MSW Resonance Research Articles

Locating the core-mantle boundary using oscillations of atmospheric neutrinos

Atmospheric neutrinos provide a unique avenue to explore the internal structure of Earth based on weak interactions, which is complementary to seismic studies and gravitational measurements. In this work, we demonstrate that the atmospheric neutrino oscillations in the presence of Earth matter can serve as an important tool to locate the core-mantle boundary (CMB). An atmospheric neutrino detector like the proposed 50 kt magnetized ICAL at INO can observe the core-passing neutrinos efficiently. These neutrinos would have experienced the MSW resonance and the parametric or neutrino oscillation length resonance. The net effect of these resonances on neutrino flavor conversions depends upon the location of CMB and the density jump at that radius. We quantify the capability of ICAL to measure the location of CMB in the context of multiple three-layered models of Earth. For the model where the density and the radius of core are kept flexible while the mass and radius of Earth as well as the densities of outer and inner mantle are fixed, ICAL can determine the location of CMB with a 1σ precision of about 250 km with an exposure of 1000 kt yr. With the 81-layered PREM profile, this 1σ precision would be about 350 km. The charge identification capability of ICAL plays an important role in achieving this precision.

Geometric phases in neutrino mixing

Neutrinos can acquire both dynamic and geometric phases due to the nontrivial mixing between mass and flavor eigenstates. In this paper, we derive the general expressions for all plausible gauge invariant diagonal and off-diagonal geometric phases in the three- flavor neutrino model using the kinematic approach. We find that diagonal and higher-order off-diagonal geometric phases are sensitive to the mass ordering and the Dirac CP violating phase [Formula: see text]. We show that, third-order off-diagonal geometric phase [Formula: see text] is invariant under any cyclic or non-cyclic permutations of flavor indices when the Dirac CP phase is zero. For nonzero [Formula: see text], we find that [Formula: see text]. We also prove that, only the third-order off-diagonal geometric phase is sensitive to the sign of [Formula: see text]. Further, we explore the effects of matter background using a two-flavor neutrino model and show that the diagonal geometric phase is either [Formula: see text] or [Formula: see text] in the MSW resonance region and takes nontrivial values elsewhere. The transition between zero and [Formula: see text] occurs at the point of complete oscillation inversion called the nodal point, where the diagonal geometric phase is not defined. Also, in two-flavor approximations, two distinct diagonal geometric phases are co-functions with respect to the mixing angle. Finally, in the two-flavor model, we show that the only second-order off-diagonal geometric phase is a topological invariant quantity and is always [Formula: see text].

DUNE atmospheric neutrinos: Earth tomography

In this paper we show that the DUNE experiment can measure the Earth’s density profile by analyzing atmospheric neutrino oscillations. The crucial feature that enables such measurement is the detailed event reconstruction capability of liquid argon time projection chambers. This allows for studying the sub-GeV atmospheric neutrino component, which bears a rich oscillation phenomenology, strongly dependent on the matter potential sourced by the Earth. We provide a pedagogical discussion of the MSW and parametric resonances and their role in measuring the core and mantle densities. By performing a detailed simulation, accounting for particle reconstruction at DUNE, nuclear physics effects relevant to neutrino-argon interactions and several uncertainties on the atmospheric neutrino flux, we manage to obtain a robust estimate of DUNE’s sensitivity to the Earth matter profile. We find that DUNE can measure the total mass of the Earth at 9.3% precision with an exposure of 400 kton-year. By accounting for previous measurements of the total mass and moment of inertia of the Earth, the core, lower mantle and upper mantle densities can be determined with 9%, 14% and 22% precision, respectively, for the same exposure. Finally, for a low exposure run of 60 kton-year, which would correspond to two far detectors running for three years, we have found that the core density could be measured by DUNE at ∼ 30% precision.

Resonance refraction and neutrino oscillations

The refraction index and matter potential depend on neutrino energy and this dependence has a resonance character associated to the production of the mediator in the s−channel. For light mediators and light particles of medium (background) the resonance can be realized at energies accessible to laboratory experiments. We study properties of the energy dependence of the potential for different C-asymmetries of background. Interplay of the background potential and the vacuum term leads to (i) bump in the oscillation probability in the resonance region, (ii) dip related to the MSW resonance in the background, (iii) substantial deviation of the effective ∆m2 above the resonance from the low energy value, etc. We considered generation of mixing in the background. Interactions with background shifts the energy of usual MSW resonance and produces new MSW resonances. Searches of the background effects allow us to put bounds on new interactions of neutrinos and properties of the background. We show that explanation of the MiniBooNE excess, as the bump due to resonance refraction, is excluded.

