The KM3NeT Collaboration has successfully deployed the first detection units of the next generation undersea neutrino telescopes in the Mediterranean Sea at the two sites in Italy and in France. A ...sample of the data collected between December 2016 and January 2020 has been used to measure the atmospheric muon rate at two different depths under the sea level: at 3.5 km with KM3NeT-ARCA and at 2.5 km with KM3NeT-ORCA. Atmospheric muons represent the dominant signal in a neutrino telescope and can be used to test the reliability of the Monte Carlo simulation chain and to study the physics of extensive air showers caused by highly-energetic primary nuclei impinging the Earth's atmosphere. At energies above PeV the contribution from prompt muons, created right after the first interaction in the shower, is expected to become dominant, however, its existence has not yet been experimentally confirmed. In this work, data collected with the first detection units of KM3NeT are compared to Monte Carlo simulations based on MUPAGE and CORSIKA codes. The main features of the simulation and reconstruction chains are presented. Additionally, the first results of the simulated signal from the prompt muon component for KM3NeT-ARCA and KM3NeT-ORCA obtained with CORSIKA are discussed.
The gSeaGen framework has been upgraded to simulate events detectable in neutrino telescopes induced by neutrino or cosmic ray interactions. The new version is well-suited to generate neutrino ...interactions at energies from a few MeV to EeV, profiting from the latest GENIE extensions to lower and higher energies. In addition, a brand new functionality to propagate leptons from CORSIKA air showers has been developed. Novel features of gSeaGen will be presented, related to simulation of PeV tau neutrinos and charged lepton propagation, using the KM3NeT detectors as physics case.
In the upcoming decades, the KM3NeT detectors will produce valuable data that can be used in various scientific contexts, from astro- and particle physics to environmental and Earth and Sea science. ...Based on the Open Science policy established by the KM3NeT Collaboration, several efforts to offer science-ready data, foster common analysis approaches and publish open source software are currently pursued. In this contribution, ongoing projects focusing on the exchange of high-level data and simulation derivatives and establishment of an integrated computing environment supporting an open-science focused workflow will be discussed.
The Protvino accelerator facility located in the Moscow region, Russia, is in a good position to offer a rich experimental research program in the field of neutrino physics. Of particular interest is ...the possibility to direct a neutrino beam from Protvino towards the KM3NeT/ORCA detector, which is currently under construction in the Mediterranean Sea 40 km offshore Toulon, France. This proposal is known as P2O. Thanks to its baseline of 2595 km, this experiment would yield an unparalleled sensitivity to matter effects in the Earth, allowing for the determination of the neutrino mass ordering with a high level of certainty after only a few years of running at a modest beam intensity of
≈
90
kW
. With a prolonged exposure (
≈
1500
kW
year
), a
2
σ
sensitivity to the leptonic CP-violating Dirac phase can be achieved. A second stage of the experiment, comprising a further intensity upgrade of the accelerator complex and a densified version of the ORCA detector (Super-ORCA), would allow for up to a
6
σ
sensitivity to CP violation and a
10
∘
-
17
∘
resolution on the CP phase after 10 years of running with a 450 kW beam, competitive with other planned experiments. The initial composition and energy spectrum of the neutrino beam would need to be monitored by a near detector, to be constructed several hundred meters downstream from the proton beam target. The same neutrino beam and near detector set-up would also allow for neutrino-nucleus cross section measurements to be performed. A short-baseline sterile neutrino search experiment would also be possible.
Celotno besedilo
Dostopno za:
DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
The gSeaGen framework has been upgraded to simulate events detectable in neutrino telescopes induced by neutrino or cosmic ray interactions. The new version is well-suited to generate neutrino ...interactions at energies from a few MeV to EeV, profiting from the latest GENIE extensions to lower and higher energies. In addition, a brand new functionality to propagate leptons from CORSIKA air showers has been developed. Novel features of gSeaGen will be presented, related to simulation of PeV tau neutrinos and charged lepton propagation, using the KM3NeT detectors as physics case.
The KM3NeT neutrino telescope is currently being deployed at two different sites in the Mediterranean Sea. First searches for astrophysical neutrinos have been performed using data taken with the ...partial detector configuration already in operation. The paper presents the results of two independent searches for neutrinos from compact binary mergers detected during the third observing run of the LIGO and Virgo gravitational wave interferometers. The first search looks for a global increase in the detector counting rates that could be associated with inverse beta decay events generated by MeV-scale electron anti-neutrinos. The second one focuses on upgoing track-like events mainly induced by muon (anti-)neutrinos in the GeV--TeV energy range. Both searches yield no significant excess for the sources in the gravitational wave catalogs. For each source, upper limits on the neutrino flux and on the total energy emitted in neutrinos in the respective energy ranges have been set. Stacking analyses of binary black hole mergers and neutron star-black hole mergers have also been performed to constrain the characteristic neutrino emission from these categories.
