Neutrino project: Mysore's loss is Madurai's gain

A meeting of the INO group - different agencies, scientists and professors working on the project - has been convened in the second week of next month to discuss beginning work at a site near Madurai.

INO, a Rs 1,000-crore project, will firmly place Indian science on the global map, as only a few countries have undertaken such experiments so far.

Many reputable institutes worldwide will collaborate with the INO project, which could provide information on the evolution of earth and solutions to complex problems the world is likely to face in future.

The INO team has identified a hill near Madurai, which raises to a height of about 200 metres from ground level, to establish the underground laboratory. The hill will serve as the nucleus of the project.

Madurai’s gain

Initially, the project entailed setting up a testing laboratory on the University of Mysore campus for the INO work that was to be carried out at Masinagudi, about 80 miles from Mysore, on the Madumalai Hills.

However, environmental and ecological concerns as also technical reasons forced the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE), the Department of Science and Technology and other agencies implementing the project to shift the site near Madurai.

With this, the testing laboratory proposed to be set up in Mysore has also been shifted.
Given Masinagudi’s proximity to Mysore, the DAE wanted the testing laboratory for the project site to be set up there.

Following non-availability of a big chunk of land on the Mysore University campus, the State Government approved 50 acres of land out of the 100 acres allocated to the University of Music at Varkodu, off T Narasipur Road, for the testing laboratory.

But the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests rejected the idea of setting up the INO project at Masinagudi as the region was a thick forest, an elephant corridor and a tiger reserve.

The project will be similar to the big bang experiment being carried out on the Spain-France border. But the interaction with matter here will be minus any radiation, sources said.

The INO experiment will be most sophisticated as the glass plate detectors used in the underground tunnel will be superior to detectors used anywhere in the world. The laboratory will test the detectors of 5 mm thickness and 2m x 2m size and shift them to the underground laboratory.

What is Neutrino Observatory?

The objective of the India-based Neutrino Observatory experiment is to find the ultimate constituent of matter. Till now, quark is believed to be the smallest entity. The experiment will interact with environment matter every nano second and may take years to come out with the desired results. The experiment is expected to provide information on the evolution of earth and solutions to complex problems the world is likely to face in future.