Parts | Days | Selection | Search | Updates | Downloads | Help
T: Fachverband Teilchenphysik
T 101: Kosmische Strahlung IV
T 101.7: Talk
Wednesday, March 30, 2011, 18:15–18:30, 30.41: 004
Cosmic ray induced ionization of molecular clouds — •Florian Schuppan1, Julia Becker1, John Black2, and Mohammadtaher Safarzadeh2 — 1Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Fakultät für Physik und Astronomie, Theoretische Physik IV, Bochum, Germany — 2Chalmers University of Technology, Onsala Space Observatory, Onsala, Sweden
For a wide energy range, the source of cosmic rays is yet unknown. This is for instance the case for gamma radiation in the GeV to TeV-regime. Such highly energetic gamma rays could in principle be caused by hadronic interactions, by inverse Compton scattering or bremsstrahlung, provided the corresponing required parameters match. Because of sensitivity limits, it is difficult to find sufficient constraints on the aforementioned parameters to definitely pinpoint the formation processes for the observed gamma radiation. However, if the influence of the potential high enery gamma radiation causing processes in lower energy regimes is considered, it can be possible to unambiguously check which of the processes is at work. Here, we will be doing this by examining cosmic ray induced ionization of molecular clouds in the direct vicinity of supernovae for the four currently known objects, namely W28, W44, W51C and IC443. The ionization of molecular hydrogen drives the formation of molecules, excited in rotation and vibration. Their relaxation gives characteristic line emission, which -if detected- will confirm the idea that hadronic interactions are the cause of the observed gamma radiation.