Volume 358 - 36th International Cosmic Ray Conference (ICRC2019) - NU - Neutrino
Concept and Analysis for a 1 – 100 PeV Tau Neutrino Observatory
A. Romero-Wolf,* W. Carvalho, J. Alvarez-Muniz, J. Bazo, J. Bellido, A. Cummings, A. Gago, H. Schoorlemmer, S. Wissel, E. Zas
*corresponding author
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Pre-published on: 2019 July 22
Published on:
Abstract
The IceCube Neutrino observatory has discovered an astrophysical neutrino flux in the energy range $>$1~TeV with their highest energy event $\sim$3~PeV. Although IceCube has excellent muon flavor identification, their ability to identify tau neutrinos is highly limited. We present a concept for observing the tau neutrino flux in the 1--100 PeV range, where a flux is guaranteed and its observation would give further support to the astrophysical origin of the IceCube flux. The design of the observatory requires an acceptance $\langle A\Omega\rangle >$400~m$^2$~sr$\times\left(\frac{E}{\mathrm{PeV}}\right)^{1.5}$ to match the $\sim$1~PeV IceCube all-flavor event rate in tau neutrinos provided a $\nu_e:\nu_\mu:\nu_\tau = 1:1:1$ flavor ratio. The energy dependence of the acceptance is designed to match the IceCube best-fit spectral flux index of $E^{-2.5}$ so the spectrum is evenly sampled in the 1--100 PeV range. We present a background-free implementation with pointing resolution $<1^\circ$ to begin the era of high energy tau neutrino astronomy.
Open Access