A Telescope In a Cubic Kilometer of Ice 118
Roland Piquepaille writes "University of Delaware (UD) scientists and engineers are currently working at the South Pole under very harsh conditions. This research team is one of the many other ones working on the construction of IceCube, the world's largest neutrino telescope in the Antarctic ice, far beneath the continent's snow-covered surface. When it is completed in 2011, the telescope array will occupy a cubic kilometer of Antarctica. One of the lead researchers said that 'IceCube will provide new information about some of the most violent and far-away astrophysical events in the cosmos.' The UD team has even opened a blog to cover this expedition. It will be opened up to December 22, 2008. I guess they want to be back in Delaware for Christmas, but read more for additional details and references, including a diagram of this telescope array built inside ice."
Does not look promising (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Does not look promising (Score:5, Funny)
Dangerous things found in Antarctica:
'The Thing' (Kurt Russel in a Cowboy hat!)
The Borg from Star Trek
Aliens v Predator
Vicious Penguins
Re: (Score:2)
You forgot:
no sexual harrassment in the antarctic? (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Nobody cares about the Secret Nazi UFO bases anymore :!(
Re: (Score:2)
Well, who do you think is behind all the nasty stuff that GP listed, eh??
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
Help I'm melting...!
The Hardest Part (Score:5, Funny)
But assuming we manage that... (Score:2)
All we need is a million-ton olive, and our martini will be complete! [nukees.com]
Re:Does not look promising (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
You Black Mesa hotshots get all the fat government contracts. Just you wait til we get GLaDOS out of beta (although, it's been in beta so long you'd think we were Google).
Re: (Score:2)
Huh? I heard you were out of beta and would be releasing on time...
That was a joke - haha - fat chance.
Nutrinoes! (Score:2, Funny)
Bullcrap! (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:1)
Fools! Don't they know it will just interfere with the first stargate?!?
Er... I mean... starwhat now? Nonsense, we don't have a stargate, and we don't send Macgyver to other planets through it!
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Not since he let himself go anyway.
Re: (Score:2)
Does not matter. McGyver can always build another stargate out of a roll of tinfoil, a bowl of vinegar/oil salad sauce, a golden hairpin, and some dust.
Re: (Score:2)
Does not matter. McGyver can always build another stargate out of a roll of tinfoil, a bowl of vinegar/oil salad sauce, a golden hairpin, and some dust.
It was actually a Stargate power amplifier, but yeah.
Re: (Score:2)
Cool! (Score:1, Funny)
Does Ice Cube approve (Score:4, Funny)
Definitely Ice Cube http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_Cube [wikipedia.org] won't like it.
Perhaps time to call in the RIAA and fix this.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Ooh, the temptation to alter the wiki pages to say Ice Cube is the spokesperson for the neutrino detector is huge... Must... resist... Vandalism... bad...
Ice...for now. (Score:4, Funny)
By the time it is finished, it will be in a cubic kilometer of water.
Re: (Score:2, Troll)
Re: (Score:2)
I bet in 2015 environmentalists will blame global warming for the extintion of the last ice telescope in the wild.
My first thought when reading the story is "Where the f*ck are all the environmentalists?"
It's apparently ok to screw around with a cubic kilometer of ice and wildlife for a telescope, but it's not ok to take up 0.2 kilometers for an oil rig...and notice I didn't say 'square'.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
On ice.
Re: (Score:2)
Environmentalists don't really complain about the idea of building one oil rig. Of those who are against, say, ANWR drilling, they mostly complain about building many oil rigs, and all the road and pipeline infrastructure needed to support them. Also, there isn't really any wildlife at the South Pole, other than assorted gnats.
Re: (Score:2)
Environmentalists don't really complain about the idea of building one oil rig. Of those who are against, say, ANWR drilling, they mostly complain about building many oil rigs, and all the road and pipeline infrastructure needed to support them. Also, there isn't really any wildlife at the South Pole, other than assorted gnats.
The size of land they are talking about using in the ANWR has been compared to a postage stamp on a football field.
No matter what we do, wherever we do it, there will be an impact to the environment, or some species. But we can't stop everything we do because it will effect a frog, or herd of caribou or whatever. On the other hand, we can't be totally irresponsible either.
