neutrino

Physicists take on the mystery of the missing (and extra) neutrinos.

From The Big Think, July 8, 2022: Science writer and astrophysicist Ethan Siegel explores how the design of Fermilab’s DUNE experiment aims to detect neutrino oscillations from one flavor into another when neutrinos travel 1300 km through the earth.

From Physics Today, July 2022: Anne Heavey, senior technical editor at Fermilab describes how teams from around the world are developing and constructing detector components for the world’s largest cryogenic particle detector, the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE).

From The Big Think, June 28, 2022: Fermilab’s Don Lincoln explores the possible existence of a fourth neutrino known as “sterile neutrinos.” With the LSND, Mini BooNE and MicroBooNE experiments displaying anomalies from the Standard Model of physics, could this fourth neutrino really exist?

The CDF experiment at Fermilab measured the mass of the W boson and came up with an answer that no one expected.

For the first time, physicists extracted the detailed “energy-dependent neutrino-argon interaction cross section,” a key value for studying how neutrinos change their flavor.

The Mu2e experiment at Fermilab will look for a never-before-seen subatomic phenomenon that, if observed, would transform our understanding of elementary particles: the direct conversion of a muon into an electron. An international collaboration of over 200 scientists is building the Mu2e precision particle detector that will hunt for new physics beyond the Standard Model.

Toups now co-leads the precision neutrino experiment through its analysis phase, along with Justin Evans of the University of Manchester.

From World Nuclear News, December 7, 2021: A neutrino detection kit has been installed in the containment of Argentina’s Atucha 2 reactor in support of a US-Argentine experiment to learn more about the mysterious particles. Scientists of the vIOLETTA Project are using sensitive Skipper CCD equipment designed and prepared by Fermilab and Berkeley labs. It will be able to detect interactions between neutrinos and a silicon matrix. The experimental arrangement will give them insights on neutrinos at previously unexplored low energy ranges.

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.