Cosmic rays

Energy

Cosmic rays attract great interest practically, due to the damage they inflict on microelectronics and life outside the protection of an atmosphere and magnetic field, and scientifically, because the energies of the most energetic ultra-high-energy cosmic rays have been observed to approach 3 × 10 eV (This is slightly greater than 10 million times the design energy of particles accelerated by the Large Hadron Collider, 7 teraelectronvolts [TeV] (7.0×10 eV).) One can show that such enormous energies might be achieved by means of the centrifugal mechanism of acceleration in active galactic nuclei. At 50 joules [J] (3.1×10 GeV), the highest-energy ultra-high-energy cosmic rays (such as the OMG particle recorded in 1991) have energies comparable to the kinetic energy of a 90-kilometre-per-hour [km/h] (56 mph) baseball. As a result of these discoveries, there has been interest in investigating cosmic rays of even greater energies. Most cosmic rays, however, do not have such extreme energies; the energy distribution of cosmic rays peaks at 300 megaelectronvolts [MeV] (4.8×10 J).