14 DAY TRIAL // Future particle detectors may help us test some of the paradoxes and mysteries posed by quantum physics, such as the verifying of the predicted decay of protons that has so far eluded detection, and other discoveries that will help us better understand the origin of the universe, and how it evolved.
Aside from the detection of the proton decay, these detectors could also provide key insight in the properties of neutrinos like those produced inside the Sun and supernovae explosions, which may lead to information on the spectrum of energies these particles can take. This can be used to study certain nuclear reaction taking place deep inside a star's core.
Neutrinos are also emitted in Earth's core, as a result of the decay of radioactive heavy elements, and detecting them offers the possibility of learning more about the inner core of our planet. Most traditional detectors are absolutely massive, consisting of cylinder shaped structures filled with three or more detection medias, which determine the detection capability of a certain detector.
For example, the next particle detector assigned for construction will be built in a large salt mine in Poland and is named Giant Liquid Argon Charge Imaging ExpeRiment or GLACIER. When completed, it will consist of a vertical cylindric container of 70 meters in diameter and 20 meters tall and the whole volume will be filled with argon liquid. All particle detectors function on the ionizing principle, thus as a particle crosses the detection media it will eventually hit some atoms to pass them energy, while the excited atoms will have two possibilities, either to scintillate or to emit the collected energy through light.
A third possibility takes in consideration the fact that the detection media will be hit by a particle traveling at a speed greater than the speed of light, emitting Cherenkov radiation, which is also a light emission. However, all the detection methods involving light emissions are designed to collect the faint single photon of light, and amplify it in a photomultiplier, consisting of a tube submerged in the boiling argon liquid.
Nevertheless, though scientists can analyze the data received from the detector relatively quickly, finding out what kind of particle was responsible for the interaction is another thing.
Similar particle detectors involve constructing horizontal cylinders of 30 meters in diameter and 100 meters long, formed of two detection media, an inner one that would be able to absorb energetic particles that would instantly emit photons and an outer one filled with water to filter the heaviest of the leptons.
A third assigned detector based on the Megato Mass Physics experiment will use a plain water detection media to capture high-energy particles that emit Cherenkov radiation when interacting with water.