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First Directional Measurement of Sub-MeV Solar Neutrinos with Borexino

M. Agostini et al. (Borexino Collaboration)
Phys. Rev. Lett. 128, 091803 – Published 3 March 2022
Physics logo See synopsis: Solar-Neutrino Detection Gets a Boost

Abstract

We report the measurement of sub-MeV solar neutrinos through the use of their associated Cherenkov radiation, performed with the Borexino detector at the Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso. The measurement is achieved using a novel technique that correlates individual photon hits of events to the known position of the Sun. In an energy window between 0.54 to 0.74 MeV, selected using the dominant scintillation light, we have measured 108872103+2386(stat)±947(syst) (68% confidence interval) solar neutrinos out of 19 904 total events. This corresponds to a Be7 neutrino interaction rate of 51.612.5+13.9counts/(day·100ton), which is in agreement with the standard solar model predictions and the previous spectroscopic results of Borexino. The no-neutrino hypothesis can be excluded with >5σ confidence level. For the first time, we have demonstrated the possibility of utilizing the directional Cherenkov information for sub-MeV solar neutrinos, in a large-scale, high light yield liquid scintillator detector. This measurement provides an experimental proof of principle for future hybrid event reconstruction using both Cherenkov and scintillation signatures simultaneously.

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  • Received 22 December 2021
  • Accepted 25 January 2022

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.128.091803

Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article’s title, journal citation, and DOI. Funded by SCOAP3.

Published by the American Physical Society

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Particles & Fields

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Solar-Neutrino Detection Gets a Boost

Published 3 March 2022

A new measurement method allows researchers to obtain directional information about low-energy solar neutrinos, something that was previously hard to do.  

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Correlated and integrated directionality for sub-MeV solar neutrinos in Borexino

M. Agostini et al. (Borexino Collaboration)
Phys. Rev. D 105, 052002 (2022)

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Vol. 128, Iss. 9 — 4 March 2022

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