Influence of shower fluctuations and primary composition on studies of the shower longitudinal development

Details Influence of shower fluctuations and primary composition on studies of the shower longitudinal development Influence of shower fluctuations and primary composition on studies of the shower longitudinal development

2004-02-04

arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0402092v1

Phys.Rev.D69:103003,2004

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astrophysics

12 pages, 11 figures, 4 tables

Scientific paper

10.1103/PhysRevD.69.103003

We study the influence of shower fluctuations, and the possible presence of different nuclear species in the primary cosmic ray spectrum, on the experimental determination of both shower energy and the proton air inelastic cross section from studies of the longitudinal development of atmospheric showers in fluorescence experiments. We investigate the potential of track length integral and shower size at maximum as estimators of shower energy. We find that at very high energy (~10^19-10^20 eV) the error of the total energy assignment is dominated by the dependence on the hadronic interaction model, and is of the order of 5%. At lower energy (~10^17-10^18 eV), the uncertainty of the energy determination due to the limited knowledge of the primary cosmic ray composition is more important. The distribution of depth of shower maximum is discussed as a measure of the proton-air cross section. Uncertainties in a possible experimental measurement of this cross section introduced by intrinsic shower fluctuations, the model of hadronic interactions, and the unknown mixture of primary nuclei in the cosmic radiation are numerically evaluated.

Affiliated with

Also associated with

No associations

Rating

Influence of shower fluctuations and primary composition on studies of the shower longitudinal development does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this scientific paper.

If you have personal experience with Influence of shower fluctuations and primary composition on studies of the shower longitudinal development, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Influence of shower fluctuations and primary composition on studies of the shower longitudinal development will most certainly appreciate the feedback.

Rate now

Comments { 0 }

Profile ID: LFWR-SCP-O-564901