One of the most energetic events in the Universe is the core-collapse Supernova (SN) where almost all the star's binding energy is released as neutrinos. These particles are direct probes of the processes occurring in the stellar core and provide unique… Leggi tutto insights into the gravitational collapse and the neutrino properties. Currently, astroparticle physics is in need of SN observations and of a detection technique highly sensitive to all neutrino flavors. RES-NOVA will revolutionize how we detect neutrinos from astrophysical sources by deploying the first array of cryogenic detectors made from archaeological Pb. Neutrino detection in RES-NOVA is facilitated by the newly discovered Coherent Elastic neutrino-Nucleus Scattering (CEvNS). It enables the first measurement of the full SN neutrino signal, eradicating the uncertainties related to flavor oscillations. To fully exploit the advantages of CEvNS, RES-NOVA ennobles Pb from being a passive shielding to the most sensitive detector component. Pb has the highest cross-section, 10^4 times higher than all used detection channels, enabling the deployment of a cm-scale neutrino observatory. The unconventional approach of RES-NOVA is to use ultra-pure archaeological Pb and run it as a cryogenic detector with low-energy threshold (<1 keV) and unprecedented background (<0.001 c/ton/keV/s). These features also open new opportunities in multi-messenger astronomy, Dark Matter, and neutrino property studies. The success of my pioneer work in operating archaeological Pb-based cryogenic detectors is pivotal for RES-NOVA realization. RES-NOVA will survey 90% of the potential galactic SNe, with only a total detector volume of (30 cm)^3. Future detector upgrades will enhance our SN-sensitivity into the uncharted territory >1 Mpc and increase the SN observation rate. RES-NOVA has the potential to lay the foundations for a future generation of European neutrino telescopes, as all its SN neutrino detectors are currently going offline.

This Implementing Agreement No.1 is a specific agreement to implement the cooperative activities in accordance with Article 2 of the Cooperation Agreement and shall be subject to the terms and conditions thereof, which are incorporated herein by this reference including,… Leggi tutto but not limited to, provisions on confidentiality, applicable law and dispute resolution. In avoidance of doubt, the terms and conditions of the Cooperation Agreement take precedence over the other parts of the Implementing Agreement, unless the Cooperation Agreement has specifically allowed for derogation from its provisions.

After the success of the H2020 ESSνSB Design Study proving the feasibility of the upgrade of the European Spallation Source to become, in addition to a neutron facility, also a very competitive neutrino facility, we propose here a study to reinforce… Leggi tutto and develop complementary features to this proposal in order to improve and widen the scientific and technological scope. The key objective of the H2020 ESSνSB Design Study was to demonstrate the feasibility of using the European Spallation Source (ESS) proton linac to produce the world's most intense neutrino beam concurrently with the 5 MW proton beam to be used for the production of spallation neutrons. After accomplishing all deliverables and the publication of the ESSνSB CDR, this is now fully demonstrated. With the present Design Study, it is proposed to take further steps towards its realization by introducing complementary studies and enlarging its scope by making studies on synergetic aspects of the project. The ESSνSB+ high-level objectives are to: • Study the civil engineering needed for the facility implementation at the ESS site as well as those needed for the ESSνSB far detector site. • Study the feasibility and implementation of a special target station for pion production and extraction for injection to a low energy nuSTORM decay ring and to a low energy Monitored Neutrino Beam decay tunnel, for neutrino cross-section measurements. • Study the low energy nuSTORM decay ring and the injection of the pions and muons from the special target station. • Study the low energy ENUBET-like Monitored Neutrino Beam decay tunnel and the injection of the pions and muons from the special target station. • Study the capabilities of the proposed setup for sterile neutrino searches and astroparticle physics. • Promote the ESSνSB project proposal to its stakeholders, including scientists, politicians, funders, industrialists and the general public in order to pave the way to include this facility in the ESFRI list.

