ANTARES Collaboration(Albert, A. et al), Barrios-Marti, J., Coleiro, A., Colomer, M., Hernandez-Rey, J. J., Illuminati, G., et al. (2018). Long-term monitoring of the ANTARES optical module efficiencies using K-40 decays in sea water. Eur. Phys. J. C, 78(8), 669–8pp.
Abstract: Cherenkov light induced by radioactive decay products is one of the major sources of background light for deep-sea neutrino telescopes such as ANTARES. These decays are at the same time a powerful calibration source. Using data collected by the ANTARES neutrino telescope from mid 2008 to 2017, the time evolution of the photon detection efficiency of optical modules is studied. A modest loss of only 20% in 9 years is observed. The relative time calibration between adjacent modules is derived as well.
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KM3NeT Collaboration(Adrian-Martinez, S. et al), Barrios-Marti, J., Calvo Diaz-Aldagalan, D., Hernandez-Rey, J. J., Illuminati, G., Lotze, M., et al. (2016). Letter of intent for KM3NeT 2.0. J. Phys. G, 43(8), 084001–130pp.
Abstract: The main objectives of the KM3NeT Collaboration are (i) the discovery and subsequent observation of high-energy neutrino sources in the Universe and (ii) the determination of the mass hierarchy of neutrinos. These objectives are strongly motivated by two recent important discoveries, namely: (1) the high-energy astrophysical neutrino signal reported by IceCube and (2) the sizable contribution of electron neutrinos to the third neutrino mass eigenstate as reported by Daya Bay, Reno and others. To meet these objectives, the KM3NeT Collaboration plans to build a new Research Infrastructure consisting of a network of deep-sea neutrino telescopes in the Mediterranean Sea. A phased and distributed implementation is pursued which maximises the access to regional funds, the availability of human resources and the synergistic opportunities for the Earth and sea sciences community. Three suitable deep-sea sites are selected, namely off-shore Toulon (France), Capo Passero (Sicily, Italy) and Pylos (Peloponnese, Greece). The infrastructure will consist of three so-called building blocks. A building block comprises 115 strings, each string comprises 18 optical modules and each optical module comprises 31 photo-multiplier tubes. Each building block thus constitutes a three-dimensional array of photo sensors that can be used to detect the Cherenkov light produced by relativistic particles emerging from neutrino interactions. Two building blocks will be sparsely configured to fully explore the IceCube signal with similar instrumented volume, different methodology, improved resolution and complementary field of view, including the galactic plane. One building block will be densely configured to precisely measure atmospheric neutrino oscillations.
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ANTARES and IceCube Collaborations(Albert, A. et al), Barrios-Marti, J., Coleiro, A., Colomer, M., Hernandez-Rey, J. J., Illuminati, G., et al. (2018). Joint Constraints on Galactic Diffuse Neutrino Emission from the ANTARES and IceCube Neutrino Telescopes. Astrophys. J. Lett., 868(2), L20–7pp.
Abstract: The existence of diffuse Galactic neutrino production is expected from cosmic-ray interactions with Galactic gas and radiation fields. Thus, neutrinos are a unique messenger offering the opportunity to test the products of Galactic cosmic-ray interactions up to energies of hundreds of TeV. Here we present a search for this production using ten years of Astronomy with a Neutrino Telescope and Abyss environmental RESearch (ANTARES) track and shower data, as well as seven years of IceCube track data. The data are combined into a joint likelihood test for neutrino emission according to the KRA(gamma) model assuming a 5 PeV per nucleon Galactic cosmic-ray cutoff. No significant excess is found. As a consequence, the limits presented in this Letter start constraining the model parameter space for Galactic cosmic-ray production and transport.
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KM3NeT Collaboration(Adrian-Martinez, S. et al), Barrios-Marti, J., Calvo, D., Hernandez-Rey, J. J., Illuminati, G., Lotze, M., et al. (2017). Intrinsic limits on resolutions in muon- and electron-neutrino charged-current events in the KM3NeT/ORCA detector. J. High Energy Phys., 05(5), 008–39pp.
Abstract: Studying atmospheric neutrino oscillations in the few-GeV range with a multimegaton detector promises to determine the neutrino mass hierarchy. This is the main science goal pursued by the future KM3NeT/ORCA water Cherenkov detector in the Mediterranean Sea. In this paper, the processes that limit the obtainable resolution in both energy and direction in charged-current neutrino events in the ORCA detector are investigated. These processes include the composition of the hadronic fragmentation products, the subsequent particle propagation and the photon-sampling fraction of the detector. GEANT simulations of neutrino interactions in seawater produced by GENIE are used to study the effects in the 1-20 GeV range. It is found that fluctuations in the hadronic cascade in conjunction with the variation of the inelasticity y are most detrimental to the resolutions. The effect of limited photon sampling in the detector is of significantly less importance. These results will therefore also be applicable to similar detectors/media, such as those in ice.
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ANTARES Collaboration(Albert, A. et al), Barrios-Marti, J., Coleiro, A., Hernandez-Rey, J. J., Illuminati, G., Lotze, M., et al. (2017). First all-flavor neutrino pointlike source search with the ANTARES neutrino telescope. Phys. Rev. D, 96(8), 082001–15pp.
Abstract: A search for cosmic neutrino sources using the data collected with the ANTARES neutrino telescope between early 2007 and the end of 2015 is performed. For the first time, all neutrino interactions-charged and neutral-current interactions of all flavors-are considered in a search for point-like sources with the ANTARES detector. In previous analyses, only muon neutrino charged-current interactions were used. This is achieved by using a novel reconstruction algorithm for shower-like events in addition to the standard muon track reconstruction. The shower channel contributes about 23% of all signal events for an E-2 energy spectrum. No significant excess over background is found. The most signal-like cluster of events is located at (alpha, delta) = (343.8 degrees, 23.5 degrees) with a significance of 1.9 sigma. The neutrino flux sensitivity of the search is about E(2)d Phi/dE = 6 x 10(-9) GeV cm(-2) s(-1) for declinations from -90 degrees up to -42 degrees, and below 10(-8) GeV cm(-2) s(-1) for declinations up to 5 degrees. The directions of 106 source candidates and 13 muon track events from the IceCube high-energy sample events are investigated for a possible neutrino signal and upper limits on the signal flux are determined.
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