Physics & Astronomy Colloquium

3:30 PM, Friday, February 29, 2008
Room 155, Chem-Phys Building

Dr. Steve Elliott
Neutron Science and Technology Group, P-23
Los Alamos National Laboratory

" Double Beta Decay and the Neutrino ''

The recent demonstrations of oscillations in the atmospheric and solar neutrino data convincingly indicate that neutrinos do have mass. Those data however, do not tell us the absolute mass scale but only the differences of the square of the neutrino masses. Even so, we now know that at least one neutrino has a mass of about 50 meV or larger.

Studies of double beta decay rates offer hope for determining the absolute mass scale. In particular, zero-neutrino double beta decay (ββ(0ν)) can address the issues of lepton number conservation, the particle-antiparticle nature of the neutrino, and its mass. In fact, upcoming generations of ββ(0ν) experiments will be sensitive to neutrino masses in the exciting range of below 50 meV. An overview of ββ(0ν) and its relation to neutrino mass will be discussed followed by a profile of a proposed experiment: the MAJORANA Project.

Refreshments will be served in CP 179 at 3:15 PM