A New Clue to

Cosmic-Ray Origins
Ever since Victor F. Hesss pioneering
turn-of-the-century balloon flights, scientists have known that tiny particles rain
down from outer space, each with enough
energy to tear apart atoms and molecules
in our atmosphere. These potent particles, called cosmic rays, are atomic nuclei
that travel through space at near-light
speeds. Most specialists now agree that
cosmic rays somehow get their stupendous speeds from supernova explosions.
However, the origin of the nuclei themselves has remained unclear. Are they actual supernova shrapnel, or are they ambient interstellar denizens kicked to
relativistic speeds by a supernova shock
wave that has already traveled for thousands of years?
The Advanced Composition Explorer
(ACE) satellite, launched two years ago,
has produced evidence in favor of the
latter scenario. ACE measured the relative numbers of two equally heavy atomic nuclei, nickel-59 (59Ni) and cobalt-59
(59Co). Given enough time, a nickel-59
nucleus will capture an electron to become cobalt-59; the wait is typically
75,000 years (the reactions half-life).
However, the reaction cant take place at
all if the particle shoots straight out of a
supernova, where relativistic nuclei
quickly lose all their electrons as they
ricochet off other atoms. ACEs cosmicray sample, gathered over a 16-month
period, showed a 59Co/59Ni ratio of 40 or
more, suggesting that the nuclei rested
quietly in interstellar space for at least
100,000 years before being accelerated by
a passing supernova shock wave. The result was presented at the American Astronomical Society meeting in Chicago.
This time delay is the most direct indication that cosmic rays are accelerated
ambient matter, says Jet Propulsion Laboratory scientist Mark E. Wiedenbeck, but
there are other things pulling in the same
direction. Notably, the most massive
cosmic-ray nuclei appear to have an isotopic composition similar to that of our
solar system, which presumably formed
from a representative patch of the interstellar medium. Says Wiedenbeck, The
fact that cosmic rays and the solar system have the same composition suggests
that interstellar material must have been
the seed population from which cosmic
rays were accelerated.

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1999 Sky Publishing Corp. All rights reserved.

Sky & Telescope October 1999

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