The KASCADE-Grande energy spectrum of cosmic rays and the role of hadronic interaction models

Abstract

Previous results obtained by KASCADE-Grande using the QGSjetII-02 hadronic interaction model have shown that the energy spectrum of cosmic rays between 10 16 eV and 10 18 eV exhibits a significant hardening at approximately 2 Â 10 16 eV and a slight but statistically significant steepening close to 10 17 eV. Moreover, the analysis with QGSjetII-02 suggests that the break observed around 10 17 eV is caused by the heavy component of primary cosmic rays. In this paper, we report on the results of similar analyses performed using the SIBYLL 2.1 and EPOS 1.99 hadronic interaction models to interpret the data. The present results confirm qualitatively the previous findings. However, the intensity of the all-particle spectrum, the positions of the hardening and steepening of the spectrum, as well as the relative abundance of the heavy and light mass groups depend on the hadronic interaction model used to interpret the data.

Extensive Air Showers and Cosmic Ray Physics above 1017eV

“…An indication of a hardening of the light component just above 10 17 eV has been measured as well [31]. The flux of heavy and light components depends on the hadronic interaction model used to interpret the experimental data [32] as previously mentioned. The above results are summarised on Fig.…”

KASCADE-Grande energy spectrum of cosmic rays interpreted with post-LHC hadronic interaction models

“…The details of these findings rely on the results of simulations and the description of hadronic interactions for reconstructing the properties of the primary particle which differ in predictions. However, a cross-check of the results obtained with various pre-LHC interaction models showed that, qualitatively, similar features are present in the spectra, independently of the interaction model used to interpret the data [4,5,6].…”

“…Such results are compared to those obtained using the pre-LHC versions of these models, EPOS 1.99 and QGSjetII-02, as well as those obtained using SIBYLL 2.1 [10] hadronic interaction model (see [4,5,6] for details). Moreover, the analysis presented in this paper is based on the full statistics accumulated by KASCADE-Grande during its operational time between 2002 and 2013.…”

KASCADE-Grande: Composition studies in the view of the post-LHC hadronic interaction models

“…The selection of heavy primaries enhances the knee-like feature that is already present in the all-particle spectrum. The analysis was repeated on the basis of different hadronic interaction models [18,19]. Despite the fact that the relative abundance of the heavy particles varies significantly dependent on the model in use, the spectral feature of this 'heavy' knee is visible in all the spectra.…”