Performance Modeling And Improvements On The GRB Source Localization Streaming Pipeline Aboard The Antarctic Demonstrator For The Advanced Particle-Astrophysics Telescope (ADAPT)

Author

• Ye Htet
• Ye Htet
• Marion Sudvarg, Missouri University of Science and TechnologyFollow
• Marion Sudvarg
• Honghao Yang
• Jeremy Buhler
• Roger Chamberlain
• Wenlei Chen
• Wenlei Chen
• James Buckley
• Matthew Andrew
• Blake Bal
• Elisabetta E. Bissaldi
• Richard G. Bose
• Dana Braun
• James H. Buckley
• Jeremy Buhler
• Eric Burns

Abstract

The Advanced Particle-astrophysics Telescope (APT) is a mission concept for a space-based gamma-ray telescope whose capabilities include prompt localization of gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) to support multi-wavelength and multi-messenger astrophysics. ADAPT — APT's balloon-borne prototype — can localize GRBs in well under a second using on-board computing hardware. ADAPT will partner with ground-based, fast-slewing optical telescopes, rapidly providing alerts that enable the partner to observe a short-duration burst within a few seconds of detection. In this work, we investigate the utility of having ADAPT issue progressively more accurate location estimates for a GRB as detected Compton events from the burst accumulate over time. We develop a computational model to estimate how frequently ADAPT can compute these estimates, finding that it can do so at least every 150 ms for a 1 MeV/cm² burst on a low-power quad-core Intel Atom processor. We then assess how quickly ADAPT's localization improves as it observes more events and show that a partner instrument can slew to a burst's location faster if it exploits progressive location estimates than if it waits for one final estimate. Real-time, on-board source localization thus has a role to play in cooperative observation of gamma-ray transients even when data collection time, rather than computing time, dominates the cost of detection.

Recommended Citation

Y. Htet and Y. Htet and M. Sudvarg and M. Sudvarg and H. Yang and J. Buhler and R. Chamberlain and W. Chen and W. Chen and J. Buckley and M. Andrew and B. Bal and E. E. Bissaldi and R. G. Bose and D. Braun and J. H. Buckley and J. Buhler and E. Burns, "Performance Modeling And Improvements On The GRB Source Localization Streaming Pipeline Aboard The Antarctic Demonstrator For The Advanced Particle-Astrophysics Telescope (ADAPT)," Proceedings of Science, vol. 501, article no. 679, SISSA Medialab Srl, Dec 2025.

The definitive version is available at https://doi.org/10.22323/1.501.0679

Meeting Name

39th International Cosmic Ray Conference (ICRC2025)

Department(s)

Computer Science

Publication Status

Open Access

Comments

National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Grant 80NSSC21K1741

International Standard Serial Number (ISSN)

1824-8039

Document Type

Article - Conference proceedings

Document Version

Citation

File Type

text

Language(s)

English

Rights

© 2026 The Authors, All rights reserved.

Creative Commons Licensing

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.

Publication Date

30 Dec 2025