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- Ström, Rickard, 1985-
(författare)
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Exploring the Universe Using Neutrinos : A Search for Point Sources in the Southern Hemisphere Using the IceCube Neutrino Observatory
- 2015
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Neutrinos are the ideal cosmic messengers, and can be used to explore the most powerful accelerators in the Universe, in particular the mechanisms for producing and accelerating cosmic rays to incredible energies. By studying clustering of neutrino candidate events in the IceCube detector we can discover sites of hadronic acceleration. We present results on searches for point-like sources of astrophysical neutrinos located in the Southern hemisphere, at energies between 100 GeV and a few TeV. The data were collected during the first year of the completed 86-string detector, corresponding to a detector livetime of 329 days. The event selection focuses on identifying events starting inside the instrumented volume, utilizing several advanced veto techniques, successfully reducing the large background of atmospheric muons. An unbinned maximum likelihood method is used to search for clustering of neutrino-like events. We perform a search in the full Southern hemisphere and a dedicated search using a catalog of 96 pre-defined known gamma-ray emitting sources seen in ground-based telescopes. No evidence of neutrino emission from point-like sources is found. The hottest spot is located at R.A. 305.2° and Dec. -8.5°, with a post-trial p-value of 88.1%. The most significant source in the a priori list is QSO 2022-077 with a post-trial p-value of 14.8%. In the absence of evidence for a signal, we calculate upper limits on the flux of muon-neutrinos for a range of spectra. For an unbroken E-2 neutrino spectrum, the observed limits are between 2.8 and 9.4×10-10 TeV cm-2 s-1, while for an E-2 neutrino spectrum with an exponential cut-off at 10 TeV, the observed limits are between 0.6 and 3.6×10-9 TeV cm-2 s-1.
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| 2. |
- Taavola, Henric, 1983-
(författare)
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Dark Matter in the Galactic Halo : A Search Using Neutrino Induced Cascades in the DeepCore Extension of IceCube
- 2015
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- A search for Weakly Interacting Massive Particles (WIMPs) annihilating in the dark matter halo of the Milky Way was performed, using data from the IceCube Neutrino Observatory and its low-energy extension DeepCore. The data were collected during one year between 2011 to 2012 corresponding to 329.1 days of detector livetime. If WIMPs in the dark matter halo undergo pairwise annihilation they may produce a neutrino signal detectable at the Earth. Assuming annihilation into bb, W+W-, τ+τ-, μ+μ-, νν and a neutrino flavor ratio of 1:1:1 at the detector, cascade events from all neutrino flavors were used to search for an excess of neutrinos matching a dark matter signal spectrum. Two dark matter density profiles for the halo were used; the cored Burkert profile and the cusped NFW profile. No excess of neutrinos from the Galactic halo was observed, and upper limits were set for the thermally averaged product of the WIMP self-annihilation cross section and velocity, <σAv>, in the WIMP mass range 30 GeV to 10 TeV. For the bb annihilation channel and the NFW halo profile, the 90% C.L. upper limits are 9.03×10-22 cm3 s-1 for the mass WIMP 100 GeV and 4.08×10-22 cm3 s-1 for the WIMP mass 3000 GeV. The corresponding upper limits for the μ+μ- annihilation channel are 4.40×10-23 cm3 s-1 and 3.20×10-23 cm3 s-1.
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| 3. |
- Unger, Elisabeth
(författare)
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The Extremes of Neutrino Astronomy : From Fermi Bubbles with IceCube to Ice Studies with ARIANNA
- 2019
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The Fermi bubbles are extended regions of hard gamma-ray emission which were discovered with Fermi-LAT data to exist above and below the Galactic Center. In order to explain the origin of the gamma-rays, different theories are proposed. In particular, within hadronic models, highly-accelerated cosmic rays interact with interstellar matter and create the observed gamma-rays and in addition neutrinos. Data from the neutrino detector IceCube was analyzed using a maximum likelihood method. An upper limit on the possible neutrino flux from the Fermi bubbles at energies between 10 GeV and 200 GeV was determined.While this analysis is performed with the lowest energies IceCube can reach, the ARIANNA (Antarctic Ross Ice-shelf ANtenna Neutrino Array) experiment has the goal to detect the highest energy neutrinos by measuring radio wave radiation produced by their interaction products in the ice. With ARIANNA the propagation of radio waves in the firn (packed snow) of the Ross Ice Shelf was investigated. According to the classical approach the radio waves, produced in the firn, are supposed to bend down because of the changing density, and therefore changing refractive index, an effect which is called “shadowing”. Evidence that the waves can travel horizontally over a long distance will be presented. The horizontally propagating signals between two boreholes and to the ARIANNA stations were analyzed and characterized. Analyses were performed under two hypotheses to determine attenuation lengths for horizontal propagation signals. The results showed attenuation lengths between 310 m ± 83 m and 651 m ± 270 m, depending on the assumed hypothesis and performed analysis. In addition unexpected signals consistent with radio waves propagating along the firn surface, here called pre-pulses, were observed and characterized.
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