The History of BATSE

ZP12, NASA-Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, AL, 35812 USA ;
e-mail: jerry.fishman@nasa.gov

Abstract

The BATSE experiment on the Compton Gamma-ray Observatory was the first large detector system designed for the study of gamma-ray bursts. The eight large-area detectors allowed full-sky coverage and were optimized to operate in the primary energy region of emission of most GRBs. BATSE provided detailed observations of the temporal and spectral characteristics of several thousand GRBs, and it was the first experiment to provide rapid notifications of the coarse location of many them. It also provided strong evidence for the cosmological distances to GRBs through the observation of the sky distribution and intensity distribution of numerous GRBs. The large number of GRBs observed with the high- sensitivity BATSE detectors continues to provide a database of GRB spectral and temporal properties in the primary energy range of GRB emission that will likely not be exceeded for at least another decade. The origin and development of the BATSE experiment, some highlights from the mission and its continuing legacy are described in this paper.