Observation in the MINOS far detector of the shadowing of cosmic rays by the sun and moon

Adamson, P. et al. (2011) Observation in the MINOS far detector of the shadowing of cosmic rays by the sun and moon. Astroparticle Physics, 34(6), pp. 457-466. (doi: 10.1016/j.astropartphys.2010.10.010)

Abstract

The shadowing of cosmic ray primaries by the moon and sun was observed by the MINOS far detector at a depth of 2070 mwe using 83.54 million cosmic ray muons accumulated over 1857.91 live-days. The shadow of the moon was detected at the 5.6 σ level and the shadow of the sun at the 3.8 σ level using a log-likelihood search in celestial coordinates. The moon shadow was used to quantify the absolute astrophysical pointing of the detector to be 0.17 ± 0.12°. Hints of interplanetary magnetic field effects were observed in both the sun and moon shadow.

• Item Type: Articles
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Litchfield, Dr Phillip
• Authors: Adamson, P., Andreopoulos, C., Ayres, D.S., Backhouse, C., Barr, G., Barrett, W.L., Bishai, M., Blake, A., Bock, B., Bock, G.J., Boehnlein, D.J., Bogert, D., Bower, C., Budd, S., Cavanaugh, S., Cherdack, D., Childress, S., Choudhary, B.C., Cobb, J.H., Coelho, J.A.B., Coleman, S.J., Corwin, L., Cronin-Hennessy, D., Danko, I.Z., de Jong, J.K., Devenish, N.E., Diwan, M.V., Dorman, M., Escobar, C.O., Evans, J.J., Falk, E., Feldman, G.J., Frohne, M.V., Gallagher, H.R., Godley, A., Gomes, R.A., Goodman, M.C., Gouffon, P., Gran, R., Grant, N., Grashorn, E.W., Grzelak, K., Habig, A., Harris, D., Harris, P.G., Hartnell, J., Hatcher, R., Himmel, A., Holin, A., Huang, X., Hylen, J., Ilic, J., Irwin, G.M., Isvan, Z., Jaffe, D.E., James, C., Jensen, D., Kafka, T., Kasahara, S.M.S., Koizumi, G., Kopp, S., Kordosky, M., Krahn, Z., Kreymer, A., Lang, K., Lefeuvre, G., Ling, J., Litchfield, P.J., Litchfield, R.P., Loiacono, L., Lucas, P., Mann, W.A., Marshak, M.L., Marshall, J.S., Mayer, N., McGowan, A.M., Mehdiyev, R., Meier, J.R., Messier, M.D., Michael, D.G., Miller, W.H., Mishra, S.R., Mitchell, J., Moore, C.D., Mualem, L., Mufson, S., Musser, J., Naples, D., Nelson, J.K., Newman, H.B., Nichol, R.J., Nicholls, T.C., Oliver, W.P., Orchanian, M., Paley, J., Patterson, R.B., Pawloski, G., Pearce, G.F., Peterson, E.A., Pittam, R., Plunkett, R.K., Ratchford, J., Raufer, T.M., Rebel, B., Reichenbacher, J., Rodrigues, P.A., Rosenfeld, C., Rubin, H.A., Ryabov, V.A., Sanchez, M.C., Schneps, J., Schreiner, P., Semenov, V.K., Shanahan, P., Sousa, A., Strait, M., Tagg, N., Talaga, R.L., Thomas, J., Thomson, M.A., Thron, J.L., Tinti, G., Toner, R., Tzanakos, G., Urheim, J., Vahle, P., Viren, B., Weber, A., Webb, R.C., White, C., Whitehead, L., Wojcicki, S.G., Wright, D.M., Yang, T., and Zwaska, R.
• College/School: College of Science and Engineering > School of Physics and Astronomy
• Journal Name: Astroparticle Physics
• Publisher: Elsevier
• ISSN: 0927-6505
• ISSN (Online): 1873-2852
• Published Online: 25 October 2010