A new neutrino telescope

29 April 1998

A new neutrino telescope
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Today sees the official opening of the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory (SNO), located in the Creighton mine in Sudbury, Ontario. SNO has been designed to catch neutrinos from the Sun - in particular, it will use 1000 tonnes of heavy water in an attempt to solve the puzzle as to why previous experiments seem to detect too few neutrinos. This image shows the 12-m diameter acrylic vessel built to hold the heavy water. It bristles with the 10,000 light-sensitive phototubes which will detect light flashes (Cherenkov radiation) emitted when neutrinos interact in the water.

Credit: Ernest Orlando Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory