Nuetrino Experiment

We are all made up of atoms. A statement one hears often. But then what are atoms made of? Atoms consist of a nucleus made of subatomic particles. These subatomic particles are protons, electrons and neutrons. Protons have a positive charge, electrons negative and neutrons are neutral. When the neutrons undergo a nuclear reaction, they transform into protons and emit a different kind of subatomic particle. This subatomic particle is known as a neutrino and is charge less. They are elementary particles formed produced by decay of radioactive elements.


These particles are very tiny and are of three types referred to as electron, muon and tau. They are hard to detect and often pass through solid matter without detection. They don’t collide with any other molecules. Muons are charged particles released by the neutrino when the neutrino collides into a mass without passing right through it. What makes neutrinos unique is their ability to remain unaffected by nature’s forces and they are not absorbed as they travel light years between their point of origin and us. However, it also this nature of the neutrinos which makes them extremely difficult to detect and requires complex instruments to trace them.

When muons travel through a transparent, they emit a blue light, said Dr. Vijaya Swaminath, an astrophysicst and once winter-over at the South Pole. As these muons travel in the same direction as that of the neutrino it helps the scientists to trace their origin.

Ice cube experiment- the name doesn’t sound familiar and for many of us its unheard of. Not many know that there are over 60 winter-overs staying at the South Pole trying to find neutrinos and consequently trying to find the origin of stars- something that might sound incomprehensible and even unimportant to us. What is one supposed to do by finding out the origin of a star or even earth? Right?

These 60 winter-overs working for the IceCube Experiment are spending months in the world’s coldest and driest regions. IceCube is an international project sponsored and conducted by the United States and several non-U.S. countries and funding agencies. It is an international neutrino observatory for astrophysics that was installed for Astral summers for a period of over six years.
Set up on a volume of over one cubic kilometer i.e close to the size of three soccer grounds, it is embedded in the purest ice found on earth to track neutrinos. It consists of a digital optical sphere which is a pressurized glass sphere which is the size of an inflated balloon. Now the question arises as to why this experiment is being conducted only in South Pole and not anywhere else. Well, if one notices an observatory, the telescope is pointed towards the sky. Here, the earth in itself acts a telescope. Owing to the high density of ice any neutrino that hits the ice sheet will result in the production of muons. According to estimates there are close to thousand such collisions that occur in the IceCube detector.

However, finding these minute subatomic particles is not a joke and for the scientists living there it is not just a passion but often entails lot of sacrifices. According to Ethan Dicks, one of the 60 winter overs currently staying at the South pole “I miss home a lot, I miss my family and I miss 24 hours internet!” The winter overs have access to internet for just 4 hours in a day. “Earlier the access was just for 2 hours, thankfully it is now 4 hours”, said Edgar Nielsen another winter over.

Life at South Pole is no bed of roses and initially they are affected by the altitude and temperature. “Because of high altitude, the air pressure is very low and it takes time for us to adjust” said Ethan. “Exercises are a complete no-no here because of elevated heart beat and any kind of exercise affects the heart”, he said. Also because of lower air pressure, the water from the body evaporates faster leading to dehydration. “We have to keep ourselves constantly hydrated”, said Edgar.
However, once they are acclimatized to the weather and get past their initial hiccups, they do make the most of their experience. “There have been times when I wondered what I was doing here, but I have learnt a lot here. It’s a completely different environment that we work in and we do what the normal human beings around the world don’t do!” said Ethan. They do try to keep make their life in the observatory as normal as possible. “We have events, clubs, festivals, barbecues nights” he said.

Because of the freezing cold there, they have to make sure that the machinery doesn’t freeze. “We have to keep our snow mobiles switched on when we are out on the snow. If we switch them off, it would take ages for the ignition to work”, Edgar said. To drill holes into the ice for the sensors to be embedded it takes close to 57 hours and around 4800 gallons of fuel.

“We get a completely different perspective of life here. And when we are back home, even small things like going to a grocery store seems exciting!” said Ethan. Food is not a problem as supplies are flown in bulk twice in a year. “When the cargo flight unloads, we load it with the garbage that has piled up here,” he said.

Whether or not the IceCube experiment might benefit us or whether or not we will ever know its benefits, time will only tell. But these experiments involving these brave young men and women enlighten us about the hidden matter in the space and help us understand the evolution of earth.