Slope of the lateral density function of extensive air showers around the knee region as an indicator of shower age

Abstract

Analyzing simulated extensive air shower (EAS) events generated with the Monte Carlo code CORSIKA, this paper critically studies the characteristics of lateral distribution of electrons in EAS around the knee energy region of the energy spectrum of primary cosmic rays. The study takes into account the issue of lateral shower age parameter as indicator of the stage of development of showers in the atmosphere. The correlation of lateral shower age parameter with other EAS observables is examined, using simulated data in the context of its possible use in a multi-parameter study of EAS, with a view to obtaining information about the nature of the shower initiating primaries at sea level EAS experiments. It is shown that the observed slope of the lateral density function in the 3-dimensional plot at least for the KASCADE data supports the idea of a transition from light to heavy mass composition around the knee.

arXiv comment14 pages, 19 figures, accepted in EPJ

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Cited by in corpus (6)

• A novel approach for deducing the mass composition of cosmic rays from lateral densities of EAS particles
• Model-Stable Universality of the Air Shower Electromagnetic Component: an Approach to Solving the Mass Composition Problem
• On the efficiency of the evaluation of the primary cosmic ray composition using lateral distributions of air shower electromagnetic component
• Explaining the characteristics of lateral shower age of cosmic ray extensive air showers
• Determination of the mass and energy of primary cosmic rays above 100 TeV
• A new basic air shower observable sensitive to the cosmic-ray elemental mass