The KM3NeT Collaboration is building and operating two deep sea neutrino telescopes at the bottom of the Mediterranean Sea. The telescopes consist of latices of photomultiplier tubes housed in ...pressure-resistant glass spheres, called digital optical modules and arranged in vertical detection units. The two main scientific goals are the determination of the neutrino mass ordering and the discovery and observation of high-energy neutrino sources in the Universe. Neutrinos are detected via the Cherenkov light, which is induced by charged particles originated in neutrino interactions. The photomultiplier tubes convert the Cherenkov light into electrical signals that are acquired and timestamped by the acquisition electronics. Each optical module houses the acquisition electronics for collecting and timestamping the photomultiplier signals with one nanosecond accuracy. Once finished, the two telescopes will have installed more than six thousand optical acquisition nodes, completing one of the more complex networks in the world in terms of operation and synchronization. The embedded software running in the acquisition nodes has been designed to provide a framework that will operate with different hardware versions and functionalities. The hardware will not be accessible once in operation, which complicates the embedded software architecture. The embedded software provides a set of tools to facilitate remote manageability of the deployed hardware, including safe reconfiguration of the firmware. This paper presents the architecture and the techniques, methods and implementation of the embedded software running in the acquisition nodes of the KM3NeT neutrino telescopes.
European Physical Journal C 84, 112 (2024) The Cherenkov Telescope Array and the KM3NeT neutrino telescopes are major
upcoming facilities in the fields of $\gamma$-ray and neutrino astronomy,
...respectively. Possible simultaneous production of $\gamma$ rays and neutrinos
in astrophysical accelerators of cosmic-ray nuclei motivates a combination of
their data. We assess the potential of a combined analysis of CTA and KM3NeT
data to determine the contribution of hadronic emission processes in known
Galactic $\gamma$-ray emitters, comparing this result to the cases of two
separate analyses. In doing so, we demonstrate the capability of Gammapy, an
open-source software package for the analysis of $\gamma$-ray data, to also
process data from neutrino telescopes. For a selection of prototypical
$\gamma$-ray sources within our Galaxy, we obtain models for primary proton and
electron spectra in the hadronic and leptonic emission scenario, respectively,
by fitting published $\gamma$-ray spectra. Using these models and instrument
response functions for both detectors, we employ the Gammapy package to
generate pseudo data sets, where we assume 200 hours of CTA observations and 10
years of KM3NeT detector operation. We then apply a three-dimensional binned
likelihood analysis to these data sets, separately for each instrument and
jointly for both. We find that the largest benefit of the combined analysis
lies in the possibility of a consistent modelling of the $\gamma$-ray and
neutrino emission. Assuming a purely leptonic scenario as input, we obtain, for
the most favourable source, an average expected 68% credible interval that
constrains the contribution of hadronic processes to the observed $\gamma$-ray
emission to below 15%.
In the era of precision measurements of the neutrino oscillation parameters, upcoming neutrino experiments will also be sensitive to physics beyond the Standard Model. KM3NeT/ORCA is a neutrino ...detector optimised for measuring atmospheric neutrinos from a few GeV to around 100 GeV. In this paper, the sensitivity of the KM3NeT/ORCA detector to neutrino decay has been explored. A three-flavour neutrino oscillation scenario, where the third neutrino mass state \(\nu_3\) decays into an invisible state, e.g. a sterile neutrino, is considered. We find that KM3NeT/ORCA would be sensitive to invisible neutrino decays with \(1/\alpha_3=\tau_3/m_3 < 180\)~\(\mathrm{ps/eV}\) at \(90\%\) confidence level, assuming true normal ordering. Finally, the impact of neutrino decay on the precision of KM3NeT/ORCA measurements for \(\theta_{23}\), \(\Delta m^2_{31}\) and mass ordering have been studied. No significant effect of neutrino decay on the sensitivity to these measurements has been found.
The KM3NeT research infrastructure is under construction in the Mediterranean Sea. KM3NeT will study atmospheric and astrophysical neutrinos with two multi-purpose neutrino detectors, ARCA and ORCA, ...primarily aimed at GeV-PeV neutrinos. Thanks to the multi-photomultiplier tube design of the digital optical modules, KM3NeT is capable of detecting the neutrino burst from a Galactic or near-Galactic core-collapse supernova. This potential is already exploitable with the first detection units deployed in the sea. This paper describes the real-time implementation of the supernova neutrino search, operating on the two KM3NeT detectors since the first months of 2019. A quasi-online astronomy analysis is introduced to study the time profile of the detected neutrinos for especially significant events. The mechanism of generation and distribution of alerts, as well as the integration into the SNEWS and SNEWS 2.0 global alert systems are described. The approach for the follow-up of external alerts with a search for a neutrino excess in the archival data is defined. Finally, an overview of the current detector capabilities and a report after the first two years of operation are given.
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