## 6 High-Level Performance  
In order to provide a final high-level assessment of the performance of the temporal parameters investigated in this work, we derived the main performance metrics using the standard routine implemented in the ASTRI pipeline [9]. We evaluated the efficiency of the Gamma/Hadron discrimination algorithm implemented in A-SciSoft both with the standard set of parameters and with the inclusion of temporal parameters, and compared the two resulting datasets in terms of differential flux sensitivity (for an exposure time of 50 h), energy resolution, and angular resolution. A detailed study on the impact of temporal parameters in the energy reconstruction procedure will be addressed in a future work. We incorporated temporal parameter analysis into the DL2a processing pipeline, using the complete Monte Carlo dataset outlined in Section 2. The analysis spans an energy range from \(10^{-0.5}\) TeV (\(\simeq\)0.3 TeV) to \(10^{2.5}\) TeV (\(\simeq\)300 TeV). To ensure realistic representation of actual source observations, we implemented an energy-dependent event weighting scheme for both background (proton) and gamma-ray events in the Level 2b (DL2b) samples. The weighting procedure follows the methodology established in [30]. For gamma-ray events, we applied weights derived from the well-established Crab Nebula spectrum measured by the HEGRA Collaboration [31], which serves as a standard reference source in very high-energy gamma-ray astronomy. This approach ensures that our analysis reflects realistic spectral distributions encountered in observational data. For completeness in our high-level analysis, we included the electron-induced background events, although their contribution to the irreducible gamma-like background is minimal at the ASTRI Mini-Array's primary operational energies (E \(>\)\(\sim\)1 TeV). At these energies, proton-initiated showers overwhelmingly dominate the background component. Our analysis protocol implements a multi-parameter selection framework applied to the Level 2b (DL2b) samples, incorporating three primary criteria:  
* Background rejection efficiency (\"gammaness\");
* Shower arrival direction reconstruction;  
Figure 8: Feature importance of morphological, stereo, and selected temporal parameters using random forest (blue for morphological and stereo parameters, light blue for temporal parameters). Event multiplicity thresholds. These selection criteria were optimized independently within each energy bin to maximize sensitivity for a 50 h exposure time. For event acceptance, we required a detection significance of 5\(\sigma\) (calculated according to Equation (17) in [32]) within each energy bin, maintaining consistent exposure parameters with the optimization phase. The analysis methodology employs an on-source/off-source approach, with an off-source to on-source exposure ratio of 5. This approach is fundamental to [PERSON] telescope data analysis: gamma-ray signals in the \"on-source\" region must be evaluated against \"off-source\" background control regions. For point-source observations, the data acquisition strategy enables the definition of multiple background control regions (typically 5) with identical acceptance characteristics to the signal region, ensuring reliable background estimation. Additional quality criteria included the following:  
* Minimum signal excess threshold of 10 events;
* Signal-to-systematic uncertainty ratio exceeding 5:1 (assuming 1% systematic uncertainty in background estimation). These selection criteria align with established IACT community standards [30], enabling performance evaluation under well-defined and reproducible analysis conditions. Figure 9 shows the on-axis point-like source differential sensitivity (in 50 h) achieved with the use of a standard set of morphological and stereoscopic parameters for gamma/hadron separation computation (blue points) and with the additional use of the temporal parameters investigated in this work (orange points). The ratios between the results of the two methods are also shown.