Highlights from the Pierre Auger Observatory
Abstract
This paper summarizes some highlights from the Pierre Auger Observatory that were presented at the ICRC 2011 in Beijing. The cumulative exposure has grown by more than 60% since the previous ICRC to above 21000 km2 sr yr. Besides giving important updates on the energy spectrum, mass composition, arrival directions, and photon- and neutrino upper limits, we present first measurements of the energy spectrum down to 3 x 1017 eV, first distributions of the shower maximum, Xmax, together with new surface detector related observables sensitive to Xmax, and we present first measurements of the p-air cross section at ~ 1018 eV. Serendipity observations such as of atmospheric phenomena showing time evolutions of elves extend the breadth of the astrophysics research program.
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