Ongoing Projects
PUEO
We are the lead institution on the PUEO experiment, a NASA long-duration balloon (LDB) experiment and a part of the NASA Pioneers program. Currently in construction, PUEO will aim to detect radio signals generated via the Askaryan effect from the highest energy neutrinos interacting in the Antarctic ice sheet. PUEO will be sensitive to higher energy neutrinos than other techniques. PUEO is scheduled to launch from McMurdo Station in Antarctica in December of 2025.
RNO-G
We are co-leading the development and deployment of RNO-G, an in-ice radio detector that is being deployed to Summit Station in Greenland. RNO-G builds on the success of ARA and incorporates new interferometric phased array trigger technology. RNO-G will have the sensitivity required to observe ultra-high energy neutrinos. Construction is in progress, with seven out of 35 total science stations completed.
BEACON
BEACON is a mountainside radio detector concept that aims to detect radio emission from air showers created by tau leptons that result from the interaction of tau neutrinos in the Earth. We have helped design and develop an initial prototype system, which is located at Barcroft Station of the White Mountain Research Station in California. Our lab is also involved in hardware development for future stations, and we have worked on searches for cosmic rays using the prototype.
CMB-S4
We are part of the CMB-S4 collaboration, a next-generation ground-based experiment studying the cosmic microwave background. The instrument, located at the South Pole and in Chile, will be made up a suite of small and large aperture telescopes, housing 500,000 detectors. In particular, we are interested in constraining inflation and properties of neutrinos by measuring the B-mode polarization signature.
Select Recent Publications and News
SELECTED LATEST JOURNAL PUBLICATIONS
"Design and Initial Performance of the Prototype for the BEACON Instrument for Detection of Ultrahigh Energy Particles", NIM A, 1048 (2023)
"Experimental tests of sub-surface reflectors as an explanation for the ANITA anomalous events", JCAP 4, 16 (2022)
"A low-threshold ultrahigh-energy neutrino search with the Askaryan Radio Array", PRD 105:122006 (2022)
"In situ, broadband measurement of the radio frequency attenuation length at Summit Station, Greenland", J. Glaciology 68:272 (2022)
"The Payload for Ultrahigh Energy Observations (PUEO): A White Paper", JINST 3, 31 (2021)
"Design and Sensitivity of the Radio Neutrino Observatory in Greenland (RNO-G)", JINST 16 P03025 (2021)
"Prospects for high elevation detection of >100 PeV Tau Neutrinos", JCAP 11 065 (2020)
"IceCube-Gen2: The Window to the Extreme Universe", J. Phys G. 48 (2021)
"Revisiting AGN as the Source of IceCube's Diffuse Neutrino Flux", JCAP 3, 31 (2020)
"Constraints on the ultra-high energy cosmic neutrino flux from the fourth flight of ANITA", PRD 99, 122001 (2019)
"Superheavy Dark Matter and ANITA’s Anomolous Events", PRD 100, 4 (2019)
"Astrophysics Uniquely Enabled by Observations of High-Energy Cosmic Neutrinos", Astro2020 Decadal Survey (2019), arXiv: 1903.04334
"CMB-S4 Science Case, Reference Design, and Project Plan.", arXiv:1907.04473 (2019)
Our Team
Abigail Vieregg
David N. Schramm Director of the Kavli Institute for Cosmological Physics
Professor, Physics, Astronomy and Astrophysics, Enrico Fermi Institute, KICP. Ph.D., UCLA, 2010.
Cosmin Deaconu
Research Assistant Professor, Ph.D. MIT 2015.
Eric Oberla
Research Assistant Professor, Ph.D. Chicago 2015.
Christoph Welling
KICP Post-Doctoral Fellow, Ph.D. FAU Erlangen-Nürnberg 2022.
Keith McBride
Grainger Post-Doctoral Fellow, Ph.D. OSU 2022.
Philipp Windischhofer
Grainger Post-Doctoral Fellow, Ph.D. Oxford 2022.
Zachary Martin
Physics Graduate Student
Scott Mackey
Physics Graduate Student
Rachel Scrandis
Physics Graduate Student
Nat Alden
Physics Graduate Student
Joneskim Kimo
Undergraduate Student, Physics and Computer Science
Tara Chugh
Undergraduate Student, Molecular Engineering
Lucas Glickman
Undergraduate student, Physics
Natalie Orrantia
Undergraduate student, Physics
Claire Kaplan
Undergraduate student, Physics
