Cosmology View
My views on Cosmology and Physics
site navigation menu
Book by David Michalets
Detecting Neutrinos investigates neutrinos, including their definition and how they are detected.
Neutrinos have no charge and little or no mass, so they are unlike the other particles which have a specific, measured mass.
A neutrino can be detected only indirectly, by detecting a specific event which can be attributed to only a neutrino.
The systems designed to capture a detectable event caused by a neutrino are described.
The inconsistency of neutrinos and the other particles requires an investigation into the larger scope of the Standard Model of particle physics.
Table of Contents
Introduction (below on this page)
1 Standard Model
2 Radioactive Decay
3 Fermi's Interaction
4 Electron Neutrino
5 Muon Neutrino
6 Tau Neutrino
7 Solar Neutrino Problem
8 Background for Detectors
9 Neutrino Detectors
10 Geoneutrino
11 Claimed Neutrino Detections
12 My Relevant Publications
13 Final Conclusion
Introduction
Detecting Neutrinos investigates the claims of detecting a neutrino particle.
Over the years, the description of a neutrino has changed from 1 type having no mass, to 3 types with each having a different low mass value.
This investigation has 3 goals.
1) describing the respective types of neutrinos and the origin of each,
2) analyzing the complex experiments designed to detect them,
3) analyzing the claimed detections by these experiments.
Here is a summary of the 13 sections in this book.
1) Standard Model describes the subatomic particles and quasi-particles in this model tasked to explain matter,
The important particles other than neutrinos are also described.
2) Radioactive Decay describes steps of radioactive decay, where some can include a neutrino.
3) Fermi's Interaction describes the theory of beta decay with a neutrino by Enrico Fermi in 1933.
4) Electron Neutrino describes this type,
5) Muon Neutrino describes this type,
6) Tau Neutrino describes this type,
7) Solar Neutrino Problem describes a problem with the neutrinos being detected from the Sun, where they don't match predictions from the Standard Model,
8) Background describes the material and/or mechanism used in some neutrino detectors ,
9) Neutrino Detectors describes the experiments making claims of detecting neutrinos,
10) Geoneutrino describes this finding by the KamLAND experiment,
11) Claimed Neutrino Detections descibes the validity of the claims,
12) My Relevant Publications describes those of my other publications which are relevant to this book.
13) Final Conclusion provides a final conclusion after the analysis provided in the preceding sections.
Go to Table of Contents, to read a specific section.
last change 04/04/2022