EPOS Model and Ultra High Energy Cosmic Rays

TL;DR

The paper discusses the EPOS model's role in simulating air showers caused by ultra high energy cosmic rays, highlighting recent updates and their impact on understanding cosmic ray properties.

Contribution

It introduces the updated EPOS 1.99 model and analyzes its effects on air shower simulations and cosmic ray interpretation.

Findings

EPOS 1.99 improves air shower simulation accuracy

Updated model addresses issues seen with previous versions

Enhanced understanding of cosmic ray interactions

Abstract

Interpretation of extensive air showers (EAS) experiments results is strongly based on air shower simulations. The latter being based on hadronic interaction models, any new model can help for the understanding of the nature of cosmic rays. The EPOS model reproducing all major results of existing accelerator data (including detailed data of RHIC experiments) has been introduced in air shower simulation programs CORSIKA and CONEX few years ago. The new EPOS 1.99 has recently been updated taking into account the problem seen in EAS development using EPOS 1.61. We will show in details the relationship between some EPOS hadronic properties and EAS development, as well as the consequences on the model and finally on cosmic ray analysis.