Measurement of the cosmic ray helium energy spectrum from 70 GeV to 80 TeV with the DAMPE space mission

Abstract

The measurement of the energy spectrum of cosmic ray helium nuclei from 70 GeV to 80 TeV using 4.5 years of data recorded by the DArk Matter Particle Explorer (DAMPE) is reported in this work. A hardening of the spectrum is observed at an energy of about 1.3 TeV, similar to previous observations. In addition, a spectral softening at about 34 TeV is revealed for the first time with large statistics and well controlled systematic uncertainties, with an overall significance of $4.3\sigma$. The DAMPE spectral measurements of both cosmic protons and helium nuclei suggest a particle charge dependent softening energy, although with current uncertainties a dependence on the number of nucleons cannot be ruled out.

11 pages, 13 figures, published in Phys. Rev. Lett. Add one more digit for first three columns in Table S2

References in corpus (11)

• Direct detection of a break in the teraelectronvolt cosmic-ray spectrum of electrons and positrons
• Discrepant hardening observed in cosmic-ray elemental spectra
• The DArk Matter Particle Explorer mission
• Measurement of the cosmic-ray proton spectrum from 40 GeV to 100 TeV with the DAMPE satellite
• Spectral breaks as a signature of cosmic ray induced turbulence in the Galaxy
• The on-orbit calibration of DArk Matter Particle Explorer
• GeV-TeV cosmic-ray spectral anomaly as due to re-acceleration by weak shocks in the Galaxy
• Calibration and performance of the neutron detector onboard of the DAMPE mission
• Spectral features in the cosmic ray fluxes
• Correction Method for the Readout Saturation of the DAMPE Calorimeter
• Comparison of proton shower developments in the BGO calorimeter of the Dark Matter Particle Explorer between GEANT4 and FLUKA simulations

Cited by in corpus (57)

• Measurement of ultra-high-energy diffuse gamma-ray emission of the Galactic plane from 10 TeV to 1 PeV with LHAASO-KM2A
• Detection of spectral hardenings in cosmic-ray boron-to-carbon and boron-to-oxygen flux ratios with DAMPE
• Galactic diffuse gamma rays meet the PeV frontier
• Direct Measurement of the Cosmic-Ray Helium Spectrum from 40 GeV to 250 TeV with the Calorimetric Electron Telescope on the International Space Station
• Diffuse Emission of Galactic High-Energy Neutrinos from a Global Fit of Cosmic Rays
• Cosmic-ray Boron Flux Measured from 8.4 GeV$/n$ to 3.8 TeV$/n$ with the Calorimetric Electron Telescope on the International Space Station
• Galactic diffuse gamma-ray emission from GeV to PeV energies in light of up-to-date cosmic ray measurements
• Cosmic ray spectrum of protons plus helium nuclei between 6 TeV and 158 TeV from HAWC data
• Constraints on the spatially dependent cosmic-ray propagation model from Bayesian Analysis
• On the origin of observed cosmic ray spectrum below 100 TV
• Interpretations of the cosmic ray secondary-to-primary ratios measured by DAMPE
• A cosmic-ray database update: CRDB v4.1
• Pion decay model of TIBET-AS$\gamma$ PeV gamma-ray signal
• A deep learning method for the trajectory reconstruction of cosmic rays with the DAMPE mission
• Galactic gamma-ray and neutrino emission from interacting cosmic-ray nuclei
• Measurement of the cosmic p+He energy spectrum from 50 GeV to 0.5 PeV with the DAMPE space mission
• Direct Measurement of the Nickel Spectrum in Cosmic Rays in the Energy Range from 8.8 GeV/n to 240 GeV/n with CALET on the International Space Station
• Calibration of the Air Shower Energy Scale of the Water and Air Cherenkov Techniques in the LHAASO experiment
• Ultrahigh-energy diffuse gamma-ray emission from cosmic-ray interactions with medium surrounding acceleration sources
• Statistically study the optimal local sources for cosmic ray nuclei and electron
• A Three-component Model for Cosmic-ray Spectrum and Dipole Anisotropy
• Reacceleration of Galactic Cosmic Rays Beyond the Knee at the Termination Shock of a Cosmic-Ray-Driven Galactic Wind
• Understanding the phase reversals of Galactic cosmic ray anisotropies
• The CaloCube calorimeter for high-energy cosmic-ray measurements in space: performance of a large-scale prototype
• Atmospheric muons measured with the KM3NeT detectors in comparison with updated numeric predictions
• Evidence of fresh cosmic ray in galactic plane based on DAMPE measurement of B/C and B/O ratios
• Energy dependence of the knee in the cosmic ray spectrum across the Milky Way
• Search for relativistic fractionally charged particles in space
• Implications of a Possible Spectral Structure of Cosmic-ray Protons Unveiled by the DAMPE
• Secondary cosmic-ray nuclei in the Galactic halo model with nonlinear Landau damping
• LHAASO protons versus LHAASO diffuse gamma-rays: a consistency check
• Detection of the Crab Nebula using a Random Forest Analysis of the first TAIGA IACT Data
• Injection spectra of different species of cosmic rays from AMS-02, ACE-CRIS and Voyager-1
• Escape of cosmic rays from perpendicular shocks in the circumstellar magnetic field
• Large-scale anisotropy of Galactic cosmic rays as a probe of local cosmic-ray propagation
• An Unsupervised Machine Learning Method for Electron--Proton Discrimination of the DAMPE Experiment
• The AMS-02 cosmic ray deuteron flux is consistent with a secondary origin
• Galactic diffuse emission from radio to ultra-high-energy gamma rays in light of up-to-date cosmic ray measurements
• Very Local Impact on the Spectrum of Cosmic-Ray Nuclei below 100 TeV
• BGO quenching effect on spectral measurements of cosmic-ray nuclei in DAMPE experiment
• Potential of Constraining Propagation Parameters of Galactic Cosmic Rays with the High Energy cosmic-Radiation Detection facility onboard China's Space Station
• PSF Calibration of DAMPE for gamma-ray Observations
• Hadronic cross section measurements with the DAMPE space mission using 20GeV-10TeV cosmic-ray protons and ${}^4$He
• Cosmic-ray deuteron excess from a primary component
• Determination of the absolute energy scale of the DAMPE calorimeter with the geomagnetic rigidity cutoff method
• Observations of the Fermi bubbles and the Galactic center excess with the DArk Matter Particle Explorer
• Precise Measurement of the Cosmic Ray Helium Spectrum above 0.1 PeV
• LHAASO Galactic Plane $\gamma$-rays Strongly Constrain Heavy Dark Matter
• Cosmic ray mass composition measurement in the energy range from $10^{16.5}$ eV to $10^{18.5}$ eV observed with the TALE hybrid detector
• Escape of cosmic rays from perpendicular shocks in the interstellar magnetic field
• On the stochastic nature of Galactic cosmic-ray sources
• Deciphering the spectral bumps of Galactic cosmic rays through gamma-ray observations of nearby molecular clouds
• Influence of interstellar environment near the solar system on cosmic-ray spectra and dipole anisotropy
• Joint constraint on the propagation origin of the cosmic-ray spectral knee from energy spectrum and anisotropy observations
• Analyzing Cosmic Ray Spectral Features: A Numerical Investigation
• Investigation of hadronic cross sections of cosmic ray carbon and oxygen on BGO from 200 GeV to 10 TeV energy at the DAMPE experiment
• Constraining the position of the knee in the galactic cosmic ray spectrum with ultra-high-energy diffuse $\gamma$-rays