Energy cross-calibration from the rst CREAM ight: transition radiation detector versus calorimeter

The Cosmic Ray Energetics And Mass (CREAM) balloon experiment had two successful ights in 2004/05 and 2005/06. It was designed to perform energy measurements from a few GeV up to 1000 TeV, taking advantage of different detection techniques. The rst instrument, CREAM-1, combined a transition radiation detector with a calorimeter to provide independent energy measurements of cosmic- ray nuclei. Each detector was calibrated with particle beams in a limited range of energies. In order to assess the absolute energy scale of the instrument and to investigate the systematic effects of each technique, a cross-calibration was performed by comparing the two independent energy estimates on selected samples of oxygen and carbon nuclei.