Low Temperature Detectors for Neutrinos and Dark Matter: Proceedings of a Workshop, Held at Ringberg Castle, Tegernsee, May 12–13, 1987

For the last few years astrophysicists and elementary particle physicists have been working jointly on the following fascinating phenomena: 1. The solar neutrino puzzle and the question: What happens to the neutrinos on their way from the sun to the earth? 2. The growing evidence that our universe is filled with about 10 times more matter than is visible and the question: What is dark matter made of? 3. The supernovae explosions and the question: What do neutrinos tell us about such explosions and vice versa? The experimental investigation of these phenomena is difficult and involves unconventional techniques. These are presently under development, and bring together such seemingly disparate disciplines as astrophysics and elementary particle physics on the one hand and superconductivity and solid-state physics on the other. This book contains the proceedings of a workshop held in March 1987 at which the above subjects and their experimental investigation were discussed. The proposed experimental methods are very new. They involve frontier developments in low temperature and solid-state physics. The book should be useful to researchers and students who actively work on these subjects or plan to enter the field. It also offers the non-expert reader with some physics background a good survey of the activities in this field.

Table of Contents:
Update on Neutrinos, Dark Matter, and Cryogenic Detection.- New Results on the Basic Properties’of Superheated Granules Detectors.- Investigation of Superconducting Tin Granules for a Low-Energy Neutrino or Dark Matter Detector.- SQUID Detection of Superheated Granules.- VLSI Superconducting Particle Detectors.- “Minicylinder” Design for Solar Neutrino Detection (A naive proposal).- Electron Beam Detection with Superheated Superconducting Grains.- Monte Carlo Simulation of a Double-Beta Decay Experiment with Superconducting-Superheated Tin Granules.- Solar Neutrino Indium Detector Using Superheated Granules.- An Indium Solar Neutrino Experiment.- Cryogenic Detection of Particles, Development Effort in the United States.- Calorimetric Detectors at Low Temperatures.- The Possible Impact of Thermal Detectors in Nuclear and Subnuclear Physics.- Considerations on Front End Electronics for Bolometric Detectors with Resistive Readout.- Coherent Neutrino-Nucleus Elastic Scattering in Ultralow-Temperature Calorimetric Detectors.- Data Acquisition and Analysis of Calorimetric Signals.- The Use of Rotons in Liquid Helium to Detect Neutrinos.- List of Participants.- Index of Contributors.