Extensive air showers are a very unique phenomenon. In the more than six decades since their discovery by Auger et al. we have learned a great deal about these extremely energetic events and gained deep insights into high-energy phenomena, particle physics and astrophysics.
In this Tutorial, Reference Manual and Data Book Peter K. F. Grieder provides the reader with a comprehensive view of the phenomenology and facts of the various types of interactions and cascades, theoretical background, experimental methods, data evaluation and interpretation, and air shower simulation. He discusses astrophysical aspects of the primary radiation and addresses the questions that continue to puzzle researchers.
The book is divided into two parts, each in its own separate volume:
Part I in Volume I deals mainly with the basic theoretical framework of the processes that determine an air shower and ends with a summary of ways to extract information on the primary radiation from air shower observations. It also presents a compilation of data representing our current knowledge of the high-energy portion of the primary spectrum and composition.
Part II in Volume II mainly contains compilations of experimental and theoretical data, as well as predictions from simulations of individual air shower constituents. Also included are chapters dedicated exclusively to special processes and detection methods: optical atmospheric Cherenkov and fluorescence phenomena that represent special observational windows and have proven to be successful alternatives to particle measurements, yielding three-dimensional insights into the shower process, as well as radio emission, which may develop into a useful future method of detection.