Detection of supernova neutrinos by neutrino-proton elastic scattering

Abstract

We propose that neutrino-proton elastic scattering, ν+p→ν+p, can be used for the detection of supernova neutrinos in scintillator detectors. Though the proton recoil kinetic energy spectrum is soft, with Tp≃2Eν2/Mp, and the scintillation light output from slow, heavily ionizing protons is quenched, the yield above a realistic threshold is nearly as large as that from ν̅e+p→e++n. In addition, the measured proton spectrum is related to the incident neutrino spectrum, which solves a long-standing problem of how to separately measure the total energy and temperature of νμ, ντ, ν̅μ, and ν̅τ. The ability to detect this signal would give detectors like KamLAND and Borexino a crucial and unique role in the quest to detect supernova neutrinos.

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