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The indirect ground-based observations of cosmic rays through extensive air showers in modern experiments typically involve the use of Monte Carlo simulations to determine the characteristics of the primary particles. These simulations…
The interpretation of extensive air shower (EAS) measurements is strongly dependent on the hadronic interaction models used for simulating reference showers. We study the importance of low-energy hadronic interactions in simulated air…
Extensive air showers produce high-energy muons that can be utilized to probe hadronic interaction models in cosmic ray interactions. Most muons originate from pion and kaon decays, called $\textit{conventional}$ muons, while a smaller…
The excess of muons observed in ultra-high-energy cosmic-ray air showers relative to simulation predictions, known as the muon puzzle, provides indirect evidence of our incomplete understanding of high-energy hadronic interactions. An…
The air shower simulation code CORSIKA has served as a key part of the simulation chain for numerous astroparticle physics experiments over the past decades. Due to retirement of the original developers and the increasingly difficult…
Production of quarks and gluons in hadron collisions tests Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD) over a wide range of energy. Models of QCD are implemented in event generators to simulate hadron collisions and evolution of quarks and gluons into…
The development of an extensive air shower depends not only on the nature of the primary ultra-high-energy cosmic ray but also on the properties of the hadronic interactions. For energies above those achievable in human-made accelerators,…
Muons serve as the best probes of the physics of hadronic interactions in the upper atmosphere because of their simple physics. All the properties of detected muons, such as their energy and angle of incidence, are governed by the…
The aim of the Pierre Auger Observatory is the investigation of the nature of cosmic ray particles at ultra-high energies. It can simultaneously observe the longitudinal air shower development in the atmosphere as well as particle densities…
The Pierre Auger Observatory, the world's largest observatory of ultra-high-energy cosmic rays (UHECR), offers a unique insight into the properties of hadronic interactions occurring in air showers at energies well above those reached at…
We evaluate the consistency of hadronic interaction models in the CORSIKA simulation package with publicly available fluorescence telescope data from the Pierre Auger Observatory. By comparing the first few central moments of the extended…
We present the first measurement of the fluctuations in the number of muons in extensive air showers produced by ultrahigh energy cosmic rays. We find that the measured fluctuations are in good agreement with predictions from air shower…
The Pierre Auger Observatory is the largest facility in the world to study ultra-high-energy cosmic rays. It has a hybrid detection technique that combines the observation of the longitudinal development of extensive air showers and the…
Recent results obtained from leading cosmic ray experiments indicate that simulations using LHC-tuned hadronic interaction models underestimate the number of muons in extensive air showers compared to experimental data. This is the…
The characteristics of an extensive air shower derive from both the mass of the primary ultra-high-energy cosmic ray that seeds its development and the properties of the hadronic interactions that feed it. With its hybrid detector design,…
The combined data of Fluorescence and Surface Detectors of the Pierre Auger Observatory has recently provided the strongest constraints on the validity of predictions from current models of hadronic interactions. The unmodified predictions…
The Pierre Auger Observatory is the world's largest detector for observation of ultra-high-energy cosmic rays (UHECRs) (above the energy of $10^{17}$ eV). It consists of a Fluorescence Detector (FD) and an array of particle detectors known…
For over two decades, CORSIKA 7 and its previous versions have been the leading Monte Carlo code for simulating extensive air showers. However, its monolithic Fortran-based software design and hand-optimized code has created challenges for…
The energy spectrum of muons at ground level in air showers are studied and a new observable is proposed to constrain hadronic interaction models used in air shower simulations. An asymmetric Gaussian function is proposed to describe the…
CORSIKA up to version 7 has been the most-used Monte Carlo code for simulating extensive air showers for more than 20 years. Due to its monolithic, Fortran-based software design and hand-optimized code, however, it has become difficult to…