Monte Carlo simulations of the sensor head of imaging energetic electron spectrometer onboard a Chinese IGSO navigation satellite

An imaging energetic electron spectrometer built by the Peking University team (BD-IES) onboard a Chinese navigation satellite in an inclined GEO orbit has been launched successfully in September 2015, which measures the spectra of the energetic electrons with the energy range of 50–600 keV in nine directions. In this study, Monte Carlo simulations of the BD-IES sensor head were performed using Geant4 and the corresponding characteristic responses to the isotropic energetic particles were derived. The effective geometric factors were estimated using the typical electron and proton spectra in the GEO orbit and the corresponding simulated sensor head responses. It was found that the average effective geometric factors of nine directions are close to the nominal geometric factors calculated with the traditional method, but the effective geometric factor decreases as the center energy of the energy channel decreases. The BD-IES sensor head also responses to the energetic protons, but the average contamination rate of all 72 channels is about 2%, which means that the proton contamination is acceptable. The spectra of the energetic electrons measured by BD-IES are derived using the effective geometric factors of the sensor head and are comparable with the spectra measured by the magnetic electron ion spectrometer (MagEIS) instrument onboard Van Allen Probes.