DUNE

From The Conversation, December 21, 2021: Aaron McGowan, Principal Lecturer in Physics and Astronomy at the Rochester Institute of Technology explores research in 2021 in which physicists around the world ran a number of experiments that probed the Standard Model. From Higgs Boson, to Muon g-2 and the restart of the LHC at CERN, McGowan highlights some of the ways the Standard Model fails to explain every mystery of the universe.

As part of the international Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment, a UK-US collaboration is preparing for industrial scale production of large particle detector components. This fall, it’s taking the first ones for a final test-drive.

From Rapid City Journal-Our Northern Hills, November 4, 2021: Excavation crews at the underground site of DUNE reached an important milestone. They completed the careful excavation of the ventilation shaft with just one drill bit during the entire four-and-a-half-month process. Crews also uncovered a 1-1/2 foot thick chunk of quartz crystal during the process that miraculously was not damaged by the reamer head, nor by the 300-foot fall it sustained, marking it a gem of the milestone.

In early October, crews completed the raise-bore drilling of the vertical ventilation shaft at the Lead, South Dakota, LBNF/DUNE project site and unexpectedly uncovered a geological treasure during the process.

From the Black Hills Pioneer, Sept. 2, 2021: Fermilab design manager for DUNE Joshua Willhet takes readers 4,850 feet underground to view and describe the excavation of the tunnels that will make way to the caverns of the LBNF for DUNE.

From WORT 89.9 FM-Madison WI, Aug. 26, 2021: General Counsel for Fermilab, John Myer, talks with 89.9 FM hosts, Ankur Malhotra and Austin Exum, about the major projects and practical applications of the research performed at Fermilab.

From the Black Hills Pioneer, Aug. 21, 2021: The former Homestake Gold Mine in Lead, SD was dedicated as the M. Michael Rounds Operations Center at the Sanford Underground Research Facility. The dedication event included remarks from many dignitaries including Sanford Lab Executive Director Mike Headley, who talked about the long journey it has been to support the new facility and that Sanford Lab has made great strides toward building the LBNF that will house the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment at 4,850 level, led by Fermilab.

From The Rapid City Journal, August 12, 2021: The SURF Davis-Bahcall Scholars Program exposes university freshmen and sophomores in STEM fields to a variety of disciplines helping them decide their college major. This year students took a tour of SURF in Lead, SD and they had the opportunity to speak with scientists and engineers from Fermilab.

CERN deepens its collaboration with the US-based neutrino experiment with the provision of two enormous stainless-steel vessels for DUNE’s cutting-edge liquid-argon detectors.

Construction crews will excavate around 800,000 tons of rock to make space for the international Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment. But first, teams must carve out a quarter-mile-high ventilation shaft.