We report on the search for anti-neutrinos of yet unknown origin with the Borexino detector at the Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso. In particular, a hypothetical anti-neutrino flux from the Sun ...is investigated. Anti-neutrinos are detected through the neutron inverse β decay reaction in a large liquid organic scintillator target. We set a new upper limit for a hypothetical solar ν¯e flux of 760 cm−2s−1, obtained assuming an undistorted solar 8B energy spectrum. This corresponds to a limit on the transition probability of solar neutrinos to anti-neutrinos of 1.3×10−4 (90% C.L.) for Eν¯>1.8 MeV, covering the entire 8B spectrum. Best differential limits on anti-neutrino fluxes from unknown sources are also obtained between the detection energy threshold of 1.8 MeV and 17.8 MeV with more than 2 years of data.
The LIGO detectors are sensitive to a variety of noise transients of non-astrophysical origin. Instrumental glitches and environmental disturbances increase the false alarm rate in the searches for ...gravitational waves. Using times already identified when the interferometers produced data of questionable quality, or when the channels that monitor the interferometer indicated non-stationarity, we have developed techniques to safely and effectively veto false triggers from the compact binary coalescences search pipeline.
We discuss the science motivations and prospects for a joint analysis of gravitational wave (GW) and low-energy neutrino data to search for prompt signals from nearby supernovae (SNe). Both ...gravitational wave and low-energy neutrinos are expected to be produced in the innermost region of a core-collapse supernova, and a search for coincident signals would probe the processes which power a supernova explosion. It is estimated that the current generation of neutrino and gravitational wave detectors would be sensitive to galactic core-collapse supernovae, and would also be able to detect electromagnetically dark SNe. A joint GW-neutrino search would enable improvements to searches by way of lower detection thresholds, larger distance range, better live-time coverage by a network of GW and neutrino detectors, and increased significance of candidate detections. A close collaboration between the GW and neutrino communities for such a search will thus go far toward realizing a much sought-after astrophysics goal of detecting the next nearby supernova.
The quest for gravitational waves from coalescing binaries is customarily performed by the LIGO-Virgo collaboration via matched filtering, which requires a detailed knowledge of the signal. Complete ...analytical coalescence waveforms are currently available only for the non-precessing binary systems. In this paper we introduce complete phenomenological waveforms for the dominant quadrupolar mode of generically spinning systems. These waveforms are constructed by bridging the gap between the analytically known inspiral phase, described by spin Taylor (T4) approximants in the restricted waveform approximation, and the ring-down phase through a phenomenological intermediate phase, calibrated by comparison with specific, numerically generated waveforms, describing equal mass systems with dimension-less spin magnitudes equal to 0.6. The overlap integral between numerical and phenomenological waveforms ranges between 0.95 and 0.99.
Borexino is a solar neutrino experiment designed to observe the 0.86
MeV
Be
7
neutrinos emitted in the pp cycle of the sun. Neutrinos will be detected by their elastic scattering on electrons in 100
...ton of liquid scintillator. The neutrino event rate in the scintillator is expected to be low (
∼
0.35
events per day per ton), and the signals will be at energies below 1.5
MeV, where background from natural radioactivity is prominent. Scintillation light produced by the recoil electrons is observed by an array of 2240 photomultiplier tubes. Because of the intrinsic radioactive contaminants in these PMTs, the liquid scintillator is shielded from them by a thick barrier of buffer fluid. A spherical vessel made of thin nylon film contains the scintillator, separating it from the surrounding buffer. The buffer region itself is divided into two concentric shells by a second nylon vessel in order to prevent inward diffusion of radon atoms. The radioactive background requirements for Borexino are challenging to meet, especially for the scintillator and these nylon vessels. Besides meeting requirements for low radioactivity, the nylon vessels must also satisfy requirements for mechanical, optical, and chemical properties. The present paper describes the research and development, construction, and installation of the nylon vessels for the Borexino experiment.
We calculated the expected neutrino signal in Borexino from a typical Type II supernova at a distance of 10 kpc. A burst of around 110 events would appear in Borexino within a time interval of about ...10 s. Most of these events would come from the reaction channel
ν
̄
e
+
p→
e
++
n
, while about 30 events would be induced by the interaction of the supernova neutrino flux on
12C in the liquid scintillator. Borexino can clearly distinguish between the neutral-current excitations
12
C(
ν,
ν
′)
12
C
*
(15.11 MeV) and the charged-current reactions
12
C(
ν
e
,
e
−)
12
N
and
12
C(
ν
̄
e
,
e
+)
12
B
, via their distinctive event signatures. The ratio of the charged-current to neutral-current neutrino event rates and their time profiles with respect to each other can provide a handle on supernova and non-standard neutrino physics (mass and flavor oscillations).
We report the first results of DarkSide-50, a direct search for dark matter operating in the underground Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso (LNGS) and searching for the rare nuclear recoils possibly ...induced by weakly interacting massive particles (WIMPs). The dark matter detector is a Liquid Argon Time Projection Chamber with a (46.4±0.7) kg active mass, operated inside a 30 t organic liquid scintillator neutron veto, which is in turn installed at the center of a 1 kt water Cherenkov veto for the residual flux of cosmic rays. We report here the null results of a dark matter search for a (1422±67) kgd exposure with an atmospheric argon fill. This is the most sensitive dark matter search performed with an argon target, corresponding to a 90% CL upper limit on the WIMP-nucleon spin-independent cross section of 6.1×10−44 cm2 for a WIMP mass of 100 Gev/c2.
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