Mapping the dominant regions of the phase space associated with cc¯ production relevant for the prompt atmospheric neutrino flux

Abstract

We present a detailed mapping of the dominant kinematical domains contributing to the prompt atmospheric neutrino flux at high neutrino energies by studying its sensitivity to the cuts on several kinematical variables crucial for charm production in cosmic ray scattering in the atmosphere. This includes the maximal center-of-mass energy for proton-proton scattering, the longitudinal momentum fractions of partons in the projectile (cosmic ray) and target (nucleus of the atmosphere), the Feynman xF variable and the transverse momentum of charm quark/antiquark. We find that the production of neutrinos with energies larger than Eν > 10 7 GeV is particularly sensitive to the center-of-mass energies larger than the ones at the LHC and to the longitudinal momentum fractions in the projectile 10 −8 < x < 10 −5 . Clearly, these are regions where we do not control the parton, in particular gluon, densities. We also analyse the characteristic theoretical uncertainties in the charm production cross section coming from its QCD modelling. The precision data on the prompt atmospheric neutrino flux can efficiently constrain the mechanism of heavy quark production and underlying QCD dynamics in kinematical ranges beyond the reach of the current collider measurements.

Constraints on neutrino speed, weak equivalence principle violation, Lorentz invariance violation, and dual lensing from the first high-energy astrophysical neutrino source TXS 0506+056

“…Predictably, a lot of excitement have been generated by this momentous discovery [3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11]. Together with the prior discovery of a diffuse flux of high-energy astrophysical neutrinos [12,13], these observations provide us a new way to probe beyond the Standard model physics [14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22], new IceCube signal morphologies [23,24], and atmospheric prompt neutrinos [25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32].…”

Production asymmetry of open charm mesons within unfavoured ragmentation scenario

“…As discussed recently in Ref. [12] a rather large x F ∼ 0.5 region is important in this context. The dσ/dx F distribution of mesons is the most appropriate distribution in this context.…”

The Forward Physics Facility: Sites, Experiments, and Physics Potential

“…In particular, the results presented in Ref. [247] and in Sec. VII below indicate that the behavior of the prompt atmospheric neutrino flux at the highest energies accessible at IceCube and at future neutrino telescopes is determined by the production of charmed mesons at very forward rapidities, beyond those probed by the current LHC main detectors.…”

“…The dominant regions of the cc phase space relevant to the prompt atmospheric neutrino flux are discussed in Ref. [247]. The rapidity dependence of the prompt neutrino flux as a function of neutrino energy is shown in the right panel of Fig.…”