T2K measurements of muon neutrino and antineutrino disappearance using 3.13 × 10 21 protons on target
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DarkSide-50 has demonstrated the high potential of dual-phase liquid argon time projection chambers in exploring interactions of WIMPs in the GeV=c 2 mass range. The technique, based on the detection of the ionization signal amplified via electroluminescence in the gas phase, allows us to explore recoil energies down to the sub-keV range. We report here on the DarkSide-50 measurement of the ionization yield of electronic recoils down to ~180 eV er , exploiting 37 Ar and 39 Ar decays, and extrapolated to a few ionization electrons with the Thomas-Imel box model. Further, we present a model-dependent determination of the ionization response to nuclear recoils down to ~500 eV nr , the lowest ever achieved in liquid argon, using in situ neutron calibration sources and external datasets from neutron beam experiments.
Here, a measurement with high statistics of the differential energy spectrum of light elements in cosmic rays, in particular, of primary H plus He nuclei, is reported. The spectrum is presented in the energy range from 6 to 158 TeV per nucleus. Data was collected with the High Altitude Water Cherenkov (HAWC) Observatory between June 2015 and June 2019. The analysis was based on a Bayesian unfolding procedure, which was applied on a subsample of vertical HAWC data that was enriched to 82% of events induced by light nuclei. To achieve the mass separation, a cut on the lateral age of air shower data was set guided by predictions of CORSIKA/QGSJET-II-04 simulations. The measured spectrum is consistent with a broken power-law spectrum and shows a kneelike feature at around E = 24.0$^{+3.6}_{-3.1}$ TeV , with a spectral index γ = -2.51 ± 0.02 before the break and with γ = -2.83 ± 0.02 above it. The feature has a statistical significance of 4.1σ. Within systematic uncertainties, the significance of the spectral break is 0.8σ.
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We searched for proton decay via p → μ + K 0 in 0.37 Mton · years of data collected between 1996 and 2018 from the Super-Kamiokande water Cherenkov experiment. The selection criteria were defined separately for K$^0_S$ and K$^0_L$ channels. No significant event excess has been observed. As a result of this analysis, which extends the previous search by an additional 0.2 Mton · years of exposure and uses an improved event reconstruction, we set a lower limit of 3.6 × 10 33 years on the proton lifetime.
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Dark matter lighter than 10 GeV / c 2 encompasses a promising range of candidates. A conceptual design for a new detector, DarkSide-LowMass, is presented, based on the DarkSide-50 detector and progress toward DarkSide-20k, optimized for a low-threshold electron-counting measurement. Sensitivity to light dark matter is explored for various potential energy thresholds and background rates. These studies show that DarkSide-LowMass can achieve sensitivity to light dark matter down to the solar neutrino fog for GeV-scale masses and significant sensitivity down to 10 MeV / c 2 considering the Migdal effect or interactions with electrons. Requirements for optimizing the detector’s sensitivity are explored, as are potential sensitivity gains from modeling and mitigating spurious electron backgrounds that may dominate the signal at the lowest energies.
The decay or annihilation of dark matter particles may produce a steady flux of very-high-energy gamma rays detectable above the diffuse background. Nearby clusters of galaxies provide excellent targets to search for the signatures of particle dark matter interactions. In particular, the Virgo cluster spans several degrees across the sky and can be efficiently probed with a wide field-of-view instrument. The High Altitude Water Cherenkov (HAWC) observatory, due to its wide field of view and sensitivity to gamma rays at an energy scale of 300 GeV–100 TeV is well-suited for this search. Using 2141 days of data, we search for γ -ray emission from the Virgo cluster, assuming well-motivated dark matter substructure models. Our results provide some of the strongest constraints on the decay lifetime of dark matter for masses above 10 TeV. Published by the American Physical Society 2024
We present a measurement of neutrino oscillation parameters with the Super-Kamiokande detector using atmospheric neutrinos from the complete pure-water SK I–V (April 1996–July 2020) dataset, including events from an expanded fiducial volume. The dataset corresponds to 6511.3 live days and an exposure of 484.2 kiloton-years. Measurements of the neutrino oscillation parameters Δ𝑚$^2_{32}$, sin 2 𝜃 23 , sin 2 𝜃 13 , 𝛿 CP , and the preference for the neutrino mass ordering are presented with atmospheric neutrino data alone, and with constraints on sin 2 𝜃 13 from reactor neutrino experiments. Our analysis including constraints on sin 2 𝜃 13 favors the normal mass ordering at the 92.3% level.
