UDA professor participates in astronomical discovery of the Complutense of Madrid
Between January and February 2020, researchers from the Complutense University of Madrid participated in the detection of a very high-energy emission from the Púlsar del Cangrejo with a new gamma-ray telescope installed at the observatory on the island of La Palma.
Among these researchers is Andrés Baquero, professor from the Faculty of Science and Technology of the University of Azuay, who joined the project as he was part of the doctoral program in astrophysics and the high energy group of the Spanish university.
Baquero joined the UDA as a teacher in 2014 and since 2018 has been studying for a doctorate in Astrophysics at the Complutense University of Madrid.
"My passion for physics in general and for astrophysics was born from a very young age, I always wanted to study physics to understand the behavior of the natural phenomena that surround us and the universe," explains the professor from the Spanish capital and adds:
"Since there was no such degree in Cuenca, I studied Systems Engineering at the University of Cuenca and then did a master's degree in Physics, which was investigative for two years at the National Polytechnic School in Quito."
Baquero is currently developing his doctoral thesis on the development of the data analysis chain and analysis of the first data of the first prototype of a large telescope LST1 that will be part of the CTA (Cherenkov Telescope Array) collaboration.
"In addition, he was part of the MAGIC collaboration where I am a representative of the high energy group in the Software Board for automatic data analysis."
The Complutense University of Madrid reported that the detection of gamma rays from pulsars (rapidly rotating neutron stars possessing strong magnetic fields) is difficult to achieve.
“The observations of the Crab pulsar with the LST-1 were carried out during eight nights, obtaining 11 hours of data; These observations were part of the fine-tuning work to verify the telescope's performance and adjust its operating parameters, ”added the Spanish educational institution.
