Pol Bordas, appointed Deputy Physics Coordinator of the Large-Sized Telescope Collaboration

Pol Bordas, researcher from the Institute of Space Studies of Catalonia (IEEC — Institut d’Estudis Espacials de Catalunya) at the Institute of Cosmos Sciences of the University of Barcelona (ICCUB), has been recently designated as the deputy Physics Coordinator of the Large-Sized Telescope (LST) Collaboration, marking a significant milestone in his scientific career. 

The LST Collaboration is an international consortium of leading research institutions responsible for the design and construction of the Large-Sized Telescopes (LSTs), one of the three classes of telescopes required to cover the Cherenkov Telescope Array Observatory (CTAO) energy range, from 20 GeV to 300 TeV. Four LSTs will be arranged at the centre of the CTAO’s northern hemisphere array, located on La Palma (Spain), and an enhancement plan of the current layout includes also two LSTs in the southern array in the Atacama Desert (Chile).

“I am deeply honoured to assume the role of Deputy Physics Coordinator,” said Pol Bordas. “The LSTs will play a key role within the CTAO, which will become the best gamma ray observatory worldwide and so I look forward to witnessing the discoveries that the first data now being collected will bring.”

In the next years, Pol Bordas will play a pivotal role in shaping the scientific direction of the collaboration, facilitating the interdisciplinary cooperation among the different working groups and laying out their strategic research topics, in alignment with the overall CTAO’s science case. His appointment as Deputy Physics Coordinator represents a significant endorsement of his scientific trajectory in the field and of his proven expertise and leadership skills.

Pol Bordas develops his research in the High-energy Astrophysics group at the ICCUB-IEEC. The group has been present in the collaboration since the inception of its predecessors, the MAGIC telescopes. Researchers make significant contributions to LST in both the technical area (working on data analysis as well as hardware and electronics design) and the scientific area. ICCUB-IEEC members have initially focused on the study of possible gamma ray sources like galactic binaries and microquasars. Some of the suggested sources were later observed by the Cherenkov Telescopes, like the detection of LS I +61 303 which resulted in the first publication of the MAGIC Collaboration in the journal Science. 

Thanks to this initial involvement, the High-Energy Astrophysics group started taking on bigger and bigger areas and growing in members. The Technological Unit of the ICCUB, led by David Gascón, opened a new research line focused on improving the LST hardware, and on the design and development of its electronics, which have undergone a huge advance in recent years and are now basic components of the telescope. The team counts also with a new PhD researcher to work on the Data Analysis and Software Development for the LST, making the ICCUB-IEEC present in the Scientific, Instrumentation and Computation areas of the Collaboration.

Using gamma rays to explore the high-energy universe

The LST Collaboration is committed to advancing our understanding of high-energy astrophysical phenomena and pushing the boundaries of scientific exploration as part of the Cherenkov Telescope Array Observatory (CTAO), which will be the first open ground-based gamma-ray observatory and the world’s largest and most sensitive instrument for the exploration of the high-energy Universe.

When gamma rays reach the Earth’s atmosphere they interact with it, producing cascades of subatomic particles. Nothing can travel faster than light in a vacuum, but light travels 0.03 percent slower in air. Thus, these ultra-high energy particles can travel faster than light in air, creating a blue flash of “Cherenkov light” (discovered by Russian physicist Pavel Cherenkov in 1934) similar to the sonic boom created by an aircraft exceeding the speed of sound. Although the light is spread over a large area (250 m in diameter), the cascade only lasts a few billionths of a second. It is too faint to be detected by the human eye, but not too faint for the CTAO. The CTAO’s large mirrors and high-speed cameras will detect the flash of light and image the cascade generated by the gamma rays for further study of their cosmic sources.

Press release prepared in collaboration with the Institute of Cosmos Sciences of the University of Barcelona (ICCUB).

Links

• IEEC
• ICCUB
• Cherenkov Telescope Array Observatory