Related papers: Ultra High Energy Cosmic Rays: origin and propagat…
We discuss theoretical issues and experimental data that brought the ultra high energy cosmic rays in the list of Nature's greatest puzzles. After many years of research we still do not know how astrophysical acceleration processes can…
The present situation with regard to experimental data on ultra high-energy cosmic rays is briefly reviewed. Whilst detailed knowledge of the shape of the energy spectrum is still lacking, it is clear that events above 10^20 eV do exist.…
The arguments suggesting an association between the sources of cosmological gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) and the sources of ultra-high energy cosmic rays (UHECRs) are presented. Recent GRB and UHECR observations are shown to strengthen these…
The highest energy cosmic rays observed possess macroscopic energies and their origin is likely to be associated with the most energetic processes in the Universe. Their existence triggered a flurry of theoretical explanations ranging from…
We review the main experimental evidences on ultra high energy cosmic rays and their implications in the physics of these extremely energetic particles, also in connection with dark matter and cosmology. We discuss the basis of theoretical…
Recent international efforts have brought us closer to unveiling the century old mystery of the origin of cosmic rays. Cosmic ray, gamma ray, and neutrino observatories are reaching the necessary sensitivity to study the highest energy…
Some general features of cosmic ray acceleration are summarized along with some inferences that can be drawn concerning the origin of the UHE component. The UHE luminosity density is found to be similar to that derived for GeV cosmic rays…
Ultrahigh-energy cosmic rays (UHECRs) arrive at Earth from the most energetic astrophysical accelerators in the universe. They collide with atoms in the upper atmosphere with energies about ten times higher than any man-made accelerator,…
We explore two generic hypotheses for tracing the sources of ultra-high energy cosmic rays (UHECRs) in the Universe: star formation rate density or stellar mass density. For each scenario, we infer a set of constraints for the emission…
Observations of cosmic rays have been improving at all energies, with higher statistics and reduced systematics. Fundamental questions remain regarding the origins of cosmic rays both within the Galaxy and in extragalactic sources, and new…
In a letter with the above title, published some time ago in PRL, Waxman made the interesting suggestion that cosmological gamma ray bursts (GRBs) are the source of the ultra high energy cosmic rays (UHECR). This has also been proposed…
The existence of cosmic rays of energies exceeding 10^20 eV is one of the mysteries of high energy astrophysics. The spectrum and the high energy to which it extends rule out almost all suggested source models. The challenges posed by…
The clustering of ultra high energy (above 10^20 eV) cosmic rays (UHECR) suggests that they might be emitted by compact sources. Statistical analysis of Dubovsky et al. (Phys. Rev. Lett. 85 (2000) 1154) estimated the source density. We…
Context: As more and more data are collected by cosmic ray experiments such as the Pierre Auger Observatory and Telescope Array (TA), the search for the sources of the Ultra High Energy Cosmic Rays (UHECR) continues. Already we have some…
The study of ultra high energy cosmic rays is a very important scientific problem. It is likely to have a huge impact in our understanding of the universe. Very high energy particles have been observed to hit the Earth whose origin is…
The current status of origin of Ultra High Energy Cosmic Rays (UHECR) is reviewed, with emphasis given to elementary particle solutions to UHECR problem, namely to Topological Defects and Super-Heavy Dark Matter (SHDM) particles. The relic…
The origin of ultra-high energy cosmic rays (UHECRs) is one of the enduring mysteries of high-energy astrophysics. To investigate this, we cross-correlate the recently released Fermi Large Area Telescope First Source Catalog (1FGL) with the…
Ultra High Energy Cosmic Rays (UHECR) can be a signal from very early (post-inflationary) Universe. At this cosmological epoch Topological Defects (TD) and long-lived suprheavy (SH) particles are expected to be naturally and effectively…
We review the experimental evidences about flux and mass composition of ultra high energy cosmic rays in connection with theoretical scenarios concerning astrophysical sources. In this context, we also address the discussion about the…
We explore scenarios where the highest energy cosmic rays (HECR) are produced by new particle physics near the grand unification scale. Using detailed numerical simulations of extragalactic cosmic and gamma-ray propagation, we show the…