Probing the pseudo-Dirac neutrino scenario at IceCube with Galactic plane neutrino flux

The IceCube Neutrino Observatory recently published evidence for diffuse neutrino emission from

the Galactic Plane (GP) at 4.5σ significance. This new source of astrophysical neutrinos provides an

exciting laboratory for probing the nature of neutrino masses. In particular, extremely small mass

splittings––such as those predicted by pseudo-Dirac (PD) neutrino mass models—would induce

detectable oscillation signatures in neutrinos with TeV-scale energies traversing kiloparsec-scale

baselines. Using updated galactic neutrino emission models, we find that IceCube can differentiate

Standard Model and PD scenarios for previously unexplored mass splittings in the 10^-14 eV² ≲

δm2 ≲ 10^-12 eV² range. Our analysis doesn’t consider astrophysical background flux from sources

other than the GP. These initial results strongly motivate an official IceCube analysis, taking into

account astrophysical background flux.