The DAMPE apparatus will monitor high-energy particles of ordinary matter and gamma-ray photons. The theory predicts that some of them may appear precisely as a result of the decay of elusive particles of dark matter.
The DAMPE (Dark Matter Particle Explorer) satellite, dubbed the Chinese Wukong ("Monkey King"), was launched by a Long March 2D rocket and put into a sun-synchronous orbit at an altitude of 500 km - in other words, it will describe circles above the Earth so that above one and the same point on the surface will pass at approximately the same time of day. DAMPE is the result of several years of collaboration between the Chinese Academy of Sciences, several institutions in Italy and the Swiss University of Geneva.
DAMPE carries four scientific instruments: a calorimeter, a neutron detector and two particle detectors (including one scintillation). Each of them will work in their own field, and together they will allow detecting photons, electrons and other high-energy cosmic particles and radiation, measuring their parameters in order to trace the prehistory. Some theories predict that such particles could be produced during the decay of WIMPs - supposed heavy particles of dark matter.
The resolution that DAMPE will be able to work with is higher than that of ground detectors and the AMS instrument operating on board the ISS. AMS, by the way, has found some highly suspicious sources that may indicate dark matter, it is DAMPE's task to take a closer look.
DAMPE is only the first of five large-scale scientific space missions that are being implemented in China today. Two more devices are planned to be launched in the coming 2016. The first of them will allow testing quantum communication technologies between the Earth and the orbit, and the second is a space X-ray telescope for observing radiation in the vicinity of black holes.
Sergey Vasiliev