Computer Animations of Extensive Air Showers (EAS)
This page is (basically) a copy of the
original pages
in the US composed by
Miguel F. Morales
( E-mail),
SCIPP - UC Santa Cruz.
If you would like all of the movies on a CD please click here
for information.
Extensive Air Showers
Animations of extensive air showers as modeled by the CORSIKA
program. Depict EAS from the first interaction down to the MILAGRO
detector height of 2650 m.
What are EAS?: Extensive Air Showers or EAS are caused by very energetic
particles interacting with air molecules high in the atmosphere. A gamma
ray photon or proton will hit an air molecule producing several
secondary particles, these secondary particles then interact to create
even more tertiary particles, etc. A cascade develops in the atmosphere
as you can see by taking the tour. These cascades can be detected by
ground based particle detectors like Milagro or by looking at the light
produced in the atmosphere as Whipple and other Air Cherenkov Detectors
do.
This is a complete listing of the EAS animations with
their characteristics.
|
Movie
|
Initiating Particle
|
Color Coding
|
Viewpoint
|
Size (MB)
|
|
|
500 GeV Gamma Ray
|
Energy
|
Side and behind
|
8.0
|
|
|
500 GeV Gamma Ray
|
Particle Type
|
Below
|
6.9
|
|
|
2 TeV Gamma Ray
|
Particle Type
|
Below
|
9.5
|
|
|
2 Tev Gamma Ray
|
Energy
|
Below
|
9.5
|
|
|
2 Tev Proton
|
Particle Type
|
Below
|
8.7
|
|
|
2 Tev Proton
|
Energy
|
Below
|
8.7
|
|
|
2 Tev Gamma Ray
|
Particle Type
|
Side and behind (snapshot)
|
2.0
|
Milagro
Animations of extensive air showers interacting with the
Milagro
water-Cherenkov detector
at Los Alamos. Many interestiong features such as refraction and
bifurcation of the shower front can be seen.
Toy Models: Simulations based on a simplified EAS. Instead
of using the full EAS, a plane of equally spaced and monoenergetic
particles are used. This helps build an intuitive understanding of the
interaction and allows easy observation of the more subtle
effects.
|
Movie
|
Particles in toy shower
|
Size (MB)
|
Comments
|
|
|
20 MeV electrons
|
1.7
|
|
|
|
20 MeV electrons
|
2.0
|
different perspective
|
|
|
20 MeV photons
|
2.0
|
|
|
|
200 MeV electrons
|
1.4
|
|
|
|
200 MeV electrons
|
0.4
|
No Cherenkov Photons
|
|
|
200 MeV photons
|
2.0
|
|
|
|
2 GeV photons
|
2.2
|
|
EAS:Simulations based on full Extensive Air Showers.
|
Movie
|
Initiating Particle
|
Viewpoint
|
Size (MB)
|
Comments
|
|
|
2 TeV Gamma
|
Side & above (snapshot)
|
2.0
|
Gamma shower before pond interaction
|
|
|
2 TeV Gamma
|
Below
|
3.6
|
|
|
|
2 TeV Gamma
|
Side
|
2.0
|
|
|
|
2 TeV Gamma
|
Side & above (snapshot)
|
8.8
|
|
|
|
2 TeV Proton
|
Side
|
0.8
|
Proton Shower
|
Bowl-Ring Model: Animations that support the bowl-ring model of
Cherenkov light emission.
|
Movie
|
Shower Type
|
Multiple Scattering?
|
Size (MB)
|
|
|
2 TeV Gamma initiated EAS
|
Yes
|
2.1
|
|
|
2 TeV Gamma initiated EAS
|
No
|
1.6
|
|
|
Toy Model
|
Yes
|
2.0
|
|
|
Toy Model
|
No
|
1.4
|
How did he do that?
Discussion of how the movies were made from CORSIKA and GEANT
simulations. Click
here.
J. Knapp, DESY Zeuthen,