Subscribe to the gold package and get unlimited access to Shamra Academy
Register a new userReactor Neutrino Experiments: Present and Future
113
0
0.0
(
0
)
Ask ChatGPT about the research
No Arabic abstract
Reactor neutrinos have been an important tool for both discovery and precision measurement in the history of neutrino studies. Since the first generation of reactor neutrino experiments in the 1950s, the detector technology has been greatly advanced. New ideas, new knowledge, and modern software also enhanced the power of the experiments. The current reactor neutrino experiments, Daya Bay, Double Chooz, and RENO have led neutrino physics into the precision era. In this article, we will review these developments and accumulations, address the key issues in designing a state-of-art reactor neutrino experiment, and explain how the challenging requirements of determining the neutrino mass hierarchy with the next generation experiment JUNO could be realized in the near future.
rate research
Read More
This publication provides a coherent treatment for the reactor neutrino flux uncertainties suppression, specially focussed on the latest $theta_{13}$ measurement. The treatment starts with single detector in single reactor site, most relevant for all reactor experiments beyond $theta_{13}$. We demonstrate there is no trivial error cancellation, thus the flux systematic error can remain dominant even after the adoption of multi-detector configurations. However, three mechanisms for flux error suppression have been identified and calculated in the context of Double Chooz, Daya Bay and RENO sites. Our analysis computes the error {it suppression fraction} using simplified scenarios to maximise relative comparison among experiments. We have validated the only mechanism exploited so far by experiments to improve the precision of the published $theta_{13}$. The other two newly identified mechanisms could lead to total error flux cancellation under specific conditions and are expected to have major implications on the global $theta_{13}$ knowledge today. First, Double Chooz, in its final configuration, is the only experiment benefiting from a negligible reactor flux error due to a $sim$90% geometrical suppression. Second, Daya Bay and RENO could benefit from their partial geometrical cancellation, yielding a potential $sim$50% error suppression, thus significantly improving the global $theta_{13}$ precision today. And third, we illustrate the rationale behind further error suppression upon the exploitation of the inter-reactor error correlations, so far neglected. So, our publication is a key step forward in the context of high precision neutrino reactor experiments providing insight on the suppression of their intrinsic flux error uncertainty, thus affecting past and current experimental results, as well as the design of future experiments.
Neutrinos are elementary particles in the standard model of particle physics. There are 3 flavors of neutrinos that oscillate among themselves. Their oscillation can be described by a 3$times$3 unitary matrix, containing three mixing angles $theta_{12}$, $theta_{23}$, $theta_{13}$, and one CP phase. Both $theta_{12}$ and $theta_{23}$ are known from previous experiments. $theta_{13}$ was unknown just two years ago. The Daya Bay experiment gave the first definitive non-zero value in 2012. An improved measurement of the oscillation amplitude $sin^{2}2(theta_{13})$ = $0.090^{+0.008}_{-0.009}$ and the first direct measurement of the $bar u_{e}$ mass-squared difference $mid$$Delta m^2_{ee}$$mid$ = $(2.59^{+0.19}_{-0.20})times10^{-3} rm eV^{2}$ were obtained recently. The large value of $theta_{13}$ boosts the next generation of reactor antineutrino experiments designed to determine the neutrino mass hierarchy, such as JUNO and RENO-50 .
In the past decade, the precise measurement of the lastly known neutrino mixing angle $theta_{13}$ has enabled the resolution of neutrino mass hierarchy (MH) at medium-baseline reactor neutrino oscillation (MBRO) experiments. On the other hand, recent calculations of the reactor neutrino flux predict percent-level sub-structures in the $bar u_e$ spectrum due to Coulomb effects in beta decay. Such fine structure in the reactor spectrum could be an important issue for the determination of neutrino MH for the MBRO approach since they could affect the sub-dominant oscillation pattern used to discriminate different hierarchies. Inconveniently, the energy resolutions of current reactor experiments are not sufficient to measure such fine structure, and therefore the size and location in energy of these predicted discontinuities has not been confirmed experimentally. There has been speculation that a near detector is required with sufficient energy resolution to resolve the fine structure such that it can be accounted for in any analysis which attempts to discriminate the MH. This article studies the impact of fine structure on the resolution of MH, based on the predicted reactor neutrino spectra, using the measured spectrum from Daya Bay as a reference. We also investigate whether a near detector could improve the sensitivity of neutrino MH resolution using various assumptions of near detector energy resolution.
For a long time there were 3 main experimental indications in favor of the existence of sterile neutrinos: $bar{ u_e}$ appearance in the $bar{ u_mu}$ beam in the LSND experiment, $bar{ u_e}$ flux deficit in comparison with theoretical expectations in reactor experiments, and $ u_e$ deficit in calibration runs with radioactive sources in the Ga solar neutrino experiments SAGE and GALEX. All three problems can be explained by the existence of sterile neutrinos with the mass square difference in the ballpark of $1~mathrm{eV^2}$. Recently the MiniBooNE collaboration observed electron (anti)neutrino appearance in the muon (anti)neutrino beams. The significance of the effect reaches 6.0$sigma$ level when combined with the LSND result. Even more recently the NEUTRINO-4 collaboration claimed the observation of $bar{ u_e}$ oscillations to sterile neutrinos with a significance slightly higher than 3$sigma$. If these results are confirmed, New Physics beyond the Standard Model would be required. More than 10 experiments are devoted to searches of sterile neutrinos. Six very short baseline reactor experiments are taking data just now. We review the present results and perspectives of these experiments.
With the end of Daya Bay experimental operations in December 2020, I review the history, discoveries, measurements and impact of the Daya Bay reactor neutrino experiment in China.
Log in to be able to interact and post comments
comments
Fetching comments
Sign in to be able to follow your search criteria
