Neutral current coherent cross-sections — Implications on detecting SN and earth neutrinos with gaseous spherical TPC’s

Abstract

The detection of galactic supernova (SN) neutrinos represents one of the future frontiers of low energy neutrino physics and astrophysics. The neutron coherence of neutral currents (NCs) allows quite large cross-sections in the case of neutron rich targets, which can be exploited in detecting earth and sky neutrinos by measuring nuclear recoils. They are relatively cheap and easy to maintain. These (NC) cross-sections are not dependent on flavor conversions and, thus, their measurement will provide useful information about the neutrino source. In particular, they will yield information about the primary neutrino fluxes and perhaps about the spectrum after flavor conversions in neutrino sphere. They might also provide some clues about the neutrino mass hierarchy. The advantages of large gaseous low threshold and high resolution time projection counters (TPC) detectors are discussed.