Weekly seminars

Uncertainties of secondary antiproton production in cosmic rays

par Michael Korsmeier (University of Turin, Department of Physics)

Europe/Paris
Auditorium (LAPTh)

Auditorium

LAPTh

9 chemin de Bellevue 74940 Annecy
Description

During the last decade, space-based experiments have drastically reduced the measurement uncertainty of cosmic-ray fluxes. Consequently, systematic uncertainties in the description of cosmic rays become more and more relevant. One important example is the production of secondary antiprotons in our Galaxy. I will give an overview about the current status of the production cross section for cosmic-ray antiprotons and its uncertainties. In cosmic-ray fits, these uncertainties are often neglected or described at an effective level by a covariance matrix. I will review this method and present an alternative approach: We perform a global fit which joins cosmic-ray data and measurements of the antiproton production cross section. By simultaneously fitting cosmic-ray propagation parameters and the parametrization of the antiproton production cross section, we marginalize over the cross section uncertainty. I will briefly discuss the impact on the extraction of cosmic-ray propagation parameters and the putative hint for DM in the antiproton spectrum.