Seminars

Luca Pattavina: “RES-NOVA, detecting astrophysical neutrinos with archaeological Pb-based cryogenic detectors”

Europe/London
KINGS BLDG K6.63

KINGS BLDG K6.63

Description

The RES-NOVA project was recently awarded an ERC Consolidator grant for hunting neutrinos from core-collapse supernovae (SN) via coherent elastic neutrino-nucleus scattering (CEνNS) using an array of archaeological lead (Pb) based cryogenic detectors. The high CEνNS cross-section on Pb and the ultra-high radiopurity of archaeological Pb enable the operation of a highly sensitive neutrino observatory, equally sensitive to all neutrino flavors, with dimensions at the cm-scale. The first phase of the RES-NOVA project is planning to operate a demonstrator detector with a total volume of about (30 cm)$^3$. It will be sensitive to SN bursts from the entire Milky Way Galaxy with >3σ sensitivity while running PbWO4 detectors with a 1 keV energy threshold. The main SN parameters can potentially be constrained with a precision of a few % while looking at (anti-)ν$_{μ/τ}$. The innovative experimental approach allows for delivering important physics results also in other astroparticle physics sectors (e.g. Dark Matter) even when no SN is observed.

In this talk, the potential of this new experimental approach will be outlined, as well as complementary aspects with the currently used technologies. In addition, the experimental sensitivity and the performance of the first prototype detectors will be shown.