An analytic description of the radio emission of air showers based on its emission mechanisms

Understand

Ultra-high energy cosmic rays can be measured through the detection of radio-frequency radiation from air showers.

• The radio-frequency emission originates from deflections of the air-shower particles in the geomagnetic field and from a time-varying negative charge excess in the shower front.
• The distribution of the radio signal on the ground contains information on crucial cosmic-ray properties, such as energy and mass.
• A long standing challenge is to access this information experimentally with a sparse grid of antennas.