A search for neutrino emission from the Fermi bubbles with the ANTARES telescope

S Adrián-Martínez,M Kadler,I Dekeyser,D Dornic,P Vernin,V Van Elewyck,U Katz,T Michael,O Kalekin,A Dumas,A Enzenhöfer,F Folger,C W James,G De Bonis,M Taiuti,S Schulte,A Spies,K Fehn,C Racca,H Costantini,G E Păvălaş,U Fritsch,Th Stolarczyk,G Riccobene,K Geyer,M Neff,J Barrios-Martí,S Cecchini,M Ardid,S Mangano,T Seitz,Z Charif,D Lattuada,P Sapienza,C Bogazzi,B Baret,C Bigongiari,M C Bouwhuis,Q Dorosti,C Rivière,C Cârloganu,A Margiotta,S Loucatos,B Herold,I Kreykenbohm,J J M Steijger,G Giacomelli,F Simeone,A Kappes,V Popa,C Donzaud,F Classen,E Leonora,A Sánchez-Losa,D Drouhin,M Marcelin,H Yepes,G Anton,A Albert,T Chiarusi,J.-P Ernenwein,S Biagi,J J Hernández-Rey,J Hößl,R Lahmann,D Lefèvre,S Anvar,K Roensch,L Core,C Curtil,R Coniglione,Y Hello,Y Tayalati,A Creusot,U Emanuele,J Zúñiga,R Shanidze,V Giordano,A Rostovtsev,A Capone,J Carr,V Kulikovskiy,M Sanguineti,F Louis,T Montaruli,L Caramete,D Lo Presti,J Schnabel,M De Jong,M Morganti,T Astraatmadja,D Palioselitis,M Vecchi,M André,J Wilms,C Sieger,A Trovato,G Guillard,C Perrina,J Busto,M Circella,T Eberl,R Richter,I Al Samarai,T Pradier,H Loehner,E Lambard,D F E Samtleben,J A Martínez-Mora,G Lambard,S Geißelsöder,C Vallée,G Larosa,S Basa,C Hugon,S Escoffier,K Yatkin,P Coyle,A Gleixner,A Kouchner,A Deschamps,E Nezri,M Spurio,P Fermani,P Kooijman,E De Wolf,B Vallage,B Bouhou,V Flaminio,A Heijboer ,J.d Zornoza ,J Gómez-González ,Christian Tamburini ,J Brünner ,L Fusco ,S Galatá ,Hans Van Haren ,J.j Aubert ,Philippe Charvis ,Julia Schmid ,Κ Graf ,Séverine Martini ,S J Wagner ,Erwin Visser ,F Schüßler ,Aymeric Robert ,V Bertín ,Cornelia Müller

doi:10.1140/epjc/s10052-013-2701-6

Abstract

Analysis of the Fermi-LAT data has revealed two extended structures above and below the Galactic Centre emitting gamma rays with a hard spectrum, the so-called Fermi bubbles. Hadronic models attempting to explain the origin of the Fermi bubbles predict the emission of high-energy neutrinos and gamma rays with similar fluxes. The ANTARES detector, a neutrino telescope located in the Mediterranean Sea, has a good visibility to the Fermi bubble regions. Using data collected from 2008 to 2011 no statistically significant excess of events is observed and therefore upper limits on the neutrino flux in TeV range from the Fermi bubbles are derived for various assumed energy cutoffs of the source.

Highlights

Germany d at Accademia Navale de Livorno, Leghorn, Italy e at the Max Planck Institute for Physics, Munich, Germany f at Academia Sinica, 128 Academia Road, Section 2, Nankang, Taipei 115, Taiwan, ROC and National Central University, No.300, Jhongda Rd., Jhongli, Taoyuan 32001, Taiwan, ROC by gamma-ray emission with a hard E−2 spectrum and a constant intensity over the whole emission region.Signals from roughly the Fermi bubble regions were observed in the microwave band by WMAP [2] and, recently, in the radio-wave band [3]
The ANTARES detector, a neutrino telescope located in the Mediterranean Sea, has a good visibility to the Fermi bubble regions
The search for neutrino emission is performed by comparing the number of events in the Fermi bubble regions to the number found in similar off-zone regions

Summary

Introduction

Signals from roughly the Fermi bubble regions were observed in the microwave band by WMAP [2] and, recently, in the radio-wave band [3]. Several proposed models explaining the emission include hadronic mechanisms, in which gamma rays together with neutrinos are produced by the collisions of cosmic-ray protons with interstellar matter [5,6,7]. Others which include leptonic mechanisms or dark matter decay would produce lower neutrino emission or none at all [1,6,8,9,10]. The observation of a neutrino signal from the Fermi bubble regions would play a unique role in discriminating between models. 3 and the neutrino event reconstruction is described in Sect. 4. The search for neutrino emission is performed by comparing the number of events in the Fermi bubble regions to the number found in similar off-zone regions

Estimation of the neutrino flux

The ANTARES neutrino telescope

Track and energy reconstruction

Event selection criteria

Results

Conclusions