AMS-02 Experiment Research Articles

Precise Measurements of TeV Halos around Geminga and Monogem Pulsars with HAWC

We present the most precise measurements to date for the spatial extension and energy spectrum of the γ-ray region between a pulsar’s wind nebula and the interstellar medium, better known as the halo, present around Geminga and PSR B0656+14 (Monogem) using ∼2398 days of >1 TeV data collected by the HAWC observatory. We interpret the data using a physically motivated model for the diffuse γ-ray emission generated from positrons and electrons (e±) injected by the pulsar wind nebula and inverse Compton scattering with interstellar radiation fields. We find the morphologies of the regions inside these halos are characterized by an inhibited diffusion that are approximately three orders of magnitudes smaller than the Galactic average. We also obtain the e± emission efficiencies of 6.6% and 5.1%, respectively, for Geminga and Monogem. These results have remarkable consequences for the study of the particle diffusion in the region between the pulsar wind nebulae and the interstellar medium, and for the interpretation of the flux of positrons measured by the AMS-02 experiment above 10 GeV.

Feature Selection Techniques for CR Isotope Identification with the AMS-02 Experiment in Space

Isotopic composition measurements of singly charged cosmic rays (CR) provide essential insights into CR transport in the Galaxy. The Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS-02) can identify singly charged isotopes up to about 10 GeV/n. However, their identification presents challenges due to the small abundance of CR deuterons compared to the proton background. In particular, a high accuracy for the velocity measured by a ring-imaging Cherenkov detector (RICH) is needed to achieve a good isotopic mass separation over a wide range of energies. The velocity measurement with the RICH is particularly challenging for Z=1 isotopes due to the low number of photons produced in the Cherenkov rings. This faint signal is easily disrupted by noisy hits leading to a misreconstruction of the particles’ ring. Hence, an efficient background reduction process is needed to ensure the quality of the reconstructed Cherenkov rings and provide a correct measurement of the particles’ velocity. Machine learning methods, particularly boosted decision trees, are well suited for this task, but their performance relies on the choice of the features needed for their training phase. While physics-driven feature selection methods based on the knowledge of the detector are often used, machine learning algorithms for automated feature selection can provide a helpful alternative that optimises the classification method’s performance. We compare five algorithms for selecting the feature samples for RICH background reduction, achieving the best results with the Random Forest method. We also test its performance against the physics-driven selection method, obtaining better results.

New understanding of nuclei spectra properties observed by the AMS-02 experiment

The AMS-02 experiment has observed new properties of primary cosmic rays (CRs) categorized into two groups: He-C-O-Fe and Ne-Mg-Si-S, which are independent of CR propagation. In this study, we investigate the unexpected properties of these nuclei using a spatial propagation model. All nuclei spectra are accurately reproduced and separated into primary and secondary contributions. Our findings include: 1. Primary CR spectra are identical. 2. Our calculations align with AMS-02 results for primary-dominated nuclei within a 10% difference, but show significant discrepancies for the secondary-dominated nuclei. 3. The primary element abundance at around 200 GeV is presented and compared with previous solar and Galactic results. We hope that future DAMPE experiments can provide more experimental observational evidence to validate our model calculations. Published by the American Physical Society 2024

The High Energy Light Isotope eXperiment program of direct cosmic-ray studies

HELIX is a new NASA-sponsored instrument aimed at measuring the spectra and composition of light cosmic-ray isotopes from hydrogen to neon nuclei, in particular the clock isotopes 10Be (radioactive, with 1.4 Myr lifetime) and 9Be (stable). The latter are unique markers of the production and Galactic propagation of secondary cosmic-ray nuclei, and are needed to resolve such important mysteries as the proportion of secondary positrons in the excess of antimatter observed by the AMS-02 experiment. By using a combination of a 1 T superconducting magnet spectrometer (with drift-chamber tracker) with a high-resolution time-of-flight detector system and ring-imaging Cherenkov detector, mass-resolved isotope measurements of light cosmic-ray nuclei will be possible up to 3 GeV/n in a first stratospheric balloon flight from Kiruna, Sweden to northern Canada, anticipated to take place in early summer 2024. An eventual longer Antarctic balloon flight of HELIX will yield measurements up to 10 GeV/n, sampling production from a larger volume of the Galaxy extending into the halo. We review the instrument design, testing, status and scientific prospects.

