Physicists have made a groundbreaking discovery, capturing an “ultrahigh energy” neutrino using a telescope located beneath the Mediterranean Sea. This is the most energetic particle of its kind ever detected on Earth, and scientists are eager to unravel the mystery behind its origin.
Led by researchers at the University of Amsterdam, the global collaboration involved approximately 350 scientists in the detection of the neutrino. The team employed the Kilometer Cube Neutrino Telescope (KM3NeT) to record the event, which occurred in February 2023.
The detector system consists of a pair of detectors located about two miles beneath the surface of the Mediterranean Sea, off the coasts of France and Sicily. When an ultrahigh energy neutrino interacted with rock or seawater nearby, it produced a muon that sped through the KM3NeT at incredible speed, leaving a trail of bright blue photons in its wake.
By analyzing the pattern of light and time of arrival, the researchers deduced the direction of the original neutrino. They estimate that the neutrino carried 220 million billion electronvolts of energy, which is approximately tens of thousands of times more than what can be achieved by the Large Hadron Collider at CERN.
This finding not only sheds new light on the behavior of neutrinos but also opens a window into the universe’s most extreme environments. Neutrinos are notoriously difficult to detect and study due to their neutral nature, making this discovery particularly significant.
The KM3NeT team will continue to work towards refining their understanding of the neutrino’s origin, with hopes that future observations will reveal more such extraordinary particles. The telescope is still under construction but has already demonstrated its capabilities in detecting ultrahigh energy neutrinos.
This breakthrough underscores the importance of innovative detection methods, such as acoustic and radio sensing, which may better capture elusive particles like neutrinos at extreme energies. As one researcher noted, “Now, we know these neutrinos are not just predicted; they’re there. They’re real.”
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/12/science/astrophysics-universe-neutrinos.html