Neutrino emission from the collapse of ∼104 M⊙ Population III supermassive stars

Abstract

ABSTRACT We calculate the neutrino signal from Population III supermassive star (SMS) collapse using a neutrino transfer code originally developed for core-collapse supernovae and massive star collapse. Using this code, we are able to investigate the SMS mass range thought to undergo neutrino trapping (∼104 M⊙), a mass range which has been neglected by previous works because of the difficulty of neutrino transfer. For models in this mass range, we observe a neutrino sphere with a large radius and low density compared to typical massive star neutrino spheres. We calculate the neutrino light curve emitted from this neutrino sphere. The resulting neutrino luminosity is significantly lower than the results of a previous analytical model. We briefly discuss the possibility of detecting a neutrino burst from an SMS or the neutrino background from many SMSs and conclude that the former is unlikely with current technology, unless the SMS collapse is located as close as 1 Mpc, while the latter is also unlikely even under very generous assumptions. However, the SMS neutrino background is still of interest as it may serve as a source of noise in proposed dark matter direct detection experiments.