Injection Spectra of Different Species of Cosmic Rays from AMS-02, ACE-CRIS and Voyager-1

Precise measurements of energy spectra of different cosmic ray (CR) species have been obtained in recent years, by particularly the AMS-02 experiment on the International Space Station. It has been shown that apparent differences exist in different groups of the primary CRs. However, it is not straightforward to conclude that the source spectra of different particle groups are different since they will experience different propagation processes (e.g., energy losses and fragmentations) either. In this work, we study the injection spectra of different nuclear species using the measurements from Voyager-1 outside the solar system, and ACR-CRIS and AMS-02 on the top of atmosphere, in a physical framework of CR transportation. Two types of injection spectra are assumed, the broken power-law (BPL) form and the non-parametric spline interpolation form. The non-parametric form fits the data better than the BPL form, implying that potential structures beyond the constrained spectral shape of BPL may exist. For different nuclei the injection spectra are overall similar in shape but do show some differences among each other. For the non-parametric spectral form, the helium injection spectrum is the softest at low energies and the hardest at high energies. For both spectral shapes, the low-energy injection spectrum of neon is the hardest among all these species, and the carbon and oxygen spectra have more prominent bumps in 1–10 GV in the presentation. Such differences suggest the existence of differences in the sources or acceleration processes of various nuclei of CRs.

Nearby SNR: A Possible Common Origin of Multi-messenger Anomalies in the Spectra, Ratios, and Anisotropy of Cosmic Rays

Multi-messenger anomalies, including spectral hardening or excess of nuclei, leptons, ratios of and B/C, and anisotropic reversal, have been observed in past years. The AMS-02 experiment also revealed different spectral breaks for positrons and electrons at 284 GeV and beyond tera electron volts, respectively. It is natural to ask whether all those anomalies originate from one unified physical scenario. In this work, the spatially dependent propagation (SDP) with a nearby supernova remnant (SNR) source is adopted to reproduce the abovementioned anomalies. There possibly exists a dense molecular cloud (DMC) around SNRs and the secondary particles can be produced by pp collision or fragmentation between the accelerated primary cosmic rays and DMC. As a result, the spectral hardening for primary and secondary particles and ratios of B/C and can be well reproduced. Due to the energy loss at the source age of 330 kyr, the characteristic spectral break-off for a primary electron is at about 1 TeV as hinted at by the measurements. The secondary positrons and electrons from charged pion take up 5% of energy from their mother particles, so the positron spectrum has a break-off at ∼250 GeV. Therefore, the different spectral breaks for positrons and electrons together with other anomalies can be fulfilled in this unified physical scenario. More interesting is that we also obtain the featured structures as spectral break-offs at 5 TeV for secondary particles of Li, Be, and B, which can be used to verify our model. We hope that those tagged structures can be observed by the new generation of spaceborne experiment HERD in the future.

Unstable cosmic ray nuclei constrain low-diffusion zones in the Galactic disc

ABSTRACT Observations of the vicinity of a variety of galactic gamma-ray sources have indicated a local suppression of diffusivity of cosmic rays (CRs) by up to three orders of magnitude. However, the impact of these low-diffusion zones on global properties of CR transport is, however, only poorly understood. Here, we argue that CR nuclear ratios, like the boron-to-carbon ratio and relative abundances of Beryllium isotopes are sensitive to the filling fraction of such low-diffusion zones and hence their measurements can be used to constrain the typical sizes and ages of such regions. We have performed a careful parameter study of a CR transport model that allows for different diffusion coefficients κdisc and κhalo in the galactic disc and halo, respectively. Making use of preliminary data from the AMS-02 experiment on the ratio of Beryllium isotopes, we find a 3.5σ preference for a suppression of the diffusion coefficient in the disc with a best-fitting value of $\kappa _{\mathrm{disc}}/\kappa _{\mathrm{halo}} = 0.20^{+0.10}_{-0.06}$. We forecast that with upcoming data from the HELIX balloon experiment, the significance could increase to 6.8σ. Adopting a coarse-graining approach, we find that such a strong suppression could be realized if the filling fraction of low-diffusion zones in the disc was $\sim 66~{{\ \rm per\ cent}}$. We conclude that the impact of regions of suppressed diffusion might be larger than usually assumed and ought to be taken into account in models of Galactic CR transport.

