Heisenberg's uncertainty as a limiting factor for neutrino mass detection in β-decay

by Alexey Boyarsky (Leiden University (NL)), Yevheniia Cheipesh (Leiden University (NL))

Monday 19 Apr 2021, 11:15 → 12:00 Europe/Zurich

Virtual only

In order to explore the potential of beta-decay experiments to detect relic neutrinos (CνB), we
study the intrinsic irreducible uncertainty in energy of electrons resulting from the zero-point motion
of the emitter. Motivated by the PTOLEMY proposal, we consider the case of Tritium adsorbed
on graphene. We show that in this case the intrinsic uncertainty is larger than the target resolution
of the measurement. We discuss nevertheless that the ambitious goal of detecting CνB could still
be achieved with further refinement of the experimental design. One option is to substitute Tritium
with a heavier emitter; another is to design an angle-resolved detection setup where the emitter has
a higher degree of mobility along the substrate

arXiv:2101.10069

Ptolemy_Paris.pdf