Coherence of oscillations in matter andsupernova neutrinos

We study the propagation coherence for neutrino oscillations inmedia with different density profiles.For each profile, we find the dependence of thecoherence length, Lcoh, on neutrino energy andaddress the issue of correspondenceof results in the distance and energy-momentum representations.The key new feature in matter is existence ofenergy ranges with enhanced coherence around the energiesE0 of “infinite coherence” at which Lcoh→∞.In the configuration space, the infinite coherence correspondsto equality of the (effective) group velocities of the eigenstates.In constant density medium, there is a unique E0, which coincides with the MSW resonance energy of oscillations of mass states and is close to the MSW resonance energy of flavor states.In the case of massless neutrinos or negligible masses in a very densemediumthe coherence persists continuously.In the adiabatic case, the infinite coherence is realized for periodicdensity change. Adiabaticity violation changes the shape factors ofthe wave packets (WPs) and leads to their spread. In a medium with sharp densitychanges (jumps), splitting of the eigenstates occurs at crossingof each jump. We study the increase of the coherence lengthin a single jump and periodic density jumps — castle-wall (CW) profiles.For the CW profile, there are several E0 corresponding to parametric resonances. We outlined applications of the results for supernova neutrinos.In particular, we show that coherence between two shock wave fronts leads to observable oscillation effects, and our analysis suggests that the decoherence can be irrelevant for flavor transformations in the central parts of collapsing stars.

Implications of the dark large mixing angle solution and a fourth sterile neutrino for neutrinoless double beta decay

We analyze the effect of the Dark-large mixing angle (DLMA) solution on the effective Majorana mass ($m_{\beta\beta}$) governing neutrino-less double beta decay ($0\nu\beta\beta$) in the presence of a sterile neutrino. We consider the 3+1 picture, comprising of one additional sterile neutrino. We have checked that the MSW resonance in the sun can take place in the DLMA parameter space in this scenario. Next we investigate how the values of the solar mixing angle $\theta_{12}$ corresponding to the DLMA region alter the predictions of $m_{\beta\beta}$ including a sterile neutrino in the analysis. We also compare our results with three generation cases for both standard large mixing angle (LMA) and DLMA. Additionally, we evaluate the discovery sensitivity of the future ${}^{136}Xe$ experiments in this context.

Collective neutrino oscillations and detectabilities in failed supernovae

We investigate the collective neutrino oscillations under the three flavor multi-angle approximation in a spherically symmetric simulation of failed supernovae. A failed supernova emits high neutrino fluxes in a short time, while intense accretion proceeds with high electron density enough to experience re-collapse into a black hole. Our results show that matter-induced effects completely dominate over neutrino self-interaction effects and multi-angle matter suppression occurs at all time snapshots we studied. These facts suggest us that only MSW resonances affect the neutrino flavor conversions in failed supernovae and simple spectra will be observed at neutrino detectors. We also estimate the neutrino event rate in current and future neutrino detectors from a source at 10 kpc as a Galactic event. The time evolution of neutrino detection could provide information about the dense and hot matter and constrain the neutrino mass ordering problem.

Radon background study in Super-Kamiokande

Super-Kamiokande (SK), a 50 kton water Cherenkov detector in Japan, observes 8B solar neutrinos with neutrino-electron elastic scattering. SK searches for distortions of the solar neutrino energy spectrum caused by the edge of the MSW resonance in the core of the Sun. The installation of new front-end electronics in 2008 marks the beginning of the 4th phase of SK (SK-IV). With the improvement of the water circulation system, calibration methods, reduction cuts, this phase achieved the lowest energy threshold thus far (3.5 MeV kinetic energy). To improve the sensitivity to the MSW effect, it is required to achieve lower energy threshold. For this purpose, understanding the origin of background events and reducing them are important. Currently, the main background is known as a beta decay of 214Bi in a Radon decay chain. So far, SK collaboration has developed several techniques for studying Radon contamination in the SK water. In this proceedings, a measurement system which can measure Radon concentration in the SK water with the accuracy of 0.1 mBq/m3 level is presented. In addition, an evaluation of Radon background events in SK injecting Radon rich water into the SK tank, as well as future prospects are also presented.

