The U.S. Department of Energy has awarded $45.6 million to the University of Minnesota to build an international physics laboratory near the Ash River, about 40 miles southeast of International Falls.
Building the lab is the first step in an estimated $250 million project to study neutrinos, subatomic particles that can help researchers discover how the universe was formed and how it will develop in the future.
"This is a great day, but it's not surprising," said University of Minnesota physics professor Marvin Marshak, a lead faculty member on the project. "Projects like this require many steps, and the finalization of this cooperative agreement is one of those steps. There are many steps to go, but this is a significant move forward."
Neutrinos are called the ghosts of the universe because they have little or no mass and no electrical charge and tend not to interact with other matter. But they are so numerous that even a small mass for each could have huge consequences for understanding the universe.
Physicists estimate that about 80 percent to 90 percent of the mass in the universe is "dark matter," matter that can't be seen. Researchers hope that if the mass of neutrinos can be determined, so can their contribution to the universe's mass.
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In 2005, a half-a-mile-long "gun" at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab) near Chicago began shooting neutrinos through 450 miles of earth toward a detector at the Soudan Underground Science Laboratory. Changes from one form of neutrino to another between Fermi and Soudan will help researchers determine the particles' mass.
While perhaps a trillion neutrinos per year will pass through the Soudan detector, many will miss it by miles. The property of the neutrinos changes the farther they are from the center of the beam and the farther they travel, Marshak said. Hence the idea to build an off-axis detector near Ash River -- about 50 miles past Soudan from Chicago.
"The nature of neutrinos is that they pass pretty much through everything without doing anything," Marshak said. "It's not like the beam gets to Soudan and just stops."
While the Soudan detector was built 2,341 feet underground, the Ash River detector will be in a 70-foot tall building sunk 40 feet into the ground. The 15,000-ton detector itself will consist of mineral oil, plastic containers and monitoring devices.
"We hope to begin construction this spring," Marshak said. "We're looking at finishing the building in the spring of 2010 and then start installing the detector. As soon as we start installing the detector it will start working. But it will take us about another three years to finish installing the detector. Then we plan to collect data for another eight to 10 years."
The neutrino detector itself will cost about $150 million. The Department of Energy is expected to provide most of these funds.
"This is a great example of how universities are an integral part of the Department of Energy's scientific research program," Robin Staffin, senior advisor to the director of the Department of Energy's Office of Science, said in a news release. "NOvA (the Ash River detector) will be at the forefront of neutrino science in the next decade, but we would not be able to do it without outstanding research groups like the University of Minnesota."
In addition to funding the Ash River laboratory, the Department of Energy also plans to spend approximately $50 million to improve the existing neutrino beam from Fermilab.
