Speaker
Description
The Home-grown Radiation Monitor (YRM) is being developed for deployment on Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite missions. YRM will consist of a proton telescope, sensitive to protons with kinetic energies between 2–200 MeV, and an electron detector, sensitive to electrons with kinetic energies between 0.5–7 MeV.
The proton telescope design has been completed, and an initial prototype was flown twice on a sounding rocket in 2020. A second prototype has since been developed, successfully passed environmental testing, and is scheduled for flight to 350 km altitude this year.
For the electron detector, two scintillator-based configurations have been developed: one using a polyvinyl toluene (PVT) scintillator and the other a CsI scintillator, both equipped with SiPM-based electronic readout. High-altitude balloons (HABs) provide an ideal test platform for these detectors, enabling measurements in the stratosphere near-space environment with sufficient statistics.
A HAB platform named YİB, developed by METU-İVMER, has conducted nine stratospheric flights during 2024–2025, collecting radiation data alongside environmental measurements. In the YİB-4 flight, the PVT detector recorded energy deposition in the range 50 keV–2 MeV, while the CsI detector covered up to 3 MeV, in 1024 energy bins (with the final bin reserved as overflow). In the YİB-8 flight, the PVT detector measured from 50 keV–2 MeV and the CsI detector extended coverage up to 7 MeV. YİB-4 reached an altitude of 33 km over Ankara, Turkey, while YİB-8 reached 30 km over Aksaray, Turkey.
In addition, the YİB-7 flight carried the SB.0 proton detector, an early prototype of YRM’s proton telescope, sensitive to protons in the range of approximately 4.3–70 MeV. This flight module had previously flown on ROKETSAN sounding rockets in 2020, and for the balloon campaign it was adapted for civil air traffic safety and tested as part of the same near-space program.
These flights provide valuable data for understanding radiation variability with altitude and geomagnetic location. The results are compared with atmospheric radiation models, demonstrating the readiness of the compact detectors for future LEO deployment in space weather monitoring.
