Cosmic rays & astroparticles is a research area focused on high-energy particles of extraterrestrial origin and their role in fundamental physics and astrophysics. It encompasses experimental and theoretical studies of primary cosmic rays (protons, nuclei, electrons), secondary air-shower particles, gamma rays, neutrinos, and other non-photonic messengers that probe extreme environments such as supernova remnants, active galactic nuclei, and compact objects. The field integrates particle detection techniques, high-energy astrophysics, plasma and magnetic field modeling, and multi-messenger observations to investigate particle acceleration mechanisms, propagation in interstellar and intergalactic media, and potential signatures of new physics beyond the Standard Model.
Scientists have come a step closer to understanding how collisionless shock waves—found throughout the universe—are able to accelerate particles to extreme speeds.
Plasma Physics
Jan 13, 2025
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117
Researchers led by Nanyang Technological University, Singapore (NTU Singapore) have developed a breakthrough technique that could lay the foundations for detecting the universe's "dark matter" and bring scientists closer ...
Astronomy
Jan 9, 2025
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377
Scientists have a problem with cosmic rays—they produce too many muons at the Earth's surface. Cascades of muons are byproducts of high-energy cosmic rays as they collide with nuclei in the upper atmosphere, and scientists ...
Five telescopes of the H.E.S.S.-collaboration in Namibia are used to study cosmic radiation, especially gamma radiation. With data from 10 years of observations, researchers have now been able to detect cosmic electrons and ...
Astronomy
Nov 25, 2024
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98
A team of researchers has successfully demonstrated nonlinear Compton scattering (NCS) between an ultra-relativistic electron beam and an ultrahigh intensity laser pulse using the 4-Petawatt laser at the Center for Relativistic ...
General Physics
Nov 25, 2024
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113
Fine tuning an experimental setup improved a detector's sensitivity to neutrinos and perhaps eventually dark matter—two difficult-to-measure forms of matter which hold great importance for understanding particle physics and ...
General Physics
Nov 4, 2024
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83
A team of physicists from the universities of Amsterdam, Princeton and Oxford have shown that extremely light particles known as axions may occur in large clouds around neutron stars. These axions could form an explanation ...
Astronomy
Oct 18, 2024
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395
One of the great challenges of modern cosmology is to reveal the nature of dark matter. We know it exists (it constitutes more than 85% of the matter in the universe), but we have never seen it directly and still do not know ...
Astronomy
Oct 4, 2024
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204
Last week, at the biennial ICHEP conference, the AMBER experiment presented results from its first data-taking period. Taken in 2023, these results show preliminary plots of the antiproton's production cross section—the probability ...
General Physics
Aug 5, 2024
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61
Neutrinos have a quantum mechanical property called "flavor." This flavor can transform as neutrinos move through space. A major challenge is to keep track of both the physical movement of the neutrinos and their change of ...
General Physics
Jul 12, 2024
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400
