Measurement of the AtmosphericνeSpectrum with IceCube

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Abstract

We present a measurement of the atmospheric ${\ensuremath{\nu}}_{e}$ spectrum at energies between 0.1 and 100 TeV using data from the first year of the complete IceCube detector. Atmospheric ${\ensuremath{\nu}}_{e}$ originate mainly from the decays of kaons produced in cosmic-ray air showers. This analysis selects 1078 fully contained events in 332 days of live time, and then identifies those consistent with particle showers. A likelihood analysis with improved event selection extends our previous measurement of the conventional ${\ensuremath{\nu}}_{e}$ fluxes to higher energies. The data constrain the conventional ${\ensuremath{\nu}}_{e}$ flux to be $1.{3}_{\ensuremath{-}0.3}^{+0.4}$ times a baseline prediction from a Honda's calculation, including the knee of the cosmic-ray spectrum. A fit to the kaon contribution ($\ensuremath{\xi}$) to the neutrino flux finds a kaon component that is $\ensuremath{\xi}=1.{3}_{\ensuremath{-}0.4}^{+0.5}$ times the baseline value. The fitted/measured prompt neutrino flux from charmed hadron decays strongly depends on the assumed astrophysical flux and shape. If the astrophysical component follows a power law, the result for the prompt flux is $0.{0}_{\ensuremath{-}0.0}^{+3.0}$ times a calculated flux based on the work by Enberg, Reno, and Sarcevic.

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