Reconstruction and Simulation of Electric Field Polarization from the Antarctic Ross Ice-Shelf Antenna Neutrino Array (ARIANNA) at the South Pole

Ultra-high energy (UHE) neutrinos, of energies up to 10²⁰ eV, may provide important insight into understanding the exact nature of cosmic ray sources. The Antarctic Ross Ice-Shelf Antenna Neutrino Array (ARIANNA) experiment, which consisted of multiple radio detectors underneath the Antarctic Ice's surface, aimed to detect neutrinos through Askaryan radio emission of particle showers produced by neutrino-ice interactions. An observation of neutrinos requires that the radio pulses arrive at the surface with minimal distortion from the ice medium. In 2018 and 2019, a radio transmitter was lowered into the residual hole from the South Pole Ice Coring Experiment (SPICE), and pulses were emitted at depths between 400 - 1700m. An ARIANNA surface station then measured the resulting signals after they arrived at the ice surface, allowing for the quantification of how well one can reconstruct the angle of arrival and polarization of a signal. These angles are required to measure the direction of the original neutrino. However, previously unanalyzed results from 2019 data show that polarization did not agree with values predicted by reference measurements in an anechoic chamber for depths shallower than roughly 900 meters. To study and quantify the possible reasons behind this discrepancy in greater detail, we have developed a simulation of the transmitting and receiving antennas, along with known ice properties at the South Pole site, utilizing the NuRadioMC Monte Carlo radio neutrino detector simulation package.