Search for an eV-Scale Sterile Neutrino Using Improved High-Energy Event Reconstruction in IceCube
R. Abbasi (Department of Physics, Loyola University Chicago, Chicago, Illinois 60660, USA); M. Ackermann (Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY, Platanenallee 6, D-15738 Zeuthen, Germany); J. Adams (Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Canterbury, Private Bag 4800, Christchurch, New Zealand); S. K. Agarwalla (Department of Physics and Wisconsin IceCube Particle Astrophysics Center, University of Wisconsin—Madison, Madison, Wisconsin 53706, USA); J. A. Aguilar (Université Libre de Bruxelles, Science Faculty CP230, B-1050 Brussels, Belgium); et al - Show all 422 authors
This Letter presents the result of a sterile neutrino search using 10.7 yr of IceCube data. We analyze atmospheric muon neutrinos that traverse the Earth with energies ranging from 0.5 to 100 TeV, incorporating significant improvements in modeling neutrino flux and detector response compared to earlier studies. Notably, for the first time, we categorize data into starting and throughgoing events, distinguishing neutrino interactions with vertices inside or outside the instrumented volume, to improve energy resolution. The best-fit point for a model is found to be at and , which agrees with previous iterations of this Letter. The result is consistent with the null hypothesis of no sterile neutrinos with a value of 3.1%.