Ultra high energy cosmic rays (UHECRs) are expected to be accelerated inastrophysical sources and to travel through extragalactic space before hitting the Earth atmosphere. They interact both with the environment in the source and with the intergalactic photon fields they encounter, causing different processes at various scales depending on the photon energy in the nucleus rest frame. UHECR interactions are sensitive to uncertainties in the extragalactic background spectrum and in the photo-disintegration models.