Searching for sub-eV Sterile Neutrinos in Neutrino Telescopes

Abstract

With the forthcoming deployment of IceCube-Upgrade, unprecedented statistics of atmospheric neutrinos in the energy range (1-100) GeV will become available, providing a valuable opportunity to probe physics beyond the Standard Model in the neutrino sector. In this study, we calculate the sensitivity of the IceCube-Upgrade to sterile neutrinos with mass-squared splittings $\lesssim 1~{\rm eV}^2$. We demonstrate that, particularly due to the (1-10) GeV energy window, $\nu_\mu-\nu_s$ mixing angles as small as $\sim5^\circ$ can be probed by IceCube-Upgrade for all mass-squared splittings below $1~{\rm eV}^2$. Furthermore, we investigate the potential impact of a sterile neutrino state on the precision determination of standard atmospheric neutrino mixing parameters in the IceCube-Upgrade.