A Decade-Long Particle Survey Could Shake Up Our Understanding of Cosmic Rays

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A Decade-Long Particle Survey Could Shake Up Our Understanding of Cosmic Rays

A complete survey of all the particle and antiparticle activity that goes on during the Sun’s 11-year cycle has found previously unknown ways these particles behave.

Cosmic rays coming from outside the Solar System bring these particles closer to the Sun, where they experience changes caused by heat and other types of solar energy.

It is possible that antimatter might have something to do with dark matter, and even the origins of the universe.

On Earth, the

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may seem the same every dawn that it rises and every dusk that it sets, but our star actually goes through

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of fluctuations that each last 11 years. As scientists have watched our star over this most recent 11-year cycle, it has revealed previously unknown ways that changes in solar activity have affected energetic particles and cosmic rays.

A huge part of this new understanding has been made possible by the

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particle physics detector on the International Space Station (ISS), which has observed billions of cosmic ray events from low Earth orbit. In the search for dark matter and antimatter—which could be holding secrets about the origins of the universe—it uses

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to separate particles from cosmic rays based on their electric charge before measuring the masses and energies of those particles. Analyzing these particles separately is important because the behavior of a particle can give it away as matter or antimatter.

An international team of researchers have now completed a survey of a full solar cycle, and the data showed some aspects of the behavior of

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particles that hadn’t previously been well-understood (when only parts of a cycle had been studied). Even the hundreds of theories out there have not been able to simultaneously explain the connection between how many particles are present during different times of the solar cycle and the types of particle interactions occurring at those times.

“The knowledge of the fluxes of charged [subatomic]

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is crucial in understanding phenomena in the cosmos, such as the nature of dark matter,” the researchers said in a study recently published by the

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.

It also helps us understand how the Sun modifies these particles. Another discovery found that the degree to which these particles and antiparticles are changed by solar effects depends on the shape of the wavelength those particles travel in. The shape of the

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depends on temperature—lower, longer wavelengths at lower temperatures look like broad waves, while higher, shorter wavelengths at higher temperatures look like narrow waves. As cosmic rays approach the Sun, wavelengths become shorter because particles are excited by the heat, and therefore vibrate faster.

Cosmic rays that come from far-flung parts of the galaxy and enter the

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also undergo other changes brought on by the Sun’s energy. These include diffusion of particles, convection (in which hotter material rises), alterations to particles caused by traveling through the magnetic field, and loss of other types of energy (besides heat). When these phenomena happen depends on what phase of the solar cycle the Sun is in, since there are smaller cycles of activity within the broader 11-year cycle.

Mysteries about antimatter are still floating in space. It is possible, for instance, that antiparticles are somehow related to

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—though, while neither are visible to the naked eye, antiparticles are at least detectable (dark matter has not yet been detected). How antimatter originated also remains a puzzle, which could be illuminated by the ways these particles are affected by the Sun. And an upcoming upgrade to the AMS might reveal even more.

“Our findings provide a distinct channel for understanding solar modulation effects,” the researchers said in an adjacent study, also recently published by the

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. “Accurate knowledge of the solar modulation effects on antiproton fluxes is crucial for understanding the origin of antiprotons in the

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.”

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