Related papers: Cosmic rays cannot explain the high ionisation rat…
Although Galactic cosmic rays (protons and nuclei) are widely believed to be dominantly accelerated by the winds and supernovae of massive stars, definitive evidence of this origin remains elusive nearly a century after their discovery [1].…
The inner 300-500 pc of the Milky Way has some of the most extreme gas conditions in our Galaxy. Physical properties of the Central Molecular Zone (CMZ), including temperature, density, thermal pressure, and turbulent pressure, are key…
In a companion paper, we investigated the question of the spatial origin of the cosmic rays detected in the Solar neighborhood, in the case of standard sources located in the Galactic disk. There are some reasons to believe that there may…
We suggest that the energy source of the observed diffuse gamma-ray emission from the direction of the Galactic center is the Galactic black hole Sgr A*, which becomes active when a star is captured at a rate of $\sim 10^{-5} $ yr^{-1}.…
Comets are small bodies thought to contain the most pristine material in the solar system. However, since their formation 4.5 Gy ago, they have been altered by different processes. While not exposed to much electromagnetic radiation, they…
The Galactic Centre (GC) has experienced a high degree of recent star-forming activity, as evidenced by the large number of massive stars currently residing there. The relative abundances of chemical elements in the GC may provide insights…
(Abridged) We present fine structure and recombination lines observations of the ionized gas toward a sample of 18 sources located within 300 pc of the center of the Galaxy (GC). The fine structure lines from [NII] and [SIII] have been…
Cosmic rays are charged relativistic particles that reach the Earth with extremely high energies, providing striking evidence of the existence of effective accelerators in the Universe. Below an energy around $\sim 10^{17}$ eV cosmic rays…
We present infrared and millimeter observations of molecular gas, dust and ionized gas towards a sample of clouds distributed along the 500 central pc of the Galaxy. The clouds were selected to investigate the physical state, in particular…
Cosmic rays are a fundamental source of ionization for molecular and diffuse clouds, influencing their chemical, thermal, and dynamical evolution. The amount of cosmic rays inside a cloud also determines the $\gamma$-ray flux produced by…
The luminosity of [C II] is used to probe the star formation rate in galaxies, but the correlation breaks down in some active galactic nuclei (AGNs). Models of the [C II] emission from galactic nuclei do not include the influence of X-rays…
We use the recent detection of He II absorption at $z=2.2-2.6$ in the line of sight of the quasar HS1700+64 to put bounds on the sources of ionization. We find that given the uncertainty in $\tauhgp$ and the model of absorption in the…
Galaxies at high redshifts with strong star formation are sources of high-energy cosmic rays. These cosmic rays interact with the baryon and radiation fields of the galactic environment via photo-pair, photo-pion and proton-proton processes…
The Galactic Center lobe is a degree-tall shell seen in radio continuum images of the Galactic center (GC) region. If it is actually located in the GC region, formation models would require massive energy input (e.g., starburst or jet) to…
The galactic cosmic rays are the main source of ionization in the Earth stratosphere and troposphere. The induced by primary cosmic ray particles ionization is important in various processes related to atmospheric physics and chemistry,…
We study the combined impact of magnetic mirroring and focusing on the ionization by cosmic rays (CRs) in dense molecular clouds and circumstellar disks. We show that for effective column densities of up to $\sim10^{25}$ cm$^{-2}$ (where…
In this paper we briefly discuss the problem of the origin of Ultra High Energy Cosmic Rays in the framework of Top-Down models. We show that, for high energy of decays and in a wide range of spectra of injected protons, their extragalactic…
Gamma ray observations have found evidence of an extremely energetic outflow emanating from the Galactic Centre, and an `excess' of emission at GeV energies towards the Galactic Centre over that expected from current models. Determining…
Context. Ionization plays a central role in the gas-phase chemistry of molecular clouds. Since ions are coupled with magnetic fields, which can in turn counteract gravitational collapse, it is of paramount importance to measure their…
Galactic cosmic-rays (GCRs) are thought to be accelerated in strong shocks induced by massive star winds and supernova explosions sweeping across the interstellar medium. But the phase of the interstellar medium from which the CRs are…