2011

A Non-holds-barred, Gloves-off, Mind-boggling Tour of What it Takes to Calculate a Reactor Neutrino Flux

by Prof. Robert Svoboda (University of California, Davis)

Pacific/Honolulu
417 (Watanabe Hall)

417

Watanabe Hall

Description
SPECIAL HIGH ENERGY PHYSICS SEMINAR The new calculations of slightly larger predicted reactor neutrino fluxes could have grand implications, not only slightly effecting present neutrino mixing measurements, but more dramatically the possibility of revealing sterile neutrino mixing as explanation of several observational anomalies. Sterile neutrino production's effect on the electron anti-neutrino survival probability versus distance can have significant implications for the short baseline attempts to measure theta-13. To understand the basis of the new predictions one needs to know how reactor neutrino fluxes are calculated. Bob says "this talk is not for the faint of heart. I will go through in detail why the new calculation is different than the old. I just did a "Cosmic Convergence" chalkboard talk on this at Davis and it was popular even with the theorists."