Prompt atmospheric neutrino fluxes: The role of parton distribution functions and constraints on intrinsic charm

by Prof. Günter Sigl (Universität Hamburg)

Monday 11 Dec 2023, 15:00 → 16:00 Europe/Berlin

CP-03-123 (TU Dortmund)

We discuss implications of heavy flavor measurements and particle physics theory on the prediction of the prompt neutrino fluxes. Data from the LHCb collaboration and from the ALICE experiment impose constraints on the gluon and the sea-quark distributions at low partonic fractions x of the proton momentum, down to x~10⁻⁶. The impact of the resulting parton distribution function in the predictions for the prompt atmospheric-neutrino fluxes is studied. Furthermore, we derive preliminary limits on the intrinsic charm content of the proton based on various theoretical models. Such upper limits on intrinsic charm follow from the condition that the total prompt neutrino flux from both the perturbative QCD heavy-flavour production and the process of freeing and hadronizing intrinsic charm saturates the experimental upper limit on the prompt neutrino flux from the IceCube experiment.

slides.pdf