Paper 13093-276
Paper 13093-276
The evaluation of the CUSP scientific performance by a GEANT4 Monte Carlo simulation
On demand | Presenting live 19 June 2024 
Abstract
The CUbesat Solar Polarimeter (CUSP) project is a CubeSat mission orbiting the Earth aimed to measure the linear polarization of solar flares in the hard X-ray band by means of a Compton scattering polarimeter. CUSP will allow to study the magnetic reconnection and particle acceleration in the flaring magnetic structures of our star. CUSP is a project in the framework of the Alcor Program of the Italian Space Agency aimed to develop new CubeSat missions. It is approved for a Phase B study. In this work, we report on the accurate simulation of the detector's response to evaluate the scientific performance. A GEANT4 Monte Carlo simulation is used to assess the physical interactions of the source photons with the detector and the passive materials. Using this approach, we implemented a detailed CUSP Mass Model. We report on the evaluation of the detector's effective area, the modulation for polarized photons, and the spurious modulation due to the detector's geometry as a function of the beam energy.
Presenter
INAF - Istituto di Astrofisica e Planetologia Spaziali (Italy)
Giovanni Lombardi is a young scientist working on the CUSP project. His work is crucial for the Monte Carlo simulation presented in this poster. His activity involves exporting the mass model of CUSP from the CAD design.