Speaker
Description
Eos is a currently operating four-tonne fiducial optical detector located at UC Berkeley, designed as a testbed for next-generation “hybrid” neutrino detector technology. These hybrid detectors exploit fast timing photodetectors, novel scintillators, and spectral photon sorting to distinguish Cherenkov from scintillation light, enabling improved event reconstruction and particle identification. Eos has recently completed a data-taking campaign with a water target, during which comprehensive detector calibrations were finalized and reconstruction performance was thoroughly characterized against detailed Monte Carlo studies.
Eos is planning to relocate to the Spallation Neutron Source (SNS) at Oak Ridge National Lab in 2027. The SNS produces an intense flux of neutrinos in the 10s-of-MeV range, directly relevant to the studies of core-collapse supernova neutrinos. By deploying at the SNS, Eos will characterize reconstruction of neutrino interactions in a hybrid detector and measure key cross-sections for supernova neutrino studies. In particular, with water as the target, Eos can measure the charged-current cross-section on $^{16}$O – critical input for Hyper Kamiokande and other future large, oxygen-based neutrino detectors seeking to interpret signals from future galactic supernovae.