CREAM: 70 days of flight from 2 launches in Antarctica

• Published in: Advances in Space Research
• Main Authors: Seo, E.S., Ahn, H.S., Allison, P., Bagliesi, M.G., Barbier, L., Barrau, A., Bazer-Bachi, R., Beatty, J.J., Bigongiari, G., Boyle, P., Brandt, T.J., Buénerd, M., Childers, J.T., Conklin, N.B., Coutu, S., Derome, L., Duvernois, M.A., Ganel, O., Han, J.H., Jeon, J.A., Kim, K.C., Lee, M.H., Lutz, L., Malinin, A., Mangin-Brinet, M., Marrocchesi, P.S., Maestro, P., Menchaca-Rocha, A., Minnick, S., Mognet, S.I., Nam, S., Nutter, S., Park, I.H., Park, N.H., Putze, A., Sina, R., Swordy, S., Wakely, S., Walpole, P., Wu, J., Yang, J., Yoon, Y.S., Zei, R., Zinn, S.Y.
• Other Authors: Laboratoire de Physique Subatomique et de Cosmologie (LPSC), Université Joseph Fourier - Grenoble 1 (UJF)-Institut polytechnique de Grenoble - Grenoble Institute of Technology (Grenoble INP )-Institut National de Physique Nucléaire et de Physique des Particules du CNRS (IN2P3)-Institut National Polytechnique de Grenoble (INPG)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Centre d'étude spatiale des rayonnements (CESR), Université Toulouse III - Paul Sabatier (UT3), Université de Toulouse (UT)-Université de Toulouse (UT)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Observatoire Midi-Pyrénées (OMP), Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD)-Université Toulouse III - Paul Sabatier (UT3), Université de Toulouse (UT)-Université de Toulouse (UT)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Centre National d'Études Spatiales Toulouse (CNES)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Météo-France-Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Centre National d'Études Spatiales Toulouse (CNES)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Météo-France-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), CREAM
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2008
• Subjects: Cosmic rays; ULDB; CREAM; Balloon experiment; Antarctica; [PHYS.ASTR.CO]Physics [physics]/Astrophysics [astro-ph]/Cosmology and Extra-Galactic Astrophysics [astro-ph.CO]; [PHYS.PHYS.PHYS-INS-DET]Physics [physics]/Physics [physics]/Instrumentation and Detectors [physics.ins-det]; Antarc*; South pole
• Online Access: https://hal.in2p3.fr/in2p3-00344982; https://doi.org/10.1016/j.asr.2007.03.056

The Cosmic-Ray Energetics And Mass balloon-borne experiment has been launched twice in Antarctica, first in December 2004 and again in December 2005. It circumnavigated the South Pole three times during the first flight, which set a flight duration record of 42 days. A cumulative duration of 70 days within 13 months was achieved when the second flight completed 28 days during two circumnavigations of the Pole on 13 January 2006. Both the science instrument and support systems functioned extremely well, and a total 117 GB of data including 67 million science events were collected during these two flights. Preliminary analysis indicates that the data extend well above 100 TeV and follow reasonable power laws. The payload recovered from the first flight has been refurbished for the third flight in 2007, whereas the payload from the second flight is being refurbished to be ready for the fourth flight in 2008. Each flight will extend the reach of precise cosmic-ray composition measurements to energies not previously possible.