China turns on giant neutrino detector • The Register

More than a decade after construction began, China has commenced operation of what it claims is the world’s most sensitive neutrino detector.

Neutrinos are subatomic particles that have no charge and therefore pass through most matter without leaving any sign of their passing. Physics can’t fully explain neutrinos, so scientists are interested in observing them more often to learn more about how they behave.

The Jiangmen Underground Neutrino Experiment (JUNO) is buried 700 meters under a mountain and features a 20,000-tonne “liquid scintillator detector” that China’s Academy of Science says is “housed at the center of a 44-meter-deep water pool.” There’s also a 35.4-meter-diameter acrylic sphere supported by a 41.1-meter-diameter stainless steel truss. All that stuff is surrounded by mor