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Feasibility studies of a shallow depth neutrino experiment and exploring the possibilities of measuring internal magnetic field using muon spin rotation

The Sudbury Neutrino Observatory (SNO) experiment, led by Nobel laureate Arthur B. McDonald has conclusively proven that neutrinos exist in three different flavors which are a superposition of 3 mass eigenstates having tiny masses. However, the ordering of the three mass eigenstates also known as the neutrino mass hierarchy is not yet solved. India is planning to build an underground laboratory named India based neutrino observatory (INO) under a mountain rock coverage of ~1 km to conduct various experiments in neutrino physics, dark matter searches and rare event studies. The primary aim of INO is to set up a 51 kton Iron Calorimeter detector to probe the neutrino mass hierarchy. Building such an underground facility is often very challenging. In the first part of my talk, I will discuss the possibility of having an alternative solution to house an ICAL like experiment at a shallow depth (~100 m) with the help of a highly efficient active muon veto detector. In the second part, I will briefly discuss the installation of a ~85 ton magnet prototype of the ICAL (mini-ICAL) detector followed by magnetic field measurement inside the iron in the mini-ICAL detector using muon spin rotation of cosmic muons.

If you’d like to attend virtually, please send an email to Levente Balogh levente.balogh@queensu.ca for the Zoom link.