Using evolutionary algorithms to design antennas with greater sensitivity to ultrahigh energy neutrinos

Abstract

The Genetically Evolved NEutrino Telescopes for Improved Sensitivity project seeks to optimize detectors in physics for science outcomes in high-dimensional parameter spaces. In this project, we designed an antenna using a genetic algorithm with a science outcome directly as the sole figure of merit. This paper presents initial results on the improvement of an antenna design for in-ice neutrino detectors using the current Askaryan Radio Array (ARA) experiment as a baseline. By optimizing for the effective volume using the evolved antenna design in ARA, we improve upon ARA's simulated sensitivity to ultrahigh energy neutrinos by 11%, despite using limited parameters in this initial investigation. Future improvements will continue to increase the computational efficiency of the genetic algorithm and the complexity and fitness of the antenna designs. This work lays the foundation for continued research and development of methods to increase the sensitivity of detectors in physics and other fields in parameter spaces of high dimensionality. © 2023 American Physical Society.