CORSIKA
an Air Shower Simulation Program

CORSIKA (COsmic Ray SImulations for KAscade) is a program for detailed simulation of extensive air showers initiated by high energy cosmic ray particles. Protons, light nuclei up to iron, photons, and many other particles may be treated as primaries. The particles are tracked through the atmosphere until they undergo reactions with the air nuclei or - in the case of instable secondaries - decay. The hadronic interactions at high energies may be described by several reaction models alternatively: The VENUS, QGSJET, and DPMJET models are based on the Gribov-Regge theory, while SIBYLL is a minijet model. The neXus model extends far above a simple combination of QGSJET and VENUS routines. The most recent EPOS model is based on the neXus framework but with important improvements concerning hard interactions and nuclear and high-density effect. HDPM is inspired by findings of the Dual Parton Model and tries to reproduce relevant kinematical distributions being measured at colliders.
Hadronic interactions at lower energies are described either by the GHEISHA interaction routines, by a link to FLUKA, or by the microscopic UrQMD model. In particle decays all decay branches down to the 1 % level are taken into account. For electromagnetic interactions a taylor made version of the shower program EGS4 or the analytical NKG formulas may be used. Options for the generation of Cherenkov radiation and neutrinos exist. CORSIKA may be used up to and beyond the highest energies of 100 EeV.
The most actual version is CORSIKA 6.900 (May 05, 2009).

Philosophy

Physics Description

User's Guide (version CORSIKA 6.9xx)

How to get CORSIKA

Recent Publications on CORSIKA by D. Heck

Shower images

These shower images have been produced by F. Schmidt and J. Knapp in Leeds (2005).

Shower Movies

These shower movies have been established from CORSIKA simulation results, which are arranged as animated .gif files to visualize the development of extensive air showers initiated by gamma, proton, or iron primaries with energies of 100 TeV/1 PeV. The movies have been created by J. Oehlschläger and R. Engel, Institut für Kernphysik, Forschungszentrum Karlsruhe (2004).

Other Shower Movies modeled with CORSIKA have been made available by M. F. Morales as QuickTime movies. More details you find here.

CORSIKA SCHOOL 2008 November 25 - November 30, 2008 in Freudenstadt-Lauterbad

Talks of the school

Group photo of the school

VIHKOS CORSIKA SCHOOL 2005 May 31 - June 5, 2005 in Freudenstadt-Lauterbad

Talks of the school

Photos of the school

For more information, contact:

Tanguy Pierog                       Dieter Heck                         Johannes Knapp
Karlsruhe Institute of Technology   Karlsruhe Institute of Technology   Department of Physics and Astronomy
Institut für Kernphysik             Institut für Kernphysik             E.C. Stoner Building
P.O. Box 3640                       P.O. Box 3640                       University of Leeds
D-76021 Karlsruhe                   D-76021 Karlsruhe                   Leeds LS2 9JT
Germany                             Germany                             United Kingdom
Tel.: 0049-(0)7247-828134           Tel.: 0049-(0)7247-823777           Tel.: 0044-(0)113-233-3890
Fax:  0049-(0)7247-824075           Fax:  0049-(0)7247-824075           Fax:  0044-(0)113-233-3900
e-mail: tanguy.pierog(at)kit.edu    e-mail: dieter.heck(at)kit.edu      e-mail: j.knapp(at)leeds.ac.uk

November 09, 2009
Impressum
Dieter Heck dieter.heck(at)kit.edu

CORSIKA an Air Shower Simulation Program

CORSIKA
an Air Shower Simulation Program