Effect of the Mott cross section on the determination of the charge of ultraheavy cosmic rays from emulsion tracks

Energy deposition due to secondary electrons is calculated as a function of distance from the axis of the track of a heavy ion. The calculation incorporates the empirical formulas of Kobetich and Katz (1968) for delta-ray energy dissipation. Both the Mott and Born-approximation expressions for the delta-ray energy distributions are used, and the results are compared. The energy deposition projected along a line perpendicular to the track is also calculated. These results are used to estimate the effect that the use of the Mott cross section would have in the interpretation of photometric measurements on emulsion tracks of trans-iron cosmic-ray particles. It is shown that the use of 50 keV as a characteristic track-formation electron energy to estimate the effect of the Mott cross section systematically overestimates charge as derived from emulsions for Z greater than 20.