Daya Bay Reactor Neutrino Experiment

22°35′43″N 114°32′35″E / 22.5953°N 114.5431°E / 22.5953; 114.5431

One of the Daya Bay detectors.

The Daya Bay Reactor Neutrino Experiment is a China-based multinational particle physics project studying neutrinos, in particular neutrino oscillations. The multinational collaboration includes researchers from China, Chile, the United States, Taiwan (Republic of China), Russia, and the Czech Republic. The US side of the project is funded by the US Department of Energy's Office of High Energy Physics.

It is situated at Daya Bay, approximately 52 kilometers northeast of Hong Kong and 45 kilometers east of Shenzhen. There is an affiliated project in the Aberdeen Tunnel Underground Laboratory in Hong Kong. The Aberdeen lab measures the neutrons produced by cosmic muons which may affect the Daya Bay Reactor Neutrino Experiment.

The experiment consists of eight antineutrino detectors, clustered in three locations within 1.9 km (1.2 mi) of six nuclear reactors. Each detector consists of 20 tons of liquid scintillator (linear alkylbenzene doped with gadolinium) surrounded by photomultiplier tubes and shielding.[1]

A much larger follow-up is in development in the form of the Jiangmen Underground Neutrino Observatory (JUNO) in Kaiping,[2] which will use an acrylic sphere filled with 20,000 tons of liquid scintillator to detect reactor antineutrinos. Groundbreaking began 10 January 2015, with operation expected in 2020.[3]

  1. ^ Daya Bay collaboration (22 May 2012). "A side-by-side comparison of Daya Bay antineutrino detectors". Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research A. 685 (1): 78–97. arXiv:1202.6181. Bibcode:2012NIMPA.685...78A. doi:10.1016/j.nima.2012.05.030. S2CID 7471018.
  2. ^ Li, Xiaonan (August 2013). Daya Bay II: Jiangmen Underground Neutrino Observatory (JUNO) (PDF). Windows On the Universe.
  3. ^ "Groundbreaking at JUNO". Interactions NewsWire. 10 January 2015. Retrieved 2015-01-12.