Search for High-energy Neutrinos from Ultraluminous Infrared Galaxies with IceCube
Rasha Abbasi, M. Ackermann, J. Adams, J. A. Aguilar, M. Ahlers, M. Ahrens, Cyril Martin Alispach, A. A. Alves, N. M. Amin, R. An, K. Andeen, T. Anderson, G. Anton, C. Argüelles, Yosuke Ashida, Spencer Axani, X. Bai, Aswathi Balagopal, Anastasia Maria Barbano, S. W. Barwick, Benjamin Bastian, Vedant Basu, S. Baur, R. Bay, J. J. Beatty, K. Becker, J. Becker Tjus, Chiara Bellenghi, S. BenZvi, D. Berley, E. Bernardini, D. Besson, G. Binder, D. Bindig, E. Blaufuss, Summer Blot, Matthias Boddenberg, Federico Bontempo, Jürgen Borowka, S. Böser, O. Botner, J. Böttcher, Etienne Bourbeau, Federica Bradascio, J. Braun, S. Bron, Jannes Brostean-Kaiser, Sally-Ann Browne, A. Burgman, Ryan T. Burley, Raffaela Busse, Michael Campana, Erin Carnie-Bronca, Kunal Deoskar, D. Chirkin, K. Choi, Brian Clark, K. Clark, Lew Classen, Alan Coleman, G. H. Collin, J. M. Conrad, Paul Coppin, Pablo Correa, D. F. Cowen, R. Cross, Christian Dappen, Pranav Dave, C. De Clercq, James DeLaunay, H.-P. Dembinski, Kunal Deoskar, S. De Ridder, Abhishek Desai, P. Desiati, K. D. de Vries, G. de Wasseige, M. de With, T. DeYoung, Sukeerthi Dharani, A. Diaz, J. C. Díaz–Vélez, Markus Dittmer, Hrvoje Dujmović, M. Dunkman, M. A. DuVernois, Emily Dvorak, Thomas Ehrhardt, P. Eller, R. Engel, Hannah Erpenbeck, John Evans, P. A. Evenson, Kwok Lung Fan, A. R. Fazely, Sebastian Fiedlschuster, Aaron Fienberg, K. Filimonov, C. Finley, Leander Fischer
Abstract
Abstract Ultraluminous infrared galaxies (ULIRGs) have infrared luminosities L IR ≥ 10 12 L ⊙ , making them the most luminous objects in the infrared sky. These dusty objects are generally powered by starbursts with star formation rates that exceed 100 M ⊙ yr −1 , possibly combined with a contribution from an active galactic nucleus. Such environments make ULIRGs plausible sources of astrophysical high-energy neutrinos, which can be observed by the IceCube Neutrino Observatory at the South Pole. We present a stacking search for high-energy neutrinos from a representative sample of 75 ULIRGs with redshift z ≤ 0.13 using 7.5 yr of IceCube data. The results are consistent with a background-only observation, yielding upper limits on the neutrino flux from these 75 ULIRGs. For an unbroken E −2.5 power-law spectrum, we report an upper limit on the stacked flux <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" overflow="scroll"> <mml:msubsup> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi mathvariant="normal">Φ</mml:mi> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:msub> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi>ν</mml:mi> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi>μ</mml:mi> </mml:mrow> </mml:msub> <mml:mo>+</mml:mo> <mml:msub> <mml:mrow> <mml:mover accent="true"> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi>ν</mml:mi> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>¯</mml:mo> </mml:mrow> </mml:mover> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi>μ</mml:mi> </mml:mrow> </mml:msub> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mn>90</mml:mn> <mml:mo>%</mml:mo> </mml:mrow> </mml:msubsup> <mml:mo>=</mml:mo> <mml:mn>3.24</mml:mn> <mml:mo>×</mml:mo> <mml:msup> <mml:mrow> <mml:mn>10</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>−</mml:mo> <mml:mn>14</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> </mml:msup> <mml:mspace width="0.25em"/> <mml:msup> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi>TeV</mml:mi> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>−</mml:mo> <mml:mn>1</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> </mml:msup> <mml:mspace width="0.25em"/> <mml:msup> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi>cm</mml:mi> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>−</mml:mo> <mml:mn>2</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> </mml:msup> <mml:mspace width="0.25em"/> <mml:msup> <mml:mrow> <mml:mi mathvariant="normal">s</mml:mi> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>−</mml:mo> <mml:mn>1</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> </mml:msup> <mml:mspace width="0.25em"/> <mml:msup> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo stretchy="false">(</mml:mo> <mml:mi>E</mml:mi> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo stretchy="true">/</mml:mo> </mml:mrow> <mml:mn>10</mml:mn> <mml:mspace width="0.25em"/> <mml:mi>TeV</mml:mi> <mml:mo stretchy="false">)</mml:mo> </mml:mrow> <mml:mrow> <mml:mo>−</mml:mo> <mml:mn>2.5</mml:mn> </mml:mrow> </mml:msup> </mml:math> at 90% confidence level. In addition, we constrain the contribution of the ULIRG source population to the observed diffuse astrophysical neutrino flux as well as model predictions.