Pre-supernova Alert System for Super-Kamiokande
In 2020, the Super-Kamiokande (SK) experiment moved to a new stage (SK-Gd) in which gadolinium (Gd) sulfate octahydrate was added to the water in the detector, enhancing the efficiency to detect thermal neutrons and consequently improving the sensitivity to low energy electron anti-neutrinos from inverse beta decay (IBD) interactions. SK-Gd has the potential to provide early alerts of incipient core-collapse supernovae through detection of electron anti-neutrinos from thermal and nuclear processes responsible for the cooling of massive stars before the gravitational collapse of their cores. These pre-supernova neutrinos emitted during the silicon burning phase can exceed the energy threshold for IBD reactions. We present the sensitivity of SK-Gd to pre-supernova stars and the techniques used for the development of a pre-supernova alarm based on the detection of these neutrinos in SK, as well as prospects for future SK-Gd phases with higher concentrations of Gd. For the current SK-Gd phase, high-confidence alerts for Betelgeuse could be issued up to 9 hr in advance of the core collapse itself.
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- Astronomy & Astrophysics
- 5109 Space sciences
- 5107 Particle and high energy physics
- 5101 Astronomical sciences
- 0306 Physical Chemistry (incl. Structural)
- 0202 Atomic, Molecular, Nuclear, Particle and Plasma Physics
- 0201 Astronomical and Space Sciences
Citation
Published In
DOI
EISSN
ISSN
Publication Date
Volume
Issue
Related Subject Headings
- Astronomy & Astrophysics
- 5109 Space sciences
- 5107 Particle and high energy physics
- 5101 Astronomical sciences
- 0306 Physical Chemistry (incl. Structural)
- 0202 Atomic, Molecular, Nuclear, Particle and Plasma Physics
- 0201 Astronomical and Space Sciences