The pattern of the tracker wires can be clearly seen in the darkness

Shining a light into the tracker reveals the pattern of wires shaping the electric field in its 2000 cells.

Deployment system for the radioactive sources used to calibrate the SuperNEMO detector.

Checking the calorimeter modules for dust

The 'champagne wall' of optical modules.

The SuperNEMO demonstrator module, seen end-on.

Closing the SuperNEMO demonstrator module

The SuperNEMO source foils, seen through the tracker

Two tracker sections are coupled to one of the calorimeter walls, to make a half-detector.

The interior of the NEMO-3 detector (taken during decommissioning)

Physicists carefully insert a cassette of cells into the tracker

The tracker cells must be inspected for any residual dust before they can be inserted

Looking upwards through the SuperNEMO tracker

The LSM surface lab at Modane in the French Alps (copyright IN2P3/CNRS)

View from the LSM surface lab

The NEMO-3 detector under construction

8-inch optical modules ready for installation in the calorimeter wall

A SuperNEMO tracker section, showing the pattern of wires in the cells.

Blue scintillation light in one of our optical modules

SuperNEMO source foils and tracker

Preparing the selenium-82 source foils

Looking up through the SuperNEMO tracker

A tracker section arriving at the LSM lab in the Fréjus tunnel

In an ultra-low-background experiment, the detector must be perfectly clean. Here we are using a UV light to check the tracker wires for any specks of dust before we install the row of cells.

Searching for Neutrinoless Double Beta Decay

The NEMO (Neutrino Ettore Majorana Observatory) collaboration is an international physics effort including the experiment SuperNEMO and its predecessor, NEMO-3.

The SuperNEMO demonstrator module is currently being assembled at the LSM underground lab, located in the Fréjus tunnel near Modane, France. NEMO-3, also at the LSM, ran from 2003-11. Its rich repository of data is still being analysed today.

Both SuperNEMO and NEMO-3 are designed to study extremely rare double-beta decay processes, and in particular are looking for evidence of neutrinoless double beta decay. This is a rare type of radioactive decay which has been predicted, but has never been observed. If this process was seen, it would prove that neutrinos were their own antiparticles, which could be a clue to the matter-antimatter asymmetry in the universe.

Photo gallery

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