The elusive neutrino. Illustration: Sandbox Studio
The 27th International Conference on Neutrino Physics and Astrophysics, commonly called Neutrino 2016, will be hosted by the Institute of Physics and Imperial College London at the Royal Geographical Society in South Kensington. The conference will bring together physicists from around the world to discuss the latest theories and findings in neutrino physics and astrophysics.
Scientists working with the U.S. Department of Energy’s Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory will give numerous presentations at Neutrino 2016 and unveil some significant results. Here is a quick guide to the Fermilab experiments represented at the conference and what new developments to expect. (If you’re not attending Neutrino 2016, don’t worry. You can keep up with all these results by following Fermilab on Twitter @Fermilab.)
Times are in British Summer Time.
- New results from NOvA – July 4, 11:30 a.m.
Nearly a year ago, the NOvA experiment – Fermilab’s flagship neutrino experiment – presented its first oscillation results. The two NOvA detectors sit more than 800 kilometers apart, in the path of Fermilab’s intense neutrino beam, and are designed to catch muon neutrinos changing into electron neutrinos on their journey from Fermilab in Illinois to northern Minnesota.
At Neutrino 2016, the NOvA collaboration will present its next set of oscillation results, working with more than twice the amount of data they had a year ago. They will also offer their first result on the search for sterile neutrinos (a theorized fourth type of neutrino that does not interact with matter in the same way as the three types scientists have observed), and present improvements to their analyses of muon neutrino disappearance and electron neutrino appearance events. Patricia Vahle of the College of William and Mary will give this talk.
“We are delighted to be showing our results on the first day of the conference, and we look forward to seeing what everyone else has to say,” said Peter Shanahan of Fermilab, co-spokesperson of the NOvA experiment.
- A strong farewell from MINOS+ – July 5, 2 p.m.
The MINOS experiment was Fermilab’s first foray into long-distance neutrino oscillation physics and has been running for 13 years (the last three as MINOS+, with a higher-energy neutrino beam). With the MINOS far detector set to cease operation this summer, the collaboration plans to go out with a bang at Neutrino 2016.
The MINOS+ talk, presented by Justin Evans of the University of Manchester, will include a joint result with the Daya Bay experiment in China on the search for sterile neutrinos. The collaboration will also present results on nonstandard neutrino interactions and large extra dimensions, an area also probed by the Large Hadron Collider, as well as updating its standard oscillation results using all MINOS data and the first two years of MINOS+ data.
“We’re very pleased that even after more than 10 years, we still have exciting results coming out,” Evans said.
- First results from MicroBooNE – July 5, 12:05 p.m.
Tuesday’s talk, presented by Matthew Toups of Fermilab, will be MicroBooNE’s public debut. The short-baseline experiment started taking data in 2015, using liquid argon to record precise tracks of neutrino interactions in order to search for sterile neutrinos. For the first time, the physics community will get a good look at the initial data collected since the start of the experiment. The collaboration will showcase the detector and the software that creates beautiful 3-D images of neutrino interactions and provide a taste of the first of those interactions they captured. The technology behind MicroBooNE will be scaled up and used for future neutrino projects, including the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE), Fermilab’s proposed new flagship. (More on that experiment below.)
- New cross section measurements from MINERvA – July 5, 11:40 a.m.
The MINERvA detector, located 350 feet underground at Fermilab, is measuring how neutrinos interact with nuclei with unprecedented precision. Using target materials ranging from helium all the way to lead, MINERvA is producing results that are used by neutrino oscillation experiments worldwide such as Fermilab’s NOvA, T2K in Japan and the planned international DUNE experiment. Since the last Neutrino conference, MINERvA has published nine papers on a wide variety of neutrino and antineutrino processes and is still uncovering new surprises about the way neutrinos interact in nuclei. Laura Fields of Fermilab will present highlights from these MINERvA results and explain how they help to ensure the most precise measurements of the properties of neutrinos.
- The short-baseline neutrino program at Fermilab – July 5, 3:10 p.m.
In early 2017, scientists will transport the largest liquid-argon neutrino detector ever built, called ICARUS, from CERN to Fermilab. It will then take its place as one of three detectors in a new experimental program at Fermilab that will search for the long-theorized sterile neutrino. MicroBooNE (mentioned above) is already hunting for these particles, while scientists are currently building a third detector, the Short-Baseline Near Detector, to round out the suite. David Schmitz of the University of Chicago, co-spokesperson of the SBND experiment, will outline all the details of this new program.
- DUNE: Status and prospects – July 6, 9:20 a.m.
More than 850 scientists from 30 countries around the world are building prototype detectors and advancing plans for the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment. DUNE will make use of Fermilab’s accelerator complex and send the world’s most intense neutrino beam 1,300 kilometers to the Sanford Underground Research Facility in South Dakota, where the largest liquid-argon neutrino detector ever built will be constructed. Jon Urheim of Indiana University will discuss this long-term, visionary project.
While these are the most prominent Fermilab-related talks at Neutrino 2016, they aren’t the only ones. Fermilab scientists will discuss high-intensity neutrino beams on July 9, and many Fermilab experiments will be represented at poster sessions. For more information about Fermilab’s neutrino program, please visit the laboratory website at www.fnal.gov. And don’t forget to follow Fermilab on Twitter (@Fermilab) for the latest news out of Neutrino 2016.
Fermilab is America’s premier national laboratory for particle physics research. A U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science laboratory, Fermilab is located near Chicago, Illinois, and is operated under contract by the Fermi Research Alliance LLC. Visit Fermilab’s website at www.fnal.gov, and follow Fermilab on Facebook at www.facebook.com/fermilab and on Twitter @Fermilab.
