sterile neutrino

The MINOS+ and Daya Bay neutrino experiments combine results to produce most stringent test yet for the existence of sterile neutrinos.

From Scientific American, July 2020: Evidence for the existence of a sterile neutrino is compelling, but the idea that certain experiments might be detecting a fourth neutrino remains controversial. Projects around the world seek to settle the matter, including Fermilab’s Short-Baseline Neutrino program.

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 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.

From University of Cincinnati News, June 13, 2019: University of Cincinnati researchers search for subatomic particles called ‘sterile neutrinos,’ which could redefine the Standard Model.

From CERN Courier, March 8, 2019: Newly published results from the MINOS+ experiment at Fermilab cast fresh doubts on the existence of the sterile neutrino — a hypothetical fourth neutrino flavor that would constitute physics beyond the Standard Model. MINOS+ studies how muon neutrinos oscillate into other neutrino flavors as a function of distance travelled.

From Live Science, Jan. 1, 2019: One of the four is MiniBooNE’s search for a fourth neutrino, which could be a dark matter candidate.

From Forbes, Dec. 5, 2018: If there’s a fourth neutrino out there, Fermilab’s Short-Baseline Neutrino Program experiments will lead the way.

From New Scientist, Nov. 21, 2018: Elusive though it is, the sterile neutrino would be a real boon. It could make sense of experimental anomalies stretching back decades, and give us the first confirmed glimpse of physics beyond what we know. Subscription required.

From Cosmos, Nov. 28, 2018: MiniBooNE researchers have published a paper in the journal Physical Review Letters, reporting a possible trace of a fourth neutrino, an addition to the three of the Standard Model.