2015年CRI Chinese Team Wins Breakthrough Prize for Neutrino Research

 

Wang Yifang, from the Institute of High Energy Physics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, attended the award ceremony of the 2016 Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics at the NASA Ames Research Centre.

He is the director of the team behind China's Daya Bay Reactor¹ Neutrino Experiment.

"I attribute this prize to the joint² and relentless³ efforts of our team members. And a lot of hard work has been done in the past 30 years for China's high-energy physics to have today's achievements."

Established in 2006, the Daya Bay team discovered the value of the angle theta one-three, the last of three long-sought neutrino mixing angles, in 2012.

The groundbreaking achievement is based on analysis and measurements of how the oscillation process varies with neutrino energy by some 200 scientists from six countries and regions around the world.

Wang Yifang says the discovery is of great importance to neutrino research:

"This result laid a solid foundation for further research on cosmology and particle physics and provided a direction for further research on neutrino."

This is the first time that Chinese scientists have won the prize.

The prize is one of three awarded by the Breakthrough Foundation for outstanding contributions in life sciences, fundamental physics, and mathematics.

Russian entrepreneur and physicist⁴ Yuri Milner founded the Breakthrough Foundation.

He also awarded a three million U.S. dollars prize to the five winning teams.

Milner explains the rationale behind the sum of money offered as a prize by the foundation.

"It is a big enough number to send the message to the world that science is important. We need to keep in mind that the kind of scientists that are getting those prizes, they don't have the ability to use any intellectual property, because discovery belongs to everyone, from the time it's been discovered. So we made it so that everything that the scientists discover belongs to everyone, that's why they usually don't make a lot of money. "

The other four teams honored are KamLand, K2K/T2K, and Super-Kamiokande from Japan, as well as the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory⁵ from Canada.

For CRI, I'm Victor Ning.

1 reactor   

n.反应器；反应堆

参考例句：

• The atomic reactor generates enormous amounts of thermal energy.原子反应堆发出大量的热能。
• Inside the reactor the large molecules are cracked into smaller molecules.在反应堆里，大分子裂变为小分子。

2 joint   

adj.联合的，共同的；n.关节，接合处；v.连接，贴合

参考例句：

• I had a bad fall,which put my shoulder out of joint.我重重地摔了一跤，肩膀脫臼了。
• We wrote a letter in joint names.我们联名写了封信。

3 relentless   

adj.残酷的，不留情的，无怜悯心的

参考例句：

• The traffic noise is relentless.交通车辆的噪音一刻也不停止。
• Their training has to be relentless.他们的训练必须是无情的。

4 physicist   

n.物理学家，研究物理学的人

参考例句：

• He is a physicist of the first rank.他是一流的物理学家。
• The successful physicist never puts on airs.这位卓有成就的物理学家从不摆架子。

5 observatory   

n.天文台，气象台，瞭望台，观测台

参考例句：

• Guy's house was close to the observatory.盖伊的房子离天文台很近。
• Officials from Greenwich Observatory have the clock checked twice a day.格林威治天文台的职员们每天对大钟检查两次。