title: Muon production in extended air shower simulations.
abstract: Whereas air shower simulations are very valuable tools for interpreting cosmic ray data, there is a long-standing problem: it is difficult to accommodate at the same time the longitudinal development of air showers and the number of muons measured on the ground. Using a new hadronic interaction model (EPOS) in air shower simulations produces much more muons, in agreement with results from the HiRes-MIA experiment. We find that this is mainly due to a better description of (anti) baryon production in hadronic interactions. This is an aspect of air shower physics which has been neglected so far.
authors.affiliation: Forschungszentrum Karlsruhe, Institut für Kernphysik, Karlsruhe, Germany.
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Pierog
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Werner