ИСТИНА

Current status and preliminary design of the High-Energy Ray Observatory (HERO) are presented. The HERO is planned to be launched onboard a heavy satellite. This experiment is based on the application of a deep and wide aperture ionization calorimeter. The effective geometrical factor of the observatory is at least 9-16 m^2*sr, depending on the type of particles. Under the long exposure, this mission will allow to solve the most actual problems of high energy astrophysics by direct investigation of the cosmic rays with energies up to 10^17 eV. New simulation results and their analysis are presented.