A minimal model for extragalactic cosmic rays and neutrinos

Abstract

We aim to explain in a unified way the experimental data on ultrahigh energy cosmic rays (UHECR) and neutrinos, using a single source class and obeying limits on the extragalactic diffuse gamma-ray background (EGRB). If UHECRs only interact hadronically with gas around their sources, the resulting diffuse CR flux can be matched well to the observed one, providing at the same time large neutrino fluxes. However, air showers in the Earth's atmosphere induced by UHECRs with energies $E>3\times 10^{18}$ eV would reach in such a case their maxima too high. Therefore additional photo-hadronic interactions of UEHCRs close to the accelerator have to be present, in order to modify the nuclear composition of CRs in a relatively narrow energy interval. We include thus both photon and gas backgrounds, and combine the resulting CR spectra with the high-energy part of the Galactic CR fluxes predicted by the escape model. As result, we find a good description of experimental data on the total CR flux, the mean shower depth $X_\max$ and its width $RMS(X_\max)$ in the whole energy range above $E\simeq 10^{17}$ eV. The predicted high-energy neutrino flux matches IceCube measurements, while the contribution to the EGRB is of order 30%.

v2: 7 pages, 6 eps figures; slightly extended version to appear in PRD

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Cited by in corpus (29)

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• Progress towards characterizing ultrahigh energy cosmic ray sources
• Massive star cluster origin for the galactic cosmic ray population at very-high energies
• Constraints on the models of the origin of high-energy astrophysical neutrinos
• Probing decaying heavy dark matter with the 4-year IceCube HESE data
• Vela as the Source of Galactic Cosmic Rays above 100 TeV
• Curious case of the maximum rigidity distribution of cosmic-ray accelerators
• Modeling the spectrum and composition of ultrahigh-energy cosmic rays with two populations of extragalactic sources
• High-energy neutrinos from cosmic ray interactions in the Local Bubble
• Self-consistent model of extragalactic neutrino flux from evolving blazar population
• High-energy neutrinos from Galactic superbubbles
• Origin of the light cosmic ray component below the ankle
• Constraining photohadronic scenarios for the unified origin of IceCube neutrinos and ultrahigh-energy cosmic rays
• Ultrahigh energy cosmic rays and neutrinos from light nuclei composition
• What is the nature and origin of the highest-energy particles in the universe?
• Identifying nearby sources of ultra-high-energy cosmic rays with deep learning
• Determination of the Cosmic-Ray Chemical Composition: Open Issues and Prospects
• Carpet-2 search for gamma rays above 100 TeV in coincidence with HAWC and IceCube alerts
• Impact of the finite life-time of UHECR sources
• Cosmic Clues from Amaterasu: Blazar-Driven Ultrahigh-Energy Cosmic Rays?
• Extragalactic cosmic ray sources with very small contribution in the particle flux on the Earth and their study
• Prospects of detecting a large-scale anisotropy of ultra-high-energy cosmic rays from a nearby source with the K-EUSO orbital telescope
• Possible Sources of Iron Nuclei in Ultra-High-Energy Cosmic Rays
• Neutrino anisotropy as a probe of extreme astrophysical accelerators
• New limit on high Galactic latitude PeV gamma-ray flux from Tibet AS-gamma data
• A study of an energy-dependent anisotropy of cosmic rays beyond the GZK cut-off with deep neural networks