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CONUS experiment
The CONUS (COherent Neutrino nUcleus Scattering) experiment is a research project at the commercial nuclear power plant in Brokdorf, Germany (see Figure 1). The CONUS project is sponsored by the Max-Planck-Institut für Kernphysik and Preussen Elektra GmbH.
The CONUS project is searching for the fundamental process of coherent elastic neutrino-nucleus scattering. The primary goal is to confirm the existence of this process and to use this interaction type to investigate further neutrino properties within and beyond the Standard Model of elementary particle physics.
As electrically neutral leptons, neutrinos only interact via the weak force with other particles. Due to this fact, neutrino detectors are generally very large and filled with several (kilo)tons of target material.
There are basically two possibilities to detect neutrinos: First, they can interact with the electrons in the atomic shell of a target atom, and second they can interact with the protons and neutrons of an atomic nucleus. Interactions between neutrinos and electrons as well as neutrinos and nuclear constituents have already been well studied.
However, at low energies up to a maximum of a few tens of MeV, neutrinos can interact coherently with the nucleus as a whole (see Figure 2). This process was predicted in 1974 and is known as coherent elastic neutrino nucleus scattering (CEνNS, pronounced "sevens"). Although its cross section is several magnitudes larger than the cross section of the conventionally used interaction channels (see Figure 3), the tiny recoil of the struck nucleus leads to a very low energy release, making the process very hard to detect. Therefore, experiments investigating this process need detectors with an extremely low energy threshold, i.e., below 1 kilo-electronvolt (keV). On the other hand, since the CEνNS interaction cross sections is enhanced, a few kilogram of detector material can already be enough to detect the interaction.
As the first experiment worldwide, the COHERENT Collaboration was able to experimentally prove the existence of coherent elastic neutrino-nucleus scattering in 2017. Herein, it used a relatively high energy neutrino beam in comparison with reactor neutrinos. Further complementary studies at lower energies in the fully coherent regime are yet to come. Examining this low energy neutrino region is the main goal of the CONUS project.
The detection as well as detailed investigations of the properties of CEνNS utilizing neutrinos from a nuclear reactor require the detector to be located as close as possible to the reactor core to guarantee a maximized neutrino flux. To achieve this, the CONUS detector is located at a distance of 17 m from the reactor core inside the nuclear reactor facility at Brokdorf, see Figure 4. This is only possible due to the selected detector technology such that it can be placed inside the facility without interfering with the operation of the reactor.
The Brokdoft reactor runs at a maximum thermal power of 3.9 GW, making it one of the most powerful in the world. On average, about 7.2 neutrinos are produced per nuclear fission (6 from fission products and 1.2 due to decays after neutron captures on Uranium-238). At the detector site this results in a flux of about 23 trillion neutrinos per second and square centimeter.
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CONUS experiment
The CONUS (COherent Neutrino nUcleus Scattering) experiment is a research project at the commercial nuclear power plant in Brokdorf, Germany (see Figure 1). The CONUS project is sponsored by the Max-Planck-Institut für Kernphysik and Preussen Elektra GmbH.
The CONUS project is searching for the fundamental process of coherent elastic neutrino-nucleus scattering. The primary goal is to confirm the existence of this process and to use this interaction type to investigate further neutrino properties within and beyond the Standard Model of elementary particle physics.
As electrically neutral leptons, neutrinos only interact via the weak force with other particles. Due to this fact, neutrino detectors are generally very large and filled with several (kilo)tons of target material.
There are basically two possibilities to detect neutrinos: First, they can interact with the electrons in the atomic shell of a target atom, and second they can interact with the protons and neutrons of an atomic nucleus. Interactions between neutrinos and electrons as well as neutrinos and nuclear constituents have already been well studied.
However, at low energies up to a maximum of a few tens of MeV, neutrinos can interact coherently with the nucleus as a whole (see Figure 2). This process was predicted in 1974 and is known as coherent elastic neutrino nucleus scattering (CEνNS, pronounced "sevens"). Although its cross section is several magnitudes larger than the cross section of the conventionally used interaction channels (see Figure 3), the tiny recoil of the struck nucleus leads to a very low energy release, making the process very hard to detect. Therefore, experiments investigating this process need detectors with an extremely low energy threshold, i.e., below 1 kilo-electronvolt (keV). On the other hand, since the CEνNS interaction cross sections is enhanced, a few kilogram of detector material can already be enough to detect the interaction.
As the first experiment worldwide, the COHERENT Collaboration was able to experimentally prove the existence of coherent elastic neutrino-nucleus scattering in 2017. Herein, it used a relatively high energy neutrino beam in comparison with reactor neutrinos. Further complementary studies at lower energies in the fully coherent regime are yet to come. Examining this low energy neutrino region is the main goal of the CONUS project.
The detection as well as detailed investigations of the properties of CEνNS utilizing neutrinos from a nuclear reactor require the detector to be located as close as possible to the reactor core to guarantee a maximized neutrino flux. To achieve this, the CONUS detector is located at a distance of 17 m from the reactor core inside the nuclear reactor facility at Brokdorf, see Figure 4. This is only possible due to the selected detector technology such that it can be placed inside the facility without interfering with the operation of the reactor.
The Brokdoft reactor runs at a maximum thermal power of 3.9 GW, making it one of the most powerful in the world. On average, about 7.2 neutrinos are produced per nuclear fission (6 from fission products and 1.2 due to decays after neutron captures on Uranium-238). At the detector site this results in a flux of about 23 trillion neutrinos per second and square centimeter.