Satellite measurements challenge the current understanding of cosmic-ray acceleration and propagation in our Galaxy.

The satellite-borne experiment PAMELA has been used to make a new measurement of the cosmic-ray antiproton flux and the antiproton-to-proton flux ratio which extends previously published measurements down to 60 MeV and up to 180 GeV in kinetic energy. During 850 days of data acquisition approximately 1500 antiprotons were observed. The measurements are consistent with purely secondary production of antiprotons in the Galaxy. More precise secondary production models are required for a complete interpretation of the results.

A new measurement of the cosmic-ray antiproton-to-proton flux ratio between 1 and 100 GeV is presented. The results were obtained with the PAMELA experiment, which was launched into low-Earth orbit on-board the Resurs-DK1 satellite on June 15th 2006. During 500 days of data collection a total of about 1000 antiprotons have been identified, including 100 above an energy of 20 GeV. The high-energy results are a tenfold improvement in statistics with respect to all previously published data. The data follow the trend expected from secondary production calculations and significantly constrain contributions from exotic sources, e.g., dark matter particle annihilations.