Current
Affairs
India
based Neutrino Observatory (INO)
Part 2
[What is INO? / Nodal agency of INO / Location of INO / What is Neutrino
and their types]
CLICK HERE
Neutrino Oscillation:
·
Neutrinos (Electron / Muon / Tau) can morph from one
type or flavour to another as they pass through space, people, matter and the
earth itself. This phenomenon is called as Neutrino Oscillation.
·
While the details of two oscillations – the electron
type to the muon type and muon type to tau type are known fairly well, the
third, the switching of the tau type to electron type is not well characterised
and forms one of the main objectives of the INO
Why is Neutrino study important?
·
Since Neutrinos are abound in the universe, even
their tiny masses can have an effect on the evolution of the universe through
their gravitational effects.
·
Thus, neutrinos hold the key to fundamental
questions on the origin of the universe and energy production in stars.
·
INO is an experimental project in basic sciences
seeking to expand our knowledge horizon.
·
Scientists firmly says that, INO has nothing to do
with radioactivity or any other dangerous nuclear activity, nor does it have
any defence or strategic objectives
History of INO:
·
India was at the forefront of neutrino research in
the 1960s. One of the earliest laboratories established to detect neutrinos in
the world was located more than 2 km deep at the Kolar Gold Field mines in
Karnataka. It was at this laboratory that the atmospheric neutrinos were first
detected in 1965. Unfortunately, this laboratory had to be shut down with the
closure of the mines in the 1990s.
·
The INO was proposed in 2000 at an international
conference in Chennai. The proposal was further refined and consolidated at the
2001 neutrino meeting in Chennai, when the INO consortium of collaborating
Indian institutions was formed.
Oct 18, 2010
|
Ministry of
Environment & Forests approved both environment and forest clearance for
setting up the observatory in the Bodi West Hills Reserved Forest in the
Theni district of Tamil Nadu
|
Feb 2012
|
The land was
allocated to the INO collaboration by the government of Tamil Nadu and the
excavation work was about to start.
Naba K Mondal,
chief spokesperson of INO project and a senior scientist at the Tata
Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai, told that the pre-project work
will start in April 2012 and Rs. 66 crores has been sanctioned for the work.
The first task will be to have a road connectivity
from Rasingapuram to Pottipuram village.
The project is expected to be completed in 2015 at
an estimated cost of Rs 1,500 crores.
|
Sep 18, 2012
|
Kerala’s
octogenarian Opposition leader and CPI(M) central committee member VS
Achuthanandan expressed anxiety over establishing a neutrino observatory on
the Theni-Idukki border between Tamil Nadu and Kerala, citing environmental
and radiological issues.
Soon the INO
collaboration clarified on all the issues raised by him and the responses are
on the INO website.
|
Jan 05, 2015
|
Union Cabinet
headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi approved to set up the India-based
Neutrino Observatory (INO)
|
Feb 20, 2015
|
The southern
bench of National Green Tribunal ordered notices to the central and state
governments on a petition challenging the environmental clearance granted to
the India-based Neutrino Observatory (INO) project.
|
Mar 26, 2015
|
The Madurai bench
of the Madras high court restrained the central government from commencing
the work on the proposed India-based Neutrino Observatory (INO).The court
directed the government to get permission from the Tamil Nadu Pollution
Control Board (TNPCB) before commencing the work.
|
Why Bodi Hills chosen as site for INO?:
·
Bodi Hills was chosen as a suitable site for
locating the underground detector as the steep slopes of the Western Ghats
provide ideal and stable rock conditions to build a large underground cavern
for long-term use
·
The main detector, which will detect both natural
and man-made neutrinos, is an indigenously built 50 kiloton magnetized iron
calorimeter (ICAL) detector.
·
It will be world’s most massive neutrino detector.
This will be located in a cavern 1.3 km below the mountain peak so that there
is a material overburdern of about 1200 metres in all directions to filter out
cosmic rays
2 Phases of INO:
·
Phase I: INO will study neutrinos produced by cosmic
rays in the earth’s atmosphere
·
Phase II: will be at least 10-15 years down the
line, the INO could be used as a far detector for using beams from future
accelerator – based ‘neutrino factories’ in Japan, Europe and USA in what is
called as Long Baseline Neutrino Experiment (LBNE)
Neutrino Factories:
·
Unlike the sporadic neutrinos flying in all
directions that a particle accelerator normally produces, a neutrino factory
will create a focused beam of neutrinos at one site on the earth and fire it
downwards until the beams resurface at other points.
TN political parties oppose:
·
The campaigners against the INO project have
projected the proposed facility variously as a nuclear weapon facility.
·
Also they says it is a facility being built at the
behest of Fermilab ( a US based particle accelerator facility, which has
proposed to build a neutrino factory)
·
MDMK Chief Mr. Vaiko said that, INO is more or less
like a hospital undertaking drug trials
·
Petition filed in Madurai Bench of Madras High
Court.
·
Scientists argue that: Neutrinos are products of
radioactive decays, they themselves are not radioactive
China and Neutrino:
·
Only in 2004, two years after India’s proposal did
China propose an experiment to study neutrinos from the Daya Bay nuclear
reactor using a detector located in an underground tunnel in a nearby hill.
·
In March 2012, that experiment succeeded in
measuring a key parameter relating to the tau-neutrino / electron-neutrino
oscillation.
·
Scientists believe that, no major science project
can take off and succeed in India
==========================================
