Bose–Einstein Condensation and Muon Production in Ultrahigh Energy Cosmic Ray Particle Collisions

Abstract

Collisions of cosmic ray particles with ultrahigh initial energies with nuclei in the atmosphere open a wide room for appearing of the novel dynamical features for multiparticle production processes. In particular, the laser-like behavior of pions driven by Bose–Einstein condensation would result in the shift to larger multiplicities and, as a consequence, could provide, in general, the enhanced yield of cosmic muons. In the present work the critical value of the space charged particle density for onset of Bose–Einstein condensation of the boson (pion) wave packets into the same wave-packet state is estimated within the model with complete multiparticle symmetrization for the energy domain corresponding to the ultrahigh energy cosmic rays (UHECR). Energy dependence of mean density of charged pions is evaluated for the cases of absence of the Bose–Einstein effects and for presence of laser-like behavior of pions. The possible influence of the Bose–Einstein condensation is discussed for the muon production in UHECR particle collisions with the atmosphere.