The Energy Spectrum of Primary Cosmic Rays

Abstract

Primary cosmic rays are nucleons from outer space incident upon the Earth's atmosphere. Their flux varies with energy E as £-Y in which the exponent assumes values between 2.5 and 3.2. We provide herein a framework to account for these values. We consider the particles' kinetic temperature T and introduce a damping factor r-m to account for non head-on collisions. It is the presence of the index m which can provide values of y.