Coherent Captain Mills: The Search for Sterile Neutrinos

Neutrinos are ubiquitous sub-atomic particles populating every part of the universe. Their lack of electric and color charge makes them susceptible to only weak and gravitational interactions. The observation of neutrino oscillations confirms that the active neutrinos ($\nu_{\mathrm{e}}$ , $\nu_{\mathrm{\mu }}$ , $\nu_{\mathrm{\tau }})$ are comprised of three mass eigenstates with $\Delta $m$^{\mathrm{2\thinspace }}$values between 10$^{\mathrm{-3\thinspace }}$to 10$^{\mathrm{-5\thinspace }}$eV$^{\mathrm{2}}$. However, a persistent phenomenon has been observed at LSND, MiniBooNE and other short-baseline experiments (SBE) where $\Delta $m$^{\mathrm{2\thinspace }}$\textasciitilde $^{\mathrm{~}}$1eV$^{\mathrm{2\thinspace }}$is not compatible with the current mixing between mass eigenstates. However, a 4th neutrino, a sterile neutrino ($\nu $s) That doesn't participate in weak interactions could explain the phenomena observed as SBE's. An experiment has been constructed at TA-53 at Los Alamos National Laboratory, the Coherent Captain Mills experiment (CCM), to investigate this large $\Delta $m$^{\mathrm{2}}$\textasciitilde $^{\mathrm{~}}$1eV$^{\mathrm{2\thinspace }}$and determine conclusively whether or not this large $\Delta $m$^{\mathrm{2}}$ is due to a ``new'' sterile neutrino.