Simulation studies on distortion of EAS muons by the Earth’s magnetic field

Abstract

The distortion of the secondary cosmic ray (CR) muon component triggered by the earth’s magnetic field is studied using a Monte Carlo (MC) code dedicated to CR air shower physics. In an inclined shower, a clear separation may be put in evidence by studying the dipole defined by both barycentres of negative and positive muons. The length of this dipole as well as its azimuthal orientation depends on the incidence of the shower characterizing by the angle of the shower axis with the components of the magnetic field and the path of the secondary muons. We observed that the new observable muonic dipole length might be useful to determine the nature of primary CR species.