Calculating the ionization rate induced by GCR and SCR protons in Earth’s atmosphere

Abstract

This paper explores the applied use of the RUSCOSMICS software package [http://ruscosmics.ru] designed to simulate propagation of primary cosmic ray (CR) particles through Earth’s atmosphere and collect information about characteristics of their secondary component. We report the results obtained for proton fluxes with energy distributions corresponding to the differential spectra of galactic CR (GCR) and solar CR (SCR) during ground level enhancement (GLE) events GLE65 and GLE67. We examine features of the geometry of Earth’s atmosphere, parametrization methods, and describe a primary particle generator. The typical energy spectra of electrons obtained both for GCR and for GLE65 provide information that allows us to quantitatively estimate the SCR contribution to the enhancement of secondary CR fluxes. We also present altitude dependences of ionization rate for GCR and both the GLE events for several geomagnetic cutoff rigidity values. The conclusion summarizes and discusses the prospects for future research.

Keywords

• cosmic rays
• astrophysics
• Monte Carlo method
• GEANT4
• particle physics
• numerical simulation