Re: (Score:2)
The size of land they are talking about using in the ANWR has been compared to a postage stamp on a football field.
I am sure it has been compared to that, but is it a correct comparison? I don't know. The right number is "ecological impact", not "land surface area", but it's probably hard to quantify. From a surface area perspective, it should include not only the area taken up by the drilling apparatus, but also by support buildings, roads, pipelines, etc. From a non-areal perspective, it needs to account for the ecosystems affected, including any rare species, distant populations whose migratory pathways may be i
Re: (Score:2)
Drilling in ANWR would make money for oil companies, but the consumer isn't going to see any of that oil within the next decade or two
First off, you make it sound like oil companies earning money is wrong. I don't know about you, but when I start a business, I expect to make money. No one starts a business to lose money.
Second, Shell is saying the time from start to pumping oil would be less than 6 months. That oil would be on the market in less than a year.
There are very few truly unspoiled wildlife refuges left in the U.S. Is it worth it to develop part of one for limited benefits? That's unclear to me. Of course, the drilling doesn't affect the whole area, but it's yet another encroachment on one of the few remaining protected areas
That's true. Personally, I'm all against the federal government setting aside any land for any purpose that isn't in the constitution. Now if the states set it aside, I'd be m
Re: (Score:2)
First off, you make it sound like oil companies earning money is wrong. I don't know about you, but when I start a business, I expect to make money. No one starts a business to lose money.
I'm not saying oil companies earning money is wrong. I'm saying that I don't really care if THEY benefit from the oil. I care if society benefits, and if I benefit. If it makes oil companies richer but not me or the average citizen, then that changes my opinion of the value of the activity. So I have to ask, is the change in oil price that the consumer sees (e.g., in gas prices) worth the drawbacks of the activity? I'm sure if I was an oil executive whose salary depends on oil profits, my cost-benefit
Re: (Score:2)
I'm not saying oil companies earning money is wrong. I'm saying that I don't really care if THEY benefit from the oil. I care if society benefits, and if I benefit.
That sounds like a great plan. How do I sign up for not lifting a finger all the while benefiting from another human being's labor? (Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you're saying, but that's how your statement comes across to me...)
So I have to ask, is the change in oil price that the consumer sees (e.g., in gas prices) worth the drawbacks of the activity? I'm sure if I was an oil executive whose salary depends on oil profits, my cost-benefit analysis would run rather differently.
Of course it would differ. An oil company executive (regardless of what he negotiated as a paycheck) is there to support the share holders. Part of my retirement fund invests in 'big oil'. So of course I want them to make a profit. On the other hand, I don't want it to be
Re: (Score:2)
How do I sign up for not lifting a finger all the while benefiting from another human being's labor?
You're totally missing the point. I didn't say that I wanted to get rich off their oil and let them have nothing. I said that I don't support drilling if the oil companies get rich but nobody ELSE benefits. If they drill in ANWR and the average citizen doesn't see any large lasting impact on prices, and we don't seriously reduce our dependence on foreign oil from it, why is this a good idea compared to its drawbacks?
Who are you going to trust--a bunch of government bureaucrats or the people who actually do the work daily?
I would trust the DOE over an oil company any day when it comes to this sort of analysis.
Re: (Score:2)
Um, so oil rigs are 0.2 kilometers long and have no width?
And the difference here is impact, very little actually lives IN the ice, so as long as you don't impact the surface or the base of the ice you won't be harming anyone.
Also, if somehow it exploded all we'd get are shards of ice and pools of water not gigantic oil spills...
I'm not saying you're wrong*, just that your arguments are.
*though, incidentally, you are.
Re: (Score:2)
Um, so oil rigs are 0.2 kilometers long and have no width?
I have no clue how big oil rigs are--but I'm betting they aren't 1 sq. kilometer. And about 10 seconds after I posted that, I realized my mistake--for some stupid reason, I was thinking the telescope measurements were cubed, not squared. Totally retarded.
Also, if somehow it exploded all we'd get are shards of ice and pools of water not gigantic oil spills...
I don't think you should drive a car. If it suddenly exploded while you were driving, it could impact local wildlife...
