Study of the High Energy Gamma-ray Emission from the Crab Pulsar with the MAGIC telescope and Fermi-LAT

My thesis deals with a fundamental question of high energy gamma-ray astronomy. Namely, I studied the cut-off shape of the Crab pulsar spectrum to distinguish between the leading scenarios for the pulsar models. Pulsars are celestial objects, which emit periodic pulsed electromagnetic radiation (pulsation) from radio to high energy gamma-rays. Two major scenarios evolved in past 40 years to explain the pulsation mechanism: the inner magnetosphere scenario and the outer magnetosphere scenario. Both scenarios predict a high energy cut-off in the gamma-ray energy spectrum, but with different cut-off sharpness. An exponential cut-off is expected for the outer magnetosphere scenario while a super-exponential cut-off is predicted for the inner magnetosphere scenario. Therefore, one of the best ways to confirm or refute these scenarios is to measure the energy spectrum of a pulsar at around the cut-off energy, i.e., at energies between a few GeV and a few tens of GeV. All past attempts to measure pulsar spectra with ground-based instruments have failed while satellite-borne detectors had a too small area to study detailed spectra in the GeV domain. In this thesis, the gamma-ray emission at around the cut-off energy from the Crab pulsar is studied with the MAGIC telescope. The public data of the satellite-borne gamma-ray detector, Fermi-LAT, are also analyzed in order to discuss the MAGIC observation results in comparison with the adjacent energy band. In late 2007, a new trigger system (SUM trigger system) allowed to reduce the threshold energy of the MAGIC telescope from 50 GeV to 25 GeV and the Crab pulsar was successfully detected during observations from October 2007 and January 2009. My analysis reveals that the energy spectrum is consistent with a simple power law between 25 GeV to 100 GeV. The extension of the energy spectrum up to 100 GeV rules out the inner magnetosphere scenario. Fermi-LAT started operation in August 2008. The Fermi-LAT data reveal that a power law with an exponential cut-off at a few GeV can well describe the energy spectrum of the Crab pulsar between 100 MeV and 30 GeV. This is consistent with the outer magnetosphere scenario and again, inconsistent with the inner magnetosphere scenario. The measurements of both experiments strongly disfavor the inner magnetosphere scenario. However, by combining the results of the two experiments, it turns out that even the standard outer magnetosphere scenario cannot explain the measurements. Various assumptions have been made to explain this discrepancy. By modifying the energy spectrum of the electrons which emit high energy gamma-rays via the curvature radiation, the combined measurements can be reproduced but further studies with higher statistics and a better energy resolution are needed to support this assumption. The energy-dependent pulse profile from 100 MeV to 100 GeV has also been studied in detail. Many interesting features have been found, among which the variabilities of both the pulse edges and the pulse peak phases are the most remarkable. More data would allow a more thorough investigation of the fine structure of the pulsar magnetosphere based on these features. Aiming for better observations of pulsars and other sources below 100 GeV, a new photosensor, HPD R9792U-40, has been investigated. Many beneficial properties, such as a very high photodetection efficiency, an extremely low ion-feedback probability and an excellent charge resolution have been found.