Münster 2017 – scientific programme

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T: Fachverband Teilchenphysik

T 11: Neutrinophysik 1 (Neutrinomassen)

T 11.3: Talk

Monday, March 27, 2017, 17:20–17:35, VSH 17

The Electron Capture in ¹⁶³Ho experiment — •Federica Mantegazzini for the ECHo collaboration — Kirchhoff-Institute for Physics, Heidelberg University, Germany

The Electron Capture in ¹⁶³Ho (ECHo) experiment is designed to investigate the electron neutrino mass with sub-eV sensitivity by the analysis of the electron capture spectrum of ¹⁶³Ho. The sensitivity on the electron neutrino mass is crucially related to the energy available for the decay Q_EC = 2833(30_stat)(15_sys)  eV, which has been precisely determined by the ECHo collaboration. Accordingly, a sensitivity below 10   eV at the end of the present phase of the experiment, ECHo-1k, is expected. During this phase about 1   kBq of high purity ¹⁶³Ho source will be implanted in arrays of low temperature metallic magnetic calorimeters operated in a reduced background environment. The goals of the current phase are the precise characterization of the parameters describing the spectrum, the optimization of the detectors production and the identification and reduction of the background sources. These results will pave the way to the second phase of the experiment, ECHo-1M, where an activity of 1   MBq will be used, in order to reach a sub-eV sensitivity on the electron neutrino mass. Furthermore, the high statistics and high resolution measurement of the ¹⁶³Ho electron capture spectrum will allow the investigation of the existence of sterile neutrinos at the eV- and keV-scale up to a mass value of Q_EC. In this contribution, a general overview of the ECHo experiment is presented and the current status as well as the future perspectives are discussed.