Futurity · Space

CERN Experiment Simulates Cosmic Ray Collisions in Earth's Atmosphere

Researchers have utilized CERN's Large Hadron Collider (LHC) to experimentally model the interactions of high-energy cosmic rays with Earth's atmosphere, offering a new approach beyond traditional computer simulations.

High-energy cosmic rays, originating from sources like supernovae and possessing over a million times the energy of solar particles, pose a puzzle regarding their atmospheric collisions. Previous reliance on computer simulations has yielded inconsistent results.

An international team of physicists employed the LHC to recreate these collisions. They directed oxygen beams, fundamental to Earth's atmosphere, against proton beams that mimic cosmic rays from supernovae.

This experiment produced the world's first measurements of 'cosmic rainstorms' under controlled laboratory conditions. Millions of images were captured of the aftermath of proton-oxygen collisions, which occur at high frequencies.

Sophisticated equipment measured the number, energies, and angles of particles generated in these collisions, providing detailed insights into their formation.

The findings, published in Physical Review Letters, offer a clearer understanding of how particles from exotic cosmic objects interact with our atmosphere, improving upon the accuracy of previous models.

This research helps decipher the origins of interstellar particles and unravels mysteries of the universe by sharpening knowledge of these subatomic interactions.

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