Estimation of Shape Parameter of the Radial Distribution of Cosmic Ray Shower Particles

Abstract

The problem of manipulating lateral distributions of secondary cosmic ray (CR) charged particles is the central in ground-based extensive air shower (EAS) experiments. The analytical approaches in obtaining the spectra of EAS electrons (e ±), muons (μ ±), and hadrons (\( h(\bar{h}) \)) in the cascade theory suffer from restricted applicability due to several assumptions or approximations adopted in the theory. Estimation of the shape parameter of the radial distribution of shower particles from simulated data can bypass all these bindings adopted in the theory and thereby improving the reliability of the method, even if it has normal dependencies upon hadronic interactions implemented in the simulation. We have various profile functions for the radial distribution of EAS particles in terms of observables called shape or slope or age. These parameters actually determine how number of shower particles or radial density changes with atmospheric depth or core distance. A more judicious estimation of such observables has been made by defining the local age or segmented slope parameter (LAP or SSP) in the work. Using simulated/experimental data, the radial dependence of LAP/SSP for e ±, μ ± and \( h(\bar{h}) \) particles is investigated aiming for the measurement of chemical composition of primary cosmic rays (PCRs).