The Origin of Cosmic Rays.- A. Summary of the properties of cosmic rays.- B. Structure of the model.- C. Propagation of the cosmic ray beam in space.- D. The diffusion of the cosmic-ray particles.- E. The astronomical setting for cosmic rays.- F. Synthesis of a model.- General references.- Theory of the Geomagnetic Effects of Cosmic Radiation.- References.- Experimental Results of Flights in the Stratosphere.- I. Intensities of cosmic radiation in the atmosphere.- II. Particle interactions in the atmosphere.- III. The intensities of the components.- Summary and conclusion.- General references.- Penetrating Showers.- I. Introduction.- II. Attenuation and interaction mean free path of the shower particles.- III. Meson production in penetrating showers.- IV. Discussion and interpretation.- V. Summary.- Extensive Air Showers.- A. A qualitative description.- B. The electro-magnetic cascade.- I. Results of the electro-magnetic cascade theory.- a) The longitudinal development.- b) The lateral distribution.- c) The time distribution.- II. Experimental results.- a) The density spectrum.- b) Development in the atmosphere.- c) Localization of the shower core.- d) The lateral distribution.- e) The number spectrum.- C. The meson-nucleon cascade.- I. Experimental results.- a) The N-component.- b) The ?-component above ground.- c) The ?-component underground.- II. Interpretation of the results.- D. Selected topics.- I. The nature of the primary radiation.- II. The energy spectrum of the primary radiation.- III. Time variations correlated with atmospheric changes.- IV. Time variations correlated with changes in the primary radiation.- The Hard Component of ?-Mesons in the Atmosphere.- A. Introduction.- B. Properties of the ?-meson component in the vertical direction.- I. Measurement of the momentum spectrum of ?-mesons at sea level.- a) A summary of the techniques of measurement.- b) Measurement of the momentum spectrum.- II. The effect of instrumental bias on the spectrum measurements.- III. The interpretation of the vertical momentum spectrum.- a) The relationships between the various spectra.- b) The ?- and ?-meson spectra in the low energy region.- c) The ?- and ?-meson spectra in the high energy region.- IV. Latitude effect.- V. The positive excess.- a) Experimental results on the positive excess.- b) Comparison with theory.- C. Comparison with ?-meson production models.- D. The properties of the ?-meson component in inclined directions.- I. The observed variation of the momentum spectrum with zenith angle for moderate angles.- a) Experimental results.- b) Theoretical interpretation.- II. The spectrum at large zenith angles.- III. The latitude effect in inclined directions.- IV. The positive excess.- E. Meteorological effects on the ?-meson component.- Sachverzeichnis (Deutsch-Englisch).- Subject Index (English-German).
