Project Grant DESC0025608

This $600,000 project grant award from the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Mathematical and Physical Sciences (CFDA 47.049) program supports two fundamental neutrino physics research efforts led by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). The first effort is the continued development of the Project 8 neutrino experiment, which uses cyclotron radiation emission spectroscopy to precisely measure the tritium beta decay endpoint and determine the neutrino mass scale. Over the next...

This Project Grant award from the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Mathematical and Physical Sciences program provides $375,000 to Central Michigan University (CMU) to perform precise mass measurements to identify potential ultra-low Q value beta-decay candidates. The research aims to determine the mass of the neutrino, which is of great interest to particle physics and cosmology. As part of the project, CMU will invite a cohort of six high school students each summer for a two-week program...

This $411,735 National Science Foundation project grant supports research to develop specialized germanium detectors and conduct experiments at the TRIUMF accelerator center in Canada. The goal is to search for a hypothesized boson particle in the decay of antimuons by focusing on low-energy signatures. The University of Chicago will receive the funding to build detectors with improved energy resolution of over three orders of magnitude compared to previous large scintillator calorimeters. These...

This Project Grant award from the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Mathematical and Physical Sciences (CFDA 47.049) program provides $350,000 to Michigan State University (MSU) to develop and test a laser-based detector capable of efficiently capturing and selectively identifying magnesium atoms produced by the neon-22 and helium-4 nuclear reaction. The goal is to use this "single atom microscope" technique to measure the cross-section of this low-probability nuclear reaction, which...

This $1,000,000 Project Grant award, provided by the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Mathematical and Physical Sciences (CFDA 47.049) program, supports the development and construction of a state-of-the-art trigger system for the Pacific Ocean Neutrino Experiment (P-ONE), a next-generation neutrino observatory located off the coast of Washington state. The award will fund a team of researchers at Georgia Tech Research Corporation, Drexel University, Michigan State University, and the...

This Project Grant award of $350,000 from the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Mathematical and Physical Sciences Program (CFDA 47.049) supports the University of Hawaii's efforts to enhance the sensitivity of the KamLAND2-Zen neutrino-less double beta decay search experiment located in Japan. The Principal Investigator will focus on fabricating, installing, and commissioning an advanced optical calibration system for the KamLAND2-Zen detector. This will involve developing fiber-based optical...

This $635,033 Project Grant award from the National Science Foundation's Division of Physics supports research at the University of Texas at Austin to search for neutrinoless double beta decay using the LEGEND experiment. The researchers will employ high-purity germanium detectors and an ultra-low background setup to detect this rare nuclear transition, which could shed light on neutrino properties and the early evolution of the universe. Additionally, the team will collaborate on developing...

The National Science Foundation (NSF) has awarded a $480,000 Project Grant to the Trustees of Boston University to support research on the fundamental nature of neutrinos. Through this grant under the NSF Division of Physics' Mathematical and Physical Sciences program (CFDA 47.049), the university will implement major enhancements to the world-leading KamLAND-Zen neutrino detection experiment to search for evidence of neutrinos being their own antiparticles, a hypothetical property known as...

The Regents of the University of California at Riverside received a $891,952 Project Grant from the National Science Foundation to support the project "Precision Measurement of the 1S-2S Interval in Positronium" from September 1, 2021 through August 31, 2024. This award under the NSF's Mathematical and Physical Sciences program (CFDA #47.049) will fund research to precisely measure the energy difference between the ground state and first excited state of positronium, an exotic atom...

The National Science Foundation (NSF) awarded a $330,000 Project Grant under its Mathematical and Physical Sciences (CFDA 47.049) program to Trustees of Indiana University (Indiana University) to provide theoretical research and analytical models needed to support precision neutrino physics experiments. The research focuses on developing improved descriptions of neutrino-nucleus interactions, particularly the nucleon axial form factor which is crucial for accurately modeling neutrino...