English

On the viability of holistic cosmic-ray source models

Astrophysics 2009-11-11 v1

Abstract

We consider the energy spectrum of cosmic-rays (CRs) from a purely phenomenological point of view and investigate the possibility that they all be produced by the same type of sources with a single power-law spectrum, in E^{-x}, from thermal to ultra-high energies. We show that the relative fluxes of the Galactic (GCR) and extra-galactic (EGCR) components are compatible with such a holistic model, provided that the index of the source spectrum be x \simeq 2.23\pm 0.07. This is compatible with the best-fit indices for both GCRs and EGCRs, assuming that their source composition is the same, which is indeed the case in a holistic model. It is also compatible with theoretical expectations for particle acceleration at relativistic shocks.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.astro-ph/0605046,
  title  = {On the viability of holistic cosmic-ray source models},
  author = {J. Aublin and E. Parizot},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:astro-ph/0605046},
  year   = {2009}
}

Comments

5 pages, 1 figure, Accepted for publication in Astronomy and Astrophysics