Speaker:
Anna Nelles
Institution:
Radboud Univ Nijmegen, Netherlands
Speaker Link:
Date:
Monday, June 23, 2014
Time:
4:00 pm
Location:
FRH 4135
ABSTRACT:
Dr. Nelles will be visiting UC Irvine on Monday June 23, and she agreed to give a talk on an exciting new development in the field of cosmic rays at extreme energies above 10^18eV.
Traditionally, extremely energetic cosmic rays have been detected by surface arrays that measure the particle content of the shower, or observing fluorescence emission with optical detectors. Over the past few years, several groups have looked for radio pulses generated by the charged particle cascades initiated by high energy cosmic rays colliding with the atmosphere. The radio emission is directed in a forward cone a few degrees wide and pulse durations are typically a few nanoseconds. By measuring a significant fraction of the footprint of the radio emission using surface antennas, it is possible to measure the energy and direction of the cosmic ray with excellent precision. Dr. Nelles will discuss new work that has focused on the possibility to extract information about the charge/mass of the cosmic ray by measuring the position of the shower in the atmosphere with maximum particle content (“shower max”).
Host:
Steven Barwick