2020-11-18 14:00  P7F

Astro and particle physics with neutrino telescopes in the next decade

Dr. Anatoli Fedynitch

The 2010’s have been very successful for astro- and particle physics with the discoveries of extraterrestrial high-energy neutrinos and gravitational waves ranking among the hottest fundamental topics. The near-realtime evaluation of “electromagnetic”, neutrino and gravitational wave alerts revealed the association of a neutron star merger (GW170817) with short gamma-ray bursts/kilonovae. The multi-wavelength campaign triggered by the neutrino alert (IC170922A) from the IceCube Observatory helped to associate radiation from relativistic jets in active galactic nuclei (blazars) with cosmic ray accelerators. However, the latter and other recent sub-threshold neutrino observations remain puzzling for “multimessenger theory” that in this case struggles to simultaneously explain the high neutrino flux and low emission of high-energy photons. The previously anticipated astrophysical source candidates were not confirmed as dominant origin the IceCube Neutrinos leaving room for near-term discoveries. So far, the only significant neutrino source remains the supernova SN1987A, while the accelerators of high energy cosmic rays are undetected for more than 100 years after the discovery.

In this seminar I will demonstrate the versatile physics opportunities of very large volume neutrino telescopes ranging from studies of fundamental neutrino properties at low energies, hadronic interactions and beyond standard model physics at intermediate energies, and astrophysics or QCD at high-energies. The very end of the neutrino spectrum connects with the still puzzling world of ultra-high energy cosmic rays. However, drawing these connections is challenging due to the imperfections of the detection medium (natural ice or water), the indirect nature of the measurement, often low statistics and in particular incomplete theory. My argument is that the present time is excellent to enter this field since during the 2020’s up to five next-generation telescopes will compete in going beyond the pioneering work by IceCube and perform fundamental discoveries.

  Presentation Slides