Neutrino Mass Ordering Studies with PINGU and IceCube/DeepCore

TL;DR

This paper discusses the potential of PINGU and IceCube/DeepCore detectors to determine the neutrino mass ordering through simulation studies and analysis of atmospheric neutrino data.

Contribution

It presents the current status of Monte Carlo simulation studies and projected sensitivity of DeepCore for neutrino mass ordering determination.

Findings

DeepCore provides high-statistics atmospheric neutrino data

Simulation studies help understand systematic effects

Projected sensitivity indicates potential for NMO determination

Abstract

The Precision IceCube Next Generation Upgrade (PINGU) is a proposed extension to the IceCube detector. The design of PINGU would augment the existing 86 strings with an additional 40 with the main goal of determining the neutrino mass ordering (NMO). Preliminary studies of the NMO can start with IceCube/DeepCore, a sub-array of more densely- packed strings in operation since 2011. This detector has a neutrino energy threshold of roughly 10 GeV and allows for high-statistics datasets of atmospheric neutrinos to be collected. This data provides a unique opportunity to better understand the systematic effects involved in making the NMO measurement by comparing the simulation studies to real data. These proceedings will present the current status of these studies in Monte Carlo simulations with projected DeepCore sensitivity for the NMO.