Longitudinal profiles of Extensive Air Showers with inclusion of charm and bottom particles

Abstract

Charm and bottom particles are rare in Extensive Air Showers but the effect of its presence can be radical in the development of the Extensive Air Showers (EAS). If such particles arise with a large fraction of the primary energy, they can reach large atmospheric depths, depositing its energy in deeper layers of the atmosphere. As a consequence, the EAS observables (X max , RM S and N max ) will be modified, as well as the shape of the longitudinal profile of the energy deposited in the atmosphere. In this paper, we will modify the CORSIKA Monte Carlo by the inclusion of charm and bottom production in the first interaction of the primary cosmic ray. Results for different selections of the typical x F values of the heavy particles and distinct production models will be presented.

Effects of charm particles in Extensive Air Showers

“…For X max we have a shift to deeper layers of the atmosphere in relation to the STD CORSIKA, with the relative difference being about 12%. On the other hand, for the RMS, we have a relative difference of about 40% [4]. For the charm production with F E ≥ 0.8 we find the values of 898.8 g/cm 2 and 87.8 g/cm 2 , respectively, for X max and RMS.…”

“…Since charmed particles are able to reach larger depths in the atmosphere, interacting rather than decaying, they delay the EAS development. The resulting longitudinal profiles are wider, have more particles at ground level and larger depths [3,4]. In addition, EASs that transport energy deeper in the atmosphere result in a larger number of electromagnetic component inside the Water-Cherenkov tanks.…”

“…In our analysis we include this possibility and take into account of the production and propagation of heavy particles using the DPMJET and QGSJET models to describe the interactions. For this analysis, we only consider production of the following states Λ + c , D 0 , D + , D + s , B + and B 0 (and their anti-particles) [3,4].…”

“…In this contribution we investigate the impact of charmed particles in the EASs development using a modified version of the CORSIKA [2] (Cosmic Ray Simulations for Kaskade) Monte Carlo, which includes the charm and bottom particle production in the first interaction of the primary particle [3,4] (denoted hereafter HQ CORSIKA). For comparison, we have present the predictions of the standard version of CORSIKA (denoted STD CORSIKA), which disregards the presence of the charm and bottom particles.…”

Angular distribution of prompt neutrinos in Extensive Air Showers

“…In this contribution we will estimate the prompt muon and neutrino fluxes considering a modified version of the CORSIKA (Cosmic Ray Simulations for Kaskade) Monte Carlo [6], hereafter denoted HQ CORSIKA, which includes the charm and bottom production at the cosmic ray first interaction (For more details see Refs. [7,8]. In order to estimate the impact of the heavy particles in the EAS development, we will compare our predictions with those derived using the standard version of the CORSIKA (STD CORSIKA).…”