Neutrino Telescopes and High-Energy Cosmic Neutrinos
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
See attached file.
Comments for author File: 
Comments.pdf
Author Response
Dear Referee,
many thanks! We found valuable your comments and those we have received from the other two Referees. We gladly used the occasion you offered us to improve the presentation, sometimes significantly - e.g., in the introductory section and in the reference list, now much wider.
We worked hard to try our best to adhere to the term of 10 days for the revision indicated by the Editor: please find included below the revised text, where the changes have been emphasized in blue, along with succinct answer to your report, please see the attached file.
Best regards,
The Authors
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
General comments
This review gives a concise summary of the state of neutrino telescopes and astrophysical neutrinos. With the exception of Sec. 7 (see detailed comments), I found the content to be well organized. However, I think some sections could benefit from additional substance and some of the language should be modified to be more accurate. There’s not much historical perspective, which I think could be useful especially in the detector section. E.g. DUMAND and AMANDA are ignored. Section 6 focuses on three evidences for astrophysical neutrinos, but the physics program is much richer. There is no discussion of all-sky source searches, cross section measurements, and BSM physics. I think there needs to be a broader coverage of experimental results. References are lacking throughout the text. For example in the detector section there are no references to detector papers, discussions of angular resolution should have references, there are additional recent self-veto references that should be included etc. Since this is a review, references at the appropriate locations are important to give the reader information on where to look up additional details. It would be nice to have a full diagram of a detector.
Detailed comments
E_knee à E_ankle (4) should have E_pi/4 “thumb rule” à “rule of thumb” Around L84: Is there a particular adjective for the scaling? I don’t think I’ve heard it referred to simply as the “scaling” L86: CR nuclei is briefly mentioned, but it’s unclear from the text why pgamma with nuclei lead to photodisintegration while pp still produce neutrinos. L116-117: Is there a trials factor on this 3sigma? How is it consistent with IceCube, which is a km^3 detector that has been running for over six years? Around L119: “ordinary oscillations” à “oscillations” Before Eq. (12): some discussion of why averaging is appropriate is warranted. Around L125: “couple of muon (anti)neutrinos for each electron (anti)neutrino” this phrase with its parentheses is confusing. Perhaps better to just write out the decay chain. L128, 136-137: nutaus are rarely produced via charm but non-zero. Its detection is significant, but not proof that the neutrino is astrophysical. Just before Eq. (18): remove “atmospheric origin” L146: It should be mentioned that neutral current interactions affect the arrival spectrum, as does CC nutau + tau-regeneration (19): The exponential attenuation is an approximation and there are more sophisticated calculations available that give the full cascade solution (nuFATE, nuSQuIDS) that should be discussed. Sec 2.2: Glashow resonance (GR) is relevant L159: What is meant by “free”? Perhaps delete. L161: “relativistic, charged” L163-164: “the characterization of the diffuse neutrino flux” L173: “neutrino astronomy”à “source searches”. L174-175: The sentence starting with “Always remember…” is not really necessary L176-177: Refer to Sec. 4 L189: 125m for the main array, DeepCore is denser Sec 3.2.3: Discuss differences between ORCA and ARCA Sec 3.2.4: Additional details on GVD detector? L128: Describe what causes the shower. Start of pg. 11: nu/nubar can be distinguished via GR Start of pg. 11: “a shower of particles…” do you mean hadronic shower? Even that is not necessarily the case for W-> nu+lepton L228: What is meant by “passing”? Tracks can also start in the detector. L229: Partially contained cascades (vertex outside instrumented volume) can be reconstructed Paragraph starting at L237: Would be better to be more precise, comparing absorptivity and scattering in ice and water. L261: “Not produced” is too strong. They are rare but non-zero. 4.3 is dedicated to “double core” events but no mention was given in the intro of Sec. 4 Sec 4.4: There is no discussion of why GR is treated as a separate topology from cascade or track 6: What are the models shown? L309: “background events” L321: The muon does not have to be produced in the same decay as the neutrino, but the same airshower. The word “guaranteed” is too strong. 9: This looks like the event distributions in reconstructed energy, not the unfolded fluxes. Parts of Sec. 7 seems more appropriate near the beginning of the review. Section 7 itself should focus on constraints from data on these source classes. 7.2.2: The term “multiplet” is never defined besides saying “two or more neutrinos from one FSRQ…”. Over what time interval? L554: Should mention signalness is dependent on assumptions e.g. spectrum
Author Response
Dear Referee,
many thanks! We found valuable your comments and those we have received from the other two Referees. We gladly used the occasion you offered us to improve the presentation, sometimes significantly - e.g., in the introductory section and in the reference list, now much wider.
We worked hard to try our best to adhere to the term of 10 days for the revision indicated by the Editor: please find included below the revised text, where the changes have been emphasized in blue, along with succinct answer to your report, please see the attached file.
Best regards,
The Authors
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
This article reviews the status of high-energy neutrino astrophysics, both experimentally and theoretically. The authors cover a comprehensive list of subjects in a clear manner. They provide many physical insights and conceptual understanding of problems, which are very useful for the field. However, to be a maximally useful reference for the community, I believe it is crucial to re-organize the references in this article. Therefore I cannot recommend publication unless the authors significantly improve the references in the article.
High-energy neutrino astrophysics is an exciting and highly active field. Despite this fact, of the total 58 references in this article, there are 15 self-citations, compared to a total of 17 experimental citations and 26 citations to all other references. This gives a biased view of the activities in the field. In addition, there are few in-line citations. They are appropriate and necessary for references to be useful. For instance, on p. 3, there is a bold sentence stating that leading pions carry 1/5 of the proton energy. There should be at least one in-line reference after this sentence.
