Pinpointing astrophysical bursts of low-energy neutrinos embedded into the noise

Abstract

We propose a novel method to increase the probability of identifying impulsive astrophysical bursts of low-energy neutrinos. The proposed approach exploits the temporal structure differences between astrophysical bursts and background fluctuations and it allows us to pinpoint weak signals otherwise unlikely to be detected. With respect to previous search strategies, this method strongly reduces the Super Kamiokande misidentification probability by a factor of ∼ 9 within a distance of 0D∼ 20 kpc without decreasing the detection efficiency. In addition, we extend the proposed method to a network of different detectors and we show that the Kamland & LVD background reduction is improved by a factor 0∼ 2 up to an horizon of D∼75 kpc.