Can tau neutrinos from space reveal exotic physics beyond standard mixing?

Astrophysical neutrinos oscillate between flavors on their journey to Earth, and measuring the tau-flavored component tests this mixing. Most detectors catch tau neutrinos only through rare double-cascade events. This work proposes using visible inelasticity—how much energy gets radiated away in detector tracks—to statistically distinguish tau from muon interactions. With IceCube data, the method is already competitive with existing approaches and opens the door to mapping individual sources.