The energy dependence of the leading nucleon distribution and the evolution of the nucleonic cosmic ray component in the atmosphere

We show that in order to obtain a fairly accurate description of the nucleonic component of cosmic ray at sea level the energy dependence of the leading nucleon distribution has to be taken into account. By relating the collision inelasticity to the impact parameter overlap function we are able to estimate the energy dependence of the leading nucleon spectrum and to obtain good agreement with cosmic ray data at sea level in the energy range 1≤E (GeV)≤104. (orig.)