Hint for a TeV neutrino emission from the Galactic Ridge with the ANTARES telescope

The central region of our Galaxy (Galactic Ridge) is expected to produce a neutrino flux comparable to the one detected in 𝛾 rays by Fermi, assuming these result from hadronic collisions of cosmic rays within the interstellar medium. Data collected by the ANTARES neutrino telescope between 2007 and 2020 are used to constrain this neutrino flux in the TeV energy range. Neutrino events reconstructed both as track-like and shower-like events are considered and the event selection is optimized for the search of an excess in the region of galactic coordinates | 𝑙 | < 30 ◦ , | 𝑏 | < 2 ◦ . The final energy distributions of selected events are inconsistent with the background-only expectation, estimated using off regions in the data, at 2 𝜎 level. The best-fit neutrino flux is compatible with the observed 𝛾 -ray flux from the Galactic Ridge, suggesting the presence of cosmic rays with energies up to the PeV range. The presentation will cover the details of the analysis strategy and results, as well as the prospects for future observations with the currently under-construction KM3NeT telescope.