The distribution of the transverse momentum among the secondaries of ultra-high-energy interactions

Abstract

A possible distribution of transverse momentum among the secondaries of ultra-high-energy interactions is deduced from the lateral distributions of muons in the momentum range 1–100 GeV/c, the directions of muons of various momenta in EAS, and the occurrence of high-energy nuclear interacting particles far from the shower cores. The distribution can be represented by an expression of the form given by Cocconi et al. (1961) for the secondaries of low-energy interactions, together with a tail of median momentum of about 4 GeV/c containing ~6% of the particles.