COSI started as a stratospheric scientific balloon experiment. Through several flights and instrument iterations, and two names (COSI was originally called NCT – the Nuclear Compton Telescope), COSI’s most recent balloon-borne instrument design features 12 High Purity Germanium Detectors (GeDs), each with 37 electrode strips per detector face. This can be compared to the newest Instrument Design from the COSI collaboration, for COSI-SMEX (a Small Explorer satellite), which builds on the legacy of our successful balloon-borne instruments and increases the number of detectors from as well as the number of electrode strips per detector face.
Keep scrolling to read about some of COSI’s flight campaigns!
Flight Campaigns
Click the links below to read more about COSI’s flight campaigns:
- COSI 2020 (Wanaka, New Zealand)
- COSI 2016 (Wanaka, New Zealand)
- COSI 2014 (McMurdo Station, Antarctica)
- Previous Campaigns (NCT)
Balloon Team
The COSI balloon team is based at the Space Sciences Laboratory, at the University of California, Berkeley, but consists of a collaboration consisting of multiple academic institutions, research laboratories, and a NASA center. Browse our directory below, or see the links at the bottom of the page to COSI’s affiliated institutions.
Prof. Steven Boggs – Principal Investigator (COSI-APRA)
UC San Diego – Dean of Physical Sciences
B.S. University of Illinois, Urbana
Ph.D. University of California, Berkeley
seboggs at ucsd dot edu
Publications
Dr. John Tomsick – Principal Investigator (COSI-SMEX)
UC Berkeley/Space Sciences Lab
B.S. University of California, San Diego
Ph.D. Columbia University
jtomsick at berkeley dot edu
Publications
Dr. Andreas Zoglauer – Research Scientist
UC Berkeley/Space Sciences Lab
M.S. Technical University of Munich
Ph.D. Technical University of Munich
zoglauer at berkeley dot edu
Publications
Dr. Terri Brandt – Currently Head of Astrophysics@SRON
Netherlands Institute for Space Research (formerly GSFC)
B.A. Vassar College
Ph.D. The Ohio State University
T.J.Brandt at sron dot nl
Publications
Dr. Thomas Siegert – Currently faculty @ Wuerzburg
University of Wuerzburg (formerly UC San Diego)
M.S. Technical University of Munich
Ph.D. Technical University of Munich
thomas.siegert at uni-wuerzburg dot de
Publications Twitter
Dr. Jarred Roberts – Project Scientist
UC San Diego
B.S. University of California, Riverside
Ph.D. University of Hawaii at Manoa
jmroberts at physics dot ucsd dot edu
Publications
Dr. Alex Lowell – Aerospace Engineer
UC Berkeley/Space Sciences Lab
B.S. University of California, Santa Cruz
Ph.D. University of California, Berkeley
alowell at ssl dot berkeley dot edu
Publications
Dr. Carolyn Kierans
Goddard Space Flight Center
Ph.D. University of California, Berkeley
B.S. Simon Frasier University
M.S. University of Toronto
carolyn.a.kierans at nasa dot gov
Dr. Clio Sleator
Naval Research Lab
Ph.D. University of California, Berkeley
B.A. Columbia University
Publications
Hadar Lazar
UC Berkeley/Space Sciences Laboratory
B.A. University of Chicago
Jacqueline Beechert
UC Berkeley/Space Sciences Laboratory
B.S. University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Nick Pellegrini
UC Berkeley/Space Sciences Laboratory
B.A. University of California, Berkeley
Steve McBride – Systems (Old Geezer) Engineer
Space Sciences Laboratory
mcbride at ssl dot berkeley dot edu
Brent Mochizuki – Computer Engineer
Space Sciences Laboratory
brentm at ssl dot berkeley dot edu
Follow @BrentMochizuki
Tweet to @BrentMochizuki
Dr. Cheng-Lun (Alan) Chiu
National Tsing Hua University
Ph.D. National Tsing Hua University
Publications
Chien-Ying “Abby” Yang
National Tsing Hua University
M.S. National Tsing Hua University
Che-Yen “Jimmy” Chu
National Tsing Hua University
M.S. National Tsing Hua University