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Search for neutrino-induced particle showers with IceCube-40

M. G. Aartsen2, R. Abbasi29, M. Ackermann45, J. Adams15, J. A. Aguilar23, M. Ahlers29, D. Altmann22, C. Arguelles29, T. C. Arlen42 et al. (IceCube Collaboration)

T. C. Arlen42, J. Auffenberg29, X. Bai33,*, M. Baker29, S. W. Barwick25, V. Baum30, R. Bay7, J. J. Beatty17,18, J. Becker Tjus10, K.-H. Becker44, S. BenZvi29, P. Berghaus45, D. Berley16, E. Bernardini45, A. Bernhard32, D. Z. Besson27, G. Binder8,7, D. Bindig44, M. Bissok1, E. Blaufuss16, J. Blumenthal1, D. J. Boersma43, C. Bohm36, D. Bose38, S. Böser11, O. Botner43, L. Brayeur13, H.-P. Bretz45, A. M. Brown15, R. Bruijn26, J. Casey5, M. Casier13, D. Chirkin29, A. Christov23, B. Christy16, K. Clark39, L. Classen22, F. Clevermann20, S. Coenders1, S. Cohen26, D. F. Cowen42,41, A. H. Cruz Silva45, M. Danninger36, J. Daughhetee5, J. C. Davis17, M. Day29, J. P. A. M. de André42, C. De Clercq13, S. De Ridder24, P. Desiati29, K. D. de Vries13, M. de With9, T. DeYoung42, J. C. Díaz-Vélez29, M. Dunkman42, R. Eagan42, B. Eberhardt30, B. Eichmann10, J. Eisch29, S. Euler1, P. A. Evenson33, O. Fadiran29, A. R. Fazely6, A. Fedynitch10, J. Feintzeig29, T. Feusels24, K. Filimonov7, C. Finley36, T. Fischer-Wasels44, S. Flis36, A. Franckowiak11, K. Frantzen20, T. Fuchs20, T. K. Gaisser33, J. Gallagher28, L. Gerhardt8,7, L. Gladstone29, T. Glüsenkamp45, A. Goldschmidt8, G. Golup13, J. G. Gonzalez33, J. A. Goodman16, D. Góra22, D. T. Grandmont21, D. Grant21, P. Gretskov1, J. C. Groh42, A. Groß32, C. Ha8,7, A. Haj Ismail24, P. Hallen1, A. Hallgren43, F. Halzen29, K. Hanson12, D. Hebecker11, D. Heereman12, D. Heinen1, K. Helbing44, R. Hellauer16, S. Hickford15,†, G. C. Hill2, K. D. Hoffman16, R. Hoffmann44, A. Homeier11, K. Hoshina29, F. Huang42, W. Huelsnitz16, P. O. Hulth36, K. Hultqvist36, S. Hussain33, A. Ishihara14, E. Jacobi45, J. Jacobsen29, K. Jagielski1, G. S. Japaridze4, K. Jero29, O. Jlelati24, B. Kaminsky45, A. Kappes22, T. Karg45, A. Karle29, M. Kauer29, J. L. Kelley29, J. Kiryluk37, J. Kläs44, S. R. Klein8,7, J.-H. Köhne20, G. Kohnen31, H. Kolanoski9, L. Köpke30, C. Kopper29, S. Kopper44, D. J. Koskinen19, M. Kowalski11, M. Krasberg29, A. Kriesten1, K. Krings1, G. Kroll30, J. Kunnen13, N. Kurahashi29, T. Kuwabara33, M. Labare24, H. Landsman29, M. J. Larson40, M. Lesiak-Bzdak37, M. Leuermann1, J. Leute32, J. Lünemann30, O. Macías15, J. Madsen35, G. Maggi13, R. Maruyama29, K. Mase14, H. S. Matis8, F. McNally29, K. Meagher16, M. Merck29, T. Meures12, S. Miarecki8,7, E. Middell45,‡, N. Milke20, J. Miller13, L. Mohrmann45, T. Montaruli23, R. Morse29, R. Nahnhauer45, U. Naumann44, H. Niederhausen37, S. C. Nowicki21, D. R. Nygren8, A. Obertacke44, S. Odrowski21, A. Olivas16, A. Omairat44, A. O’Murchadha12, T. Palczewski40, L. Paul1, J. A. Pepper40, C. Pérez de los Heros43, C. Pfendner17, D. Pieloth20, E. Pinat12, J. Posselt44, P. B. Price7, G. T. Przybylski8, M. Quinnan42, L. Rädel1, M. Rameez23, K. Rawlins3, P. Redl16, R. Reimann1, E. Resconi32, W. Rhode20, M. Ribordy26, M. Richman16, B. Riedel29, S. Robertson2, J. P. Rodrigues29, C. Rott38, T. Ruhe20, B. Ruzybayev33, D. Ryckbosch24, S. M. Saba10, H.-G. Sander30, M. Santander29, S. Sarkar19,34, K. Schatto30, F. Scheriau20, T. Schmidt16, M. Schmitz20, S. Schoenen1, S. Schöneberg10, A. Schönwald45, A. Schukraft1, L. Schulte11, O. Schulz32, D. Seckel33, Y. Sestayo32, S. Seunarine35, R. Shanidze45, C. Sheremata21, M. W. E. Smith42, D. Soldin44, G. M. Spiczak35, C. Spiering45, M. Stamatikos17,§, T. Stanev33, N. A. Stanisha42, A. Stasik11, T. Stezelberger8, R. G. Stokstad8, A. Stößl45, E. A. Strahler13, R. Ström43, N. L. Strotjohann11, G. W. Sullivan16, H. Taavola43, I. Taboada5, A. Tamburro33, A. Tepe44, S. Ter-Antonyan6, G. Tešić42, S. Tilav33, P. A. Toale40, M. N. Tobin29, S. Toscano29, M. Tselengidou22, E. Unger10, M. Usner11, S. Vallecorsa23, N. van Eijndhoven13, A. Van Overloop24, J. van Santen29, M. Vehring1, M. Voge11, M. Vraeghe24, C. Walck36, T. Waldenmaier9, M. Wallraff1, Ch. Weaver29, M. Wellons29, C. Wendt29, S. Westerhoff29, B. Whelan2, N. Whitehorn29, K. Wiebe30, C. H. Wiebusch1, D. R. Williams40, H. Wissing16, M. Wolf36, T. R. Wood21, K. Woschnagg7, D. L. Xu40, X. W. Xu6, J. P. Yanez45, G. Yodh25, S. Yoshida14, P. Zarzhitsky40, J. Ziemann20, S. Zierke1, and M. Zoll36 (IceCube Collaboration)

