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The Search For The 'Body' Of The Neutrino

Posted by timothy on from the one-hundred-and-seventy-million-dollars dept.

An anonymous reader writes: "CNN has an interesting story about the scientists who are searching for proof that neutrinos have mass a half mile below Minnesota. Not alot of scientific theory but a good overall perspective on what is taking place. One of the more interesting quotes: "We're going to take a sawed-off shotgun and blast a bunch of neutrinos toward Minnesota and measure what sticks," said Marvin Marshak, a physics professor at the University of Minnesota."

4 of 30 comments (clear)

  1. Neutrino research by ktulu1115 · · Score: 4, Informative

    There's been a lot of research going on about neutrinos in the recent years. I still recall the big recent newsbreak when they discovered that they can spontaneously change to another form. The Ultimate Neutrino Page and Neutrino History have some good news.

    The thing I've been thinking is... what they really need is another somewhat-close supernova to occur. That should give scientists even more data to digest.

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    1. Re:Neutrino research by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

      The thing I've been thinking is... what they really need is another somewhat-close supernova to occur. That should give scientists even more data to digest.

      That's not actually enormously useful (although supernovae are free, so ....) Apart from the fact that you can expect to wait about 100 years for the next supernova anywhere close, like our old friend SN1987A, you don't actually learn a great deal about neutrinos from a supernova - there's too much that we don't really understand about the supernova itself.

      On the other hand, if we figure out what's going on with neutrinos, they'll give an extra handle to learn about supernovae.

  2. Non-Euclidian geometries by Shooter6947 · · Score: 2, Informative

    If you shoot neutrinos, which travel in straight lines at nearly the speed of light, from Chicago to Minnesota, they will not pass through Canada! They will, in fact, pass well above Canada, since the Earth is not flat and the ground will fall away under the poor neutrinos as they travel away from Soudan, MN. Since Soudan is so far North, though, maybe some of them will fly through Canadian airspace -- I hope they get clearance from ATC.

  3. Re:question for the experts by Misanthropic+Lycanth · · Score: 3, Informative
    As far as the standard model goes, all elementary particles are point particles. There are several problems with that. You pointed out one. Another is simultaneity of interactions for different observers.

    String theory demands a minimum non-zero size for all of it's constituents (except for 0-branes, which are point particles and are part of M-theory).

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    Physics: Making the universe open source.