75 research outputs found
JUNO Conceptual Design Report
The Jiangmen Underground Neutrino Observatory (JUNO) is proposed to determine
the neutrino mass hierarchy using an underground liquid scintillator detector.
It is located 53 km away from both Yangjiang and Taishan Nuclear Power Plants
in Guangdong, China. The experimental hall, spanning more than 50 meters, is
under a granite mountain of over 700 m overburden. Within six years of running,
the detection of reactor antineutrinos can resolve the neutrino mass hierarchy
at a confidence level of 3-4, and determine neutrino oscillation
parameters , , and to
an accuracy of better than 1%. The JUNO detector can be also used to study
terrestrial and extra-terrestrial neutrinos and new physics beyond the Standard
Model. The central detector contains 20,000 tons liquid scintillator with an
acrylic sphere of 35 m in diameter. 17,000 508-mm diameter PMTs with high
quantum efficiency provide 75% optical coverage. The current choice of
the liquid scintillator is: linear alkyl benzene (LAB) as the solvent, plus PPO
as the scintillation fluor and a wavelength-shifter (Bis-MSB). The number of
detected photoelectrons per MeV is larger than 1,100 and the energy resolution
is expected to be 3% at 1 MeV. The calibration system is designed to deploy
multiple sources to cover the entire energy range of reactor antineutrinos, and
to achieve a full-volume position coverage inside the detector. The veto system
is used for muon detection, muon induced background study and reduction. It
consists of a Water Cherenkov detector and a Top Tracker system. The readout
system, the detector control system and the offline system insure efficient and
stable data acquisition and processing.Comment: 328 pages, 211 figure
Determination of a time-shift in the OPERA set-up using high energy horizontal muons in the LVD and OPERA detectors
The purpose of this work is to report the measurement of a time-shift in the
OPERA set-up in a totally independent way from Time Of Flight (TOF)
measurements of CNGS neutrino events. The LVD and OPERA experiments are both
installed in the same laboratory: LNGS. The relative position of the two
detectors, separated by an average distance of ~ 160 m, allows the use of very
high energy horizontal muons to cross-calibrate the timing systems of the two
detectors, using a TOF technique which is totally independent from TOF of CNGS
neutrino events. Indeed, the OPERA-LVD direction lies along the so-called
"Teramo anomaly", a region in the Gran Sasso massif where LVD has established,
many years ago, the existence of an anomaly in the mountain structure, which
exhibits a low m. w. e. thickness for horizontal directions. The "abundant"
high-energy horizontal muons (nearly 100 per year) going through LVD and OPERA
exist because of this anomaly in the mountain orography. The total live time of
the data in coincidence correspond to 1200 days from mid 2007 until March 2012.
The time coincidence study of LVD and OPERA detectors is based on 306 cosmic
horizontal muon events and shows the existence of a negative time shift in the
OPERA set-up of the order of deltaT(AB) = - (73 \pm 9) ns when two calendar
periods, A and B, are compared. This result shows a systematic effect in the
OPERA timing system from August 2008 until December 2011. The size of the
effect is comparable with the neutrino velocity excess recently measured by
OPERA. It is probably interesting not to forget that with the MRPC technology
developed by the ALICE Bologna group the TOF world record accuracy of 20 ps was
reached. That technology can be implemented at LNGS for a high precision
determination of TOF with the CNGS neutrino beams of an order of magnitude
smaller than the value of the OPERA systematic effect
Latest results of the OPERA experiment on nu-tau appearance in the CNGS neutrino beam
OPERA is a long-baseline experiment designed to search for ΜΌ â ÎœÏ oscillations in appearance mode. It was based at the INFN Gran Sasso laboratory (LNGS) and took data from 2008 to 2012 with the CNGS neutrino beam from CERN. After the discovery of ÎœÏ appearance in 2015, with 5.1Ï significance, the criteria to select ÎœÏ candidates have been extended and a multivariate approach has been used for events identification. In this way the statistical uncertainty in the measurement of the oscillation parameters and of ÎœÏ properties has been improved. Results are reported
