CERN Neutrino Platform


The Neutrino Platform is CERN’s undertaking to foster and contribute to fundamental research in neutrino physics at particle accelerators worldwide

The CERN Neutrino Platform is CERN’s undertaking to foster and contribute to fundamental research in neutrino physics at particle accelerators worldwide, as recommended by the 2013 European Strategy for Particle Physics. It includes the provision of a facility at CERN to allow the global community of neutrino experts to develop and prototype the next generation of neutrino detectors, including Icarus, Baby MIND and ProtoDUNE. The CERN Neutrino Platform is CERN’s main contribution to a globally coordinated programme of neutrino research.

Understanding the neutrino sector is a worldwide priority promising physics beyond the Standard Model. Neutrino research at particle accelerators is complementary to studies made in cosmology and provides crucial input to knowledge of the universe. Future measurements could cast light on outstanding questions concerning, for example, the nature of dark matter and the matter/antimatter imbalance in the universe. The experiments at accelerators will also have the ability to observe neutrinos from supernovae.

The CERN Neutrino Platform’s R&D facility is located in a test-beam hall on CERN’s Prévessin site. It also supports state-of-the-art technologies in the fields of cryogenics, magnets and beam lines, as well as integration and assembly techniques.

The CERN Neutrino Platform marks a new direction in CERN’s neutrino’s research. In the 1970s, neutrino beams at the Laboratory allowed the discovery of neutral currents with the Gargamelle bubble chamber. The most recent neutrino beam produced at CERN went through the Earth to the INFN’s Gran Sasso National Laboratory in Italy, from July 2006 to December 2012.

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