NSERC grants at Laurentian University Subventions du CRSNG `a l ...

Partners with Laurentian UniversityPartenaires avec l’Université LaurentienneMark Chen with/avec A. L. Hallin, A. B. Macdonald,Doug Hallman & Clarence Virtue 1SNO Liquid Scintillator R & DThe amount of the grant is to be determined.Le montant de la subvention reste à être déterminé.Subatomic Physics Project – Projet en physique subatomiqueThe Sudbury Neutrino Observatory (SNO) uses heavy water as the mediumfor detecting solar neutrinos. After current studies using this heavywater are completed in 2007, it would be possible to replace the heavy waterin SNO with a liquid scintillator - an organic hydrocarbon liquid that emitslight when subatomic particles interact in it. A liquid scintillator would boostthe light produced by neutrino interactions in SNO by a factor of fifty overthe present configuration, allowing lower energy neutrinos to be studied.These would include solar neutrinos from different nuclear reactions in thesun. By studying these lower energy solar neutrinos, a deeper understandingof the nuclear energy generation mechanisms in stars would be achieved, aswell as increased precision in our knowledge of the new neutrino propertiesrecently discovered by SNO. At lower energies, it would also be possible todetect geo-neutrinos, the neutrinos emitted by natural radioactivity in theEarth. By studying geo-neutrinos, one can survey the whole Earth at onceto directly determine the amount of radioactivity deep in the Earth and itsrole in Earth’s total heat generation, a subject that is poorly known. A liquidscintillator detector also serves as an excellent monitor for detecting1 The names of the researchers from Laurentian University are shown in italics./Les noms des chercheurs de l’UniversitéLaurentienne sont en italiques.137