[The University of Texas at Austin: What starts here changes the world]
Theory Group
Center for Particles and Fields Seminar, 26 January 2015


Dr. Joshua Spitz, MIT

Using kaons to unlock the secrets of the neutrino

abstract

More than 80 years after its proposed existence, the neutrino remains largely mysterious and elusive. Despite this fact, we are closing in on answers to some of the big questions surrounding the "little neutral one". After an introduction to the neutrino and neutrino mass, I will discuss two of the most important open questions in particle physics and cosmology: (1) How many neutrinos are there? and (2) Is there a difference between matter neutrinos and antimatter neutrinos?
Recently, the monoenergetic 236 MeV muon neutrino from charged kaon decay-at-rest has been identified as a potential source for a sterile neutrino search. A detector placed close to such a source can be used to search for electron neutrino appearance, which would be consistent with the existence of at least one sterile neutrino. Further, this unique, known-energy neutrino can be used to inform neutrino oscillation experiments searching for a difference between neutrinos and anti-neutrinos called CP-violation. Specifically, a set of cross section measurements would furnish a standard candle for the energy reconstruction and interaction kinematics relevant for charged current neutrino events near this energy. I will discuss these ideas and also present a set of experiments that will be able to explore these topics in the next few years.



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