  • 1III. Physikalisches Institut, RWTH Aachen University, D-52056 Aachen, Germany
  • 2School of Chemistry and Physics, University of Adelaide, Adelaide SA, 5005 Australia
  • 3Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Alaska Anchorage, 3211 Providence Drive, Anchorage, Alaska 99508, USA
  • 4CTSPS, Clark-Atlanta University, Atlanta, Georgia 30314, USA
  • 5School of Physics and Center for Relativistic Astrophysics, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, USA
  • 6Department of Physics, Southern University, Baton Rouge, Louisiana 70813, USA
  • 7Department of Physics, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA
  • 8Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, California 94720, USA
  • 9Institut für Physik, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, D-12489 Berlin, Germany
  • 10Fakultät für Physik und Astronomie, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, D-44780 Bochum, Germany
  • 11Physikalisches Institut, Universität Bonn, Nussallee 12, D-53115 Bonn, Germany
  • 12Université Libre de Bruxelles, Science Faculty CP230, B-1050 Brussels, Belgium
  • 13Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Dienst ELEM, B-1050 Brussels, Belgium
  • 14Department of Physics, Chiba University, Chiba 263-8522, Japan
  • 15Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Canterbury, Private Bag 4800, Christchurch, New Zealand
  • 16Department of Physics, University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland 20742, USA
  • 17Department of Physics and Center for Cosmology and Astro-Particle Physics, Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio 43210, USA
  • 18Department of Astronomy, Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio 43210, USA
  • 19Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen, DK-2100 Copenhagen, Denmark
  • 20Department of Physics, TU Dortmund University, D-44221 Dortmund, Germany
  • 21Department of Physics, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada T6G 2E1
  • 22Erlangen Centre for Astroparticle Physics, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, D-91058 Erlangen, Germany
  • 23Département de physique nucléaire et corpusculaire, Université de Genève, CH-1211 Genève, Switzerland
  • 24Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Gent, B-9000 Gent, Belgium
  • 25Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of California, Irvine, California 92697, USA
  • 26Laboratory for High Energy Physics, École Polytechnique Fédérale, CH-1015 Lausanne, Switzerland
  • 27Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas 66045, USA
  • 28Department of Astronomy, University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin 53706, USA
  • 29Department of Physics and Wisconsin IceCube Particle Astrophysics Center, University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin 53706, USA
  • 30Institute of Physics, University of Mainz, Staudinger Weg 7, D-55099 Mainz, Germany
  • 31Université de Mons, 7000 Mons, Belgium
  • 32T.U. Munich, D-85748 Garching, Germany
  • 33Bartol Research Institute and Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Delaware, Newark, Delaware 19716, USA
  • 34Department of Physics, University of Oxford, 1 Keble Road, Oxford OX1 3NP, United Kingdom
  • 35Department of Physics, University of Wisconsin, River Falls, Wisconsin 54022, USA
  • 36Oskar Klein Centre and Department of Physics, Stockholm University, SE-10691 Stockholm, Sweden
  • 37Department of Physics and Astronomy, Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, New York 11794-3800, USA
  • 38Department of Physics, Sungkyunkwan University, Suwon 440-746, Korea
  • 39Department of Physics, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, M5S 1A7
  • 40Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, Alabama 35487, USA
  • 41Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania 16802, USA
  • 42Department of Physics, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania 16802, USA
  • 43Department of Physics and Astronomy, Uppsala University, Box 516, S-75120 Uppsala, Sweden
  • 44Department of Physics, University of Wuppertal, D-42119 Wuppertal, Germany
  • 45DESY, D-15735 Zeuthen, Germany

