A key piece of equipment for a major international science experiment, which could lead to discoveries on the origin of matter and the formation of black holes, is being produced in the North West.
A series of detector components are being built at the Science and Technology Facilities Council’s Daresbury Laboratory, located at Sci-Tech Daresbury in Liverpool, for the DUNE (the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment) experiment.
The UK Government has invested £65m in the project which is being hosted by Fermilab in the US and will study neutrinos in a bid to advance understanding of the origin and structure of the universe.
As part of the experiment, scientists will capture the neutrinos in detectors containing 17,000 tons of liquid argon.
The electrical signals of neutrino interactions will be read out by Anode Plane Assemblies (APAs) – huge rectangular planes covered with thousands of copper-beryllium wires, about the width of a human hair.
Each APA stands at a 2.3m by 6.3m – making them the largest individual components for DUNE.
Daresbury Laboratory – with its university partners in Liverpool and Manchester – will ultimately produce 150 APAs for DUNE.
To meet this need, a large purpose-built APA factory was created at Daresbury inside a former accelerator hall, and 20 specific jobs were created for this task.
The Daresbury team has now started the production of the first APA for ProtoDUNE-II.
The high-precision APAs will first undergo cryogenic testing in the ProtoDUNE-II detector at CERN before the full set of APAs for DUNE are built, a process that will take several years to complete.
Executive chairman of STFC Professor Mark Thomson, said: “It is impressive that the project team continues to made excellent progress in such a challenging year.
“This development means that 2021 should be the year of the Final Design Review and beginning of ‘mass’ production of APAs at Daresbury – a huge milestone for everyone involved and a major step towards the construction of this incredibly exciting neutrino experiment.
“I am deeply proud of the team at Daresbury for how hard they have continued to work in difficult circumstances.”
“These detector components will play a key role in unravelling the mystery of neutrinos and their role in the formation of the Universe,” added DUNE spokesperson Professor Stefan Soldner-Rembold, of the University of Manchester
