Radiodetection of Neutrinos

Abstract

Despite 100 years of effort, we still know very little about the origin of ultra-high energy cosmic rays. The observation of neutrinos produced when cosmic-ray protons with energies above 4×1019 eV interact with the cosmic microwave background radiation, or in the neutrino sources, would tell us much about the origin and composition of these particles. Over the past decade, many experiments have searched for radio waves emitted from the charged particle showers produced when Extremely High Energy (EHE) neutrinos interact with Antarctic or Greenland ice or the moon. These experiments have not yet observed a neutrino signal. Two groups are now proposing to instrument 100 km3 of Antarctic ice with radio antennas, producing a detector large enough to observe a clear EHE neutrino signal in a few years of operation.