High-energy neutrinos are detected by the IceCube Observatory in the
direction of NGC 1068, the archetypical type II Seyfert galaxy. The neutrino
flux, surprisingly, is more than an order of magnitude higher than the
γ-ray upper limits at measured TeV energy, posing tight constraints on
the physical conditions of a neutrino production site. We report an analysis of
the sub-millimeter, mid-infrared, and ultraviolet observations of the central
50 pc of NGC 1068 and suggest that the inner dusty torus and the region where
the jet interacts with the surrounding interstellar medium (ISM) may be a
potential neutrino production site. Based on radiation and magnetic field
properties derived from observations, we calculate the electromagnetic cascade
of the γ-rays accompanying the neutrinos. Our model may explain the
observed neutrino flux above ∼10 TeV and contribute to 20% of the
neutrino flux at 3 TeV. It predicts a unique sub-TeV γ-ray component,
which could be identified by a future observation. Jet-ISM interactions are
commonly observed in the proximity of jets of both supermassive and
stellar-mass black holes. Our results imply that such interaction regions could
be γ-ray obscured neutrino production sites, which are needed to explain
the IceCube diffuse neutrino flux.Comment: 8 pages, 4 figures, 1 tabl