Experimental Parameters for a Cerium 144 Based Intense Electron Antineutrino Generator Experiment at Very Short Baselines

The standard three-neutrino oscillation paradigm, associated with small squared mass splittings $\ll 0.1\ \mathrm{eV^2}$, has been successfully built up over the last 15 years using solar, atmospheric, long baseline accelerator and reactor neutrino experiments. However, this well-established picture might suffer from anomalous results reported at very short baselines in some of these experiments. If not experimental artifacts, such results could possibly be interpreted as the existence of at least an additional fourth sterile neutrino species, mixing with the known active flavors with an associated mass splitting $\ll 0.1\ \mathrm{eV^2}$, and being insensitive to standard weak interactions. Precision measurements at very short baselines (5 to 15 m) with intense MeV electronic antineutrino emitters can be used to probe these anomalies. In this article, the expected antineutrino signal and backgrounds of a generic experiment which consists of deploying an intense beta minus radioactive source inside or in the vicinity of a large liquid scintillator detector are studied. The technical challenges to perform such an experiment are identified, along with quantifying the possible source and detector induced systematics, and their impact on the sensitivity to the observation of neutrino oscillations at short baselines.Comment: 21 pages, 27 figures, generated with pdflatex, accepted for publication in Phys. Rev.

White paper: CeLAND - Investigation of the reactor antineutrino anomaly with an intense 144Ce-144Pr antineutrino source in KamLAND

We propose to test for short baseline neutrino oscillations, implied by the recent reevaluation of the reactor antineutrino flux and by anomalous results from the gallium solar neutrino detectors. The test will consist of producing a 75 kCi 144Ce - 144Pr antineutrino source to be deployed in the Kamioka Liquid Scintillator Anti-Neutrino Detector (KamLAND). KamLAND's 13m diameter target volume provides a suitable environment to measure energy and position dependence of the detected neutrino flux. A characteristic oscillation pattern would be visible for a baseline of about 10 m or less, providing a very clean signal of neutrino disappearance into a yet-unknown, "sterile" state. Such a measurement will be free of any reactor-related uncertainties. After 1.5 years of data taking the Reactor Antineutrino Anomaly parameter space will be tested at > 95% C.L.Comment: White paper prepared for Snowmass-2013; slightly different author lis

CeLAND: search for a 4th light neutrino state with a 3 PBq 144Ce-144Pr electron antineutrino generator in KamLAND

The reactor neutrino and gallium anomalies can be tested with a 3-4 PBq (75-100 kCi scale) 144Ce-144Pr antineutrino beta-source deployed at the center or next to a large low-background liquid scintillator detector. The antineutrino generator will be produced by the Russian reprocessing plant PA Mayak as early as 2014, transported to Japan, and deployed in the Kamioka Liquid Scintillator Anti-Neutrino Detector (KamLAND) as early as 2015. KamLAND's 13 m diameter target volume provides a suitable environment to measure the energy and position dependence of the detected neutrino flux. A characteristic oscillation pattern would be visible for a baseline of about 10 m or less, providing a very clean signal of neutrino disappearance into a yet-unknown, sterile neutrino state. This will provide a comprehensive test of the electron dissaperance neutrino anomalies and could lead to the discovery of a 4th neutrino state for Delta_m^2 > 0.1 eV^2 and sin^2(2theta) > 0.05.Comment: 67 pages, 50 figures. Th. Lasserre thanks the European Research Council for support under the Starting Grant StG-30718

The SOX experiment in the neutrino physics

SOX (Short distance neutrino Oscillations with BoreXino) is a new experiment that takes place at the Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso (LNGS) and it exploits the Borexino detector to study the neutrino oscillations at short distance. In different phases, by using two artificial sources Cr-51 and Ce-144-Pr-144, neutrino and antineutrino fluxes of measured intensity will be detected by Borexino in order to observe possible neutrino oscillations in the sterile state. In this paper an overview of the experiment is given and one of the two calorimeters that will be used to measure the source activity is described. At the end the expected sensitivity to determine the neutrino sterile mass is shown

