About Me

Paolo Desiati is a research professor at the Wisconsin IceCube Particle Astrophysics Center (WIPAC), a center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His research focuses on cosmic ray physics through his work with the IceCube Neutrino Observatory, the High Altitude Water Cherenkov (HAWC) Observatory, and the Southern Wide-field Gamma-ray Observatory (SWGO), performing experimental analyses and simulation studies of cosmic rays. He collaborates with various teams to create multi-experiment combined analyses, aiming to provide comprehensive insights into the complexities of cosmic rays. Additionally, Paolo conducts numerical calculations of particle trajectories using computational astrophysical magnetic field models to develop theoretical frameworks for testing against observational data.

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Interests
  • Astrophysics
  • Cosmic Rays
  • Heliosphere
  • Magnetic fields
Education
  • PhD Physics

    Sapienza - Università di Roma (Italy)

  • MSc Physics

    Università degli Studi di Firenze (Italy)

My Research

IceCube: Leading the cosmic-ray analyses in IceCube since 2006. Co-PI of the current IceCube Cosmic Ray Analysis sub-award (funded by NSF; UW–Madison PI: Desiati). I lead a working group on cosmic-ray anisotropy analyses at UW-Madison in collaboration with Dr. Juan Carlos Díaz Vélez (WIPAC), Prof. Rasha Abbasi (Loyola University Chicago), Prof. Frank McNally (Mercer University).

Collaboration with Prof. Julia Becker Tjus (University of Bochum, Germany) and the Bochum group on the observation of the cosmic-ray shadow cast by the Moon and the Sun using IceCube data and the numerical calculation of cosmic-ray particle trajectories around the Sun at different phases of the solar cycle.

HAWC: Combined analysis of 10 TeV cosmic-ray anisotropy with the HAWC and the IceCube neutrino observatories (with Dr. Juan Carlos Díaz Vélez). I am working on an overhaul of cosmic-ray anisotropy analysis in the 1-100 TeV energy range, using eight years of HAWC data. And on the HAWC/IceCube combined analysis in the 10-100 TeV energy range (funded by NSF grant; PI: Desiati). An MoU between IceCube and HAWC was established.

SWGO: Collaboration member of the Southern Wide-field Gamma-ray Observatory (SWGO) and member of the Cosmic Ray task force aimed to establish requirements for high-energy cosmic anisotropy observations.

GRAPES-3: Collaboration with the GRAPES-3 extensive air shower experiment (located in Ooty, India) aimed to perform a combined analysis of cosmic-ray anisotropy with IceCube in the energy range of 10-100 TeV. An MoU between IceCube and GRAPES-3 was established.

Numerical Calculations: Paolo Desiati and Juan Carlos Díaz Vélez (UW-Madison) collaborate with Prof. Nikolai Pogorelov (Univ. of Alabama - Huntsville), Prof. Zhang Ming (Florida Institute of Technology), and Dr. Vanessa López Barquero (University of Maryland) on the heliosphere’s distortion effects on the arrival direction distribution of TeV cosmic rays and the unfolding of the interstellar diffusion properties.

Featured Publications
Recent Publications
(2025). Chaotic Behavior of Trapped Cosmic Rays. submitted to Astrophysical Journal.
(2024). Atmospheric muons and their variations with temperature. Astroparticle Physics.
(2024). Estimating the potential of SWGO to measure the composition-dependent behaviour of the CR anisotropy. Proceedings of Science.
(2024). Observation of Cosmic-Ray Anisotropy in the Southern Hemisphere with Twelve Years of Data Collected by the IceCube Neutrino Observatory. accepted for publication by Astrophysical Journal.
(2024). Search for Galactic Core-collapse Supernovae in a Decade of Data Taken with the IceCube Neutrino Observatory. Astrophysical Journal.
Featured Talks