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arXiv · 2004.08394

Measuring Changes in the Atmospheric Neutrino Rate Over Gigayear Timescales

Johnathon R. Jordan·Sebastian Baum·Patrick Stengel·Alfredo Ferrari·Maria Cristina Morone·Paola Sala·Joshua Spitz
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Abstract

Measuring the cosmic ray flux over timescales comparable to the age of the solar system, $\sim 4.5\,$Gyr, could provide a new window on the history of the Earth, the solar system, and even our galaxy. We present a technique to indirectly measure the rate of cosmic rays as a function of time using the imprints of atmospheric neutrinos in paleo-detectors, natural minerals which record damage tracks from nuclear recoils. Minerals commonly found on Earth are $\lesssim 1\,$Gyr old, providing the ability to look back across cosmic ray history on timescales of the same order as the age of the solar system. Given a collection of differently aged samples dated with reasonable accuracy, this technique is particularly well-suited to measuring historical changes in the cosmic ray flux at Earth and is broadly applicable in astrophysics and geophysics.

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Johnathon R. Jordan, Sebastian Baum, Patrick Stengel, Alfredo Ferrari, Maria Cristina Morone, Paola Sala, Joshua Spitz. 2020-04-17. Measuring Changes in the Atmospheric Neutrino Rate Over Gigayear Timescales. https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevlett.125.231802

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