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When Earth-skimming tau neutrinos interact within the Earth, they generate upgoing tau leptons that can decay in the atmosphere, forming extensive air showers. The Beamforming Elevated Array for COsmic Neutrinos (BEACON) is a novel detector concept that utilizes a radio interferometer atop a mountain to search for the radio emission due to these extensive air showers. The prototype, located at the White Mountain Research Station in California, consists of 4 crossed-dipole antennas operating in the 30-80 MHz range and uses a directional interferometric trigger for reduced thresholds and background rejection. The prototype will first be used to detect down-going cosmic rays to validate the detector model. A Monte-Carlo simulation was developed to predict the acceptance of the prototype to cosmic rays, as well as the expected rate of detection. In this simulation, cosmic ray induced air showers with random properties are generated in an area around the prototype array. It is then determined if a given shower triggers the array using radio emission simulations from ZHAireS and antenna modelling from XFdtd. Here, we present the methodology and results of this simulation.
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The Beamforming Elevated Array for COsmic Neutrinos (BEACON): A Radio Detector for Earth-Skimming Tau Neutrinos
When ultrahigh energy tau neutrinos skim the Earth, they can generate tau leptons that then decay in the atmosphere, forming upgoing extensive air showers. The Beamforming Elevated Array for COsmic Neutrinos (BEACON) is a novel detector concept that utilizes a mountaintop radio interferometer to search for the radio emission due to these extensive air showers. The prototype, located at the White Mountain Research Station in California, consists of 4 custom crossed-dipole antennas operating in the 30-80 MHz range and uses a directional interferometric trigger to achieve reduced thresholds and background rejection. The prototype will first be used to detect extensive air showers from down-going cosmic rays to validate the detector model. In this talk, we give an overview of the BEACON concept and the status of its prototype. We also discuss the ongoing cosmic ray search which utilizes both data analysis and simulation.
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- PAR ID:
- 10402968
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- 9th International Workshop on Acoustic and Radio EeV Neutrino Detection Activities - ARENA2022
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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The Beamforming Elevated Array for COsmic Neutrinos (BEACON) is a concept for a neutrino telescope designed to detect radio emission from upgoing air showers induced by tau leptons that are generated by ultra-high energy tau neutrino interactions in the Earth. This detection mechanism provides a pure measurement of the tau flavor of cosmogenic and astrophysical neutrinos, which could be used to set limits on the observed flavor ratios in a manner complimentary to the all-flavor neutrino flux measurements made by other experiments. A BEACON prototype has been installed at high elevation at Barcroft Field Station for several years and consists of 4 crossed-dipole antennas operating in the 30-80 MHz band and connected to a custom DAQ. The BEACON prototype is at high elevation to maximize effective volume and uses a directional beamforming trigger to reduce man-made background signals at the trigger level. This prototype system is expected to be capable of detecting downgoing cosmic ray air showers, a signal like the upgoing tau lepton air shower, but distinguishable chiefly by arrival direction. Here we give an overview of the BEACON experiment and present an ongoing cosmic ray search with data from the BEACON prototype. Cosmic ray candidates that are identified by this search will be used to experimentally determine the sensitivity of the BEACON concept to the known cosmic ray flux, which can then be used to predict the sensitivity of a full-scale BEACON array to the cosmogenic and astrophysical neutrino fluxes.more » « less
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