In the next few years, electromagnetic and gravitational-wave facilities will uncover the elusive population of intermediate-mass black holes (IMBHs), the likely progenitors of present-day supermassive black holes. The upcoming detections promise to revolutionise our understanding of the black-hole population across the cosmic… Leggi tutto epochs; in preparation for this exciting future, it is now fundamental to shed light on the debated dynamical processes governing the growth of IMBHs. TESIFA is the long-awaited program that will clarify the timespan black holes spend in the intermediate-mass range, thus allowing for a solid interpretation of the upcoming IMBH detections. Leveraging the emergent picture according to which IMBHs primarily grow via stellar accretion, TESIFA will numerically model the rates of tidal disruption events (TDEs, thousands of which will be detected by the Vera Rubin Observatory starting next year) and gravitational-wave-induced extreme mass ratio inspirals (EMRIs, accessible to the planned LISA mission) about IMBHs. By combining this approach with state-of-the-art observations of nearby stellar systems, TESIFA will place novel constraints on the local IMBH population. Furthermore, TESIFA will investigate the ratio between TDE and EMRI rates as a function of the host galaxy properties, so that the observed TDE rates could be used to forecast LISA EMRI rates. Overall, TESIFA will lay the foundation for understanding the IMBH demographics and best exploiting their upcoming observations. At Princeton University, the fellow will work alongside world-leading experts in the field of IMBH observations; she will learn the challenges affecting the observations of IMBHs and their hosts, as well as the capabilities and limits of electromagnetic facilities. The planned training will perfectly complement the fellow’s extensive numerical expertise, making her a well rounded scientist and placing her at the forefront of the research targeting IMBHs.

Gravitational-wave astronomy is entering its large-statistics regime. Catalogs with thousands of gravitational-wave events will soon be available, providing a wealth of information on the most compact objects in the Universe --black holes and neutron stars. These new datasets need new tools to… Leggi tutto be exploited effectively in order to maximize their scientific impact. GWmining is an ambitious program to explore upcoming gravitational-wave catalogs with data-mining techniques. We will develop a complete framework to analyze gravitational-wave data in light of astrophysical predictions. Going beyond phenomenological models, we will train machine-learning algorithms directly on large banks of populationsynthesis simulations and post-Newtonian integrations. The development of these astrophysical predictions requires new modeling strategies to accurately capture all the gravitational-wave observables, notably spins and eccentricities. Combined with a hierarchical Bayesian analysis, our neural network will deliver the most stringent measurements to date on elusive phenomena influencing the lives of massive stars. We will constrain phenomena such as binary common envelope, supernova kicks, stellar winds, tidal interactions, etc. Besides harnessing the catalog in its entirety, our complete framework will put us at the forefront to analyze outliers -- golden events with favorable properties of one or more parameters. We will design a complete strategy to exploit the strongest signals to infer exquisite details of the relativistic dynamics of their sources. GWmining is a unique project strategically placed at the intersection of astronomy, data analysis, and relativity. As the large-statistics revolution of gravitational-wave astronomy unfolds, GWmining will pioneer the application of datamining techniques in gravitational-wave population studies, setting the foundations of this booming field for decades.

The direct detection of gravitational waves from binary stellar-mass black hole systems in our Universe provides a wealth of astrophysical information which is now within our reach. These binaries merge in the LIGO and Virgo detector frequency sensitivity bands, and were once… Leggi tutto sweeping through the LISA band, emitting at much lower frequencies. In LIGO, the binary mergers appear both as single, resolved events and as a multitude of incoherent signals, known as the stochastic gravitational-wave background. In LISA, a similar picture will be seen, where a few binaries are directly resolved, while the vast majority build up a stochastic signal. With StochRewind, we will draw out all binary black hole information measured by LIGO and Virgo to calibrate the LISA mission, providing a crucial ingredient for LISA data analysis methods. First, we focus on the stochastic background in LIGO, and deliver a brand new pipeline which maximises our chances for detection. Then, we analyse the implications of the LIGO black hole detections and stochastic background for LISA, delivering the first data-based prediction of the LISA binary black hole stochastic background, fully exploiting our multi-band gravitational-wave knowledge. It is essential that StochRewind be hosted by an institute which can supplement the fellow's first-hand experience in stochastic LIGO data analysis with knowledge on black hole population analysis and LISA astrophysics. UniMiB is a unique institution which counts top experts in both these fields, providing an environment which bridges the gap between LISA and LIGO. These revolutionary science objectives will be paired with advanced training objectives tailored to the fellow's personal career development plan, rooted in what UniMiB and the collaborations have to offer. StochRewind will have far-reaching impacts on the community, which will reap the benefits for decades to come.

