APOD 3.7

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap110213.html

 

Ice Fishing for Cosmic Neutrinos  (Feb. 13 2011)

                   This was intriguing to me because scientists are melting holes in the bottom of our world! In fact, almost 100 of these holes melted near the South Pole are being used as astronomical observatories. Astronomers with the IceCube Neutrino Observatory lowered into each hole a long string knotted with light detectors which are roughly the size of basketballs. The water in each hole soon refreezes. The detectors attached to the strings are sensitive to blue light emitted in the surrounding clear ice. Such light is expected by the astronomers from ice collisions with high-energy neutrinos emitted by objects or explosions out in the universe. Last year, the last of IceCube's 86 strings were lowered into the freezing abyss, pictured above, making IceCube the largest neutrino detector ever created. Data from a preliminary experiment, AMANDA, has already been used to create the first detailed map of the high-energy neutrino sky. Experimental goals of the newer IceCube include a search for cosmic sources of neutrinos, a search for neutrinos coincident with nearby supernova and distant gamma-ray bursts, and, if lucky, a probe of exotic physical concepts such as unseen spatial dimensions and faster-than-light travel.I felt this was a fitting APOD to what we are currently discussing so I decided to look into it. I personally find all the different methods of attempting to detect neutrinos as fascinating because they are so translucent.