Antistars as possible sources of antihelium cosmic rays

A minor population of antistars in galaxies has been predicted by some of non-standard models of baryogenesis and nucleosynthesis in the early Universe, and their presence is not yet excluded by the currently available observations. Detection of an unusually high abundance of antinuclei in cosmic rays can probe the baryogenesis scenarios in the early Universe. Recent report of the AMS-02 collaboration on the tentative detection of a few antihelium nuclei in GeV cosmic rays provided a great hope on the progress in this issue. We discuss possible sources of antinuclei in cosmic rays from antistars which are predicted in a modified Affleck-Dine baryogenesis scenario by Dolgov and Silk (1993). The model allows us to estimate the expected fluxes and isotopic content of antinuclei in the GeV cosmic rays produced in scenarios involving antistars. We show that the flux of antihelium CRs reported by the AMS-02 experiment can be explained by Galactic anti-nova outbursts, thermonuclear anti-SN Ia explosions, a collection of flaring antistars, or an extragalactic source with abundances not violating existing gamma-ray and microlensing constraints on the antistar population.

Reference measurements for indirect dark matter searches with p+C collisions at the NA61/SHINE experiment

NA61/SHINE is a large-acceptance fixed-target experiment located at the CERN SPS, which studies final hadronic states in interactions of various particles and nuclei. It is unique in terms of providing data on a variety of collision systems at different collision energies. This allows for wide deuteron, antiproton and antideuteron production cross-section studies. The latter are currently considered a possible dark matter interaction signal with exceptionally small background. The measurements on carbon targets are important to reduce systematic experimental effects due to experiment-internal antideuteron production, as the most abundant element in the path of an incoming particle for the AMS-02 experiment is carbon. This manuscript will focus on analysis of NA61/SHINE data on p+C thin target collisions in the context of light (anti)nuclei production. A preliminary analysis of experimental data and the particle identification method as well as current deuteron and antideuteron yields will be described.

The RICH detector of the AMS-02 experiment aboard the International Space Station

The Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) is a high-energy particle physics magnetic spectrometer installed on the International Space Station (ISS) in May 2011, successfully operating and taking data since then. The goal of the experiment is to carry out accurate measurements of galactic Cosmic Rays spectra in a wide energy range from GeV/n to TeV/n and search for rare components as hints of the presence of Dark Matter and Anti-Matter. The AMS instrument includes a Ring Imaging Čerenkov (RICH), which provides a precise measurement of the particle velocity and electric charge. The AMS-RICH layout follows a proximity focusing design with two radiators: at the center there are sodium fluoride tiles surrounded by silica aerogel ones. No significant indications of degradation of the radiator properties have been observed in more than 11 years of operation in space and 95% of the detection sensors is working nominally. The velocity and charge responses are stable in time and their resolution fulfills the design requirements. The impact of the RICH detector in the AMS physics program will be highlighted and the most recent results on light isotopes in cosmic rays will be discussed, with a particular attention to the AMS capabilities to identify Beryllium isotopes.

The Formalism of Milky-Way Antimatter-Domains Evolution

If baryosynthesis is strongly nonhomogeneous, macroscopic regions with antibaryon excess can be created in the same process from which the baryonic matter is originated. This exotic possibility can become real, if the hints to the existence of antihelium component in cosmic rays are confirmed in the AMS02 experiment, indicating the existence of primordial antimatter objects in our Galaxy. Possible forms of such objects depend on the parameters of models of baryosynthesis and evolution of antimatter domains. We elaborate the formalism of analysis of evolution of antibaryon domain with the account for baryon-antibaryon annihilation at the domain borders and possible “Swiss cheese” structure of the domain structure. We pay special attention to evolution of various forms of high, very high and ultrahigh density antibaryon domains and deduce equations of their evolution in the expanding Universe. The proposed formalism will provide the creation of evolutionary scenarios, linking the possible forms and properties of antimatter bodies in our Galaxy to the mechanisms of nonhomogeneous baryosynthesis.

Enhanced cosmic-ray antihelium production from dark matter annihilation through light mediators

Cosmic-ray (CR) antihelium is an important probe for the indirect search of dark matter (DM) annihilation in the Galaxy. However, due to stringent constraints from the measurements of CR antiprotons and γ-rays, the flux of CR antihelium from the conventional DM direct annihilation into Standard Model final states is expected to be far below the sensitivity of the current experiments. We show that the production of antihelium can be significantly enhanced if the DM particles annihilate through light mediator particles with a mass mϕ ≈ 8 GeV close to the antihelium production threshold. After taking into account the constraints from the AMS-02 antiproton data and the Fermi-LAT γ-ray data on the spheroidal dwarf galaxies, we find that in this scenario the CR antihelium flux can be enhanced by three orders of magnitude, which makes it within the sensitivity of the ongoing AMS-02 experiment.

