KM3NeT - neutrino

KM3NeT on display at the “Des abysses au cosmos” exhibition

From the 15th of September to the 8th of October, KM3NeT is represented at the exhibition “Des abysses au cosmos” (From the abyss to the cosmos), at the Fort Napoléon cultural centre in La Seyne-sur-Mer, France, operating quarters of the ANTARES and KM3NeT experiments.

The exhibition presents 20 years of underwater exploration of the cosmos, as well as the scientific and technological challenges and innovations involved in studying neutrinos and the deep marine environment. Organised by the CPPM and the City Hall of la Seyne-sur-Mer, this exhibition is aimed at the general public as well as primary and secondary school students.

Posters, photos, miniatures, objects and mini-interviews about KM3NeT are displayed, showing the scientific and technological efforts done by the Collaboration since the beginnings of the experiment to the present day. The KM3NeT-INFRADEV2 project is also represented to highlight the Collaboration’s commitment towards the full implementation of a reliable and sustainable KM3NeT international Research Infrastructure. A section is also dedicated to women in science, presenting the involvement of women scientists, engineers and technicians in KM3NeT.

 

An exhibition that will take its visitors to a depth of more than 2400 metres and behind the scenes of international research!

 

Some of the objects presented at the exhibit (by Chiara Lastoria)

 

Some pictures of the exhibition opening, on the 14th of September (by Victoria Ciarlet)

 

More information on the exhibition: https://cppm.in2p3.fr/abysses-cosmos

KM3NeT presented at conferences worldwide

15 September 2023 – This summer, KM3NeT members participated in conferences all over the world to present the latest results and  developments of our Collaboration.

Besides TAUP in Vienna, EPS-HEP in Hamburg, and TeVPA in Naples, KM3NeT-ers have massively attended the 38th International Cosmic Ray Conference (ICRC), in Nagoya, Japan. Since the ICRC is among the largest conferences in the field of astroparticle physics, it was an ideal opportunity for reporting the progress of the collaboration in neutrino astronomy, neutrino physics, multi-messenger astronomy, cosmic rays, and dark matter searches.

In total, KM3NeT presented 10 talks and 28 posters at the ICRC, in addition to a plenary talk given by prof. Antoine Kouchner, the spokesperson of the ANTARES Collaboration, on catching neutrinos in the Mediterranean Sea.

Interested?

The full proceedings of ICRC2023 can be found here. For your convenience, the contributions of KM3NeT to the proceedings are available here and are also on arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2309.05016.

KM3NeT members at the ICRC2023.
Antoine Kouchner, spokesperson of the ANTARES Collaboration, presenting at the ICRC2023 an overview of recent work achieved by ANTARES and KM3NeT.
Some of the talks given by KM3NeT members at the ICRC2023.
Some of the posters presented by KM3NeT members at the ICRC2023.

 

Three more detection units for KM3NeT/ORCA

1 May 2023 – During a two days sea operation, 27-28 April 2023, three detection units were successfully connected to the ORCA detector of KM3NeT in a record time of just over 24 hours. In addition, an acoustic beacon was recovered for battery replacement. The total number of deployed ORCA units is now 18, as visible in the sonar scan above.

As usual, the operation was performed with two ships: the Castor of Foselev, for deployment of the detection units, and the Janus II of SAAS (formerly Comex), equipped with a deep-sea remotely operated vehicle, for submarine operations.

Many thanks to the crews offshore as well as to the team who performed the functional tests of the new detection units from the shore station!

The KM3NeT-INFRADEV2 project is launched

27 March 2023 – The kick-off Meeting of the KM3NeT-INFRADEV2 project, funded by the European Union, marked the official start of a new step toward the full implementation of the KM3NeT Research Infrastructure.

Involving institutes, laboratories and universities from France, Italy, Germany, Greece, The Netherlands, and Spain, this three-year European project aims to support the creation of a KM3NeT legal entity, accelerates the implementation of the detectors, develops the data management and open science practices of the collaboration as well as ensures a sustainable future for the infrastructure.

During the online meeting, each work package was presented to all partners involved and to Ioannis Andredakis, the Project Officer for the INFRADEV2 project from the European Research Executive Agency.

The leaders of the working groups and their team members also had the opportunity to further discuss their work together, giving a very positive start to the project.

