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February 23 is reserved to "Neutrino Astronomy"
On this day 30 years ago, light and neutrinos arrived on Earth from a cataclysmic stellar explosion that took place about 170,000 light-years away. The event, called Supernova 1987A, was the first supernova visible to the naked eye in nearly 400 years.
Although the bright light tipped off astronomers to the event, tiny particles called neutrinos actually arrived first. A few dozen were spotted by detectors around the world, marking the birth of neutrino astronomy. Thirty years later, scientists are still studying the remains of the supernova to learn how giant stars explode. Researchers are also detecting other neutrinos from beyond the solar system.
Article:
http://earthsky.org/space/supernova-1987a-closest-brightest-supernova-star-death
http://physicstoday.scitation.org/do/10.1063/PT.5.9087/full/
Image:
This diagram shows SN 1987A's triple-ring system. The supernova's shock wave slammed into regions along the inner ring, heating them up and causing them to glow. The first hotspot appeared in the 1990s; now, two decades later, they're beginning to fade.
Credit: NASA / ESA / A. Feild (STScI)
#history #neutrinos #SN1987A #science #nasa #universe #space
On this day 30 years ago, light and neutrinos arrived on Earth from a cataclysmic stellar explosion that took place about 170,000 light-years away. The event, called Supernova 1987A, was the first supernova visible to the naked eye in nearly 400 years.
Although the bright light tipped off astronomers to the event, tiny particles called neutrinos actually arrived first. A few dozen were spotted by detectors around the world, marking the birth of neutrino astronomy. Thirty years later, scientists are still studying the remains of the supernova to learn how giant stars explode. Researchers are also detecting other neutrinos from beyond the solar system.
Article:
http://earthsky.org/space/supernova-1987a-closest-brightest-supernova-star-death
http://physicstoday.scitation.org/do/10.1063/PT.5.9087/full/
Image:
This diagram shows SN 1987A's triple-ring system. The supernova's shock wave slammed into regions along the inner ring, heating them up and causing them to glow. The first hotspot appeared in the 1990s; now, two decades later, they're beginning to fade.
Credit: NASA / ESA / A. Feild (STScI)
#history #neutrinos #SN1987A #science #nasa #universe #space
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Along with gravitational waves, the find adds more options for “multimessenger” astronomy, which does not solely rely on light to gather data
Ever since the 1950s, when physicists first dreamed up the idea of doing astronomy with neutrinos, the holy grail has been to observe the first object outside our solar system that emits these ghostly particles.
#Astronomers' #Extragalactic #GhostParticles #Neutrinos #NeutrinosonIce #Science
Ever since the 1950s, when physicists first dreamed up the idea of doing astronomy with neutrinos, the holy grail has been to observe the first object outside our solar system that emits these ghostly particles.
#Astronomers' #Extragalactic #GhostParticles #Neutrinos #NeutrinosonIce #Science
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For the first time, scientists from around the world have detected a source of high-energy cosmic neutrinos — subatomic particles, produced in the aftermath of explosive astrophysical phenoma, that streak across the universe by the billions, leaving very little trace of their presence.
#space #neutrinos #subatomic particles #MIT
#space #neutrinos #subatomic particles #MIT
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Neutrino experiment at Fermilab delivers an unprecedented measurement
Tiny particles known as neutrinos are an excellent tool to study the inner workings of atomic nuclei. Unlike electrons or protons, neutrinos have no electric charge, and they interact with an atom's core only via the weak nuclear force. This makes them a unique tool for probing the building blocks of matter. But the challenge is that neutrinos are hard to produce and detect, and it is very difficult to determine the energy that a neutrino has when it hits an atom.
This week, a group of scientists working on the MiniBooNE experiment at the Department of Energy's Fermilab reported a breakthrough: They were able to identify exactly-known-energy muon neutrinos hitting the atoms at the heart of their particle detector. The result eliminates a major source of uncertainty when testing theoretical models of neutrino interactions and neutrino oscillations.
"The issue of neutrino energy is so important," said Joshua Spitz, Norman M. Leff assistant professor at the University of Michigan and co-leader of the team that made the discovery, along with Joseph Grange at Argonne National Laboratory. "It is extraordinarily rare to know the energy of a neutrino and how much energy it transfers to the target atom. For neutrino-based studies of nuclei, this is the first time it has been achieved."
