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Radio Cherenkov signals from the Moon: Neutrinos and cosmic rays
Journal article   Peer reviewed

Radio Cherenkov signals from the Moon: Neutrinos and cosmic rays

Yu Seon Jeong, Mary Hall Reno and Ina Sarcevic
Astroparticle physics, Vol.35(6), pp.383-395
2012
DOI: 10.1016/j.astropartphys.2011.10.010
url
https://arxiv.org/pdf/1108.2459View
Open Access

Abstract

► New radio Cherenkov lunar aperture for nonstandard neutrinos and cosmic rays. ► Cosmogenic neutrino fluxes will not yield observable signals in the standard model. ► Radio telescopes may constrain non-standard neutrino interactions in the future. ► Astrophysical neutrino fluxes may be constrained by radio techniques. Neutrino production of radio Cherenkov signals in the Moon is the object of radio telescope observations. Depending on the energy range and detection parameters, the dominant contribution to the neutrino signal may come from interactions of the neutrino on the Moon facing the telescope, rather than neutrinos that have traversed a portion of the Moon. Using the approximate analytic expression of the effective lunar aperture from a recent paper by Gayley, Mutel and Jaeger, we evaluate the background from cosmic ray interactions in the lunar regolith. We also consider the modifications to the effective lunar aperture from generic non-standard model neutrino interactions. A background to neutrino signals are radio Cherenkov signals from cosmic ray interactions. For cosmogenic neutrino fluxes, neutrino signals will be difficult to observe because of low neutrino flux at the high energy end and large cosmic ray background in the lower energy range considered here. We show that lunar radio detection of neutrino interactions is best suited to constrain or measure neutrinos from astrophysical sources and probe non-standard neutrino–nucleon interactions such as microscopic black hole production.
 Cosmic rays Neutrinos Radio Cherenkov

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