The effect of core-collapse supernova accretion phase turbulence on neutrino flavor evolution*

During the accretion phase of a core-collapse supernovae, large amplitude turbulence is generated by the combination of the standing accretion shock instability and convection driven by neutrino heating. The turbulence directly affects the dynamics of the explosion, but there is also the possibility of an additional, indirect, feedback mechanism due to the effect turbulence can have upon neutrino flavor evolution and thus the neutrino heating. In this paper we consider the effect of turbulence during the accretion phase upon neutrino evolution, both numerically and analytically. Adopting representative supernova profiles taken from the accretion phase of a supernova simulation, we find the numerical calculations exhibit no effect from turbulence. We explain this absence using two analytic descriptions: the stimulated transition model and the distorted phase effect model. In the stimulated transition model turbulence effects depend upon six different lengthscales, and three criteria must be satisfied between them if one is to observe a change in the flavor evolution due to stimulated transition. We further demonstrate that the distorted phase effect depends upon the presence of multiple semi-adiabatic MSW resonances or discontinuities that also can be expressed as a relationship between three of the same lengthscales. When we examine the supernova profiles used in the numerical calculations we find the three stimulated transition criteria cannot be satisfied, independent of the form of the turbulence power spectrum, and that the same supernova profiles lack the multiple semi-adiabatic MSW resonances or discontinuities necessary to produce a distorted phase effect. Thus, we conclude that even though large amplitude turbulence is present in supernova during the accretion phase, it has no effect upon neutrino flavor evolution.

Production of heavy sterile neutrinos from vector boson decay at electroweak temperatures

In the standard model extended with a seesaw mass matrix, we study the production of sterile neutrinos from the decay of vector bosons at $T\simeq M_{W,Z}$. We derive a general quantum kinetic equation for the production of sterile neutrinos and their effective mixing angles valid in a wide range of temperature, to all orders in interactions of the standard model, and to leading order mixing angle $\theta \ll 1$. Production rates and effective mixing angles depend sensitively on helicity. Positive helicity states interact more weakly with the medium and their effective mixing angle is not modified significantly whereas the mixing angle for negative helicity is strongly suppressed by the medium. If $M_s \lesssim 8.35\,\mathrm{MeV}$, there are fewer states with negative helicity produced than those with positive helicity. There is an MSW resonance in the absence of lepton asymmetry, but is screened by the damping rate, without production enhancement. Negative helicity states freeze-out at $T^-_f\simeq 5\,\mathrm{GeV}$ and positive helicity states freeze-out at $T^+_f \simeq 8\,\mathrm{GeV}$, both distributions are far from thermal. Negative helicity states feature a broader momentum distribution than that for those with positive helicity. Sterile neutrinos produced via vector boson decay do not satisfy the abundance, lifetime and cosmological constraints to be the sole dark matter component in the universe but might solve the $^{7}Li$ problem, albeit at the very edge of the possible parameter space. A heavy sterile neutrino with a mass of a few MeV could decay into light sterile neutrinos, of a few keV in mass, that contribute to warm dark matter. We argue that heavy sterile neutrinos with lifetime $\leq 1/H_0$ reach local thermodynamic equilibrium.

Influence of solar flares on behavior of solar neutrino flux

Limiting ourselves to two flavor approximation the motion of the neutrino flux in the solar matter and twisting magnetic field is considered. For the neutrino system described by the 4-component wave function ΨT=(νeL,νXL,ν¯eL,ν¯XL), where X=μ,τ, an evolution equation is found. Our consideration carries general character, that is, it holds for any SM extensions with massive neutrinos. The resonance transitions of the electron neutrinos are investigated. Factors which influence on the electron neutrino flux, crossing a region of solar flares (SF) are defined. When the SF is absent a terrestrial detector records the electron neutrino flux weakened at the cost both of vacuum oscillations and of the MSW resonance conversion only. On the other hand, the electron neutrino flux passed the SF region in preflare period proves to be further weakened in so far as it undergoes one (Majorana neutrino) or two (Dirac neutrino) additional resonance conversions, apart from the MSW resonance and vacuum oscillations.The hypothesis of the νe-induced decays which states that decreasing the beta decay rates of some elements of the periodic table is caused by reduction of the solar neutrino flux is discussed as well.