For the next three years and thanks to the European funding, the consortium will continue firmly with the development and successful operation of the KM3NeT neutrino observatory.

 

 

 

Major upgrade of ARCA’s seafloor network

22 November 2022 – After 4 years of  activities carried out by the Italian funding agency INFN and Alcatel Submarine Networks, part of Nokia, the new subsea network for KM3NeT ARCA, funded under the Idmar regional project in Italy, is now complete.

The new system comprises a 100 km long electro-optical cable, equipped with 48 optical fibres for detector control and data communication and two electrical conductors for power distribution, connected to the shore station control and power feeding equipment, that can deliver up to 80 kW offshore. The cable is bifurcated in order to serve the two building blocks foreseen in ARCA.

During a 10 days long sea operation, which ended on November 17th, a cable termination frame (CTF) was installed on the northern branch of the cable. To this purpose the end of the cable, which was deployed already in 2020, was recovered from the sea floor and connected to the CTF onboard the deployment ship – the Ile d’Ouessant of Alcatel Submarine Networks. Then the CTF was carefully deployed to the target position on the sea floor. Extensive tests were done before and after the deployment to ensure its nominal behaviour.

The CTF is a large-size, 12-ton component which is equipped with four medium voltage converters and a total of 16 electrical and optical subsea connectors for connecting a set of submarine junction boxes to which the detection units will be in turn connected.

With this installation the connectivity and power transmission capabilities of the network have been increased by a factor four compared to the first part of the network, used to run the set of junction boxes and the first 30 detection units of ARCA Phase 1. This will allow for the completion of the construction of the first building block of ARCA and prepares the field for the installation of a second CTF on the other branch of the cable for the second building block.

The CTF at the end of the integration.
CTF onboard Ile d’Ouessant.
Overboarding of the CTF.

Sea campaign for ARCA concluded: welcome, KM3NeT/ARCA19!

14 June 2022 – The sea campaign for enlarging the KM3NeT/ARCA submarine telescope has been completed with full success!

During the last few days, all detection units loaded on Handin Tide for the second phase of the operation were carefully installed on the sea bottom. This was achieved at a record-breaking speed, with 7 detection units installed, connected and unfurled in less than 48 hours!

As a result of the campaign, the size of ARCA has more than doubled. It now comprises 19 detection units in operation, equipped with more than 10,000 photomultipliers,

We thank the teams which worked tirelessly offshore and onshore to reach this remarkable success. And we can’t forget that this was made possible by the hard work ongoing in the almost 30 integration sites of the Collaboration.

The activities at sea went around the clock during the campaign.

The shore station during the campaign – more than 30 people were involved in the onshore team for this campaign.

Welcome KM3NeT/ARCA19

14 June 2022 – The sea campaign for enlarging the KM3NeT/ARCA submarine telescope which was started on June 2, has been completed today with a full success. As a result, data taking with ARCA has been resumed with 19 detection units in operation!

This represents a major step forward for the collaboration, as this was the first time that a 2-weeks campaign was performed. The scope of the operation in fact was twofold: to upgrade the submarine network, by installing 2 new junction boxes in replacement of the junction box that we had been operating so far, and to install 11 new detection units (DUs). The operation therefore took place in two steps: after the first round of activities for installation of the junction boxes and the first 4 DUs, the ship went back to shore to pick up the remaining set of 7 DUs.

The campaign was performed with Handin Tide, of the FUGRO company, which had already performed the previous sea campaign for KM3NeT/ARCA last year, sailing off from Malta.

All planned activities were performed with full success, including ancillary operations such as the replacement of one autonomous acoustic beacon on the sea floor. A speed record was also established, with 7 detection units installed, connected and unfurled in less than 48 hours!

As a result of the campaign, the size of ARCA has more than doubled: It now comprises 19 detection units in operation, equipped with more than 10,000 photomultipliers,

The KM3NeT collaboration wishes to thank the Handin Tide crew for their top-level performance, the KM3NeT teams which worked tirelessly offshore and onshore to reach this remarkable success, as well as all teams which work so hard at the almost 30 integration sites of the collaboration to produce the DUs for building the apparatus.

Below is a gallery of pictures from the campaign. A log of the activities while the operation was ongoing is available on our blog.

Detection units in the port of Malta awaiting deployment.
Loading of a detection unit onto Handin Tide.
Handin Tide leaving Malta for the first phase of the campaign.

