Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astrophysics
Scientific paper
Jan 1995
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=1995phdt.........4l&link_type=abstract
Thesis (PH.D.)--BOSTON UNIVERSITY, 1995.Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 56-01, Section: B, page: 0302.
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Astrophysics
Magnetic Monopoles
Scientific paper
A search for a supermassive magnetic monopole has been performed using the Monopole Astrophysics and Cosmic Ray Observatory (MACRO), an underground detector at the Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso, near L'Aquila, Italy. Monopoles are predicted to exist by Grand Unified Theories (GUTs) of particle physics, which attempt to unify the strong, electromagnetic and weak forces. Due to their large mass (of the order of 10^{17 } GeV), these particles could only be produced in the very early universe. Therefore, they are expected to exist only as relics of the Big Bang. Astrophysical arguments indicate that they would be moving slowly, at velocities several orders of magnitude below that of light. The MACRO detector was designed primarily to detect such relic GUT monopoles. In my analysis, three independent elements of the MACRO detector were used: liquid scintillation counters; a limited streamer tube tracking system utilizing Helium as the active detection element; and the track etch plastics, CR-39 and Lexan. This work is the first to use the three elements of the MACRO detector together in a monopole search. Active searches were performed independently in the scintillator and streamer tube systems, with confirmation of potential candidate events being performed in all three systems. No monopole candidates were found in the two searches, with the scintillator search covering a total live time of 3705 hours (6 months of real time), and the streamer tube search covering a longer live time of 10,535 hours (1.5 years of real time). This corresponds to an upper limit on the total flux of monopoles in the solar system of 4.1 times 10^{-15} cm^{-2}s^ {-1}sr^{-1} for velocities in the range 2.0 times 10^{-4}c <= v<= 2.0 times 10 ^{-3}c, where c is the speed of light, from the scintillator analysis, and a limit of 1.9 times 10^{-15 } cm^{-2}s ^{-1}sr^ {-1} for velocities in the range 1.1 times 10^{-4} c<= v<= 5.0 times 10 ^{-3}c, from the streamer tube analysis. These limits are significantly more sensitive than any previously published results using comparable detection techniques. Finally, in the next 5 years of operation, MACRO will either detect the first magnetic monopole, or it will set an upper limit on the monopole flux of the order of 10^{-16} cm^{-2}s ^{-1}sr^{-1 }.
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