Signal Stability Studies with the Askaryan Under-Ice Radio Array

High energy astrophysical neutrinos are useful for understanding the origins of high energy cosmic rays, which have been a mystery for almost a century. Such neutrinos can be detected via coherent radio Cerenkov emission resulting from neutrino induced particle showers in ice. The Askaryan Under-Ice...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Suchyta, Eric
Other Authors: Beatty, James
Format: Thesis
Language:English
Published: The Ohio State University 2010
Subjects:
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/1811/45674
Description
Summary:High energy astrophysical neutrinos are useful for understanding the origins of high energy cosmic rays, which have been a mystery for almost a century. Such neutrinos can be detected via coherent radio Cerenkov emission resulting from neutrino induced particle showers in ice. The Askaryan Under-Ice Radio Array (AURA) is an Antarctic test array of five detectors intended to study technology and analysis techniques for a future large scale radio Cherenkov neutrino array. One important input parameter for the design of such a future array is the radio frequency attenuation length in the Antarctic ice. In order to measure the ice’s radio frequency attenuation length, radio signals are broadcast from a transmitter and received at the AURA detectors; by comparing the signal strength observed in two different detectors, one can measure the attenuation length. We present a preliminary stability study of extracting power signals from AURA waveforms, in preparation for the radio frequency attenuation length measurement. We define a signal extraction algorithm then proceed to determine under what conditions and to what degree a reliable power signal can be extracted. Applying the algorithm, we demonstrate good linearity for large signals and perform a statistical uncertainty exercise. No embargo