What are cosmic rays? How do they affect earth?
Answers
Answer:
Cosmic rays are high energy atomic nuclei.
Explanation:
They mainly consist of protons and nuclei of lighter elements. They have high energy and most likely originate from supernova explosions.
They have little effect on Earth as the atmosphere blocks almost all of them. Some of the more energetic particles do reach the surface of the Earth.
There are surface based cosmic ray detectors which are typically fields of interconnected sensing devices.
Cosmic rays constantly rain down on Earth, and while the high-energy "primary" rays collide with atoms in the Earth's upper atmosphere and rarely make it through to the ground, "secondary" particles are ejected from this collision and do reach us on the ground.
When cosmic rays enter the Earth's atmosphere they collide with atoms and molecules, mainly oxygen and nitrogen. The interaction produces a cascade of lighter particles, a so-called air shower secondary radiation that rains down, including x-rays, muons, protons, alpha particles, pions, electrons, and neutrons.