Potentialities of a low-energy detector based on ${}^4$He evaporation to observe atomic effects in coherent neutrino scattering and physics perspectives

Abstract

We propose an experimental setup to observe coherent elastic neutrino-atom scattering (CE$\nu$AS) using electron antineutrinos from tritium decay and a liquid helium target. In this scattering process with the whole atom, that has not beeen observed so far, the electrons tend to screen the weak charge of the nucleus as seen by the electron antineutrino probe. The interference between the nucleus and the electron cloud produces a sharp dip in the recoil spectrum at atomic recoil energies of about 9 meV, reducing sizeably the number of expected events with respect to the coherent elastic neutrino-nucleus scattering case. We estimate that with a 60 g tritium source surrounded by 500 kg of liquid helium in a cylindrical tank, one could observe the existence of CE$\nu$AS processes at 3$\sigma$ in 5 years of data taking. Keeping the same amount of helium and the same data-taking period, we test the sensitivity to the Weinberg angle and a possible neutrino magnetic moment for three different scenarios: 60 g, 160 g, and 500 g of tritium. In the latter scenario, the Standard Model (SM) value of the Weinberg angle can be measured with a statistical uncertainty of ${\sin }^2{{\vartheta }_W^{\mathrm{SM}}}_{-0.016}^{+0.015}$. This would represent the lowest-energy measurement of ${\sin }^2{\vartheta }_W$, with the advantage of being not affected by the uncertainties on the neutron form factor of the nucleus as the current lowest-energy determination. Finally, we study the sensitivity of this apparatus to a possible electron neutrino magnetic moment and we find that using 60 g of tritium it is possible to set an upper limit of about $7\times 10^{-13}{\mu }_B$ at 90% C.L., that is more than one order of magnitude smaller than the current experimental limit.

arXiv comment9 pages, 7 figures, Fig. 3 corrected, improved discussion on electron form factor (Fig. 1 added) and detector layout

References in corpus (34)

• Asymptotic formulae for likelihood-based tests of new physics
• Search for New Physics with Atoms and Molecules
• Observation of Coherent Elastic Neutrino-Nucleus Scattering
• A Precise Determination of Electroweak Parameters in Neutrino-Nucleon Scattering
• Precision Measurement of the Weak Mixing Angle in Moller Scattering
• "Dark" Z implications for Parity Violation, Rare Meson Decays, and Higgs Physics
• Superconducting Detectors for Super Light Dark Matter
• Probing new physics with coherent neutrino scattering off nuclei
• Detection of sub-MeV Dark Matter with Three-Dimensional Dirac Materials
• Detection of Light Dark Matter With Optical Phonons in Polar Materials
• Revisiting parity non-conservation in cesium
• Precision Measurement of the Weak Charge of the Proton
• Neutrino physics with the PTOLEMY project: active neutrino properties and the light sterile case
• COHERENT constraints on nonstandard neutrino interactions
• Limiting neutrino magnetic moments with Borexino Phase-II solar neutrino data
• A COHERENT enlightenment of the neutrino Dark Side
• COHERENT constraints to conventional and exotic neutrino physics
• Average CsI neutron density distribution from COHERENT data
• Diamond Detectors for Direct Detection of Sub-GeV Dark Matter
• Probing neutrino coupling to a light scalar with coherent neutrino scattering
• Neutrino-nucleus coherent scattering as a probe of neutron density distributions
• Muon Anomaly and Dark Parity Violation
• Neutrino Charge Radii from COHERENT Elastic Neutrino-Nucleus Scattering
• Coherent Elastic Neutrino Nucleus Scattering (CE$\nu$NS) as a probe of $Z^{\prime }$ through kinetic and mass mixing effects
• Impact of form factor uncertainties on interpretations of coherent elastic neutrino-nucleus scattering data
• Future perspectives for a weak mixing angle measurement in coherent elastic neutrino nucleus scattering experiments
• Non-Standard Neutrino Interactions and Neutral Gauge Bosons
• Probing neutrino transition magnetic moments with coherent elastic neutrino-nucleus scattering
• Magnetic Bubble Chambers and Sub-GeV Dark Matter Direct Detection
• Searching for Beyond the Standard Model Physics with COHERENT Energy and Timing Data
• Reinterpreting the weak mixing angle from atomic parity violation in view of the Cs neutron rms radius measurement from COHERENT
• Coherency and incoherency in neutrino-nucleus elastic and inelastic scattering
• Dark Matter Detection Using Helium Evaporation and Field Ionization
• Low Q^2 Weak Mixing Angle Measurements and Rare Higgs Decays

Cited by in corpus (13)

• Recent probes of standard and non-standard neutrino physics with nuclei
• Flavor-dependent radiative corrections in coherent elastic neutrino-nucleus scattering
• Novel constraints on neutrino physics beyond the standard model from the CONUS experiment
• Muon and electron g-2 and proton and cesium weak charges implications on dark ${\mathbf{Z}}_{\mathbf{d}}$ models
• COHERENT constraints after the COHERENT-2020 quenching factor measurement
• New insights into nuclear physics and weak mixing angle using electroweak probes
• Neutrino Electromagnetic Properties
• CP-Violating and Charged Current Neutrino Non-standard Interactions in CE$\nu$NS
• Scintillation yield from electronic and nuclear recoils in superfluid ${}^4$He
• Elastic neutrino-atom scattering as a probe of neutrino millicharge and magnetic moment
• Can sub-GeV dark matter coherently scatter on the electrons in the Atom?
• Electromagnetic neutrinos: New constraints and new effects in oscillations
• Neutrino magnetic moments in low-energy neutrino scattering on condensed matter systems