Final results on neutrino oscillation parameters from the OPERA experiment in the CNGS beam
International audienceThe OPERA experiment has conclusively observed the appearance of tau neutrinos in the muon neutrino CNGS beam. Exploiting the OPERA detector capabilities, it was possible to isolate high purity samples of Îœe, ΜΌ and ÎœÏ charged current weak neutrino interactions, as well as neutral current weak interactions. In this paper, the full dataset is used for the first time to test the three-flavor neutrino oscillation model and to derive constraints on the existence of a light sterile neutrino within the framework of the 3+1 neutrino model. For the first time, tau and electron neutrino appearance channels are jointly used to test the sterile neutrino hypothesis. A significant fraction of the sterile neutrino parameter space allowed by LSND and MiniBooNE experiments is excluded at 90% C.L. In particular, the best-fit values obtained by MiniBooNE combining neutrino and antineutrino data are excluded at 3.3Ï significance
Observation of a first candidate in the OPERA experiment in the CNGS beam
The OPERA neutrino detector in the underground Gran Sasso Laboratory (LNGS)
has been designed to perform the first detection of neutrino oscillations in
direct appearance mode through the study of the
channel. The hybrid apparatus consists of an emulsion/lead target complemented
by electronic detectors and it is placed in the high energy long-baseline CERN
to LNGS beam (CNGS) 730 km away from the neutrino source. Runs with CNGS
neutrinos were successfully carried out in 2008 and 2009. After a brief
description of the beam, the experimental setup and the procedures used for the
analysis of the neutrino events, we describe the topology and kinematics of a
first candidate charged-current event satisfying the kinematical
selection criteria. The background calculations and their cross-check are
explained in detail and the significance of the event is assessed.Comment: 19 pages, 3 figure
Measurement of the cosmic ray muon flux seasonal variation with the OPERA detector
The OPERA experiment discovered muon neutrino into tau neutrino oscillations in appearance mode, detecting tau leptons by means of nuclear emulsion films. The apparatus was also endowed with electronic detectors with tracking capability, such as scintillator strips and resistive plate chambers. Because of its location in the underground Gran Sasso laboratory, under 3800 m.w.e., the OPERA detector has also been used as an observatory for TeV muons produced by cosmic rays in the atmosphere. In this paper the measurement of the single muon flux modulation and its correlation with the seasonal cycle of atmospheric temperature is reported
Updated constraints on sterile neutrino mixing in the OPERA experiment using a new identification method
This paper describes a new identification method specifically
designed to improve the low-energy ()
identification efficiency attained by enlarging the emulsion film scanning
volume with the next generation emulsion readout system. A relative increase of
25-70% in the low-energy region is expected, leading to improvements in
the OPERA sensitivity to neutrino oscillations in the framework of the 3 + 1
model. The method is applied to a subset of data where the detection efficiency
increase is expected to be more relevant, and one additional candidate
is found. The analysis combined with the appearance results improves
the upper limit on to 0.016 at 90% C.L. in the
MiniBooNE allowed region .Comment: 12 pages, 6 figure
Measurement of the cosmic ray muon flux seasonal variation with the OPERA detector
The OPERA experiment discovered muon neutrino into tau neutrino oscillations
in appearance mode, detecting tau leptons by means of nuclear emulsion films.
The apparatus was also endowed with electronic detectors with tracking
capability, such as scintillator strips and resistive plate chambers. Because
of its location, in the underground Gran Sasso laboratory, under 3800 m.w.e.,
the OPERA detector has also been used as an observatory for TeV muons produced
by cosmic rays in the atmosphere. In this paper the measurement of the single
muon flux modulation and of its correlation with the seasonal variation of the
atmospheric temperature are reported
- âŠ