Fermilab Project To Produce 'Unprecedented Stream of Neutrinos'

BATAVIA , IL — Batavia's Fermilab has just been approved to move forward with an accelerator project that will create more powerful particle beams to "generate an unprecedented stream of neutrinos," according to a press release from the laboratory. The Proton Improvement Plan II (PIP-II) accelerator upgrade, part of Fermilab's Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment, or DUNE, is billed as "the largest international science experiment ever to be conducted on U.S. soil" and has garnered international attention.

If you aren't a nuclear physicist, you might be wondering what all this means.

The project's upgrade will allow for higher-power particle beams to make a large number of neutrinos. These super-fast-moving subatomic particles are tough to catch, so the PIP-II upgrade is a big thing. Fermilab anticipates that the increased number of neutrinos will flood its neutrino detectors, giving scientists an opportunity to study the elusive neutrinos in ways they never have.

Once the beam is generated, Fermilab will send it to its on-site neutrino detector and then to a second, underground detector that is 800 miles away at the Sanford Underground Research Facility in South Dakota via the Earth's crust.

"Every neutrino that stops in our detectors adds a bit of information to our picture of the universe. And the more neutrinos that stop, the closer we get to filling in the picture," University of Chicago physicist Ed Blucher, who is co-sponsoring the DUNE project, said in the media release.

On its way, the neutrino beam will pass through a series of high-powered accelerators. According to Fermilab officials, "By the time the beam exits the final accelerator, it will have an energy of up to 120 billion electronvolts and more than 1 megawatt of power."

That's the power of around 17,000 60-watt lightbulbs.

The DUNE project, which is partially funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, is expected to reach completion by the mid-2020s. According to officials, it's set to make "Fermilab is positioned to be the world leader in accelerator-based neutrino research."

Image credit: YouTube, Fermilab