A Novel Target Material for Optical Neutrino Detectors
by
small seminar room
Since the late 1960s, optical detectors have been a common method for detecting neutrino interactions. Two common target materials for these detectors are pure water and liquid scintillator, each having advantages and disadvantages. A new material, water-based liquid scintillator (WbLS), has been developed over the last decade at Brookhaven National Laboratory and combines the advantages of its constituents while minimizing their disadvantages. Small-scale, tabletop experiments have been done with WbLS, but ton-scale tests need to be performed before scaling up to a kiloton-scale WbLS detector. This talk will give an overview of the design of three ton-scale WbLS detectors currently in operation and plans for a future kiloton-scale WbLS detector.