Enhancement of the ${\bar{\nu }}_e$ flux from astrophysical sources by two photon annihilation interactions

Abstract

The ratio of anti-electron to total neutrino flux, ${\Phi }_{{\bar{\nu }}_e}:{\Phi }_{\nu }$, expected from $p\gamma$ interactions in astrophysical sources is $\le 1:15$. We point out that this ratio is enhanced by the decay of ${\mu }^{+}{\mu }^{-}$ pairs, created by the annihilation of secondary high energy photons from the decay of the neutral pions produced in $p\gamma$ interactions. We show that, under certain conditions, the ${\Phi }_{{\bar{\nu }}_e}:{\Phi }_{\nu }$ ratio may be significantly enhanced in gamma-ray burst (GRB) fireballs, and that detection at the Glashow resonance of ${\bar{\nu }}_e$ in kilometer scale neutrino detectors may constrain GRB fireball model parameters, such as the magnetic field and energy dissipation radius.

6 pages, 3 figures, PRD accepted

References in corpus (1)

• Gamma-Ray Bursts: Progress, Problems & Prospects