Galactic knee and extragalactic ankle
Thursday, May 9, 2013 - 05:00
in Astronomy & Space
It is obvious from the data of the KASCADE-Grande experiment at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) that the so-called "knee" of the cosmic rays, a bend in the energy spectrum at high energies, is located at different energies for light and heavy particles. As regards light particles, the scientists have now found that the energy spectrum flattens again beyond the knee and forms a type of "ankle". This structure indicates that cosmic radiation particles with energies beyond the knee are accelerated in galaxies other than the Milky Way.