Usually referring to stable high energy elementary particles - cosmic rays were found to arrive the Earth from galactic and extragalactic sources and interact with the atmosphere. The energies of this particles are one of their prominent features and extend over multiple orders of magnitude, at ...
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114 views
What happens to the electron companions of cosmic ray protons?
If primary cosmic rays are made mostly of protons, where are the electrons lost, and does this mean that the Earth is positively charged?
Does the sun eject protons and electrons in equal number?
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52 views
Could Voyager 1 have entered a solar radiation belt?
We currently believe that the Sun has no radiation belts because the unstable magnetic field, which turns every 11 years, is not stable enough to sustain a solar radiation belt. But observations from ...
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1answer
71 views
What is the furthest object from which fermion rays were detected?
What is the furthest object from which non-electromagnetic cosmic rays were detected?
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3answers
94 views
New physics at high energies, cosmic rays, particle-detectors in space
New physics is expected at high energies and cosmic rays have high energies, so have there been or are there any plans to put particle detectors in space to study cosmic rays for new physics ?
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1answer
123 views
How often does a cosmic ray hit our eyes when we are on Earth?
Astronauts often see flashes when they are in space. How often these particles make their ways down to the Earth and hit us? What's the chance they hit our eyes and see flashes?
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1answer
103 views
Are there cosmic rays in a nuclear reaction?
If the range of energies of cosmic rays is not so far away respect to gamma's, why those are not found commonly in a nuclear reaction?
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46 views
Distinguishing Gamma-rays and stars from each other in nebulas
How do you tell the difference between a gamma-ray burst and a star just from a picture of a nebula, in which it cannot flash on and off here and there?
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1answer
102 views
How many anti-particles hit the ground?
I am curious to know the amount of flux of anti-particles that arrive to the ground in the cosmic rays. The reason is that I thought it should be very improbable that an anti-particle traveling ...
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2answers
490 views
Mechanism of Pair Production and Annihilation of Matter
Pair production is where an energetic photon on its interaction with strong electric field surrounding a nucleus produces electron-positron pair. Annihilation of matter is its converse where an ...
3
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6answers
240 views
Why not using cosmic rays to study HEP, since they are way more energetic than LHC?
Cosmic rays energies can exceed $10^{8}$ TeV, way higher than the energy scale achieved in the LHC or that can be achieved in the near future.
cannot we just use them to study fundamental ...
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2answers
214 views
What are the effects of cosmic rays on consumer electronics?
When electronics/computer companies design a new chip, processor/ memory card/ or a solar cell, do they study the effect of cosmic rays on such electronically sensitive materials? If not, why not?
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3answers
177 views
black body and cosmic microwave background radiation
Why is the sprectum of the cosmic microwave background radiation (or seems to be) that of a black body?
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1answer
88 views
Cosmic Background Radiation: How did planets form before the CBR could reach us?
I've understood that the Cosmic Background Radiation(CBR) is an electromagnetic wave that originated from the big bang. However, we now live on a planet which that is also originating from the big ...
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2answers
88 views
Gamma Ray Bursts
What is the maximum frequency of the Gamma Rays produced during supernovae? And how are these detected by telescopes without getting some serious damage done?
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2answers
323 views
Are cosmic muons causing mutations or even influence evolutionary rate?
As there are experiments studying influence of cosmic rays on organisms,
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11541768
I ask my self, if there any influence to DNA from atmospheric muons on the Earth ...
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0answers
67 views
Cosmic radiation cutoff at LOW energies?
The energy spectrum of the cosmic radiation (not CMB) is limited to both sides.
I know about the GZK-cutoff at high energies. Basically the interaction probability for photons of energies above 10^20 ...
2
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2answers
178 views
Can x-ray radiation be compared to background radiation?
I've been trying to learn about the possible effects of x-ray radiation from dental x-rays and most of the resources I come across compare the exposure to that of natural background radiation.
...
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1answer
38 views
Why do rockets need a cosmic ray detector?
I was watching the video Video camera installed on rocket that reaches 121,000 ft., and this rocket has a cosmic ray detector. Why is this needed in a rocket?
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4answers
382 views
cosmic radiation muons as a source for muon-catalyzed fusion
taking rough numbers from here and here, it seems that with natural cosmic radiation sources, we could sustain $10^6$ muon-catalyzed fusion reactions per square-meter per minute. This would be $14 ...
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0answers
216 views
Is the conclusion that the cosmic burst observed in the Draco constellation from gamma rays that are streaming towards a massive black hole correct?
Referencing this news article:
http://www.smh.com.au/technology/sci-tech/cosmic-burst-in-far-away-galaxy-puzzles-nasa-20110408-1d6kz.html
It also references an event id:
(GRB) 110328A
The article ...
4
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3answers
364 views
Cosmic ray hazards
The Pierre Auger Observatory site mentions the detection of a 3E20 eV (48 J) cosmic ray whose energy, well above the GZK cutoff, was based on an analysis of its atmospheric shower. This was equivalent ...
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3answers
898 views
How are neutrons produced from cosmic ray particles?
What are the details of how neutrons are produced as a result of cosmic ray particles hitting our planet's atmosphere?
For instance, what is the pathway that creates the highest number of neutrons ...