About SURA
Semnan University Radio Array (SURA) is the first cosmic ray radio experiment in the Middle East. The ultimate goal of this new site is to detect ultra-high energy cosmic rays with an investigation on their radio signal properties.
Radio detection of cosmic rays has evolved over the past decade with high expectations. In recent years this new approach has once again become an interesting field of research with possible advantages over existing techniques. As a result of the progress in both technical and theoretical aspects of radio signal interpretation, this new technique has been used in many different experiments to detect cosmic rays and to determine their key properties either as a self-trigger experiment or as a complementary setup alongside other detection methods.
This approach has many advantages including a high duty cycle, inexpensive required hardware compared to other methods, and the ability to work alongside other detection techniques which can provide a hybrid detection of cosmic rays.
The first radio antenna of the SURA experiment was deployed in March 2018 at the roof of the physics faculty of Semnan university in Iran. After a successful assembly of the antennas and the electronics, the first set of radio data were recorded and analyzed in December 2018.
Currently, the group is working on investigating the recorded events in order to determine the key properties of cosmic ray candidates.
The next step is to make the computer code more efficient so it can detect more accurate cosmic ray candidates.
Moreover, installing a few more radio antennas and connect to the central cluster is another major challenge for the team.
In the near future, a selected number of particle detectors will also be added to the experiment and bring a whole new dimension to the experiment. Not only they can be used to detect cosmic ray events on their own but also it will be possible to have hybrid detection.