Deployment of one of the junction boxes installed in the campaign.

The deck of Handin Tide loaded with DUs for the second phase of the campaign.
Connection of one detection unit on the sea bottom.
The onshore control station at Portopalo di Capo Passero during the campaign. More than 30 people from 10 institutes in France, Italy and the Netherlands participated in the activities onshore.

Activities at sea being resumed at the ARCA site

11 June 2022 – Due to the adverse weather conditions of the last days, the schedule of the sea campaign had to be redefined.

Here is the updated plan:

  • the ship left Malta this afternoon, to be back at the ARCA site tonight
  • the deep sea activities will be started already during the night
  • DU deployments will be started tomorrow
  • end of the operation is foreseen for early next week

Good luck to our offshore and onshore teams!

Empty LOMs (the launcher vehicles used for deployment and unfurling of the detection units) on the dock in the Malta port after the first phase of the sea campaign.
The deck of the Handin Tide loaded with detection units and their cable trays for the second phase of the campaign.
The Handin Tide leaving the port of Malta this afternoon.

Intermediate outcome of the ARCA campaign: 2 junction boxes and 12 detection units operational

6 June 2022 – The first round of activities of the ongoing sea campaign at ARCA has been completed.

In a summary, in the past week-end:

  • we installed two submarine junction boxes, one of which in replacement of the temporary junction box that we have used so far
  • the temporary junction box has been safely recovered
  • we moved all connections of the detection units already installed on the sea bed onto the new junction boxes
  • we installed 4 new detection units (where, by installation, one should understand that each detection unit was lowered to the bottom of the sea, carefully placed on the sea bottom, connected to the junction box and unfurled to reach its nominal, upright configuration)

Each of the steps above comprised dedicated tests, requiring careful coordination of the activities of the onshore and offshore teams.

And… the campaign is not yet finished! The ship is now heading back to Malta to load an additional set of detection units to install.

Stay tuned, as there will be more to report in the next days!

Preparation to deployment of the first detection unit to be installed during the campaign. On the right of it is one of the junction boxes awaiting installation, on the left the temporary junction box recovered from the sea floor.

 

The first detection unit installed in this campaign gracefully splashes into the water, to start its journey down to 3,500 m depth.

 

KM3NeT@neutrino2022

Fifty years ago, in 1972, the first neutrino conference was held in Hungary, because the organisers were not satisfied with the subdued position of neutrino interactions at the international conferences at that time. Nowadays, the neutrino conference is one of the major conferences in neutrino (astro)particle physics. Neutrino2022 took place in virtual Seoul, 30 May-4 June, 2022 and of course KM3NeT was there to show the results of data taking with the first detection units of ARCA and ORCA.

Aart Heijboer, physics coordinator of KM3NeT, showed the results of one year of data taking with ORCA6 and 100 days with ARCA6. The ‘6’  refers to the number of detection units in a detector used in the data analysis.

The ORCA detector is optimised to measure the oscillation parameters of neutrinos travelling through the Earth. Neutrino oscillation is a quantum mechanical phenomenon in which a neutrino created with a particular flavour – electron, muon or tau neutrino – can be later measured to have changed its flavour. In figure 1 below, it is evident that the data does NOT follow the flat blue horizontal line indicating the absence of neutrino oscillations. In other words, already with only six detection units, the ORCA6 detector ‘sees’ oscillations. In the second figure two oscillation parameters are plotted against each other. Clearly, the contour of ORCA6 is still wider than that of other experiments. More data with more detection units will make it narrower.

 

Also the ARCA detector, optimised for the search of high energy neutrinos from sources in the Universe, is well underway pushing the limits of the potential to discover sources of neutrinos down towards the expected limits of the full detector.

 

In the poster sessions KM3NeT physicists presented the details of many analyses being performed with the ARCA and ORCA detectors.

Aart Heijboer concluded at the plenary session that ARCA and ORCA will span eight decades in energy, that there is a rich variety of data analyses going on in the collaboration and that construction of the detectors is ramping up. Promising conclusions.

Very nice to have been invited to share the progress of KM3NeT with the community of neutrino (astro)physicists!

The KM3NeT Collaboration thanks the organisers of Neutrino2022 for an excellent edition of the conference. See you in two years time in Milano.