Status and Perspectives of the Pierre Auger Observatory

摘要

Cosmic ray research is at the energy forefront of astroparticle physics.Of particular interest are cosmic ray particles with energy > 10~(20)eV.At such high energies the flux is very low and requires the use of very large detector fields.The Pierre Auger Observatory is being constructed to understand the nature and origin of these enigmatic particles.It will be the largest cosmic ray detector ever built,covering 3000 square kilometres in both hemispheres in its full configuration.The first runs have demonstrated a very good performance of the apparatus.