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Research

I. PhD Thesis Research

II. Talks & Presentations

III. Past Research Projects
IV. Listening Project

V. Publications

I. PhD Thesis Research

My thesis research is to use Monte Carlo Markov Chain (MCMC) -- a Bayesian inference tool -- with Hamiltonian Monte Carlo on the NOvA Near and Far Detector data to obtain best fit values for the parameters that govern neutrino oscillation.


Talks and Presentations

Michael Dolce, for the NOvA Collaboration, Fitting NOvA cross-section parameters with Markov Chain Monte Carlo, Talk at New Perspectives 2021, Fermilab, USA, August 16 to 19, 2021. Invited talk at New Perspectives conference on fitting neutrino cross section parameters.

Michael Dolce, for the NOvA Collaboration, NOvA central value tuning and uncertainties for the hN FSI model in GENIE 3, Talk at New Perspectives 2020, Fermilab, USA, July 20 to July 21, 2020. Invited talk at New Perspectives conference on FSI Systematics.

Michael Dolce, for the NOvA Collaboration, NOvA central value tuning and uncertainties for the hN FSI model in GENIE 3, Poster at Neutrino 2020, Chicago, USA, June 22 to July 2, 2020.

Michael Dolce, for the DUNE collaboration, Optimization of the LBNF/DUNE beamline for tau neutrinos, Talk at conclusion of SULI program, Brookhaven National Laboratory, USA, August 12, 2016.


II. Past Research Projects

Nuclear Binding Energy

In neutrino interactions, neutrinos commonly interact with a single proton/neutron rather than the whole nucleus. However, because protons/neutrons (i.e. a nucleon) live within a nucleus, a nucleon that is observed by a detector has overcome some "potential" energy to exit the nucleus from which it was bound -- often called the nuclear binding energy. This energy is critical in neutrino experiments because in order to measure the parameters that govern its oscillation, we must reconstruct the neutrino's energy as precisely as possible. This includes the nuclear binding energy since this energy lost to the nucleus originated from the neutrino. This potential energy is very difficult to directly measure and various models have been proposed to correctly account for this energy (sometimes also called the removal energy). My work involved was to incorporate a specific binding energy physics model into the NOvA experiment's simulation and determine the impact of the model on NOvA's prediction.


hN FSI model tuning and uncertainties

Also within the nucleus is a phenomenon called Final State Interactions (FSI). When a neutrino interacts with a neutron inside the nucleus, a proton is created and in some cases produces a pion. This pion must also traverse the nuclear medium before it can be observed in our detectors. However, there a number of interactions a pion can experience before we can observe it. For example, the pion can be absorbed into the nucleus, and therefore is never observed in our detector. In this case, the estimate for the true neutrino energy would be missing the contribution of energy from the pion, further hindering a reasonable estimate of the true neutrino energy (similar to the binding energy), and therefore preventing a precise measurement of the neutrino oscillation parameters. To improve NOvA's simulation, I have tuned an existing FSI physics model to form better agreement with external data. By improving this FSI model, NOvA can more accurately predict when such a FSI interaction occurs, such as the example of an absorbed pion in the nucleus, thereby improving NOvA's simulation to predict neutrino energies and their interactions.


Signal processing of MicroBooNE detector

The MicroBooNE neutrino experiment uses a Liquid Argon Time Projection Chamber (LArTPC) detector to provide high resolution reconstruction of particle interactions. In this LArTPC, there is a single anode wire plane with a voltage applied that collects charges from interacting particles. In this study, data was collected of various anode voltage configurations and I identified which voltage configuration produced the strongest signal from background noise by measuring the charge deposited from tracks in a series of different orientations.


Optimization of tau neutrinos in DUNE

The Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE), is the neutrino experiment of the future. It will not begin taking data for a few more years. However, there are many studies that can be done before data-taking begins. For example, to understand how to optimize the appearance of tau neutrinos in the DUNE Far Detectors. My study sought to understand this question by analyzing configurations of the target complex at the Long Baseline Neutrino Facitilty (LBNF) in Fermilab, the source of the neutrino beam.


III. HHMI Listening Project

Tufts University is an active member in the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) Listening Project. The project seeks to "substantially and sustainably increase their capacity for inclusion of all students, especially those students who belong to groups underrepresented in science." Throughout the year, Tufts STEM faculty and graduate students meet to elicit and engage with student thinking from real student interactions from our own classes.
As a teaching assistant (TA) for introductory physics courses, I contributed several of my own classroom interactions with students to group sessions with faculty and graduate students where we can improve our ability to listen to and understand student thinking in the various forms in a college classroom.
In the last several years I have been a coach for new graduate students involved in the Listening Project. Throughout the semester I meet with pairs of Listeners to engage in student artifacts from their classes and to improve their listening to students' thoughts and ideas.
A flier for the project can be found here.

Publications

NOvA Collaboration, M.A. Acero et al. [NOvA and R. Group], ``An Improved Measurement of Neutrino Oscillation Parameters by the NOvA Experiment'' , arxiv:2108.08219 [hep-ex].

NOvA Collaboration, M.A. Acero et al. [NOvA and R. Group], ``Extended search for supernova-like neutrinos in NOvA coincident with LIGO/Virgo detections'' , arxiv:2106.06035 [astro-ph.HE].

NOvA Collaboration, M.A. Acero et al. [NOvA and R. Group], ``Search for active-sterile antineutrino mixing using neutral-current interactions with the NOvA experiment'', arXiv:2106.04673 [hep-ex].

NOvA Collaboration, M.A. Acero et al. [NOvA and R. Group], ``Seasonal Variation of Multiple-Muon Cosmic Ray Air Showers Observed in the NOvA Detector on the Surface'', arXiv:2105.03848 [hep-ex].

NOvA Collaboration, M.A. Acero et al. [NOvA and R. Group], ``Search for Slow Magnetic Monopoles with the NOvA Detector on the Surface'', arXiv:2009.04867 [hep-ex].

NOvA Collaboration, M. Acero et al., ``Supernova neutrino detection in NOvA'', arXiv:2005.07155 [physics.ins-det].

MicroBooNE collaboration, C. Adams, ``Ionization electron signal processing in single phase LArTPCs. Part II. Data/simulation comparison and performance in MicroBooNE'', ``JINST'' 13 (2018) P07007, [1804.02583].