ONGOING ACTIVITIES

• Physical characterization of materials: graphene oxide and dependence of its properties on functional groups; free volume in polymers, rubbers and their blends.
• Main techniques used: positron annihilation spectroscopies and thermal analyses (differential scanning calorimetry and dilatometry).
• AEGIS collaboration at CERN. Goals: 1) generation of a pulsed beam of antiatoms to carry out gravity measurements on antimatter (test of the equivalence principle). 2) Formation of Positronium in Rydberg states to study its laser cooling.
• AUGER collaboration, to detect cosmic rays of ultra high energy. An upgrade of the experiment is in progress, with new detectors, their calibration, validation and subsequent deployment in Malargue (Argentina), where the experiment takes place.
• SWGO collaboration. Goal: to build an observatory for the detection of gamma rays in the range 100 GeV – 10 PeV. The Politecnico group (members of DAER and DENG) is involved in the study of water Cherenkov detectors with new sensors.

FUTURE PLANS

Irradiation studies on materials for space applications using a low energy electron beam (up to 20 keV) specifically designed to this purpose and in phase of commissioning. Aim: to test the damage of surfaces to increasing radiation doses. Surfaces will be characterized by means of traditional techniques (FTIR, EPR, DSC) as well as by positron annihilation.

ERC KEYWORDS

PE2-7 Atomic, molecular physics
PE4-17 Characterization methods of materials
PE9-10 High energy and particles astronomy – X rays, cosmic rays, gamma rays, neutrinos

FREE KEYWORDS

Antihydrogen
Cosmic rays
Polymers
Porous materials
Positron annihilation
Thermal analysis