Joey was inspired by his Westhill physics teacher, Mr. Heikkinen "whose great teaching sent him on the path that he’s on today." 

Joseph Howlett, Westhill Class of 2010, you make us Westhill and Proud!

 

Mining for Neutrinos, and for Cosmic Answers
In a South Dakota cavern, scientists are working to capture the most elusive particles in the universe.

By Joseph Howlett
Reported from Lead, S.D., with support from a grant from the Council for the Advancement of Science Writing and the Brinson Foundation.

Published Aug. 30, 2024
Every morning, two dozen miners and engineers pack into a cage-like elevator for an 11-minute descent into the bowels of South Dakota’s Black Hills.

At the bottom, a mile beneath the surface, the cage door lifts and the workers file down a rocky, twisting corridor. At its end lies the result of three years of labor: two empty caverns, each as high as a seven-story building and so long that it takes a full second for your voice to reach the far wall and echo back.

For over a century, these depths were scoured by miners in search of gold. Now they hold the Sanford Underground Research Facility, or SURF. In the coming years, some of the world’s top particle physicists plan to transform this realm into the listening end of an 800-mile, $5 billion tin-can telephone. With it, they hope to hear a whispered answer to an existential question: How did we get here?

Read the full article here: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/30/science/astrophysics-dune-neutrinos.html