Descripción del proyecto
Un telescopio submarino rupturista a la caza de neutrinos cósmicos
Los neutrinos cósmicos podrían revelar los procesos que ocurren en el borde de los agujeros negros supermasivos. Se necesitan telescopios enormes de varios kilómetros cúbicos de hielo o agua equipados con miles de sensores de luz para hacerles un seguimiento. Los sensores captan el rastro de luz creado por la colisión de un neutrino con una molécula de agua, lo que permite a los científicos determinar la energía del neutrino y su dirección de origen. En el proyecto NEUTRINOSHOT, financiado con fondos europeos, se creará un nuevo observatorio de neutrinos cósmicos en el Océano Pacífico, el Experimento de Neutrinos del Océano Pacífico (P-ONE). El nuevo telescopio de neutrinos de matriz multilineal podrá funcionar en condiciones extremas de profundidad con sensibilidades de varios órdenes de magnitud mejores que las de última generación.
Objetivo
For over a century, ultra-high energy cosmic rays (CR) have been observed by scientists, but their energy and place of production remain a mystery. At very high energies, neutrinos generated by CR carry messages from, e.g. the verge of supermassive black holes, but here our understanding is limited. Tracking neutrinos offers a way to trace the origin of the highest energetic particles in the universe. The stumbling block is that neutrinos, the ghost particles, are notoriously tough to detect. A target of at least a Gigaton of natural transparent material, like water or ice, must be instrumented to collect neutrinos from the cosmos. Currently, only IceCube Neutrino Observatory at the South Pole has the exposure to detect very high-energy neutrinos beyond Earth’s atmosphere. More and larger telescopes are needed to advance on this promising, rich path of fundamental discoveries in astro and particle physics. The objectives of NEUTRINOSHOT are to significantly advance the development of telescopes that detect far beyond the reach of IceCube, and make the exploration of cosmic accelerators more affordable. This can only be achieved with multi-cubic-kilometre (km) neutrino telescopes, currently limited by the scalability of technology to volumes beyond the cubic km. To this end, the lead researcher has identified the optimum testing location and established a scientific relationship with Ocean Networks Canada (ONC) to pioneer this global network as a testbed infrastructure for first case testing, deployment, and use of a new multi-line array neutrino telescope capable of functioning in extreme deep sea environmental conditions with improved sensitivities by orders of magnitude. This project will detect the first neutrinos in the Pacific Ocean and give neutrino astronomy a new “shot” to bring science a major step closer to revealing the hidden parts of our universe.
Ámbito científico
Palabras clave
Programa(s)
- HORIZON.1.1 - European Research Council (ERC) Main Programme
Régimen de financiación
HORIZON-ERC - HORIZON ERC GrantsInstitución de acogida
80333 Muenchen
Alemania