Low energy neutrinos in Super-Kamiokande

Super-Kamiokande (SK), a 50 kton water Cherenkov detector, observes 8B solar neutrinos via neutrino-electron elastic scattering. The analysis threshold was successfully lowered to 3.5 MeV (recoil electron kinetic energy) in SK-IV. To date SK has observed solar neutrinos for 18 years. An analysis regarding possible correlations between the solar neutrino flux and the 11 year solar activity cycle is shown. With large statistics, SK searches for distortions of the solar neutrino energy spectrum caused by the MSW resonance in the core of the sun. SK also searches for a day/night solar neutrino flux asymmetry induced by the matter in the Earth.The Super-Kamiokande Gd (SK-Gd) project is the upgrade of the SK detector via the addition of water-soluble gadolinium (Gd) salt. This modification will enable it to efficiently identify low energy anti-neutrinos. SK-Gd will pursue low energy physics currently inaccessible to SK due to backgrounds. The most important will be the world’s first observation of the diffuse supernova neutrino background. The main R&D program towards SK-Gd is EG ADS: a 200 ton, fully instrumented tank built in a new cavern in the Kamioka mine.

Effect of interaction with neutrons in matter on flavor conversion of super-light sterile neutrino with active neutrino

A super-light sterile neutrino was proposed to explain the absence of the expected upturn of the survival probability of low energy solar boron neutrinos. This is because this super-light sterile neutrino can oscillate efficiently with electron neutrino through a MSW resonance happened in Sun. One may naturally expect that a similar resonance should happen for neutrinos propagating in Earth matter. We study the flavor conversion of this super-light sterile neutrino with active neutrinos in Earth matter. We find that the scenario of the super-light sterile neutrino can easily pass through possible constraints from experiments which can test the Earth matter effect in oscillation of neutrinos. Interestingly, we find that this is because the naively expected resonant conversion disappears or is significantly suppressed due to the presence of a potential V n which arises from neutral current interaction of neutrino with neutrons in matter. In contrast, the neutron number density in the Sun is negligible and the effect of V n is effectively switched off. This enables the MSW resonance in Sun needed in oscillation of the super-light sterile neutrino with solar electron neutrinos. It’s interesting to note that it is the different situation in the Sun and in the Earth that makes V n effectively turned off and turned on respectively. This observation makes the scenario of the super-light sterile neutrino quite interesting.

Restricting the LSND and MiniBooNE sterile neutrinos with the IceCube atmospheric neutrino data

We study oscillations of the high energy atmospheric neutrinos in the Earth into sterile neutrinos with the eV-scale mass. The MSW resonance and parametric enhancement of the $\bar{\nu}_\mu\to\bar{\nu}_s$ oscillations lead to distortion of the zenith angle distribution of the muon-track events which can be observed by IceCube. Due to matter effect, the IceCube signal depends not only on the mixing element $U_{\mu 4}$ relevant for LSND and MiniBooNE but also on $U_{\tau 4}$ and the CP-violating phase $\delta_{24}$. We show that the case with $U_{\tau 4} = \delta_{24} = 0$ leads to the weakest IceCube signal and therefore should be used to bound $U_{\mu 4}$. We compute the zenith angle distributions of the $\nu_\mu-$events for different energy intervals in the range (0.1 - 10) TeV and find that inclusion of the energy information (binning in energy) improves the sensitivity to $\nu_s$ drastically. We estimate that with already collected (during 3 - 4 years) IceCube statistics the bound $|U_{\mu 4}|^2 < 0.01$ ($99\%$ C.L.) can be established and the mixing required by LSND and MiniBooNE can be excluded at $(4 - 6) \sigma$ confidence level.

Probing Neutrino Mass Hierarchy with Supernova

The rise time of electron antineutrino lightcurve from a Galactic supernova (SN), observable at the IceCube Cherenkov detector, can provide signature of the neutrino mass hierarchy at “large” 1-3 leptonic mixing angle ϑ13. In the early accretion phase of the SN, the neutrino oscillations are nontrivial. Due to the matter suppression of collective effects at these early post bounce times, only the MSW resonances in the outer layers of the SN influence the neutrino flux. When the oscillations are taken into account, the signal in IceCube shows sufficiently fast rise time for the inverted mass hierarchy compared to the normal hierarchy. An investigation with an extensive set of stellar core-collapse simulations, provides both qualitative and quantitative robustness of these features. Thus opening another avenue to explore the neutrino mass hierarchy with the rise time of a supernova burst.

