The first flight of the CREAM silicon charge detector

Abstract

The CREAM (Cosmic Ray Energetics And Mass) experiment was constructed for the measurement of high-energy cosmic rays in the energy range between 10(12) and 10(15) eV. As a long duration balloon payload, the CREAM had its first successful flight in December 2004 from McMurdo Station, Antarctica. For the charge measurement of incident cosmic-ray particles entering the calorimeter module, a layer of the SCD (Silicon Charge Detector) made of 2912 silicon pixels was built with an active area of 779 x 795 mm(2). This paper describes the performance of the SCD during the 2004-2005 flight.