KAMIOKA, Gifu Prefecture--Neutrinos, the
ghostly particles that could hold the key to unlocking the mysteries of
the universe, have been detected for the first time emitting from
Earth, a research team in Japan said Wednesday.
The KamLAND (Kamioka Liquid scintillator Anti-Neutrino
Detector) facility here detected the neutrinos from the energy source
that triggers volcanic activities and geological movements, the team
The international team of researchers, led by Atsuto Suzuki, a
physics professor at Tohoku University, says the discovery will help
scientists understand the thermal energy and components at the Earth's
The findings will be published in the magazine Nature.
Neutrinos, which do not carry electrical charges and can pass
through great distances of matter, are considered one of the
fundamental particles that make up the universe.
Previous studies detected neutrinos only from space.
The Earth's crust and mantle are believed to have high
temperatures because of heat emitted when radioactive elements, such as
uranium and thorium, break down and transform.
In theory, neutrinos are emitted during this process. But previous devices failed to detect such neutrinos.
For example, the KamLAND's predecessor, the Kamiokande,
collected light emitted from neutrinos as they fell from the universe.
The facility was developed by Masatoshi Koshiba, professor emeritus at
the University of Tokyo who won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2002.
The Kamiokande used huge amounts of water for detection. But
the KamLAND facility, operated by Tohoku University, uses a special oil
that can detect low-energy neutrinos that escaped its predecessor.
Suzuki's group weeded out the "false signal" neutrinos, and
concluded that five to 54 neutrinos derived from Earth were among 152
observed at the KamLAND facility between May 2002 and October 2004.
The KamLAND started operating in 2002 and is located at a depth of about 1,000 meters.(IHT/Asahi: July 28,2005)