Direct neutrino-mass measurement with sub-electronvolt sensitivity
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s41567-021-01463-1.pdf
Description
Published version
Size
2.54 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
a69e8bde370de533ee4b7f0a30d34f5a
Author(s)
Formaggio, Joseph
Date Issued
February 2022
Journal
Nature Physics
Publisher
Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Citation
Formaggio, Joseph. 2022. "Direct neutrino-mass measurement with sub-electronvolt sensitivity." Nature Physics, 18 (2).
Version
Final published version
Abstract
Since the discovery of neutrino oscillations, we know that neutrinos have non-zero mass. However, the absolute neutrino-mass scale remains unknown. Here we report the upper limits on effective electron anti-neutrino mass, mν, from the second physics run of the Karlsruhe Tritium Neutrino experiment. In this experiment, mν is probed via a high-precision measurement of the tritium β-decay spectrum close to its endpoint. This method is independent of any cosmological model and does not rely on assumptions whether the neutrino is a Dirac or Majorana particle. By increasing the source activity and reducing the background with respect to the first physics campaign, we reached a sensitivity on mν of 0.7 eV c–2 at a 90% confidence level (CL). The best fit to the spectral data yields m2ν = (0.26 ± 0.34) eV2 c–4, resulting in an upper limit of mν < 0.9 eV c–2 at 90% CL. By combining this result with the first neutrino-mass campaign, we find an upper limit of mν < 0.8 eV c–2 at 90% CL.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Laboratory for Nuclear Science
Terms of Use
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license
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DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41567-021-01463-1
