NEUTRINO-INDUCED AND ATMOSPHERIC SINGLE-MUON FLUXES MEASURED OVER 5 DECADES OF INTENSITY BY LVD AT GRAN-SASSO-LABORATORY

Authors
AGLIETTA M ALPAT B ALYEA ED ANTONIOLI P BADINO G BAN Y BARI G BASILE M BENELLI A BEREZINSKY VS BERTONI R BIANCO S BIZZETI A BOSCO A BRUGNOLA G BRUNI G CAO Y ROMEO GC CASTAGNOLI C CASTELLINA A CHEN K CHEN R CHIAVASSA A CHINELLATO JA CIFARELLI L CINDOLO F CONFORTO G CONG S CONTIN A DADYKIN VL DESIATI P DEPASQUALE S DESILVA A DEUTSCH M DOMINICI P DOSSANTOS LG ENIKEEV RI FABBRI FL FULGIONE W GALEOTTI P GHIA P GIUSTI P GRIANTI F GU S GUIDI G GUO Y HAFEN ES HARIDAS P IACOBUCCI G INOUE N KHALCHUKOV FF KOROLKOVA EV KORTCHAGUIN PV KORTCHAGUIN VB KUDRYAVTSEV VA LANDI G LAU K LIN X LU L LUVISETTO M MA J MA Z MACCARRONE G MALGUIN AS MANTOVANI R MAO Z MARKOV MA MASSAM T MAYES B MELAGRANA C SILVA NM MISAKI A MO GH MONTELEONI B MORELLO C MOROMISATO J NANIA R NAVARRA G PANARO L PARKS D PELFER PG PERIALE L PICCHI P PINNA P PINSKY L PLESS IA PU M PYRLIK J SANTINI S SARTORELLI G SHEN D TABORGNA N TALOCHKIN VP TANG H TANG J TIAN W TRINCHERO GC TURTELLI A UMAN I VALLANIA P VERNETTO S VETRANO F VIGORITO C VONGOELER E VOTANO L WADA T WANG F WANG H WANG S WEINSTEIN R WIDGOFF M XU L XU Z YAKUSHEV VF YAMAMOTO I ZATSEPIN GT ZHOU X ZHU Q ZHU X ZHUANG B ZICHICHI A
Citation
M. Aglietta et al., NEUTRINO-INDUCED AND ATMOSPHERIC SINGLE-MUON FLUXES MEASURED OVER 5 DECADES OF INTENSITY BY LVD AT GRAN-SASSO-LABORATORY, Astroparticle physics, 3(4), 1995, pp. 311-320
Citations number
31
Categorie Soggetti
Astronomy & Astrophysics","Physics, Particles & Fields
Journal title
Astroparticle physics → ACNP
ISSN journal
09276505
Volume
3
Issue
4
Year of publication
1995
Pages
311 - 320
Database
ISI
SICI code
0927-6505(1995)3:4<311:NAASFM>2.0.ZU;2-J
Abstract
We report data taken by the LVD Experiment during a live-time period o f 11 556 h. We have measured the muon intensity at slant depths of sta ndard rock from about 3000 hg/cm(2) to about 20 000 hg/cm(2). This is an exclusive study, namely our data include only events containing sin gle muons. This interval of slant depth extends into the region where the dominant source of underground muons seen by LVD is the interactio n of atmospheric neutrinos with the rock surrounding LVD. The interest ing result is that this flux is independent of slant depth beyond a sl ant depth of about 14 000 hg/cm(2) of standard rock. Due to the unique topology of the Gran Sasso Laboratory the muons beyond about 14 000 h g/cm(2) of standard rock are al a zenithal angle near 90 degrees. Henc e we have, for this fixed angle, a muon flux which is independent of s lant depth. This is direct evidence that this flux is due to atmospher ic neutrinos interacting in the rock surrounding LVD. The value of thi s flux near 90 degrees is (8.3 +/- 2.6) x 10(-13) cm(-2) s(-1) sr(-1), which is the first reported measurement at a zenithal angle near 90 d egrees and for slant depths between 14 000 and 20 000 hg/cm(2). Our da ta cover over five decades of vertical intensity, and can be fit with just three parameters over the full range of our experiment. This is t he first time a single experiment reports the parameters of a fit made to the vertical intensity over such a large range of standard rock sl ant depth. The results are compared with a Monte Carlo simulation whic h has as one of the two free parameters gamma(pi k) the power index of the differential energy spectrum of the pions and kaons in the atmosp here. This comparison yields a value of 2.75 +/- 0.03 for gamma(pi k), where the error includes the systematic uncertainties. Our data are c ompared to other measurements made in our slant depth interval. We als o report the value of the muon flux in Gran Sasso at theta = 90 degree s as a function of the azimuthal angle.