Diffuse supernova neutrinos: oscillation effects, stellar cooling and progenitor mass dependence

We estimate the diffuse supernova neutrino background (DSNB) using the recent progenitor-dependent, long-term supernova simulations from the Basel group and including neutrino oscillations at several post-bounce times. Assuming multi-angle matter suppression of collective effects during the accretion phase, we find that oscillation effects are dominated by the matter-driven MSW resonances, while neutrino-neutrino collective effects contribute at the 5–10% level. The impact of the neutrino mass hierarchy, of the time-dependent neutrino spectra and of the diverse progenitor star population is 10% or less, small compared to the uncertainty of at least 25% of the normalization of the supernova rate. Therefore, assuming that the sign of the neutrino mass hierarchy will be determined within the next decade, the future detection of the DSNB will deliver approximate information on the MSW-oscillated neutrino spectra. With a reliable model for neutrino emission, its detection will be a powerful instrument to provide complementary information on the star formation rate and for learning about stellar physics.

Neutrino oscillations: theory and phenomenology

A brief overview of selected topics in the theory and phenomenology of neutrino oscillations is given. These include: oscillations in vacuum and in matter; phenomenology of 3-flavour neutrino oscillations; CP and T violation in neutrino oscillations in vacuum and in matter; matter effects on ν μ ↔ ν τ oscillations; parametric resonance in neutrino oscillations inside the earth; oscillations below and above the MSW resonance; unsettled issues in the theory of neutrino oscillations.

Sterile neutrinos produced near the electroweak scale: Mixing angles, MSW resonances, and production rates

We study the production of sterile neutrinos in the region $T\ensuremath{\sim}{M}_{W}$ in an extension beyond the standard model with the seesaw mass matrix originating in Yukawa couplings to Higgs-like scalars with masses and vev's of the order of the electroweak scale. Sterile neutrinos are produced by the decay of scalars and standard model vector bosons. We obtain the index of refraction, dispersion relations, mixing angles in the medium and production rates including those for right-handed sterile neutrinos, from the standard model and beyond the standard model self-energies. For $1\ensuremath{\lesssim}{M}_{W}/T\ensuremath{\lesssim}3$ we find narrow MSW resonances with $k\ensuremath{\lesssim}T$ for both left- and right-handed neutrinos even in absence of a lepton asymmetry in the (active) neutrino sector, as well as very low energy ($k/T\ensuremath{\ll}|\ensuremath{\xi}|$) narrow MSW resonances in the presence of a lepton asymmetry consistent with the bounds from Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe and Big Bang Nucleosynthesis. For small vacuum mixing angle, consistent with observational bounds, the absorptive part of the self-energies lead to a strong damping regime very near the resonances resulting in the exact degeneracy of the propagating modes with a concomitant breakdown of adiabaticity. We argue that cosmological expansion sweeps through the resonances, resonant and nonresonant sterile neutrino production results in a highly nonthermal distribution function enhanced at small momentum $k&lt;T$, with potentially important consequences for their free-streaming length and transfer function at small scales.

Fourier analysis of the parametric resonance in neutrino oscillations

Parametric enhancement of the appearance probability of the neutrino oscillation under the inhomogeneous matter is studied. Fourier expansion of the matter density profile leads to a simple resonance condition and manifests that each Fourier mode modifies the energy spectrum of oscillation probability at around the corresponding energy; below the MSW resonance energy, a large-scale variation modifies the spectrum in high energies while a small-scale one does in low energies. In contrast to the simple parametric resonance, the enhancement of the oscillation probability is itself an slow oscillation as demonstrated by a numerical analysis with a single Fourier mode of the matter density. We derive an analytic solution to the evolution equation on the resonance energy, including the expression of frequency of the slow oscillation.

Erratum: Self-induced spectral splits in supernova neutrino fluxes [Phys. Rev. D76, 081301 (2007)

In the dense-neutrino region above the neutrino sphere of a supernova (r > 400 km), neutrino-neutrino refraction causes collective flavor transformations. They can lead to "spectral splits" where an energy E_split splits the transformed spectrum sharply into parts of almost pure but different flavors. Unless there is an ordinary MSW resonance in the dense-neutrino region, E_split is determined by flavor-lepton number conservation alone. Spectral splits are created by an adiabatic transition between regions of large and small neutrino density. We solve the equations of motion in the adiabatic limit explicitly and provide analytic expressions for a generic example.