The IceCube Neutrino Observatory is a cubic-kilometer-scale high-energy neutrino detector built into the ice at the South Pole. Construction of IceCube, the largest neutrino detector built to date, was completed in 2011 and enabled the discovery of high-energy astrophysical neutrinos. We describe here the design, production, and calibration of the IceCube digital optical module (DOM), the cable systems, computing hardware, and our methodology for drilling and deployment. We also describe the...
Topics: Astrophysics, Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics, Physics, Instrumentation and Detectors
Source: http://arxiv.org/abs/1612.05093

We describe and report the status of a neutrino-triggered program in IceCube that generates real-time alerts for gamma-ray follow-up observations by atmospheric-Cherenkov telescopes (MAGIC and VERITAS). While IceCube is capable of monitoring the whole sky continuously, high-energy gamma-ray telescopes have restricted fields of view and in general are unlikely to be observing a potential neutrino-flaring source at the time such neutrinos are recorded. The use of neutrino-triggered alerts thus...
Topics: Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics, Physics, Astrophysics, High Energy Astrophysical...
Source: http://arxiv.org/abs/1610.01814

We report constraints on the sources of ultra-high-energy cosmic ray (UHECR) above $10^{9}$ GeV, based on an analysis of seven years of IceCube data. This analysis efficiently selects very high energy neutrino-induced events which have deposited energies from $\sim 10^6$ GeV to above $10^{11}$ GeV. Two neutrino-induced events with an estimated deposited energy of $(2.6 \pm 0.3) \times 10^6$ GeV, the highest neutrino energies observed so far, and $(7.7 \pm 2.0) \times 10^5$ GeV were detected....
Topics: Astrophysics, High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena, Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics
Source: http://arxiv.org/abs/1607.05886

We present an improved event-level likelihood formalism for including neutrino telescope data in global fits to new physics. We derive limits on spin-dependent dark matter-proton scattering by employing the new formalism in a re-analysis of data from the 79-string IceCube search for dark matter annihilation in the Sun, including explicit energy information for each event. The new analysis excludes a number of models in the weak-scale minimal supersymmetric standard model (MSSM) for the first...
Topics: Astrophysics, High Energy Physics - Phenomenology, Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics, High...
Source: http://arxiv.org/abs/1601.00653

We have conducted three searches for correlations between ultra-high energy cosmic rays detected by the Telescope Array and the Pierre Auger Observatory, and high-energy neutrino candidate events from IceCube. Two cross-correlation analyses with UHECRs are done: one with 39 cascades from the IceCube `high-energy starting events' sample and the other with 16 high-energy `track events'. The angular separation between the arrival directions of neutrinos and UHECRs is scanned over. The same events...
Topics: High Energy Physics - Experiment, Astrophysics, Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics, High...
Source: http://arxiv.org/abs/1511.02109

Papers submitted to the 34th International Cosmic Ray Conference (ICRC 2015, The Hague) by the IceCube-Gen2 Collaboration.
Topics: Physics, Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics, Astrophysics, Instrumentation and Detectors,...
Source: http://arxiv.org/abs/1510.05228

The recent observation by the IceCube neutrino observatory of an astrophysical flux of neutrinos represents the "first light" in the nascent field of neutrino astronomy. The observed diffuse neutrino flux seems to suggest a much larger level of hadronic activity in the non-thermal universe than previously thought and suggests a rich discovery potential for a larger neutrino observatory. This document presents a vision for an substantial expansion of the current IceCube detector,...
Topics: Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics, High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena, Astrophysics,...
Source: http://arxiv.org/abs/1412.5106

A search for high-energy neutrinos interacting within the IceCube detector between 2010 and 2012 provided the first evidence for a high-energy neutrino flux of extraterrestrial origin. Results from an analysis using the same methods with a third year (2012-2013) of data from the complete IceCube detector are consistent with the previously reported astrophysical flux in the 100 TeV - PeV range at the level of $10^{-8}\, \mathrm{GeV}\, \mathrm{cm}^{-2}\, \mathrm{s}^{-1}\, \mathrm{sr}^{-1}$ per...
Topics: High Energy Physics - Experiment, High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena, Astrophysics, Cosmology and...
Source: http://arxiv.org/abs/1405.5303

The IceCube Neutrino Observatory is a large Cherenkov detector instrumenting $1\,\mathrm{km}^3$ of Antarctic ice. The detector can be used to search for signatures of particle physics beyond the Standard Model. Here, we describe the search for non-relativistic, magnetic monopoles as remnants of the GUT (Grand Unified Theory) era shortly after the Big Bang. These monopoles may catalyze the decay of nucleons via the Rubakov-Callan effect with a cross section suggested to be in the range of...
Topics: High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena, Astrophysics, Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics
Source: http://arxiv.org/abs/1402.3460