Journal article
Constraining the Prompt Atmospheric Neutrino Flux combining IceCube’s Cascade and Track samples
The European physical journal. C, Particles and fields, v 86(7), p814
14 Jul 2026
Abstract
Abstract The IceCube Neutrino Observatory has observed a diffuse flux of high-energy astrophysical neutrinos for more than a decade. A relevant background to the astrophysical flux is prompt atmospheric neutrinos, originating from the decay of charmed mesons produced in cosmic-ray-induced air showers. The production rate of charmed mesons in the very forward phase space of hadronic interactions, and consequently, the prompt neutrino flux, remains uncertain and has not yet been observed by neutrino detectors. An accurate measurement of this flux would enhance our understanding of fundamental particle physics such as hadronic interactions in high-energy cosmic-ray-induced air showers and the nucleon structure. Furthermore, an experimental characterization of this background flux will improve the precision of astrophysical neutrino flux spectral measurements. In this work, we perform a combined fit of cascade-like and track-like neutrino events in IceCube to constrain the prompt atmospheric neutrino flux. Given that the prompt flux is a sub-dominant contribution, treating systematic uncertainties arising from the potential mis-modeling of the conventional and astrophysical neutrino fluxes is critical for its measurement. Our analysis yields a non-zero best-fit result, which is, however, consistent with the null hypothesis of no prompt flux within one standard deviation. Consequently, we establish an upper bound on the flux at4× 10⁻¹⁶4 × 10 - 16 (GeV m²2 s sr)⁻¹- 1 at 10TeV.
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Details
- Title
- Constraining the Prompt Atmospheric Neutrino Flux combining IceCube’s Cascade and Track samples
- Creators
- IceCube Collaboration
- Publication Details
- The European physical journal. C, Particles and fields, v 86(7), p814
- Publisher
- SpringerOpen
- Number of pages
- 10
- Grant note
- U.S. National Science Foundation-Office of Polar Programs U.S. National Science Foundation-Physics Division U.S. National Science Foundation-EPSCo U.S. National Science Foundation-Office of Advanced Cyberinfrastructure Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation Center for High Throughput Computing (CHTC) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Open Science Grid (OSG) Partnership to Advance Throughput Computing (PATh) Advanced Cyberinfrastructure Coordination Ecosystem: Services& Support (ACCESS) Frontera and Ranch computing project at the Texas Advanced Computing Center U.S. Department of Energy-National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center article astrophysics research computing center at the University of Maryland Institute for Cyber-Enabled Research at Michigan State University Astroparticle physics computational facility at Marquette University NVIDIA Corporation Google Cloud Platform Funds for Scientific Research (FRS-FNRS and FWO) FWO Belgian Federal Science Policy Office (Belspo) Bundesministerium fur Bildung und Forschung (BMBF) Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) Helmholtz Alliance for Astroparticle Physics (HAP) Initiative and Networking Fund of the Helmholtz Association Deutsches Elektronen Synchrotron (DESY) High Performance Computing cluster of the RWTH Aachen Swedish Research Council Swedish Polar Research Secretariat Swedish National Infrastructure for Computing (SNIC) Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation European Union - EGI Advanced Computing for research Australia - Australian Research Council Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada Calcul Quebec Compute Ontario Canada Foundation for Innovation WestGrid Digital Research Alliance of Canada Villum Fonden Carlsberg Foundation European Commission New Zealand - Marsden Fund Japan Society for Promotion of Science (JSPS) Institute for Global Prominent Research (IGPR) of Chiba University Korea - National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) Switzerland - Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF)
The IceCube Collaboration acknowledges the significant contributions to this manuscript from Jakob Bottcher, Philipp Furst, and Christopher Wiebusch. The authors gratefully acknowledge the support from the following agencies and institutions: USA - U.S. National Science Foundation-Office of Polar Programs, U.S. National Science Foundation-Physics Division, U.S. National Science Foundation-EPSCoR, U.S. National Science Foundation-Office of Advanced Cyberinfrastructure, Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, Center for High Throughput Computing (CHTC) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Open Science Grid (OSG), Partnership to Advance Throughput Computing (PATh), Advanced Cyberinfrastructure Coordination Ecosystem: Services& Support (ACCESS), Frontera and Ranch computing project at the Texas Advanced Computing Center, U.S. Department of Energy-National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center, Particle astrophysics research computing center at the University of Maryland, Institute for Cyber-Enabled Research at Michigan State University, Astroparticle physics computational facility at Marquette University, NVIDIA Corporation, and Google Cloud Platform; Belgium - Funds for Scientific Research (FRS-FNRS and FWO), FWO Odysseus and Big Science programmes, and Belgian Federal Science Policy Office (Belspo); Germany - Bundesministerium fur Bildung und Forschung (BMBF), Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG), Helmholtz Alliance for Astroparticle Physics (HAP), Initiative and Networking Fund of the Helmholtz Association, Deutsches Elektronen Synchrotron (DESY), and High Performance Computing cluster of the RWTH Aachen; Sweden - Swedish Research Council, Swedish Polar Research Secretariat, Swedish National Infrastructure for Computing (SNIC), and Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation; European Union - EGI Advanced Computing for research; Australia - Australian Research Council; Canada - Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, Calcul Quebec, Compute Ontario, Canada Foundation for Innovation, WestGrid, and Digital Research Alliance of Canada; Denmark - Villum Fonden, Carlsberg Foundation, and European Commission; New Zealand - Marsden Fund; Japan - Japan Society for Promotion of Science (JSPS) and Institute for Global Prominent Research (IGPR) of Chiba University; Korea - National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF); Switzerland - Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF).
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Language
- English
- Academic Unit
- Physics
- Web of Science ID
- WOS:001837403300002
- Other Identifier
- 991022201578204721