Sibyll with charm

TL;DR

This paper introduces charm particle production in the Sibyll cosmic ray interaction generator, improving the simulation of prompt charm decays as backgrounds in neutrino detection, validated against accelerator data.

Contribution

It adds a phenomenological charm production model to Sibyll, enhancing its accuracy for cosmic ray and neutrino experiments.

Findings

Charmed meson and baryon production matches accelerator data

Improved simulation of prompt charm decays as neutrino backgrounds

Enhanced reliability of air shower simulations

Abstract

The cosmic ray interaction event generator Sibyll is widely used in extensive air shower simulations for cosmic ray and neutrino experiments. Charmed particle production has been added to the Monte Carlo with a phenomenological, non-perturbative model that properly accounts for charm production in the forward direction. As prompt decays of charm can become a significant background for neutrino detection, proper simulation of charmed particles is very important. We compare charmed meson and baryon production to accelerator data.