We report the first measurement of the atmospheric neutrino-oxygen neutral-current quasielastic (NCQE) cross section in the gadolinium-loaded Super-Kamiokande (SK) water Cherenkov detector. In June 2020, SK began a new experimental phase, named SK-Gd, by loading 0.011% by mass of gadolinium into the ultrapure water of the SK detector. The introduction of gadolinium to ultrapure water has the effect of improving the neutron-tagging efficiency. Using a 552.2 day dataset from August 2020 to June 2022, we measure the NCQE cross section to be 0.74 ± 0.22 ( stat ) − 0.15 + 0.85 ( syst ) × 10 − 38 cm 2 / oxygen in the energy range from 160 MeV to 10 GeV, which is consistent with the atmospheric neutrino-flux-averaged theoretical NCQE cross section and the measurement in the SK pure-water phase within the uncertainties. Furthermore, we compare the models of the nucleon-nucleus interactions in water and find that the binary cascade model and the Liège intranuclear cascade model provide a somewhat better fit to the observed data than the Bertini cascade model. Since the atmospheric neutrino-oxygen NCQE reactions are one of the main backgrounds in the search for diffuse supernova neutrino background (DSNB), these new results will contribute to future studies—and the potential discovery—of the DSNB in SK. Published by the American Physical Society 2024
Radioactivity induced by cosmic muon spallation is a dominant source of backgrounds for 𝒪(10 MeV) neutrino interactions in water Cherenkov detectors. In particular, it is crucial to reduce backgrounds to measure the solar neutrino spectrum and find neutrino interactions from distant supernovae. In this paper we introduce new techniques to locate muon-induced hadronic showers and efficiently reject spallation backgrounds. Applying these techniques to the solar neutrino analysis with an exposure of 2790 × 22.5 kton · day increases the signal efficiency by 12.6%, approximately corresponding to an additional year of detector running. Furthermore, we present the first spallation simulation at Super-Kamiokande, where we model hadronic interactions using fluka. The agreement between the isotope yields and shower pattern in this simulation and in the data gives confidence in the accuracy of this simulation, and thus opens the door to use it to optimize muon spallation removal in new data with gadolinium-enhanced neutron capture detection.
We present the results of the charge ratio (𝑅) and polarization (𝑃$^{𝜇}_{0}$) measurements using decay electron events collected between September 2008 and June 2022 with the Super-Kamiokande detector. Because of its underground location and long operation, we are able to perform high-precision measurements by accumulating cosmic-ray muons. We measured the muon charge ratio to be 𝑅 = 1.32 ± 0.02(stat +syst) at 𝐸 𝜇 cos𝜃 Zenith = 0.7$^{+0.3}_{−0.2}$ TeV, where 𝐸 𝜇 is the muon energy and 𝜃 Zenith is the zenith angle of incoming cosmic-ray muons. This result is consistent with the Honda flux model while indicating a tension with the 𝜋𝐾 model of 1.9𝜎. We also measured the muon polarization at the production location to be 𝑃$^{𝜇}_{0}$ = 0.52 ± 0.02 (stat+syst) at the muon momentum of 0.9$^{+0.6}_{−0.1}$ TeV/𝑐 at the surface of the mountain; this also suggests a tension with the Honda flux model of 1.5𝜎. This is the most precise measurement ever to experimentally determine the cosmic-ray muon polarization near 1 TeV/𝑐. These measurement results are useful to improve atmospheric neutrino simulations.
Dark matter may induce an event in an Earth-based detector, and its event rate is predicted to show an annual modulation as a result of the Earth’s orbital motion around the Sun. We searched for this modulation signature using the ionization signal of the DarkSide-50 liquid argon time projection chamber. No significant signature compatible with dark matter is observed in the electron recoil equivalent energy range above 40 eV ee , the lowest threshold ever achieved in such a search. Published by the American Physical Society 2024
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Because of the high energies and long distances to the sources, astrophysical observations provide a unique opportunity to test possible signatures of Lorentz invariance violation (LIV). Superluminal LIV enables the decay of photons at high energy. The high altitude water Cherenkov (HAWC) observatory is among the most sensitive gamma-ray instruments currently operating above 10 TeV. HAWC finds evidence of 100 TeV photon emission from at least four astrophysical sources. These observations exclude, for the strongest of the limits set, the LIV energy scale to 2.2 × 10 31 eV , over 1800 times the Planck energy and an improvement of 1 to 2 orders of magnitude over previous limits.
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