Yesterday, the U.S. Department of Energy and the Italian Embassy, on behalf of the Italian Ministry of Education, Universities and Research, signed an agreement for collaboration on research with the international Short-Baseline Neutrino (SBN) program hosted at DOE’s Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory. 

The SBN program, started in 2015, comprises the development, installation and operation of three neutrino detectors spread over a distance of 600 meters on the Fermilab site. Italy and its National Institute of Nuclear Physics (INFN) are making major contributions to the SBN program, including the delivery and installation of one of the three detectors. Scientists will use the detectors and a neutrino beam from Fermilab’s particle accelerator complex to measure the properties of neutrino particles with unprecedented precision and search for a new type of particle known as a sterile neutrino.