  • *Also at Physics Department, South Dakota School of Mines and Technology, Rapid City, SD 57701, USA.
  • †Corresponding author. stephanie.v.hickford@gmail.com
  • ‡Corresponding author. eike.middell@desy.de
  • §Also at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD 20771, USA.
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Phys. Rev. D 89, 102001 – Published 1 May, 2014

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.89.102001

Abstract

We report on the search for neutrino-induced particle showers, so-called cascades, in the IceCube-40 detector. The data for this search were collected between April 2008 and May 2009 when the first 40 IceCube strings were deployed and operational. Three complementary searches were performed, each optimized for different energy regimes. The analysis with the lowest energy threshold (2 TeV) targeted atmospheric neutrinos. A total of 67 events were found, consistent with the expectation of 41 atmospheric muons and 30 atmospheric neutrino events. The two other analyses targeted a harder, astrophysical neutrino flux. The analysis with an intermediate threshold of 25 TeV leads to the observation of 14 cascadelike events, again consistent with the prediction of 3.0 atmospheric neutrino and 7.7 atmospheric muon events. We hence set an upper limit of E2Φlim≤7.46×10−8  GeV sr−1 s−1 cm−2 (90% C.L.) on the diffuse flux from astrophysical neutrinos of all neutrino flavors, applicable to the energy range 25 TeV to 5 PeV, assuming an Eν−2 spectrum and a neutrino flavor ratio of 1∶1∶1 at the Earth. The third analysis utilized a larger and optimized sample of atmospheric muon background simulation, leading to a higher energy threshold of 100 TeV. Three events were found over a background prediction of 0.04 atmospheric muon events and 0.21 events from the flux of conventional and prompt atmospheric neutrinos. Including systematic errors this corresponds to a 2.7σ excess with respect to the background-only hypothesis. Our observation of neutrino event candidates above 100 TeV complements IceCube’s recently observed evidence for high-energy astrophysical neutrinos.

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Phys. Rev. D 89, 102001– Published 1 May, 2014
  • Received 30 November 2013

© 2014 American Physical Society

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