Development of dynamic models for neutron transport calculations

A quasi-static approach within the framework of neutron transport theory is used to develop a computational tool for the time-dependent analysis of nuclear systems. The determination of the shape function needed for the quasistatic scheme is obtained by the steady-state transport code DRAGON. The kinetic model solves the system of ordinary differential equations for the amplitude function on a fast scale. The kinetic parameters are calculated by a coupling module that retrieves the shape from the output of the transport code and performs the required adjoint-weighted quadratures. When the update of the shape has to be carried out, the coupling module generates an appropriate input file for the transport code. Both the standard Improved Quasi-Static scheme and an innovative Predictor-Corrector algorithm are implemented. The results show the feasibility of both procedures and their effectiveness in terms of computational times and accuracy

A White Paper on keV Sterile Neutrino Dark Matter

We present a comprehensive review of keV-scale sterile neutrino Dark Matter,collecting views and insights from all disciplines involved - cosmology,astrophysics, nuclear, and particle physics - in each case viewed from boththeoretical and experimental/observational perspectives. After reviewing therole of active neutrinos in particle physics, astrophysics, and cosmology, wefocus on sterile neutrinos in the context of the Dark Matter puzzle. Here, wefirst review the physics motivation for sterile neutrino Dark Matter, based onchallenges and tensions in purely cold Dark Matter scenarios. We then round outthe discussion by critically summarizing all known constraints on sterileneutrino Dark Matter arising from astrophysical observations, laboratoryexperiments, and theoretical considerations. In this context, we provide abalanced discourse on the possibly positive signal from X-ray observations.Another focus of the paper concerns the construction of particle physicsmodels, aiming to explain how sterile neutrinos of keV-scale masses could arisein concrete settings beyond the Standard Model of elementary particle physics.The paper ends with an extensive review of current and future astrophysical andlaboratory searches, highlighting new ideas and their experimental challenges,as well as future perspectives for the discovery of sterile neutrinos

A White Paper on keV sterile neutrino Dark Matter

We present a comprehensive review of keV-scale sterile neutrino Dark Matter, collecting views and insights from all disciplines involved—cosmology, astrophysics, nuclear, and particle physics—in each case viewed from both theoretical and experimental/observational perspectives. After reviewing the role of active neutrinos in particle physics, astrophysics, and cosmology, we focus on sterile neutrinos in the context of the Dark Matter puzzle. Here, we first review the physics motivation for sterile neutrino Dark Matter, based on challenges and tensions in purely cold Dark Matter scenarios. We then round out the discussion by critically summarizing all known constraints on sterile neutrino Dark Matter arising from astrophysical observations, laboratory experiments, and theoretical considerations. In this context, we provide a balanced discourse on the possibly positive signal from X-ray observations. Another focus of the paper concerns the construction of particle physics models, aiming to explain how sterile neutrinos of keV-scale masses could arise in concrete settings beyond the Standard Model of elementary particle physics. The paper ends with an extensive review of current and future astrophysical and laboratory searches, highlighting new ideas and their experimental challenges, as well as future perspectives for the discovery of sterile neutrinos

The SOX experiment: understanding the detector behavior using calibration sources

The SOX experiment investigates the existence of light sterile neutrinos. A solid signal would mean the discovery of the first particles beyond the Standard Electroweak Model and would have profound implications in our understanding of the Universe and of fundamental particle physics. In case of a negative result, it is able to close a long standing debate about the reality of the neutrino anomalies. The SOX experiment will use a $^{144}Ce-^{144}Pr$ antineutrino generator placed 8.5~m below the Borexino liquid scintillator detector. In view of the SOX experiment, a precise knowledge of the energy response and the spatial reconstruction of the antineutrino events is very important. Consequently, a calibration campaign of the Borexino detector is foreseen before the beginning of the SOX data taking. This paper briefly reviews the techniques used for calibrate the Borexino detector

Optical pulsing in a resonator with a highly dispersive nonlinearity

By introducing an intracavity Doppler shift in a resonator with a highly dispersive nonlinear medium, a train of optical pulses is generated whose features are related to the slow/fast-light response of the medium. The cavity transmission is asymmetric and the pulse shape is modified differently depending on the direction of the Doppler shift, hence, on the sign of the group delay provided by the dispersive process. \ua9 2012 Optical Society of America