In addition, I have several more minor comments regarding the article.
Figure 3 is a little difficult to see. The two panels should be enlarged. The authors use the phrase “double core events” in Sec 4.3. This is not a commonly used phrase in this field. The last sentence in this paragraph could lead the readers to believe that this is a common terminology, when it is in fact not.
Author Response
Dear Referee,
many thanks! We found valuable your comments and those we have received from the other two Referees. We gladly used the occasion you offered us to improve the presentation, sometimes significantly - e.g., in the introductory section and in the reference list, now much wider.
We worked hard to try our best to adhere to the term of 10 days for the revision indicated by the Editor: please find included below the revised text, where the changes have been emphasized in blue, along with succinct answer to your report, please see the attached file.
Best regards,
The Authors
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REFEREE 3:
This article reviews the status of high-energy neutrino astrophysics, both experimentally and theoretically. The authors cover a comprehensive list of subjects in a clear manner. They provide many physical insights and conceptual understanding of problems, which are very useful for the field.
However, to be a maximally useful reference for the community, I believe it is crucial to re-organize the references in this article. Therefore I cannot recommend publication unless the authors significantly improve the references in the article.
High-energy neutrino astrophysics is an exciting and highly active field.
Despite this fact, of the total 58 references in this article, there are 15 self-citations, compared to a total of 17 experimental citations and 26 citations to all other references. This gives a biased view of the activities in the field.
ANSWER:
We have significantly improved the references in the article as recommended.
Concerning our papers, the notations and the procedures in the review work are closer to those that we use in our papers for evident reasons.
We cited those papers that are appropriate and useful for the review.
REFEREE 3:
In addition, there are few in-line citations. They are appropriate and necessary for references to be useful. For instance, on p. 3, there is a bold sentence stating that leading pions carry 1/5 of the proton energy. There should be at least one in-line reference after this sentence.
OUR ANSWER:
We have significantly increased the in-line citations and included two references in the specific point.
REFEREE 3:
In addition, I have several more minor comments regarding the article.
Figure 3 is a little difficult to see. The two panels should be enlarged.
The authors use the phrase ?double core events? in Sec 4.3. This is not a commonly used phrase in this field. The last sentence in this paragraph could lead the readers to believe that this is a common terminology, when it is in fact not.
ANSWER:
We have corrected the minor points and thank the Referee.
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
I thank the authors for the added historical section and clearer references. The only general comment I have is if the Sec. 8 only focuses on astrophysical results then this should be stated in the abstract and introduction. Line 7 should be “current status of astrophysical observations…”, line 90 should be “main observation results relevant for astrophysics” and the title of Sec. 7 should be changed as well to something more accurate.
Detailed comments
L76-77: KGF and CWI detected atmospheric neutrinos so “high energy neutrino” seems inaccurate. Perhaps just “atmospheric neutrinos were conducted …” L78 and elsewhere: “USSR” L81: lead à led L111: “still a matter” L324: tracks can also start in the detector L324: not necessarily due to numu_CC, can be from tau decay or GR for example L336: “typically induced” 5: should also mention tracks starting in the detector, especially since HESE results are discussed in the next section L413: no need to underline non-muonic neutrinos
Author Response
The only general comment I have is if the Sec. 8 only focuses on astrophysical results then this should be stated in the abstract and introduction.
Line 7 should be “current status of astrophysical observations…”,
line 90 should be “main observation results relevant for astrophysics” and the title of Sec. 7 should be changed as well to something more accurate.
ANSWER:
we have implemented the changes
Detailed comments
L76-77: KGF and CWI detected atmospheric neutrinos so “high energy neutrino” seems inaccurate. Perhaps just “atmospheric neutrinos were conducted …”
ANSWER
In our opinion the text is clear, as they searched for high-energy neutrinos and they found only high energy events, that can be explained as
atmospheric neutrinos. In order to avoid any confusion, we added a further clarifying statements later and reorganised slightly the sentence
but did not find evidence of other components in their dataset.
Shortly afterwards the idea emerged of building a much larger detector, about a kilometer in size,
as the way to proceed in the search for high-energy neutrinos from the cosmos.
L78 and elsewhere: “USSR”
ANSWER
thanks a lot, now it is OK
L81: lead --> led
ANSWER
thanks, fixed
L111: “still a matter”
ANSWER
changed
L324: tracks can also start in the detector
ANSWER
we specified
"The special case of $\nu_\mu$ CC interactions inside the detector will contain a shower originating in the interaction vertex
and an accompanying track as well."
L324: not necessarily due to numu_CC, can be from tau decay or GR for example
ANSWER
we begin the section with the statement "two main event classes” to state that they are not the only ones. In the revised text emphasized the word main by writing it in italics
L336: “typically induced” 5: should also mention tracks starting in the detector, especially since HESE results are discussed in the next section
ANSWER
We added the statement
"(As recalled above, there is also the possibility of track events that start inside the detector.)"
L413: no need to underline non-muonic neutrinos
ANSWER
We believe that the point deserves emphasis, as it is the main result of that paper. We write it in italics
Reviewer 3 Report
I appreciate the serious effort the authors put in to address my concerns about references. I believe the paper will be a valuable reference in the field.
Author Response
We are very thankful for the feedback and recognise gladly the significant help received by you and by the other reviewers.