The point I'm trying to make is this--do you know how many oil rigs 'suddenly explode'? And the argument that we shouldn't constru
Re: (Score:2)
I've had this discussion so many times I've come to the conclusion that some people just can't be convinced.
The reason I think drilling for oil is dumb is because it's an old technology (burning stuff to get the energy out), we really need to move beyond it.
Asbestos was thought to be the perfect building material, as we've discovered, it is not. Lead was thought to be a great material as it didn't corrode, it was only later we discovered it was highly toxic. Leaded gasoline was considered more environmental
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I've had this discussion so many times I've come to the conclusion that some people just can't be convinced.
The reason I think drilling for oil is dumb is because it's an old technology (burning stuff to get the energy out), we really need to move beyond it.
Man, that argument takes the cake.
You think drilling for oil is dumb because it's an old technology. The first oil well is debated as being sometime around 1820.
Maybe you also think using a telephone is dumb? Telephone's came about around 1875.
How about airplanes? 1853. Are they stupid too?
Sorry--you've lost me. With a dumb statement and logic like that, I can't even bring myself to read the rest of your post--I'd have to punch myself in the face several times just to stay conscious.
Re: (Score:2)
If you read the full CEE there, you should be able to know why. I suggest you read section 5.3 alone, if the whole document is daunting, since that describes the environmental effects and that section is followed by a descr
Re: (Score:2)
The Comprehensive Environmental Evaluations [nsf.gov] for IceCube are available online for free. If you feel that there is something in there that requires attention or if there is something there that people have previously objected to in the case of oil rigs then you really should mention that.
Ok--you called my bluff. I really don't feel like wasting my time reading through a 10 MB PDF. Especially if it's from the NSF. Another dumb government agency that has everything to benefit from saying there are science-type problems which need more study--like oil drilling, global warming, etc... They are not an unbiased agency.
If you read the full CEE there, you should be able to know why. I suggest you read section 5.3 alone, if the whole document is daunting, since that describes the environmental effects and that section is followed by a description of procedures taken to mitigate those.
I started reading section 5.2. I gained consciousness a few moments ago at the end of the first paragraph. I won't argue that this has more or less of an impact than an oil
Re: (Score:2)
I would assume that they read this document, and found the results satisfactory.
PS: Slashdot strips the <q> tag?
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
They are not an unbiased agency.
You're hilarious.
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
You surely mean 0.92km^3 of water, don't you?
Big Science (Score:1, Insightful)
I know I'm ignorant, but I just don't understand how physicists managed to get from the Manhattan project to here. Yes, the Manhattan project showed that if you put great minds together they can achieve great things.. but that was in war time.. and for weapons development. How did the lab coats manage to convince the bean counters that the same thing was possible in peace time.. and for pure science no less? And how come it's always physics physics physics? And mostly, telescopes? If someone goes to th
Re:Big Science (Score:5, Insightful)
And how come it's always physics physics physics?
That's the science where you have to build the biggest equipment, because big equipment is needed to study the extremely small or the extremely large (particle physics and astronomy).
Biomedicine/genomics is slowly starting to encroach on physics in terms of Big Science. But there is also tons of science which is not Big Science.
And mostly, telescopes?
Telescopes and particle accelerators. See above.
If someone goes to the NSF and asks for billions to build a really big computer to do AI research on, the NSF tells them to go talk to IBM.
The NSF mostly funds science (national Science foundation). Computer science doesn't get as much of a priority with them, since it's more mathematics/engineering.
Also, with a billion-dollar particle accelerator, people are likely to discover new fundamental things about the universe we live in. With a billion-dollar computer, can we guarantee any breakthroughs in AI? I don't know that hardware is the limiting factor here.
Re: (Score:2)
big equipment is needed to study the extremely small or the extremely large (particle physics and astronomy)
I should clarify that this is certainly not always the case: there is a lot of astronomy and even particle physics that you can still do without enormous resources. But there are some things that just require giant experiments, because of the scale of the problem.
Re: (Score:2)
The Department of Energy is a major source of government funding for big computer systems. There are others, but I believe they're the largest.
