The spatial distribution of galactic and anomalous cosmic rays in the heliosphere at solar minimum Original Research Article

The spatial distributions of galactic and anomalous cosmic rays in the heliosphere at the solar minima of Cycles 20/22 (qA > 0) and of Cycle 21 (qA < 0) are studied, using data from IMP 8, Voyagers 1/2 and Pioneer 10. It is found that the radial dependences of intensities J can be approximated by a power of radial distance r as J ∝ rα with a different value of a constant in the inner and outer heliosphere with a transition at a radial distance of 10–15 AU. To study the physical meaning of these radial intensity profiles we examined the rigidity dependences of the intensity gradients by determining the particle mean free paths, using a simple one-dimensional modulation model. The particle mean free path λ was assumed to be a separable function of distance of the form rγ and rigidity R of Rδ over the range of 0.5–3.0 GV in the inner and outer heliosphere. It was shown that λ of rigidity dependence of R1.6 determined for Cycle 20/22 (qA > 0) with anomalous He is about 4–5 times larger than that of Cycle 21 (qA < 0) with R0.9 at around 1 GV in the outer heliosphere, and that the radial dependences are r1.4 and r1.1, respectively, for Cycles 20/22 and for Cycle 21.