ICARUS

Scientists and engineers from around the world collaborate with Fermilab to develop state-of-the-art technologies and solve the mysteries of matter, energy, space and time. Here is a look at 10 ways they advanced science and technology this year.

Researchers from more than 50 countries collaborate with Fermilab to develop state-of-the-art technologies and solve the mysteries of matter, energy, space and time. Take a look at 10 ways Fermilab and its partners advanced science and technology in 2021.

From PBS, October 6, 9:00 pm CT: Tune in to the PBS premiere of Particles Unknown-the hunt for the universe’s most common yet elusive particle, this Wednesday on your local PBS channel. Starting with Ray Davis’ quest for neutrinos that began in 1965, Nova explores Fermilab’s search for sterile neutrinos and interviews Sam Zeller and Angela Fava from the Neutrino Division. Check your local PBS station programming to confirm the date and time of Particles Unknown.

The ICARUS detector, part of Fermilab’s Short-Baseline Neutrino Program, will officially start its hunt for elusive sterile neutrinos this fall. The international collaboration led by Nobel laureate Carlo Rubbia successfully brought the detector online and is now collecting test data and making final improvements.

From CERN Courier, July 7, 2020: A new generation of accelerator and reactor experiments is opening an era of high-precision neutrino measurements to tackle questions such as leptonic CP violation, the mass hierarchy and the possibility of a fourth “sterile” neutrino. These include the international Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment, hosted by Fermilab, and Fermilab’s NOvA and Short-Baseline Neutrino programs.

Hector Carranza Jr. of the University of Texas at Arlington has received the prestigious Department of Energy Office of Science Graduate Student Research award, or SCGSR, to conduct his research at Fermilab. DOE awarded the fellowship to 62 students from U.S. universities. He will work on light-mass dark matter searches at the ICARUS neutrino experiment.

Scientists have begun filling the ICARUS detector at Fermilab with liquid argon, moving one step closer toward neutrino oscillation measurements and the potential discovery of sterile neutrinos.

From PBS Space Time, Jan. 6, 2020: Why is there something rather than nothing? The answer may be found in the weakest particle in the universe: the neutrino. In this 10-minute video, PBS Space Time host Matt O’Dowd and Fermilab scientist Don Lincoln explore the mysteries of the neutrino and how Fermilab is tackling them. The elusive neutrino may hold powerful secrets, from the unification of the forces of nature to the biggest question of all: Why is there something rather than nothing?

From Science, Aug. 8, 2019: Fermilab physicists are resurrecting a massive particle detector by lowering it into a tomblike pit and embalming it with a chilly fluid. In August, workers eased two gleaming silver tanks bigger than shipping containers, the two halves of the detector, into a concrete-lined hole. Hauled from Europe two years ago, ICARUS will soon start a second life seeking perhaps the strangest particles physicists have dreamed up, oddballs called sterile neutrinos.

Physicists often find thrifty, ingenious ways to reuse equipment and resources. What do you do about an 800-ton magnet originally used to discover new particles? Send it off on a months-long journey via truck, train and ship halfway across the world to detect oscillating particles called neutrinos, of course. It’s all part of the vast recycling network of the physics community.