http://arxiv.org/abs/1707.05408
We argue that if ultrahigh-energy (E > 10^10 GeV) cosmic rays are heavy nuclei (as indicated by existing data), then the pointing of cosmic rays to their nearest extragalactic sources at highest energies is expected. This is because the bending of the cosmic ray decreases as 1/E, so that pointing to nearby sources becomes possible at highest energies. In addition, for a nucleus of charge Ze and baryon number A, the maximum energy of acceleration capability of the sources grows linearly in Z, while the energy loss per distance traveled decreases with increasing A. Each of these two points tend to favor heavy nuclei at the highest energies. A single dimensional analysis may not be capable of incorporating the relative importance of these phenomena. In this paper we propose a multidimensional reconstruction of the individual emission spectra (in E, direction, and cross-correlation with nearby putative sources) to study the hypothesis that primaries are heavy nuclei subject to GZK photo-disintegration, and to determine the nature of the extragalactic sources. We also show that metal-rich starburst galaxies are highly-plausible candidate sources, and we use them as an explicit example of our proposed multidimensional analysis.
L. Anchordoqui, V. Barger and T. Weiler
Wed, 19 Jul 17
44/58
Comments: 9 pages revtex, 4 figures
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