A simple determination of the halo size from10Be/9Be data

Context.The AMS-02 and HELIX experiments should soon provide10Be/9Be cosmic-ray data of unprecedented precision.Aims.We propose an analytical formula to quickly and accurately determineLfrom these data.Methods.Our formula is validated against the full calculation performed with the propagation codeUSINE. We compare the constraints onLset by Be/B and10Be/9Be, relying on updated sets of production cross-sections.Results.The best-fitLfrom AMS-02 Be/B data is shifted from 5 kpc to 3.8 kpc when using the updated cross-sections. We obtained consistent results from the Be/B analysis withUSINE,L = 3.8−1.6+2.8kpc (data and cross-section uncertainties), and from the analysis of10Be/9Be data with the simplified formula,L = 4.7 ± 0.6 (data uncertainties) ±2 (cross-section uncertainties) kpc. The analytical formula indicates that improvements onLthanks to future data will be limited by production cross-section uncertainties, unless either10Be/9Be measurements are extended up to several tens of GeV/n, or nuclear data for the production of10Be and9Be are improved; new data for the production cross section of16O into Be isotopes above a few GeV/n are especially desired.

Cosmic Ray Antihelium Probe for the Origin of the Baryonic Matter in the Universe

Several candidates for antihelium events have been found in the AMS-02 experiment. They cannot be created by natural astrophysical sources and, if confirmed, imply the existence of antimatter stars in our galaxy. This immediately reduces the class of inflationary models with baryosynthesis to those that can provide the creation of an antimatter domain of surviving size together with the general baryon asymmetry of the Universe. To confront the future results of experimental searches for cosmic antihelium with predictions of this hypothesis, we develop numerical studies of the creation and propagation of antihelium flux from antimatter globular clusters in the Galaxy. This article presents the results of such a simulation: a function of the magnetic cut-off for the penetration of antihelium nuclei into the Galaxy disk and an estimate of the energy range in which the search and detection of antihelium is most optimal.

Inert Higgs Dark Matter for CDF II W-Boson Mass and Detection Prospects.

The W-boson mass, which was recently measured at Fermilab with an unprecedented precision, suggests the presence of new multiplets beyond the standard model (SM). One of the minimal extensions of the SM is to introduce an additional scalar doublet in which the non-SM scalars can enhance W-boson mass via the loop corrections. On the other hand, with a proper discrete symmetry, the lightest new scalar in the doublet can be stable and play the role of a dark matter particle. We show that the inert two Higgs doublet model can naturally handle the new W-boson mass without violating other constraints and that the preferred dark matter mass is between 54 and 74GeV. We identify three feasible parameter regions for the thermal relic density: the SA coannihilation, the Higgs resonance, and the SS→WW^{*} annihilation. We find that the first region can be fully tested by the High Luminosity Large Hadron Collider, the second region will be tightly constrained by direct detection experiments, and the third region could yield detectable GeV γ-ray and antiproton signals in the Galaxy that may have been observed by the Fermi Large Area Telescope and the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer AMS-02 experiment.

Antistars or Antimatter Cores in Mirror Neutron Stars?

The oscillation of the neutron n into mirror neutron n′, its partner from the dark mirror sector, can gradually transform an ordinary neutron star into a mixed star consisting in part of mirror dark matter. The implications of the reverse process taking place in the mirror neutron stars depend on the sign of baryon asymmetry in the mirror sector. Namely, if it is negative, as predicted by certain baryogenesis scenarios, then n′¯−n¯ transitions create a core of our antimatter gravitationally trapped in the mirror star interior. The annihilation of accreted gas on such antimatter cores could explain the origin of γ-source candidates with an unusual spectrum compatible with baryon–antibaryon annihilation, recently identified in the Fermi LAT catalog. In addition, some part of this antimatter escaping after the mergers of mirror neutron stars can produce the flux of cosmic antihelium and also heavier antinuclei which are hunted in the AMS-02 experiment.

