RICE - Radio Ice Cerenkov Experiment

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Abstract 9617412 Besson Electromagnetic radiation (light, x-rays, gamma rays, etc.) cannot escape from inside the most active regions of the universe, for instance from the nuclei of galaxies, nor can the highest energy gamma rays even propagate through intergalactic space because they will be absorbed by the cosmic background infrared photons. Neutrinos, however, can traverse a considerable amount of material unimpeded, and if they can be detected in such a way that their arrival direction and energy can be determined, they can be used to study high density regions and highest energy events of the cosmos. When an electron type neutrino does interact in a dielectric medium (such as the deep glacial ice beneath South Pole) it will produce a shower of electron and positrons which will rapidly radiate away the energy of the original neutrino as electromagnetic radiation. The probability of such interactions increases with increasing energy, so that a detector's sensitivity increases with energy. Thus, a modest (by neutrino detector standards) sized instrumented volume of ice, say a 100 meter cube, could have an effective volume of a cubic kilometer, a size which is deemed necessary to do astronomy. This is a pilot project to determine the feasibility of the radio detection of neutrino interactions in ice. ***