Mayly Sanchez
Iowa State University
Monday, November
2, 2009
4:00 pm in SPL 57
Measuring the Elusive: Neutrino Oscillations in MINOS and Beyond
Abstract: Since neutrino oscillations were observed and announced to the World in 1998, the field of neutrino physics has been teeming with activity. A forefront contributor is the MINOS experiment, which has been taking beam data since 2005. MINOS analyzes a neutrino beam in two different locations: at Fermilab, close to the beam production, and 735 km downstream in Northern Minnesota. By searching for neutrino disappearance as well as appearance, MINOS has been able to examine some of the neutrino mixing parameters that are a window into the new directions of physics. A brief history of neutrino physics and recent results since the discovery of oscillations will lead us to discuss the challenges of performing neutrino experiments. We will focus on how these challenges have been addressed in MINOS in obtaining the results from the first two years of beam data. We will aso briefly look into the future, when other experiments such as NOvA and LBNE will explore and unravel other pieces of the neutrino puzzle.
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