NOvA and DUNE: Measuring Fundamental Particles called Neutrinos
Rachael Weir
Undergraduate Researcher
Astronomy and Astrophysics Major (College of Arts & Sciences)
Mark Messier
Faculty Mentor
Mark Messier (College of Arts & Sciences)
Project Description
Our group works on experiments to measure the properties of fundamental particles called neutrinos. The experiments, NOvA and DUNE, are based at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab) outside of Chicago. Students in our group might work with computer code to analyze the tracks left by cosmic-ray particles in our detector to calibrate its performance. Students may also work with the computer algorithms used to extract physics quantities from the measured detector tracks. Many of these algorithms employ techniques borrowed from Deep Learning and computer vision.
Technology or Computational Component
Our data analysis is based on the C++ programming language and increasingly scripts employ the python programming language. Students will also learn to work un UNIX/Linux-based computing environments and large-scale data production.