Search for low-energy neutrinos from astrophysical sources with Borexino

Understand

We report on searches for neutrinos and antineutrinos from astrophysical sources performed with the Borexino detector at the Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso in Italy.

• Electron antineutrinos ($\bar{\nu}_e$) are detected in an organic liquid scintillator through the inverse $\beta$-decay reaction.
• In the present work we set model-independent upper limits in the energy range 1.8-16.8 MeV on neutrino fluxes from unknown sources that improve our previous results, on average, by a factor 2.5.
• Using the same data set, we first obtain experimental constraints on the diffuse supernova $\bar{\nu}_e$ fluxes in the previously unexplored region below 8 MeV.