The DOE Office of Science is the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States, and is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, please visit science.energy.gov.
Helen Edwards, one of the most vital contributors to the success of Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory over its five-decade history, died on June 21 at the age of 80.
Edwards was a giant in the field of accelerator science, best known for overseeing the design, construction, commissioning and operation of the Tevatron, which for 25 years was the most powerful particle collider in the world. The Tevatron turned on in 1983, when it began delivering particle beams for Fermilab’s fixed-target experiments. It recorded its first proton-antiproton collisions in 1985 and was used by scientists to find the top quark in 1995 and the tau neutrino in 2000, two of the three fundamental particles discovered at Fermilab.
“Her vision was superb. She was a great architect — the architect of the Tevatron as a system,” said John Peoples, Fermilab’s director from 1989 to 1999. “She was terrific for Fermilab, and terrific period.”
Her work on the Tevatron earned her the MacArthur Fellowship, also known as the Genius Grant, in 1988 and the National Medal of Technology in 1989. She also received the Department of Energy’s E.O. Lawrence Award and the Robert R. Wilson Prize of the American Physical Society.
Edwards began her tenure at Fermilab in 1970 under the laboratory’s original director, Robert Wilson. She had previously worked with Wilson as a research assistant at Cornell University and joined him at the nascent lab, eventually heading up the Accelerator Division.
To all who knew her, Edwards was a force of nature. Her colleagues note her forward-thinking vision, her unrelenting determination to get things done and her penchant for coloring outside the lines when it came to solving problems.
“Her continuous drive was something that amazed me,” said engineer Paul Czarapata, deputy head of the Fermilab Accelerator Division. “It seemed like nothing could slow her down.”
She was also known for her astonishing intellect, working out complex scientific problems by relying almost entirely on her own knowledge, without having to resort to outside references.
“I once asked her a question about a property of an accelerator component, and she disappeared from the office,” Czarapata said. “She came back with a handwritten derivation of the formula, complete with the answer.”
That deep understanding of physics and her keen intuition was evident to everyone who knew her.
“I was scientifically mesmerized by her,” said University of Maryland professor Timothy Koeth, who studied accelerator physics under Edwards’ supervision when he was earning his Ph.D. from Rutgers University. “She had this intuitive and innate grasp of the material, and she was always absolutely right – she was never wrong in the 20 years I knew her. She understood complex systems from every aspect – operational or technological.”
Edwards wasn’t known for conducting business from the sidelines. She got down in the dirt, actively and directly working on accelerator components, sometimes pulling all-nighters to make sure everything was fine-tuned.
“Helen was an incredibly gifted accelerator scientist with a fiery personality and a tendency to move forward very quickly,” said scientist Roger Dixon, who formerly headed the Fermilab Accelerator Division. “Those of us who fell into her wake benefited greatly from the experience.”
The widespread respect and reverence that Edwards commanded extended to those who worked with her.
“I had what I later termed the ‘Helen card’ on my side,” Koeth said. “I quickly found out that saying ‘This is for Helen’ made things happen. When I was Helen’s student, people said, ‘I’ll have whatever you need tomorrow morning.’ That happened over and over again. It was a living legacy of what she meant to the people of the laboratory.”
Edwards had a keen understanding of people and their strengths, with a knack for positioning them in roles where they would excel. She knew how to bring the right people together to carry out a project and how to encourage them to success.
“She was really a brilliant person,” said Fermilab scientist emeritus Paul Mantsch. His job in the early days building the Tevatron was related to 250 magnets that helped align the particle beam. It didn’t start out well.
“So we worked hard to get the magnets going,” Mantsch said. “She gave constant encouragement to think hard about the problem and solve it. And we did solve it. She was very appreciative of the work we’d done. I valued that kind of relationship with my co-workers, and with Helen in particular.”
She was just as encouraging as a mentor. Koeth compared Edwards to a mama bird encouraging her baby bird out of the nest.
“She made sure I met people, that I was pushed into the community. I didn’t realize what she was doing at the time. Anytime there was a tour at AZero, she had me give it. She was a very good instructor,” Koeth said. “Working in her lab led to adventures of high RF power, high voltage, high vacuum, electron beams, and opportunities for traveling the country and the world. It was a form of paradise.”
Edwards admired the world around her. She took photos of wildlife, natural scenery and even the rings of Saturn with a camera attached to her backyard telescope.
“She loved nature, she loved animals,” Koeth said. “She had a heart of gold.”
Her kind nature extended to her friends and colleagues.
“She sincerely cared about people,” Dixon said. “I am very fortunate to have had the Helen experience in my life.”
Fermilab shut down the Tevatron in 2011. As part of a labwide shutdown ceremony, Edwards, wearing a cowboy hat, pushed the buttons that finally turned off the particle beam. It was a fitting end for the trailblazing machine that she brought to life.
Edwards worked at Fermilab for 40 years, serving most recently as a guest scientist from 1992 to 2010. Through the last years of her life, she worked on the next generation of superconducting accelerators, helping to shape the future of particle physics. She focused much of her work on accelerating cavities, and the developments in that arena led to the establishment of a test bed at Fermilab for cutting-edge particle acceleration technology, called the Fermilab Accelerator Science and Technology Facility.
She designed the key features of the Superconducting Super Collider, a planned but never completed 54-mile-around accelerator sited in Texas. Edwards also maintained a position at Deutsches Elektronen Synchrotron (DESY), working on the design for the TESLA superconducting linear accelerator.
Edwards was a member of the American Academy of Arts and Science and the National Academy of Engineering, as well as a fellow of the American Physical Society.
“It is impossible to overstate her role in making Fermilab what it is today,” said Fermilab Director Nigel Lockyer.
No memorial service for Edwards is planned.