Neutrino Programme
Programme Leader
Paul de Jong
Main points: scientific
ANTARES
- Search for neutrinos from the blazar TXS 0506+056
- Multi-messenger searches for sources of gravitational waves and high energy neutrinos, with LIGO, ANTARES and IceCube
- Constraints on galactic diffuse neutrino emission from ANTARES and IceCube
- All-flavour search for a diffuse flux of cosmic neutrinos with nine years of ANTARES data
- Measurement of oscillations of atmospheric neutrinos and limits on sterile neutrinos
KM3NeT
- In-situ calibration of the first ORCA line, determination of depth dependence of atmospheric muon background in sea water.
Main points: technical
KM3NeT
- Further improvements in KM3NeT design, a.o. sea floor network, optical system and penetrators.
- Completion of DOM construction for KM3NeT phase 1 at Nikhef (218 DOMs)
- Completion of 6 ORCA DUs, ready to be deployed
- Reconstruction and event classification software, general software and oscillation analysis software frameworks
DUNE
- Construction of the protoDUNE single-phase prototype TPC at CERN, and operation stand-alone and in a testbeam; design of the DAQ for protoDUNE and DUNE.
Awards/Fellowships
- Grant from the Dutch National Roadmap for Large Scale Research Infrastructure for KM3NeT, 12.7 M€
- NWO Physics Programme “The Hidden Universe of Weakly Interacting Particles”, 1.9 M€
- NWO Physics/f grant for Suzan Basegmez du Pree
Key positions in collaborations
KM3NeT
- Deputy spokesperson: Aart Heijboer
- Technical coordinator: Els Koffeman
- Optical systems coordinator: Gerard Kieft (until May 2018), Antonio D’Amico (after May 2018)
- Mechanics coordinator: Edward Berbee
ANTARES
- Point sources group convener: Dorothea Samtleben
Main papers in 2018
ANTARES
- The Search for Neutrinos from TXS 0506+056 with the ANTARES Telescope, Astrophys. J. 863 (2018) L30
KM3NeT
- Sensitivity of the KM3NeT/ARCA neutrino telescope to point-like neutrino sources, arXiv:1810.08499
DUNE
- FELIX based readout of the Single-Phase ProtoDUNE detector, arXiv:1806.09194
Cosmic Rays (Pierre Auger Observatory & GRAND)
Programme Leader
Sijbrand de Jong
Main points: scientific
- Further refinement of ultra-high-energy cosmic ray anisotropy studies
- Measurement of horizontal air showers with the radio detection technique
- New physics inspired model for (energy) lateral density profile of radiofrequency radiation emitted by extensive air showers
- Publication of the GRAND Science and Design white paper
Main points: technical
- Bulk production of AugerPrime upgrade SSD modules (90 completed at Nikhef)
- Site selection for GRAND Proto300 and start of GRAND Proto300 design
- Start of Auger Radio design
Awards, fellowships etc.
- ERC Advance Grant (3.5 MEuro), Auger Radio Detector, Jörg Hörandel
- NWO Groot Grant (2.5 MEuro), Auger Radio Detector, Sijbrand de Jong
Key positions in collaborations
- Auger Engineering Radio Array group leader: Jörg Hörandel
- Auger outreach co-convenor: Charles Timmermans
- GRAND technical coordinator: Charles Timmermans
Main paper in 2018
- Observation of inclined EeV air showers with the radio detector of the Pierre Auger
Observatory, The Pierre Auger Collaboration, JCAP10 (2018) 026
Dark Matter
Programme Leader
Patrick Decowski
Main points: scientific
- The XENON1T published the world’s leading results on the coupling of spin-independent WIMP dark matter to ordinary matter in May 2018, based on one tonne-year of exposure.
- The same exposure has also been used to analyze the data for WIMP-pion, spin-dependent couplings and rare decays.
- The data-period after May has mainly been used for additional calibration runs and R&D for XENONnT. In particular, cryogenic radon distillation and a novel magnetic pump were tested to investigate radon reduction measures for XENONnT.
- The XENON1T experiment was shutdown on Dec 9, 2018 to allow the upgrade of the detector to XENONnT. During the two-and-a-half years that the detector has been “cold”, i.e. with liquid xenon inside, it has operated flawlessly, with little downtime.
- The design of XENONnT has been largely finalized. This phase will increase the liquid xenon mass from 3.2 tons to 8 tons, with an order of magnitude lower radioactive backgrounds. XENONnT is expected to start operation in the fall of 2019.
- The Nikhef-based liquid xenon XAMS R&D setup has been used to investigate pulse-shape discrimination and electric-field effects in liquid xenon.
- Detailed physics studies for DARWIN, a future fifty-ton liquid xenon detector, are ongoing.
Main points: technical
- Stellar performance of the Nikhef-designed trigger and event-builder, with more than 99% uptime.
- SURFsara/Nikhef Grid resources fully integrated in XENON data processing chain.
Grants
- NWO Physics Programme “The Hidden Universe of Weakly Interacting Particles”, 1.9 M€ (with KM3NeT)
Key positions in collaborations
- XENON Editorial Board: Patrick Decowski
- XENONnT Technical Coordinator: Auke-Pieter Colijn
- DARWIN Executive Board: Patrick Decowski
Main paper in 2018
- XENON Collaboration (E. Aprile et al.), Phys. Rev. Lett. 121, 111302 (2018).
Gravitational Waves
Programme Leader
Frank Linde
Main points: scientific
- Ligo/Virgo collaboration meeting in Maastricht, Sep 4-7
- R&D laboratory ETpathfinder on track to become a reality
- Unanimous adopted motion in parliament concerning the ETpathfinder & Einstein telescope (Nov 6)
- MoU of the Einstein Telescope Coalition signed by many Dutch, Belgium and German institutes on a special meeting in Maastricht on Sep 13
- LIGO-Virgo papers with major Nikhef input:
- Paper on catalog of O1+O2 events (Caudill strongly involved in the detections): Abbott et al., arXiv:1811.12907
- Testing GR with the binary neutron star inspiral GW170817 (Van Den Broeck chair of the paper writing team): Abbott et al., arXiv:1811.00364
- Measurements of neutron star radii and equation of state with GW170817 (using analysis methodologies that were pioneered at Nikhef): Abbott et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 121, 161101 (2018)
- First measurement of Hubble constant without using electromagnetic counterpart (with strong input from postdoc Ghosh and MSc student Sur): Fishbach et al., ApJ Letters 871, L13 (2019)
- Nieuwe collega’s bij GRAPPA/UvA: Samaya Nissanke, Philipp Mosta, …
- Awarding of NWO-Groot & NWO-Physics proposals
- Einstein Telescope collaboration established during the 9th Einstein Telescope Symposium at EGO, Cascina, Italy on April 19-20
Main points: technical
- En route to reach sensitivity goal for O3 (60-85 Mpc)
- Exploring drilling in Terziet started in November
Key positions in collaborations:
- Spokesperson Virgo: Jo van den Brand
- Coordinator Suspended Optical Benches subsystem: Alessandro Bertolini
- Member LIGO-Virgo Collaboration Detection Committee: Alessandro Bertolini
- Co-convenor science case for 3rd generation (GWIC): Chris Van Den Broeck
- Co-chair LIGO-Virgo Tests of GR: Chris Van Den Broeck
- Founding co-chair of LIGO-Virgo Cosmology: Archisman Ghosh
- Co-chair All-Sky Searches for Compact Binary Coalescences: Sarah Caudill
Main paper in 2018
- Paper on catalog of O1+O2 events: Abbott et al., arXiv:1811.12907