HEP-Astro Seminar | Low-Energy Physics in Liquid Argon Time Projection Chamber Neutrino Detectors

Liquid argon time projection chamber (LArTPC) detectors have become the global technology of choice for performing neutrino flavor oscillation measurements with accelerator neutrino beams. The millimeter-precision 3D images these detectors produce contain meters-long tracks and showers generated by neutrino interaction products, as well as mm-scale blips generated by isolated MeV-scale energy depositions. While GeV track and shower features have been extensively leveraged for oscillation and neutrino-nucleus cross-section measurements, MeV-scale blip features are comparatively under-studied, despite their ability to uniquely access a range of physics and astrophysics signatures. In this talk, I will overview the physics benefits of MeV-scale reconstruction in neutrino LArTPCs, including solar and supernova neutrino burst detection, improved particle identification and hadronic calorimetry for beam neutrino measurements, and more. I will also present work performed by the LArTPC-focused Littlejohn Neutrino research Group experiment at IIT that has created new low-energy LArTPC reconstruction tools, demonstrated new MeV-scale LArTPC physics capabilities, and performed new particle physics measurements relying on these new techniques.