The ANTARES Neutrino Telescope

TL;DR

The ANTARES neutrino telescope, located deep in the Mediterranean Sea, detects high-energy neutrinos from astrophysical sources by observing Cherenkov light from muons, demonstrating its capabilities with initial data from 2007.

Contribution

This paper presents the design, deployment, and initial performance results of the ANTARES underwater neutrino telescope, a novel detector for astrophysical neutrinos.

Findings

Successful detection of downgoing muons in 2007 data

First reconstruction of upgoing neutrino-induced muons

Validation of detector performance and sensitivity

Abstract

The ANTARES underwater neutrino telescope, at a depth of 2475 m in the Mediterranean Sea, near Toulon, is taking data in its final configuration of 12 detection lines. Each line is equipped with 75 photomultipliers (PMT) housed in glass pressure spheres arranged in 25 triplets at depths between 100 and 450 m above the sea floor. The PMTs look down at 45^o to have better sensitivity to the Cherenkov light from upgoing muons produced in the interactions of high energy neutrinos traversing the Earth. Such neutrinos may arrive from a variety of astrophysical sources, though the majority are atmospheric neutrinos. The data from 5 lines in operation in 2007 yielded a sufficient number of downgoing muons with which to study the detector performances, the vertical muon intensity and reconstruct the first upgoing neutrino induced muons.