Reconstruction of Near-Earth Cosmic Ray Fluxes from Ground-Based Neutron Monitors

Abstract

Today, most scientific equipment designed to measure cosmic ray particle fluxes is located on the Earth’s surface. Those instruments record the intensities of secondary cosmic rays, which are created after the interaction of cosmic rays with the Earth’s atmosphere. With the advent of spectrometric equipment installed on space satellites, direct measurements of cosmic ray fluxes in a wide energy range have become possible. However, precise information on such measurements is not always available. Scientific equipment in outer space is subject to radiation wear, which manifests in a significant deterioration in the efficiency of particle registration. Neutron monitors have been stably measuring cosmic ray intensities for several decades. They are located on the Earth’s surface therefore they are not subject to radiation wear and. The paper discusses an algorithm for calibrating neutron monitors using satellite experiment data and the prospects for its application in analyzing cosmic ray particle fluxes during periods of minimum and maximum solar activity cycles, as well as during forbush decreases.