The Enigma of the Highest Energy Particles of Nature

Abstract

Historically cosmic rays have always been at the intersection of astrophysics with particle physics. This is still and especially true in current days where experimenters routinely observe atmospheric showers from particles whose energies reach macroscopic values up to about 50 Joules. This dwarfs energies achieved in the laboratory by about eight orders of magnitude in the detector frame and three orders of magnitude in the center of mass. While the existence of these highest energy cosmic rays does not necessarily testify physics not yet discovered, their macroscopic energies likely links their origin to the most energetic processes in the Universe. Explanations range from conventional shock acceleration to particle physics beyond the Standard Model and processes taking place at the earliest moments of our Universe. While motivation for some of the more exotic scenarios may have diminished by newest data, conventional shock acceleration scenarios remain to be challenged by the apparent isotropy of cosmic ray arrival directions which may not be easy to reconcile with a highly structured and magnetized Universe. Fortunately, many new experimental activities promise a strong increase of statistics at the highest energies and a combination with gamma-ray and neutrino astrophysics will put strong constraints on all these theoretical models. This short review is far from complete and instead presents a selection of aspects regarded by the author as interesting and/or promising for the future.