Testing the universality of cosmic-ray nuclei from protons to oxygen with AMS-02

The AMS-02 experiment has provided high-precision measurements of several cosmic-ray (CR) species. The achieved percent-level accuracy gives access to small spectral differences among the different species and, in turn, this allows scrutinizing the universality of CR acceleration, which is expected in the standard scenario of CR shock acceleration. While pre-AMS-02 data already indicated a violation of the universality between protons and helium, it is still an open question if at least helium and heavier nuclei can be reconciled. To address this issue, we performed a joint analysis using the AMS-02 CR measurements of antiprotons, protons, helium, helium 3, boron, carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen. We explore two competing propagation scenarios, one with a break in the diffusion coefficient at a few GVs and no reacceleration, and another one with reacceleration and with a break in the injection spectra of primaries. Furthermore, we explicitly consider the impact of the uncertainties in the nuclear production cross sections of secondaries by including nuisance parameters in the fit. The resulting parameter space is explored with the help of Monte Carlo methods. We find that, contrary to the naive expectation, in the standard propagation scenarios CR universality is violated also for He, on the one hand, and C, N, and O, on the other hand, i.e., different injection slopes (at the level of $\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Delta}}\ensuremath{\sim}0.05$) are required to explain the observed spectra. As an alternative, we explore further propagation scenarios, inspired by nonhomogeneous diffusion, which might save universality. Finally, we also investigate the universality of CR propagation, i.e., we compare the propagation properties inferred using only light nuclei ($\overline{p}$, p, He, $^{3}\mathrm{He}$) with the ones inferred using only heavier nuclei (B, C, N, O).

Leptophilic-portal dark matter in the light of AMS-02 positron excess

We revisit dark matter annihilation as an explanation of the positron excess reported recently by the AMS-02 satellite-borne experiment. To this end, we propose a particle dark matter model by considering a Two Higgs Doublet Model (2HDM) extended with an additional singlet boson and a singlet fermion. The additional (light) boson mixes with the pseudoscalar inherent in the 2HDM, and the singlet fermion, which is the dark matter candidate, annihilates via this bosonic portal. The dark matter candidate is made leptophilic by choosing the lepton-specific 2HDM and a suitable high value of $\tan\beta$. We identify the model parameter space which explains the muon g-2 anomaly while evading the experimental constraints. After establishing the viability of the singlet fermion to be a dark matter candidate, we calculate the positron excess produced from its annihilation to the light bosons which primarily decay to muons. Incorporating the Sommerfeld effect caused by the light mediator and an appropriate boost factor, we find that our proposed model can satisfactorily explain the positron fraction excess as well as the positron spectrum data reported by AMS-02 experiment.

The origin of Galactic cosmic rays as revealed by their composition

ABSTRACT Galactic cosmic rays (GCRs) are thought to be accelerated in strong shocks induced by massive star winds and supernova explosions sweeping across the interstellar medium. But the phase of the interstellar medium from which the CRs are extracted has remained elusive until now. Here, we study in detail the GCR source composition deduced from recent measurements by the AMS-02, Voyager 1, and SuperTIGER experiments to obtain information on the composition, ionization state, and dust content of the GCR source reservoirs. We show that the volatile elements of the CR material are mainly accelerated from a plasma of temperature ≳ 2 MK, which is typical of the hot medium found in Galactic superbubbles energized by the activity of massive star winds and supernova explosions. Another GCR component, which is responsible for the overabundance of 22Ne, most likely arises from acceleration of massive star winds in their termination shocks. From the CR-related gamma-ray luminosity of the Milky Way, we estimate that the ion acceleration efficiency in both supernova shocks and wind termination shocks is of the order of 10−5. The GCR source composition also shows evidence for a preferential acceleration of refractory elements contained in interstellar dust. We suggest that the GCR refractories are also produced in superbubbles, from shock acceleration and subsequent sputtering of dust grains continuously incorporated into the hot plasma through thermal evaporation of embedded molecular clouds. Our model explains well the measured abundances of all primary and mostly primary CRs from H to Zr, including the overabundance of 22Ne.

Using Data from a Ground-Based Network of Detectors and the PAMELA and AMS-02 Experiments to Compare Long-Term Variations in the Cosmic Ray Flux

Using Data from a Ground-Based Network of Detectors and the PAMELA and AMS-02 Experiments to Compare Long-Term Variations in the Cosmic Ray Flux