Neutrino telescopes as a probe of active and sterile neutrino mixings

Abstract

If the ultrahigh-energy (UHE) neutrino fluxes produced from a distant astrophysical source can be measured at a km^3-size neutrino telescope, they will provide a promising way to help determine the flavor mixing pattern of three active neutrinos. Considering the conventional UHE neutrino source with the flavor ratio ϕ_e : ϕ_μ: ϕ_τ= 1 : 2 : 0, I show that ϕ^D_e : ϕ^D_μ: ϕ^D_τ= (1 -2 Δ) : (1 +Δ) : (1 +Δ) holds at the detector of a neutrino telescope, where Δcharacterizes the effect of μ-τsymmetry breaking (i.e., θ_13 \neq 0 and θ_23 \neq π/4). Current experimental data yield -0.1 \leq Δ\leq +0.1. It is also possible to probe Δby detecting the \barν_e flux of E_\barν_e \approx 6.3 PeV via the Glashow resonance channel \barν_e e \to W^- \to anything. Finally, I give some brief comments on the possibility to constrain the mixing between active and sterile neutrinos by using the UHE neutrino telescopes.

arXiv comment6 pages. Plenary talk given at the XIV International Symposium on Very High Energy Cosmic Ray Interactions, Weihai, China, August 15-22, 2006

References in corpus (21)

• Big Bang Nucleosynthesis (in "The Review of Particle Properties" 2004)
• Direct Evidence for Neutrino Flavor Transformation from Neutral-Current Interactions in the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory
• First Results from KamLAND: Evidence for Reactor Anti-Neutrino Disappearance
• Evidence for Neutrino Oscillations from the Observation of Electron Anti-neutrinos in a Muon Anti-Neutrino Beam
• Indications of Neutrino Oscillation in a 250 km Long-baseline Experiment
• Particle Physics with High Energy Neutrinos
• Detecting Tau Neutrino Oscillations at PeV Energies
• Detecting Nutau Oscillations as PeV Energies
• Measuring Flavor Ratios of High-Energy Astrophysical Neutrinos
• Effects of neutrino mixing on high-energy cosmic neutrino flux
• Flavor Mixing and CP Violation of Massive Neutrinos
• Nearly Tri-bimaximal Neutrino Mixing and CP Violation from mu-tau Symmetry Breaking
• Neutrino Observatories Can Characterize Cosmic Sources and Neutrino Properties
• Sensitivity to ${\theta }_{13}$ and $\delta$ in the Decaying Astrophysical Neutrino Scenario
• Measuring the 13-mixing angle and the CP phase with neutrino telescopes
• Effects of sterile neutrinos on the ultrahigh-energy cosmic neutrino flux
• How astrophysical neutrino sources could be used for early measurements of neutrino mass hierarchy and leptonic CP phase
• Results from the Antarctic Muon and Neutrino Detector Array (AMANDA)
• Probing the 2-3 leptonic mixing at high-energy neutrino telescopes
• Towards Determination of the Initial Flavor Composition of Ultrahigh-energy Neutrino Fluxes with Neutrino Telescopes
• Neutrino Telescopes as a Probe of Broken $\mu$-$\tau$ Symmetry

Cited by in corpus (5)

• Implications of Leptonic Unitarity Violation at Neutrino Telescopes
• Sterile neutrinos beyond LSND at the Neutrino Factory
• Tetra-maximal Neutrino Mixing and Its Implications on Neutrino Oscillations and Collider Signatures
• Theoretical Overview of Neutrino Properties
• A further study of μ-τsymmetry breaking at neutrino telescopes after the Daya Bay and RENO measurements of θ_{13}