A Massive Underground Sphere Is Trying to Catch the Universe’s Ghosts—and Reveal New Physics
created: Dec. 31, 2025, 1 p.m. | updated: Jan. 8, 2026, 11:29 a.m.
Here’s what you'll learn when you read this story:The Jiangmen Underground Neutrino Observatory (JUNO) is on the hunt to determine the mass ordering of neutrino flavors, and its first results show that it’s delivering beyond expectations.
To isolate neutrinos from background noise, detectors designed to find these particles are often located deep underground.
Related Story This Ghostly Particle May Be Why Anything ExistsNow, neutrino science is officially entering a new era, as the China’s Jiangmen Underground Neutrino Observatory (JUNO) is up and running.
“Building JUNO has been a journey of extraordinary challenges,” JUNO chief engineer Xiaoyan Ma told the Cern Courier.
This sphere is then placed in a cylindrical pit filled with ultra-pure water to filter out particles that might mimic antineutrinos (i.e.
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