Ultrahigh energy cosmic rays in a structured and magnetized universe

Abstract

We simulate propagation of cosmic ray nucleons above 1019 eV in scenarios where both the source distribution and magnetic fields within about 50 Mpc from us are obtained from an unconstrained large scale structure simulation. We find that a consistency of predicted sky distributions with current data above 4 × 1019 eV requires magnetic fields of ≃0.1 μG in our immediate environment, and a nearby source density of ∼10-4- 10-3 Mpc-3. Radio galaxies could provide the required sources, but only if both high- and lowluminosity radio galaxies are very efficient cosmic ray accelerators. Moreover, at ≃10 19 eV an additional isotropic flux component, presumably of cosmological origin, should dominate over the local flux component by about a factor of 3 in order to explain the observed isotropy. This argues against the scenario in which local astrophysical sources of cosmic rays above ≃ 1019 eV reside in a strongly magnetized (B≃0.1 μG) and structured intergalactic medium. Finally we discuss how future large scale full-sky detectors such as the Pierre Auger project will allow us to put much more stringent constraints on source and magnetic field distributions. © 2003 The American Physical Society.