A CHARGED-PARTICLE TELESCOPE TO STUDY RELATIVISTIC ELECTRONS, SUB-RELATIVISTIC PROTONS AND MUONS

A bi-directional charged particle telescope has been designed to distinguish electrons, muons and protons incident on the telescope from two opposite directions and to measure the energy of particles which stop in the central total energy detector of the system. This paper describes the design, test and evaluation of the telescope using radioactive sources, cosmic rays and low energy (8 MeV) electron beam from an accelerator. This telescope has been used in an experiment to measure the flux and energy spectrum of low energy electrons in 5 to 24 MeV energy interval and protons in 70 to 110 MeV energy region in the upper atmosphere. This experiment was carried out at high altitudes, using large size scientific balloon over the city of Hyderabad, India in Dec. 1984. Ground level low energy muon flux has been observed at Ahmedabad and Hyderabad.