neutrino

AI overview

A neutrino is a tiny, electrically neutral elementary particle that interacts through the weak force and gravity, and was named for its minimal mass, which scientists once believed to be zero. Neutrinos matter because they are among the smallest and least massive particles known to exist, making them important to our understanding of fundamental physics.

AI-generated from the Wikipedia summary — may contain errors.

Key facts

Particle.caption: The first use of a hydrogen bubble chamber to detect neutrinos, on 13 November 1970, at Argonne National Laboratory. Here a neutrino hits a proton in a hydrogen atom; the collision occurs at the point where three tracks emanate on the right of the photograph.
Particle.num_types: 3 types: , , and
Particle.composition: Elementary particle
Particle.group: Leptons, antileptons
Particle.statistics: Fermionic
Particle.generation: First (), second (), and third ()
Particle.interaction: Weak interaction and gravitation
Particle.particle: ,
Particle.antiparticle: ,
Particle.symbol:  ,  ,  ,  ,  ,
Particle.mass: <  (< ), cosmological limit, sum of 3 "flavors"
Particle.electric_charge: 0 e
Particle.X_charge: −3
Particle.weak_isospin: ,
Particle.weak_hypercharge: ,
Particle.B L: −1
Particle.name: Neutrino
Particle.image: FirstNeutrinoEventAnnotated.jpg

via Wikipedia infobox

~37 min read

Encyclopedic overview

45 sections

Contents

History
Pauli's proposal
Direct detection
Neutrino flavor
Solar neutrino problem
Oscillation
Cosmic neutrinos
Properties and reactions
Flavor, mass, and their mixing
Flavor oscillations
Mikheyev–Smirnov–Wolfenstein effect
Antineutrinos
Majorana mass
Nuclear reactions
Induced fission and other disintegration events
Types
Research
Detectors near artificial neutrino sources
Gravitational effects
Sterile neutrino searches
Neutrinoless double-beta decay searches
Cosmic ray neutrinos
Speed
Superluminal neutrino glitch
Mass
Chirality
Sources
Artificial
Reactor neutrinos
Accelerator neutrinos
Collider neutrinos
Nuclear weapons
Geologic
Atmospheric
Solar
Supernovae
Supernova remnants
Big Bang
Detection
Scientific interest
See also
Notes
References
Further reading
External links

A neutrino ( ; denoted by the Greek letter Nu (letter)|) is an elementary particle that interacts via the weak interaction and gravity. The neutrino is so named because it is electrically neutral and because its rest mass is so small (-ino) that it was long thought to be zero. The rest mass of the neutrino is much smaller than that of the other known elementary particles (excluding massless particles). The weak force has a very short range, the gravitational interaction is extremely weak due to the very small mass of the neutrino, and neutrinos do not participate in the electromagnetic interaction or the strong interaction. Consequently, neutrinos typically pass through normal matter unimpeded and with no detectable effect.

Weak interactions create neutrinos in one of three leptonic flavors: electron neutrino, muon neutrino, tau neutrino,

Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “neutrino” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.