Re: (Score:1)
Not particularly interesting actually, simple dollars and sense, perhaps it does not sit well that you might have to work for the evil industry, with all their "agendas", but it gets the job don
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
That's kinda like asking "Where's the IBM of marble sculpture?"
You can mass-produce ICs. If you've found a way to mass-produce large parabolic or hyperbolic wavelength-accurate mirrors, well, you should definitely submit that one to Slashdot, OK?
Re: (Score:2)
You can mass-produce ICs. If you've found a way to mass-produce large parabolic or hyperbolic wavelength-accurate mirrors, well, you should definitely submit that one to Slashdot, OK?
Well, come to think of it, you probably could take a silicon wafer and etch it into a Fresnel mirror [wikipedia.org]. Of course, this would be a very expensive mirror, and only about 12 inches [wikipedia.org] in diameter maximum.
Re: (Score:2)
Probably because if you went to NSF and said "I could make a breakthrough in AI research, if only I had a powerful enough computer", they would (most likely correctly) not believe you. If you go to them and said "I could make a breakthrough in astrophysics, if only I had a big enough neutrino detector", they would.
Obligatory (Score:1)
And how come it's always physics physics physics?
http://xkcd.com/435/ [xkcd.com]
important safety tip: (Score:3, Informative)
Don't take in stray sled dogs from nearby camps. Shoot them before they can get close to your camp, then burn the bodies. I'm just sayin'...
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
My understanding is that The Thing is required viewing at the start of each Winter Season at the South Pole research station - if you think about who actually would spend a winter at the south pole I think you can see why they would be all over this kind of thing.
The Thing - 50s vs 80s (Score:2)
Whilst we're on the topic, I have actually seen both the original from the 50s and the John Carpenter version, and do yourself a favour - if you ever get curious about the 50s version, don't. Seriously, just don't. A perfect example of, "What has been seen cannot be UNseen."
Instead, go on a John Carpenter binge and watch 'Prince of Darkness' and 'Big Trouble in Little China,' and save yourself a lot of grief while being vastly entertained.
Re: (Score:2)
"An intellectual carrot! The mind boggles."
Hmm.
I guess with the 1950's version, you either watch it with the sound almost down, or you forget about t
Not a telescope. (Score:1, Informative)
This is a neutrino detector [wikipedia.org]. It is not a telescope. It works by detecting electrons or muons created when neutrinos hit the surrounding ice.
Re:Not a telescope. (Score:5, Interesting)
I guess a telescope isn't a telescope, it's a light detector. It detects light that hits it mirrors...
These neutrino telescopes work by detecting Cherenkov Radiation created by the collision by-products and then determining the track of the particle that is emmiting the Cherenkov Radiation. The momentum of the original Neutrino is conserved so the track of the by-product is very close to the original trajectory.
You filter out downward tracks because they are generally caused by atmospheric cosmic radiation - the earth is basically your filter here, only neutrino's will be coming up through the earth. It's called a telescope because they hope to be able to correlate neutrino tracks with actual stellar objects - once the detector is large enough (hence the cubic kilometer size) there should be a sufficient cross section of matter to have a regular set of interactions from persistent neutrino sources.
This is an extension of the AMANDA research project, they drilled the original series of test holes in the 90's to prove the process would work - I helped build some of the detector equipment back in Wisconsin while I was an undergrad there.
Re: (Score:2)
sure it is:
tele = far
scope = see
it detects (sees) events taking place far away.
Although Wikipedia defines a telescope as:
"an instrument designed for the observation of remote objects by the collection of electromagnetic radiation"
I suppose neutrinos are not technically electromagnetic radiation.
Re: (Score:2)
And a CCD pixel is just a photon detector ....
But if you have enough of them and the geometrey is right, you can reconstruct where they cam from and develop an image. I'd say this is a telescope too, just not an optical one.
Yes, not a telescope. (Score:2)
A telescope collects light or other radiation passing through a large aperture and forms an image. This neither concentrates the neutrinos nor forms an image.
Re: (Score:2)
And not led by UD. Wisconsin gets credit for this one: http://icecube.wisc.edu/
Nut gallery oddly subued (Score:1, Troll)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
Maybe because your stereotyping of "enviros" is pure BS.
