Related papers: Cosmic Rays and Spectral Distortions from Collapsi…
All the components of cosmic rays have 'structure' in their energy spectra at some level, ie deviations from a simple power law, and their examination is relevant to the origin of the particles. Emphasis, here, is placed on the large-scale…
The Pierre Auger Observatory (PAO) has measured the spectrum and composition of the ultrahigh energy cosmic rays with unprecedented precision. We use these measurements to constrain their spectrum and composition as injected from their…
We review aspects of Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) spectral distortions which do not appear to have been fully explored in the literature. In particular, implications of recent evidences of heating of the intergalactic medium (IGM) by…
In the context of the standard model of particles, the weak interaction of cosmic microwave background (CMB) and cosmic neutrino background (C$\nu$B), can generate non-vanishing TB and EB power spectra in the order of one loop forward…
The (large angle) COBE DMR data can be used to probe the global topology of our universe on scales comparable to and just beyond the present ``horizon''. For compact topologies, the two main effects on the CMB are: [1] the breaking of…
If they exist, networks of superconducting cosmic strings are capable of injecting copious amounts of electromagnetic energy into the background over a broad range of frequencies. We study this injection both analytically, as well as…
The composition in terms of nuclear species of the primary cosmic ray flux is largely uncertain in the knee region and above, where only indirect measurements are available. The predicted fluxes of high-energy leptons from cosmic ray air…
The main results from the Auger Observatory are described. A steepening of the spectrum is observed at the highest energies, supporting the expectation that above $4\times 10^{19}$ eV the cosmic ray energies are significantly degraded by…
As ultra-high energy cosmic ray protons propagate through the universe, they undergo photo-meson interactions with the cosmic microwave background, generating the `cosmogenic' neutrino flux. If a substantial fraction of the cosmic ray…
We present an updated version of the {\it SimProp} Monte Carlo code to study the propagation of ultra high energy cosmic rays in astrophysical backgrounds computing the cosmogenic neutrino fluxes expected on earth. The study of secondary…
Various extensions of the Standard Model predict the existence of hidden photons kinetically mixing with the ordinary photon. This mixing leads to oscillations between photons and hidden photons, analogous to the observed oscillations…
The cosmic microwave background (CMB) energy spectrum is a near-perfect blackbody. The standard model of cosmology predicts small spectral distortions to this form, but no such distortion of the sky-averaged CMB spectrum has yet been…
I review gamma-ray burst models (GRBs) and observations, and discuss the possible production of ultra-high energy cosmic rays and neutrinos in both the standard internal shock models and the newer generation of photospheric and hadronic GRB…
We obtain the maximum diffuse neutrino intensity predicted by hadronic photoproduction models of the type which have been applied to the jets of active galactic nuclei or gamma ray bursts. For this, we compare the proton and gamma ray…
We model the effect of photon and ultra-light pseudoscalar mixing on the propagation of electromagnetic radiation through the extragalactic medium. The medium is modelled as a large number of magnetic domains, uncorrelated with one another.…
Very different processes characterize the decoupling of neutrinos to form the cosmic neutrino background (C$\nu$B) and the much later decoupling of photons from thermal equilibrium to form the cosmic microwave background (CMB). The C$\nu$B…
The radiative component of the Universe has a characteristic impact on both large scale structure (LSS) and the cosmic microwave background radiation (CMB). We use the recent WMAP data, together with previous CBI data and 2dF matter power…
Axions and axion-like particles (ALPs) remain highly motivated extensions to the standard model due to their ability to address open questions such as the relic abundance of dark matter and the strong CP problem. Axions are also capable of…
In this paper, we explore the impact of Dark Matter-photon interactions on the CMB angular power spectrum. Using the one-year data release of the Planck satellite, we derive an upper bound on the Dark Matter-photon elastic scattering cross…
We show that if the evolution of cosmic ray sources follows that of active galactic nuclei, the upper limit on the diffuse flux of tau neutrinos from the Pierre Auger Observatory marginally constrains the proton fraction at the end of the…