To learn more about nuclei, physicists shoot particles at atoms and measure how they collide and scatter. If the energy of a particle is sufficiently large, a nucleus hit by the particle can break apart and reveal information about the subatomic forces that bind the nucleus together.
But to get the most accurate measurements, scientists need to know the exact energy of the particle breaking up the atom. That, however, is almost never possible when doing experiments with neutrinos.
Like other muon neutrino experiments, MiniBooNE uses a beam that comprises muon neutrinos with a range of energies. Since neutrinos have no electric charge, scientists have no "filter" that allows them to select neutrinos with a specific energy.
MiniBooNE scientists, however, came up with a clever way to identify the energy of a subset of the muon neutrinos hitting their detector. They realized that their experiment receives some muon neutrinos that have the exact energy of 236 million electronvolts (MeV). These neutrinos stem from the decay of kaons at rest about 86 meters from the MiniBooNE detector emerging from the aluminum core of the particle absorber of the NuMI beamline, which was built for other experiments at Fermilab.
Energetic kaons decay into muon neutrinos with a range of energies. The trick is to identify muon neutrinos that emerge from the decay of kaons at rest. Conservation of energy and momentum then require that all muon neutrinos emerging from the kaon-at-rest decay have to have exactly the energy of 236 MeV.
Source & further reading: https://phys.org/news/2018-04-neutrino-fermilab-unprecedented.html#jCp
Journal article:
https://journals.aps.org/prl/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevLett.120.141802
#physics #neutrinos #Fermilab #science
Tiny particles known as neutrinos are an excellent tool to study the inner workings of atomic nuclei. Unlike electrons or protons, neutrinos have no electric charge, and they interact with an atom's core only via the weak nuclear force. This makes them a unique tool for probing the building blocks of matter. But the challenge is that neutrinos are hard to produce and detect, and it is very difficult to determine the energy that a neutrino has when it hits an atom.
This week, a group of scientists working on the MiniBooNE experiment at the Department of Energy's Fermilab reported a breakthrough: They were able to identify exactly-known-energy muon neutrinos hitting the atoms at the heart of their particle detector. The result eliminates a major source of uncertainty when testing theoretical models of neutrino interactions and neutrino oscillations.
"The issue of neutrino energy is so important," said Joshua Spitz, Norman M. Leff assistant professor at the University of Michigan and co-leader of the team that made the discovery, along with Joseph Grange at Argonne National Laboratory. "It is extraordinarily rare to know the energy of a neutrino and how much energy it transfers to the target atom. For neutrino-based studies of nuclei, this is the first time it has been achieved."
To learn more about nuclei, physicists shoot particles at atoms and measure how they collide and scatter. If the energy of a particle is sufficiently large, a nucleus hit by the particle can break apart and reveal information about the subatomic forces that bind the nucleus together.
But to get the most accurate measurements, scientists need to know the exact energy of the particle breaking up the atom. That, however, is almost never possible when doing experiments with neutrinos.
Like other muon neutrino experiments, MiniBooNE uses a beam that comprises muon neutrinos with a range of energies. Since neutrinos have no electric charge, scientists have no "filter" that allows them to select neutrinos with a specific energy.
MiniBooNE scientists, however, came up with a clever way to identify the energy of a subset of the muon neutrinos hitting their detector. They realized that their experiment receives some muon neutrinos that have the exact energy of 236 million electronvolts (MeV). These neutrinos stem from the decay of kaons at rest about 86 meters from the MiniBooNE detector emerging from the aluminum core of the particle absorber of the NuMI beamline, which was built for other experiments at Fermilab.
Energetic kaons decay into muon neutrinos with a range of energies. The trick is to identify muon neutrinos that emerge from the decay of kaons at rest. Conservation of energy and momentum then require that all muon neutrinos emerging from the kaon-at-rest decay have to have exactly the energy of 236 MeV.