Literally... (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
Not just U Delaware (Score:2)
This is a huge project with a long list of collaborating organizations http://www.icecube.wisc.edu/collaboration/collaborators.php [wisc.edu]. I know there's a large number of Ice Cube folks here at U Wisconsin-Madison.
The scale of the project really is something. Neutrinos interact with other matter very infrequently -- something on the order of 60 billion neutrinos pass through you each second, and you probably never noticed. They need such a large volume so that they can see a reasonable number of interactions. It'
The northern counterpart (Score:2)
Delawhere? (Score:1, Funny)
I'm from Delaware and I don't want to go back for Christmas! Even Antartica is probably a step up...
Liquidation (Score:1)
So, how long will they have to use this thing before global warming causes it to start melting?
Re: (Score:2)
A very long time.
IceCube? Violence? (Score:5, Funny)
'IceCube will provide new information about some of the most violent and far-away astrophysical events in the cosmos.'
So NWA have a new album out? O.o
Re: (Score:1)
Yella(t) your friends about this, looks pretty cool.
I was there last year (Score:5, Informative)
I was there last year. For some pics of the detectors and the hot water drill used to lower the detector strings see http://spacebit.org/v/places/Antarctica/SouthPole [spacebit.org]
The drill seems straight out of Austin Powers or Bond for drilling into the core of the earth.
The visualization software (image above) was running on Linux FYI.
Re: (Score:2)
I work with the engineers who built the TWO drill heads(UW Physical Sciences Lab [wisc.edu]). The one in your picture is the Firn drill [wisc.edu], which "drills" (really melts) it's way through the first 50 feet of snow. The cooler drill is the enhanced hot water drill [wisc.edu], which uses hot water to blast through the ice to a depth of 2,400 meters. The reason for two separate drills is the hot water drill isn't efficient at going through the firn layer, as the water seeps away. Also, having two drills greatly reduces drilling time
Re: (Score:2)
You have to admit that the Firn drill is cooler looking, though.
i doubt anyone will get this ... but what the heck (Score:1)
Re: (Score:1)
Beware of Deep Ones (Score:3, Funny)
A word of advice: If you wake any squid-headed star-spawned monstrosity deep beneath the mountains of madness, run.
Re: (Score:1)
Deep, man. (Score:2)
This research team is one of the many other ones
Whoah, we're talking seriously reality-twisting science here.
-40F, that's it? (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Of course they said it was cold. Every newsie knows that you have to whoop about the cold when writing about Antarctica, no matter how irrelevant the weather is to the story.
We interviewed some of the IceCube devs... (Score:1)
Military uses? (Score:2)
South central actually... (Score:5, Funny)
Neutrino's with Attitude!
Re: (Score:2)
What happens if the event that the telescope can observe is coming from the relative northern direction? Maybe we should build one in the Arctic?
Re:South central actually... (Score:4, Interesting)
IceCube is designed to detect neutrino events only from the northern hemisphere. Neutrinos from the sky in the southern hemisphere get confused with other atmospheric muons events. So they screen out all events coming from above, and only look at those coming from below, i.e. from the north. Neutrinos have no problem passing through the Earth, but all other particles do, so they know that events from below come from neutrinos.
Still, you can rephrase the question: why don't they build a detector in the Arctic to look for southern events? The only place there's that much land ice is Greenland. There isn't much infrastructure there. There is some already at the South Pole. I suspect that's the reason. But if IceCube proves successful, maybe they'll think about a Greenland version.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Actually, there's a similar experiment called ANTARES [wikipedia.org] in the northern hemisphere. Instead of drilling their detector array into the ice, they suspend it in seawater, in the Mediterranean. There are disadvantages to this ... but I guess it worked out to be easier than building one in Greenland.
Incidentally, I'm part of a (small, speculative) project trying to get an even larger detection volume by using the Moon as a neutrino detector[1]. We're not really competing with IceCube or AMANDA, though - we're l
Re: (Score:2)
The only place there's that much land ice is Greenland. There isn't much infrastructure there. There is some already at the South Pole. I suspect that's the reason. But if IceCube proves successful, maybe they'll think about a Greenland version.
They'd better hurry...
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Wait...
Oh my god...
*holds self*