Neutrino and Gravitational Wave Research in Kamioka

Neutrino and Gravitational Wave Research In Kamioka

Professor Takaaki KAJITA (梶田隆章教授) 2015 Nobel Laureate Director of the Institute for Cosmic Ray Research, University of Tokyo

Date: May 21, 2019 (Tuesday) Time: 4:00 – 5:30 p.m. Place: LT7, Lee Shau Kee Building, CUHK

Tea reception will be served at LSK 1/F lobby from 3:30 to 3:50p.m.

ALL INTERESTED ARE WELCOME

Abstract

More than 30 years ago, Kamiokande experiment began in Kamioka. It observed Supernova neutrinos, atmospheric neutrino deficit, and solar neutrinos. Because of the importance of the studies of these neutrinos, Super-Kamiokande was constructed. It began the experiment in 1996. In 1998, neutrino oscillation was discovered with the studies of atmospheric neutrinos. In Kamioka, a new large scale project is under construction. It is an experiment to study gravitational wave, which is called KAGRA. In this lecture, I will discuss the past, present and future of the research in Kamioka.

Biography

Prof. Kajita's almae matres include Saitama University (B.S.) and University of Tokyo (M.S., Ph.D.) where his advisor was the 2002 Nobel physics laureate, Masatoshi Koshiba. Since 1988 Prof. Kajita has been at the Institute for Cosmic Radiation Research, University of Tokyo, where he became an assistant professor in 1992, and professor and director in 1999.

Prof. Kajita's team at the Super-Kamiokande helped to prove the existence of neutrino oscillation and that neutrinos have mass. For this discovery, Kajita shared the 2015 Nobel Prize in Physics with Canadian physicist Arthur McDonald. Kajita's and McDonald's work solved the longstanding Solar neutrino problem, which was a major discrepancy between the predicted and measured Solar neutrino fluxes, and indicated that the Standard Model, which required neutrinos to be massless, had weaknesses.

Prof. Kajita is currently the principal investigator of a kilometer-scale interferometric gravitational-wave detector located at the Kamioka Observatory, namely the KAGRA gravitational wave detector. This detector is expected to become operational in 2019 and will pioneer components that are cryogenically cooled to reduce thermal noise. The inclusion of KAGRA to the world-wide network will improve our understanding of cataclysmic events by enhancing our ability to find electromagnetic counterparts to gravitational-wave detections.