Sensitivity of the NEMO telescope to neutrinos from microquasars

We present the results of Monte Carlo simulation studies of the capability of the proposed NEMO telescope to detect TeV muon neutrinos from Galactic microquasars. In particular we determined the number of the detectable events from each known microquasar together with the expected atmospheric neutrino and muon background events. We also discuss the detector sensitivity to neutrino fluxes expected from microquasars, optimizing the event selection in order to reject the atmospheric background, and we show the number of events surviving the event selection.Comment: To be published on CRIS06 proceedings (Catania, Italy, May 29 - June 2, 2006

Detection potential to point-like neutrino sources with the NEMO-km3 telescope

The NEMO Collaboration is conducting an R&D activity towards the construction of a Mediterranean km3 neutrino telescope. In this work, we present the results of Monte Carlo simulation studies on the capability of the proposed NEMO telescope to detect and identify point-like sources of high energy muon neutrinos.Comment: To be published on BCN06 proceedings (Barcelona, July 4-7, 2006

Measurement of the atmospheric muon flux with the NEMO Phase-1 detector

The NEMO Collaboration installed and operated an underwater detector including prototypes of the critical elements of a possible underwater km3 neutrino telescope: a four-floor tower (called Mini-Tower) and a Junction Box. The detector was developed to test some of the main systems of the km3 detector, including the data transmission, the power distribution, the timing calibration and the acoustic positioning systems as well as to verify the capabilities of a single tridimensional detection structure to reconstruct muon tracks. We present results of the analysis of the data collected with the NEMO Mini-Tower. The position of photomultiplier tubes (PMTs) is determined through the acoustic position system. Signals detected with PMTs are used to reconstruct the tracks of atmospheric muons. The angular distribution of atmospheric muons was measured and results compared with Monte Carlo simulations.Comment: Astrop. Phys., accepte

Sensitivity and pointing accuracy of the NEMO km3^3 telescope

n this paper we present the results of Monte Carlo simulation studies on the capability of the proposed NEMO km3 telescope to detect high energy neutrinos. We calculated the detector sensitivity to muon neutrinos coming from a generic point-like source. We also simulated the lack of atmospheric muons in correspondence to the Moon disk in order to determine the detector angular resolution and to check the absolute pointing capability.Comment: To be published on VLVNT2 proceedings (Catania, Italy, November 8-11, 2005

Flux predictions of high-energy neutrinos from pulsars

Young, rapidly rotating neutron stars could accelerate ions from their surface to energies of $\sim 1$ PeV. If protons reach such energies, they will produce pions (with low probability) through resonant scattering with x-rays from the stellar surface. The pions subsequently decay to produce muon neutrinos. Here we calculate the energy spectrum of muon neutrinos, and estimate the event rates at Earth. The spectrum consists of a sharp rise at $\sim 50$ TeV, corresponding to the onset of the resonance, above which the flux drops with neutrino energy as $\epsilon_\nu^{-2}$ up to an upper-energy cut-off that is determined by either kinematics or by the maximum energy to which protons are accelerated. We estimate event rates as high as 10-100 km^${-2}$ yr$^{-1}$ from some candidates, a flux that would be easily detected by IceCube. Lack of detection would allow constraints on the energetics of the poorly-understood pulsar magnetosphere.Comment: MNRAS, 6 pages, 3 figures, 1 table. Minor editorial changes and typos correcte