Askaryan Radio Array

The Askaryan Radio Array (ARA) is a new detector designed to detect a few GZK neutrinos a year. It measures the enhanced radio-frequency radiation emitted during the interaction of the neutrino in Antarctic ice sheet. The detection is based on the Askaryan effect, an idea by Gurgen Askaryan [1][2]

This detection technique is also being used by the Antarctic Impulse Transient Antenna (ANITA) and the Radio Ice Cerenkov Experiment (RICE) detectors. The ARA experiment will be built around the IceCube experiment, and will cover an area of approximately 100 square kilometers.

A 16-antenna prototype station, the "ARA Testbed" , of the ARA system was installed Jan 2011 and began operation allowing the ARA Collaboration to determine the estimated sensitivity of the array design:[3] ARA-37 will cover 200 km2 with neutrino sensitivity of 1016–1019 eV. Measurements of the radio background and ice attenuation length were reported.

Collaborators

References

  1. G.A. Askaryan (1962). "Excess Negative Charge of an Electron-Photon Shower And Its Coherent Radio Emission". Soviet Physics JETP 14 (2): 441–443.
  2. G.A. Askaryan (1965). "Coherent Radio Emission from Cosmic Showers in Air and in Dense Media". Soviet Physics JETP 21 (3): 658. Bibcode:1965JETP...21..658A.
  3. "Design and initial performance of the Askaryan Radio Array prototype EeV neutrino detector at the South Pole". Astroparticle Physics. February 2012. arXiv:1105.2854. Bibcode:2012APh....35..457A. doi:10.1016/j.astropartphys.2011.11.010.

Further reading

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