Telescope Array Radar (TARA) observatory for Ultra-High Energy Cosmic Rays

• Published in: Nuclear instruments & methods in physics research. Section A, Accelerators, spectrometers, detectors and associated equipment Vol. 767; pp. 322 - 338
• Main Authors: Abbasi, R., Othman, M. Abou Bakr, Allen, C., Beard, L., Belz, J., Besson, D., Byrne, M., Farhang-Boroujeny, B., Gardner, A., Gillman, W.H., Hanlon, W., Hanson, J., Jayanthmurthy, C., Kunwar, S., Larson, S.L., Myers, I., Prohira, S., Ratzlaff, K., Sokolsky, P., Takai, H., Thomson, G.B., Von Maluski, D.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Elsevier B.V 11-12-2014; Elsevier
• Subjects: Chirp; Cosmic ray; Cosmic rays; Detectors; Digital signal processing; Energy (nuclear); FPGA; Observatories; PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS; RADAR; Radar arrays; Telescopes; Transmitters; Cosmic ray; Chirp; FPGA; Radar; Digital signal processing
• ISSN: 0168-9002; 1872-9576
• DOI: 10.1016/j.nima.2014.08.015

Construction was completed during summer 2013 on the Telescope Array RAdar (TARA) bi-static radar observatory for Ultra-High Energy Cosmic Rays (UHECR). TARA is co-located with the Telescope Array, the largest “conventional” cosmic ray detector in the Northern Hemisphere, in radio-quiet Western Utah. TARA employs an 8MW Effective Radiated Power (ERP) VHF transmitter and smart receiver system based on a 250MS/s data acquisition system in an effort to detect the scatter of sounding radiation by UHECR-induced atmospheric ionization. TARA seeks to demonstrate bi-static radar as a useful new remote sensing technique for UHECRs. In this report, we describe the design and performance of the TARA transmitter and receiver systems.