Abstract: This paper proposes to exploit gravitational lensing effects to improve the sensitivity of neutrino telescopes to the intrinsic neutrino emission of distant blazar populations. This strategy is illustrated with a search for cosmic neutrinos in the direction of four distant and gravitationally lensed Flat-Spectrum Radio Quasars. The magnification factor is estimated for each system assuming a singular isothermal profile for the lens. Based on data collected from 2007 to 2012 by the ANTARES neutrino telescope, the strongest constraint is obtained from the lensed quasar B0218+357, providing a limit on the total neutrino luminosity of this source of 1.08 x 10(46) erg s(-1) This limit is about one order of magnitude lower than those previously obtained in the ANTARES standard point source searches with non-lensed Flat-Spectrum Radio Quasars.

Abstract: A study on cosmic muons has been performed for the two identical near and far neutrino detectors of the Double Chooz experiment, placed at similar to 120 and similar to 300 m. w.e. underground respectively, including the corresponding simulations using the MUSIC simulation package. This characterization has allowed us to measure the muon flux reaching both detectors to be (3.64 +/- 0.04) x 10(-4) cm(-2) s(-1) for the near detector and (7.00 +/- 0.05) x 10(-5) cm(-2) s(-1) for the far one. The seasonal modulation of the signal has also been studied observing a positive correlation with the atmospheric temperature, leading to an effective temperature coefficient of alpha(T) = 0.212 +/- 0.024 and 0.355 +/- 0.019 for the near and far detectors respectively. These measurements, in good agreement with expectations based on theoretical models, represent one of the first measurements of this coefficient in shallow depth installations.

Abstract: Massive neutrinos demand to ask whether they are Dirac or Majorana particles. Majorana neutrinos are an irrefutable proof of physics beyond the Standard Model. Neutrinoless double electron capture is not a process but a virtual Delta L = 2 mixing between a parent (A)Z atom and a daughter (A)(Z – 2) excited atom with two electron holes. As a mixing between two neutral atoms and the observable signal in terms of emitted two-hole X-rays, the strategy, experimental signature and background are different from neutrinoless double beta decay. The mixing is resonantly enhanced for almost degeneracy and, under these conditions, there is no irreducible background from the standard two-neutrino channel. We reconstruct the natural time history of a nominally stable parent atom since its production either by nature or in the laboratory. After the time periods of atom oscillations and the decay of the short-lived daughter atom, at observable times the relevant 'stationary" states are the mixed metastable long-lived state and the non-orthogonal short-lived excited state, as well as the ground state of the daughter atom. We find that they have a natural population inversion which is most appropriate for exploiting the bosonic nature of the observed atomic transitions radiation. Among different observables of the atom Majorana mixing, we include the enhanced rate of stimulated X-ray emission from the long-lived metastable state by a high-intensity X-ray beam: a gain factor of 100 can be envisaged at current XFEL facilities. On the other hand, the historical population of the daughter atom ground state can be probed by exciting it with a current pulsed optical laser, showing the characteristic absorption lines: the whole population can be excited in a shorter time than typical pulse duration.