Einstein Probe
Launch Date: January 9, 2024
End of Operations: Mission duration of 3 years (5 years as a goal)
The Einstein Probe (EP) is a mission of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), in collaboration with the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Max Planck Institute for extraterrestrial Physics (MPE), Germany, dedicated to time-domain high-energy astrophysics. Its primary goals are to discover high-energy transients and monitor variable objects. To achieve this, EP employs a very large instantaneous field-of-view (3600 square degrees), along with moderate spatial resolution (FWHM ~5 arcmin) and energy resolution in the 0.5-5 keV energy band. EP has also the capability of performing fast and deep follow-up observations in the 0.5-10 keV energy band (effective area 2*300 cm2 @ 1 keV; half-power diameter, HPD, ~30 arcsec), as well as of quick downlink of transient alert messages.
| Instruments | Energy Range | Field of View | Localization |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wide Field X-ray Telescope | 0.5 - 4 keV | 3600 deg2 | 2 arcmin |
| Follow-up X-ray Telescope | 0.5 – 10 keV | 60 arcmin diameter | 5-15 arcsec (90% c.l.) |
JSON-Serialized GCN Notices Types in GCN Kafka:
Einstein Probe distributes alerts for the detection of gamma-ray transients. These notices are published on the GCN Kafka topic gcn.notices.einstein_probe.wxt.alert.
The GCN schema and example JSON message files are available to use for Einstein Probe Schema. See the Schema Browser for more information on the properties defined in the schema.
Detailed description and examples of EP Notices are available in the GCN Schema GitHub project.
| Type | Contents | Latency |
|---|---|---|
gcn.notices.einstein_probe.wxt.alert | Localization, Count Rate, Significance | ~1 min |
Yearly Trigger Rates:
| Instrument | Type | Rates |
|---|---|---|
| WXT | GRBs, other transients, and non-astrophysical triggers | ~100 |