2005/12/20 by Madsen, Jes
#Astrophysics (astro-ph) #FOS: Physical sciences #High Energy Physics - Phenomenology (hep-ph) #Nuclear Theory (nucl-th)
paper · doi:10.48550/arxiv.astro-ph/0512512
Stable lumps of quark matter may be present in cosmic rays at a flux level, which can be detected by high precision cosmic ray experiments sensitive to anomalous "nuclei" with high mass-to-charge ratio. The properties of these lumps, called strangelets, are described, and so is the production and propagation of strangelets in cosmic rays. Two experiments underway which are sensitive to a strangelet flux in the predicted range are briefly described. Finally it is summarized how strangelets circumvent the acceleration problem encountered by conventional candidates for ultra-high energy cosmic rays and move the Greisen-Zatsepin-Kuzmin cutoff to energies well above the observed maximum energies.