Our cosmological model predicts that most of the matter in the universe is distributed in a network of filaments - the Cosmic Web - in which galaxies form and evolve. Because most of this material is too diffuse to form stars,… Leggi tutto its direct imaging has remained elusive for several decades leaving fundamental questions still open, including: what are the morphological and kinematical properties of the Cosmic Web on both small (kpc) and large (Mpc) scales? How do galaxies get their gas from the Cosmic Web? In this programme, I will tackle these questions with an innovative method and technology that allows us to directly detect in emission the gaseous Cosmic Web before the peak of galaxy formation, when the universe is less than 3 billion years old: using bright quasars and galaxies as “cosmic flashlights” to make the gas “fluorescently” glow. Although challenging, detecting such emission is possible: I have recently demonstrated that some parts of the Cosmic Web illuminated by bright quasars can be detected in both hydrogen Lyman-alpha and H-alpha emission. These pilot studies and new instruments such as VLT/MUSE and the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST; available from 2021) are the ideal stepping stones for a revolution in the field, the main goals of this programme: 1) direct imaging of the average Cosmic Web extending on cosmological scales (tens of Mpc) in the young universe, away from quasars; 2) revealing the small-scale distribution (below one kpc) of gas within Cosmic Web filaments. For this aim, I will use the deepest available observations to date, including a 160-hours deep integration that is being obtained through our MUSE Guaranteed Time of Observations, and future ground-based Adaptive-Optics and JWST infrared H-alpha observations. These datasets will be combined with new data analysis methods and numerical models that will be specifically developed in this programme opening up a completely new window to study cosmic structure and galaxy formation.

The currently favoured Lambda-Cold-Dark-Matter (ΛCDM) cosmological model makes specific predictions about the abundance, structure and clustering of dark matter halos (DMHs), the sites where galaxies form. These predictions are accurate at describing large scale observations. On smaller scales, the agreement between ΛCDM… Leggi tutto and observations of dwarf galaxies is unclear because (i) the structure of DMHs depends on particularities of different galaxy formation models, and (ii) observations of dwarfs suffer from sizable uncertainties. Is ΛCDM successful on small scales? A definite answer to this major open question may either reveal the nature of DM or change dramatically our understanding of structure formation in the Universe. My research will deliver the foundations to probe ΛCDM on unprecedented small scales by exploiting a fundamental prediction of the model: the existence of nearby DM-dominated “dark” galaxies (so-called RELHICs). RELHICs are pristine collapsed DMHs that contain sufficient gas leftover from the epoch of reionization to recombine and emit radiation that can be observed in 21 cm (or recombination lines) but without becoming self-shielding and forming stars. Firstly, I will develop and analyse high-resolution hydrodynamical simulations performed with state-of-the-art numerical codes that include cutting-edge galaxy formation and radiative-transfer (RT) models to predict the abundance and clustering of RELHICs. Secondly, I will design robust survey strategies targeted at detecting RELHICs with current and upcoming observing facilities (e.g., ALMA, FAST, MEERKAT, WALLABY). The detection and characterization of REHICs will offer an unprecedented and clean probe to ΛCDM on scales that have not yet been probed. My extensive expertise in numerical simulations, cosmology and galaxy formation, combined with that of Prof. Michele Fumagalli in RT and physics of the interstellar medium will enable me to materialize my predictions into observational probes

The aim of the DART WARS project is to boost the sensitivity of experiments based on low-noise superconducting detectors. This goal will be reached through the development of wideband superconducting amplifiers with noise at the quantum limit and the implementation of a… Leggi tutto quantum limited read out in different types of superconducting detectors. Noise at the quantum limit over a large bandwidth is a fundamental requirement for challenging future applications, like neutrino mass measurement, next generation x-ray observatory, cosmic microwave background (CMB) measurement, and dark matter and axion detection. The sensitivity and the bandwidth of microcalorimeter detectors such as Transition Edge Sensors (TESs) and Microwave Kinetic Inductance Detectors (MKIDs) using dissipative readout are limited by the noise temperature and bandwidth of the cryogenic amplifier. Likewise, resonant axion detectors, such as haloscopes, must probe a range of frequencies of several GHz keeping the system noise to the lowest possible level. The need for a quantum limited microwave amplifier with large bandwidth operating at millikelvin temperatures is also particularly felt in many quantum technology applications, for example the rapid high-fidelity multiplexed readout of superconducting qubits. To this end, devices called traveling wave parametric amplifiers (TWPAs) are currently being developed. The nonlinear element of TWPAs is provided by Josephson junctions or by the kinetic inductance of a high-resistivity superconductor.The DART WARS project is a research effort to improve the performance and reliability of these amplifiers with the study of new materials and with improved microwave and thermal engineering. The long-term goal is to demonstrate, for the first time, the readout with different sensors (TESs, MKIDs, microwave cavities) opening the concrete possibility to increase the sensitivity of the next generation particle physics experiments.