First Constraints on the Ultra-High Energy Neutrino Flux from a Prototype Station of the Askaryan Radio Array

• Main Authors: ARA Collaboration, Allison, P., Auffenberg, J., Bard, R., Beatty, J. J., Besson, D. Z., Bora, C., Chen, C. -C., Chen, P., Connolly, A., Davies, J. P., DuVernois, M. A., Fox, B., Gorham, P. W., Hanson, K., Hill, B., Hoffman, K. D., Hong, E., Hu, L. -C., Ishihara, A., Karle, A., Kelley, J., Kravchenko, I., Landsman, H., Laundrie, A., Li, C. -J., Liu, T., Lu, M. -Y., Maunu, R., Mase, K., Meures, T., Miki, C., Nam, J., Nichol, R. J., Nir, G., O'Murchadha, A., Pfendner, C. G., Ratzlaff, K., Richman, M., Rotter, B., Sandstrom, P., Seckel, D., Shultz, A., Stockham, J., Stockham, M., Sullivan, M., Touart, J., Tu, H. -Y., Varner, G. S., Yoshida, S., Young, R.
• Format: Text
• Language: unknown
• Published: arXiv 2014
• Subjects: High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena astro-ph.HE; Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics astro-ph.IM; FOS Physical sciences; Antarctic; The Antarctic; South Pole; Antarc*; South pole
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.48550/arxiv.1404.5285; https://arxiv.org/abs/1404.5285

The Askaryan Radio Array (ARA) is an ultra-high energy ($>10^{17}$ eV) cosmic neutrino detector in phased construction near the South Pole. ARA searches for radio Cherenkov emission from particle cascades induced by neutrino interactions in the ice using radio frequency antennas ($\sim150-800$ MHz) deployed at a design depth of 200 m in the Antarctic ice. A prototype ARA Testbed station was deployed at $\sim30$ m depth in the 2010-2011 season and the first three full ARA stations were deployed in the 2011-2012 and 2012-2013 seasons. We present the first neutrino search with ARA using data taken in 2011 and 2012 with the ARA Testbed and the resulting constraints on the neutrino flux from $10^{17}-10^{21}$ eV. : 26 pages, 15 figures. Since first revision, added section on systematic uncertainties, updated limits and uncertainty band with improvements to simulation, added appendix describing ray tracing algorithm. Final revision includes a section on cosmic ray backgrounds. Published in Astropart. Phys. J