decades. The unique capabilities of GRAPES-3 have allowed the study of cosmic rays over energies from a few TeV to tens of PeV and beyond. The measurement of the directional flux of muons (E$_\mu$≥1 GeV) by the large muon telescope permits an excellent gamma-hadron separation, which then becomes a powerful tool in the study of multi-TeV gamma-ray sources and the composition of primary cosmic rays. However, the high precision measurements also enable studies of transient atmospheric and interplanetary phenomena such as those produced by thunderstorms and geomagnetic storms. This paper presents some exciting new and recent results, including updates on various ongoing analyses.