294 research outputs found
Comment on "Including Systematic Uncertainties in Confidence Interval Construction for Poisson Statistics"
The incorporation of systematic uncertainties into confidence interval
calculations has been addressed recently in a paper by Conrad et al. (Physical
Review D 67 (2003) 012002). In their work, systematic uncertainities in
detector efficiencies and background flux predictions were incorporated
following the hybrid frequentist-Bayesian prescription of Cousins and Highland,
but using the likelihood ratio ordering of Feldman and Cousins in order to
produce "unified" confidence intervals. In general, the resulting intervals
behaved as one would intuitively expect, i.e. increased with increasing
uncertainties. However, it was noted that for numbers of observed events less
than or of order of the expected background, the intervals could sometimes
behave in a completely counter-intuitive fashion -- being seen to initially
decrease in the face of increasing uncertainties, but only for the case of
increasing signal efficiency uncertainty. In this comment, we show that the
problematic behaviour is due to integration over the signal efficiency
uncertainty while maximising the best fit alternative hypothesis likelihood. If
the alternative hypothesis likelihood is determined by unconditionally
maximising with respect to both the unknown signal and signal efficiency
uncertainty, the limits display the correct intuitive behaviour.Comment: Submitted to Physical Review
Treatment of the background error in the statistical analysis of Poisson processes
The formalism that allows to take into account the error sigma_b of the
expected mean background b in the statistical analysis of a Poisson process
with the frequentistic method is presented. It is shown that the error sigma_b
cannot be neglected if it is not much smaller than sqrt(b). The resulting
confidence belt is larger that the one for sigma_b=0, leading to larger
confidence intervals for the mean mu of signal events.Comment: 15 pages including 2 figures, RevTeX. Final version published in
Phys. Rev. D 59 (1999) 11300
Search for Solar Axions Produced in the Reaction
A search for the axioelectric absorption of 5.5-MeV solar axions produced in
the reaction was performed with
two BGO detectors placed inside a low-background setup. A model independent
limit on axion-photon and axion-nucleon couplings was obtained: . Constraints on the axion-electron
coupling constant were obtained for axions with masses in the MeV
range: . The solar positron flux from
decay was determined for axions with masses . Using the existing experimental data on the interplanetary positron
flux, a new constraint on the axion-electron coupling constant for axions with
masses in the MeV range was obtained: .Comment: 6 pages, 5 figure
On the alpha activity of natural tungsten isotopes
The indication for the alpha decay of 180-W with a half-life
T1/2=1.1+0.8-0.4(stat)+-0.3(syst)x10^18 yr has been observed for the first time
with the help of the super-low background 116-CdWO_4 crystal scintillators. In
conservative approach the lower limit on half-life of 180-W has been
established as T1/2>0.7x10^18 yr at 90% C.L. Besides, new T1/2 bounds were set
for alpha decay of 182-W, 183-W, 184-W and 186-W at the level of 10^20 yr.Comment: 16 pages, 8 figures, accepted in Phys. Rev.
Decaying Dark Matter can explain the electron/positron excesses
PAMELA and ATIC recently reported excesses in e+ e- cosmic rays. Since the
interpretation in terms of DM annihilations was found to be not easily
compatible with constraints from photon observations, we consider the DM decay
hypothesis and find that it can explain the e+ e- excesses compatibly with all
constraints, and can be tested by dedicated HESS observations of the Galactic
Ridge. ATIC data indicate a DM mass of about 2 TeV: this mass naturally implies
the observed DM abundance relative to ordinary matter if DM is a quasi-stable
composite particle with a baryon-like matter asymmetry. Technicolor naturally
yields these type of candidates.Comment: 20 pages, 7 figure
Gamma-ray and radio tests of the e+e- excess from DM annihilations
PAMELA and ATIC recently reported an excess in e+e- cosmic rays. We show that
if it is due to Dark Matter annihilations, the associated gamma-ray flux and
the synchrotron emission produced by e+e- in the galactic magnetic field
violate HESS and radio observations of the galactic center and HESS
observations of dwarf Spheroidals, unless the DM density profile is
significantly less steep than the benchmark NFW and Einasto profiles.Comment: 16 pages, 4 figures; v2: normalizations fixed in Table 2 and typos
corrected (no changes in the analysis nor the results), some references and
comments added; v3: minor additions, matches published versio
Search for flavor-changing neutral currents and lepton-family-number violation in two-body D0 decays
Results of a search for the three neutral charm decays, D0 -> mu e, D0 -> mu
mu, and D0 -> e e, are presented. This study was based on data collected in
Experiment 789 at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory using 800 GeV/c
proton-Au and proton-Be interactions. No evidence is found for any of the
decays. Upper limits on the branching ratios, at the 90% confidence level, are
obtained.Comment: 28 pages, 18 figures. Submitted to Physical Review
New Insights into White-Light Flare Emission from Radiative-Hydrodynamic Modeling of a Chromospheric Condensation
(abridged) The heating mechanism at high densities during M dwarf flares is
poorly understood. Spectra of M dwarf flares in the optical and
near-ultraviolet wavelength regimes have revealed three continuum components
during the impulsive phase: 1) an energetically dominant blackbody component
with a color temperature of T 10,000 K in the blue-optical, 2) a smaller
amount of Balmer continuum emission in the near-ultraviolet at lambda 3646
Angstroms and 3) an apparent pseudo-continuum of blended high-order Balmer
lines. These properties are not reproduced by models that employ a typical
"solar-type" flare heating level in nonthermal electrons, and therefore our
understanding of these spectra is limited to a phenomenological interpretation.
We present a new 1D radiative-hydrodynamic model of an M dwarf flare from
precipitating nonthermal electrons with a large energy flux of erg
cm s. The simulation produces bright continuum emission from a
dense, hot chromospheric condensation. For the first time, the observed color
temperature and Balmer jump ratio are produced self-consistently in a
radiative-hydrodynamic flare model. We find that a T 10,000 K
blackbody-like continuum component and a small Balmer jump ratio result from
optically thick Balmer and Paschen recombination radiation, and thus the
properties of the flux spectrum are caused by blue light escaping over a larger
physical depth range compared to red and near-ultraviolet light. To model the
near-ultraviolet pseudo-continuum previously attributed to overlapping Balmer
lines, we include the extra Balmer continuum opacity from Landau-Zener
transitions that result from merged, high order energy levels of hydrogen in a
dense, partially ionized atmosphere. This reveals a new diagnostic of ambient
charge density in the densest regions of the atmosphere that are heated during
dMe and solar flares.Comment: 50 pages, 2 tables, 13 figures. Accepted for publication in the Solar
Physics Topical Issue, "Solar and Stellar Flares". Version 2 (June 22, 2015):
updated to include comments by Guest Editor. The final publication is
available at Springer via http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11207-015-0708-
- …