Status and prospects of the CORSIKA 8 air shower simulation framework

TL;DR

CORSIKA 8 is a modern, modular C++ framework that advances air shower simulations by improving maintainability, flexibility, and adding new features like radio and Cherenkov-light emission modeling.

Contribution

This work presents the complete rewrite of CORSIKA in C++, enabling enhanced simulation capabilities and configurability compared to the legacy Fortran version.

Findings

Full implementation of hadronic and electromagnetic cascades

Simulation of radio and Cherenkov-light emission

Enhanced flexibility in media and geometry configuration

Abstract

The Fortran-versions of the CORSIKA air shower simulation code have been at the core of simulations for many astroparticle physics experiments for the last 30 years. Having grown over decades into an ever more complex software, maintainability of CORSIKA has become increasingly difficult, though its performance is still excellent. In 2018, therefore a complete rewrite of CORSIKA has begun in modern modular C++. Today, CORSIKA 8 has reached important milestones with a full-fledged implementation of both the hadronic and electromagnetic cascades, the ability to simulate radio and Cherenkov-light emission from air showers and an unprecedented flexibility to configure simulation media and their geometries. This presentation will discuss the current status of CORSIKA 8, highlight the new possibilities already available, and future prospects of this new air shower simulation framework.