Source & further reading: https://phys.org/news/2018-04-neutrino-fermilab-unprecedented.html#jCp
Journal article:
https://journals.aps.org/prl/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevLett.120.141802
#physics #neutrinos #Fermilab #science
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Il rilevatore di neutrini ICARUS è stato installato al Fermilab
Success! The ICARUS detector is in its new home! #IcarusTrip #science #neutrinos
http://news.fnal.gov/2018/08/icarus-neutrino-detector-installed-in-new-fermilab-home/
http://news.fnal.gov/2018/08/icarus-neutrino-detector-installed-in-new-fermilab-home/
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The Nobel Prize in Physics 2015 recognises Takaaki Kajita in Japan and Arthur B. McDonald in Canada, for their key contributions to the experiments which demonstrated that neutrinos change identities. This metamorphosis requires that neutrinos have mass. The discovery has changed our understanding of the innermost workings of matter and can prove crucial to our view of the universe.
PR:
http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/2015/press.html
Image:
The Daya Bay Reactor Neutrino Experiment in southern China.
Photo via Roy Kaltschmidt, Berkeley Lab Public Affairs
#nobelprize #physics #neutrinos
PR:
http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/2015/press.html
Image:
The Daya Bay Reactor Neutrino Experiment in southern China.
Photo via Roy Kaltschmidt, Berkeley Lab Public Affairs
#nobelprize #physics #neutrinos
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What are cosmic rays and what is multi-messenger astrophysics?
Discovered more than 100 years ago, cosmic rays remain today one of the most obscure phenomena in the universe. They are believed to be connected to the most violent phenomena observed, like Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN). These are galaxies emitting an enormous radiation outflow powered by the black holes at their centers. Scientists assume that part of this outflow is composed by the charged particles that we measure as cosmic rays. Some of those are likely to interact with matter or photons surrounding the black hole giving life to high energy neutrinos and also photons. Both are unaffected by the magnetic fields in our galaxy and in the intergalactic space, so they can propagate from their origin to us keeping memory of where they come from.
Electromagnetic observations help us to assess the possible association of a single neutrino to an astrophysical source. Combining information from different particles (and instruments) is what we call "multi-messenger astrophysics".
Furthermore, neutrinos and gamma-rays can tell us the story about the origin of cosmic rays. They give us different insights. The observation of one neutrino tells us that its source can accelerate protons and nuclei. Gamma-rays together with other electromagnetic signals give us a measure of the power emitted by the underlying engines as well as which are the leading particle interactions at work. By bringing together the messages of different particles – neutrinos and photons – we can achieve a deep understanding of what happens in the source and ultimately infer the story of cosmic rays.
#Blazarneutrino #MultimessengerAstronomy #neutrinos #cosmicrays #gammarays #theMAGICtelescopes #theMAGICcollaboration
Questions and Answers by Prof. Elisa Bernardini
Image Credit: IceCube/NASA
Discovered more than 100 years ago, cosmic rays remain today one of the most obscure phenomena in the universe. They are believed to be connected to the most violent phenomena observed, like Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN). These are galaxies emitting an enormous radiation outflow powered by the black holes at their centers. Scientists assume that part of this outflow is composed by the charged particles that we measure as cosmic rays. Some of those are likely to interact with matter or photons surrounding the black hole giving life to high energy neutrinos and also photons. Both are unaffected by the magnetic fields in our galaxy and in the intergalactic space, so they can propagate from their origin to us keeping memory of where they come from.
Electromagnetic observations help us to assess the possible association of a single neutrino to an astrophysical source. Combining information from different particles (and instruments) is what we call "multi-messenger astrophysics".
Furthermore, neutrinos and gamma-rays can tell us the story about the origin of cosmic rays. They give us different insights. The observation of one neutrino tells us that its source can accelerate protons and nuclei. Gamma-rays together with other electromagnetic signals give us a measure of the power emitted by the underlying engines as well as which are the leading particle interactions at work. By bringing together the messages of different particles – neutrinos and photons – we can achieve a deep understanding of what happens in the source and ultimately infer the story of cosmic rays.
#Blazarneutrino #MultimessengerAstronomy #neutrinos #cosmicrays #gammarays #theMAGICtelescopes #theMAGICcollaboration
Questions and Answers by Prof. Elisa Bernardini
Image Credit: IceCube/NASA
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