Sanford Underground Research Facility

Like many experiments in particle physics, the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment, or DUNE, is a massive operation, in this case spanning three states.

The neutrinos will be made and fired from Fermilab in Illinois at a detector more than 800 miles away at Sanford Underground Research Facility, or SURF, a group of enormous underground caverns in South Dakota where trillions of neutrinos will plunge into tanks of liquid argon.

They travel about 1,300 kilometers.

And again, what's wonderful about neutrinos is they go straight through the Earth.

Now, here's what happened.

Deep underground, about one mile underground in the state of South Dakota in America, there's a very special laboratory and it's called the Sanford Underground Research Facility.

And inside that laboratory, scientists have been running an experiment called Lox Zeppelin.

Now, Lux Zeppelin is essentially a giant detector filled with 10 tons of ultra-pure liquid xenon.

A mile beneath the South Dakota soil, the air presses in and silence settles like a second skin.

This is the Sanford Underground Research Facility, a place where people descend to chase the faintest traces of the universe.

It is the deepest underground science laboratory in the United States, located about one and a half kilometers or 0.92 miles deep below the ground.

In these tunnels, physicists gather in the dark, hoping that dark matter will brush against vats of liquid xenon and reveal the invisible glue that binds galaxies.

When the universe is mostly invisible, even one strange flash can change the conversation.

Today, we're diving into a fascinating development from the LZ collaboration at the Sanford Underground Research Facility.

Brian Keating recently spoke with Rick Gateskull from Brown University about a dark matter result that's exciting but still unresolved.

And what's striking here is how this discussion moves from 40 years of searching to literally one event.

But, uh, we have regular collaboration meetings, as you might imagine, and this work takes, uh, or combines, uh, the input of, of, of a broad range of people, both, uh, you know, DOE institutions here in the US, um, uh, and also, uh, uh, uh, universities, uh, and labs from other parts of the world, including the United Kingdom.

Uh, uh, and, and of course, we actually are based at the Sanford Underground Research Facility in South Dakota, uh, you know, which is a, which is a US, um, uh, deep underground lab that, uh, we work with and, and are supported by very, uh, uh, you know, closely to do this level of, of, of leading sc-science.

I, I always mention the other thing you have to bear in mind [chuckles] that is, is we're not just training people within our organ- within, within LZ to do astrophysics and cosmology.

Obviously, that is something that we are trying to answer and break, you know, questions, answer questions there.