Status of the Cherenkov telescope array project

Abstract

Gamma-ray astronomy holds a great potential for Astrophysics, Particle Physics and Cosmology. The CTA is an international initiative to build the next generation of ground-based gamma-ray observatories, which will represent a factor of 5-10× improvement in the sensitivity of observations in the range 100 GeV -10 TeV, as well as an extension of the observational capabilities down to energies below 100 GeV and beyond 100 TeV. The array will consist of two telescope networks (one in the Northern Hemisphere and another in the South) so to achieve a full-sky coverage, and will be composed by a hybrid system of 4 different telescope types. It will operate as an observatory, granting open access to the community through calls for submission of proposals competing for observation time. The CTA will give us access to the non-thermal and high-energy universe at an unprecedented level, and will be one of the main instruments for high-energy astrophysics and astroparticle physics of the next 30 years. CTA has now entered its prototyping phase with the first, stand-alone instruments being built. Brazil is an active member of the CTA consortium, and the project is represented in Latin America also by Argentina, Mexico and Chile. In the next few months the consortium will define the site for installation of CTA South, which might come to be hosted in the Chilean Andes, with important impact for the high-energy community in Latin America. In this talk we will present the basic concepts of the CTA and the detailed project of the observatory. Emphasis will be put on its scientific potential and on the Latin-American involvement in the preparation and construction of the observatory, whose first seed, the ASTRI mini-array, is currently being constructed in Sicily, in a cooperation between Italy, Brazil and South Africa. ASTRI should be installed on the final CTA site in 2016, whereas the full CTA array is expected to be operational by the end of the decade.