Neutrino Hunters
Before the Higgs boson, there was a maddening search for another particle that holds the secrets of the universe – the neutrino. First detected in 1956, it teased the answers to science’s greatest mysteries. How did the Big Bang happen? What might ‘dark matter’ be made of? And could faster-than light travel be possible, overturning Einstein’s theory of special relativity?
But the hunt for the neutrino and its meaning has also involved adventures, from Cold War defections and extra dimensions to mile-deep holes in the Antarctic ice and a troubled genius who disappeared without a trace. Renowned astrophysicist and award-winning science writer Ray Jayawardhana delivers a thrilling detective story of revolutionary science from the dawn of the quantum age to today’s most inventive labs.
Ray Jayawardhana is a professor and the Canada Research Chair in Observational Astrophysics at the University of Toronto. Originally from Sri Lanka, he is a graduate of Yale and Harvard. The co-author of more than one hundred papers in scientific journals, his discoveries have made headlines worldwide, including in The Times, The Economist, Sydney Morning Herald, and BBC News, and have led to numerous accolades such as the Steacie Prize, the McLean Award, the Rutherford Medal, and the Radcliffe Felllowship.