Science and Technology of a Low-Energy Solar Neutrino Spectrometer (LENS) and Development of the MiniLENS Underground Prototype

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Date
2010-05-05
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Virginia Tech
Abstract

A real time low energy spectral measurement of the neutrinos coming from the Sun will give us a greater understanding of energy production in the Sun, and the mechanisms of neutrino mixing. We will, for the first time, measure the solar neutrino spectrum for all solar neutrinos <2MeV in particular pp, Be and CNO neutrinos, be able to compare the solar photon derived energy luminosity (Lï §) to the solar neutrino derived energy luminosity (Lï ®) independent of any solar model, explore dark energy with respect to mass varying neutrinos, and explore CNO abundances in the Sun. These measurements require new technology in Indium loaded scintillators and large scale detector designs, namely increased spatial resolution through a novel scintillation lattice. I will present the advances we are making to these fields at Virginia Tech as well as neutrino science and the physics of the LENS detector.

Description
Keywords
calibration, radiation, Borexino, metal loaded liquid scintillator, neutrino physics, LENS, scintillation lattice
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