Nearly a mile underground in South Dakota, construction is under way on the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE), one of the world’s most ambitious particle physics experiments.
Bringing together more than 1,500 researchers from around the world, with the UK as its largest international partner, DUNE will investigate some of the Universe’s biggest mysteries.
These include how the Universe evolved after the big bang and why it contains so much more matter than antimatter.
A major milestone has now been reached, as teams from the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab), CERN and the Sanford Underground Research Facility (SURF) begin construction of DUNE’s massive cryostats.
DUNE-UK
The UK’s contribution is led by the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) through the DUNE-UK collaboration, including 15 UK universities and STFC’s Daresbury Laboratory and Rutherford Appleton Laboratory.
The universities are:
- University of Bristol
- University of Cambridge
- Durham University
- The University of Edinburgh
- Imperial College London
- Lancaster University
- University of Liverpool
- The University of Manchester
- University of Oxford
- Queen Mary University London
- Royal Holloway University of London
- The University of Sheffield
- University of Sussex
- University College London
- University of Warwick
Together, they are contributing expertise across the experiment, from detector components and developing data-acquisition systems to software, computing, accelerator technology and scientific research.
Unique international expertise
The University of Warwick’s Professor Gary Barker, Principal Investigator for the DUNE-UK collaboration, said:
The UK neutrino community is making a major contribution to DUNE, providing unique expertise to the international project across precision engineering, advanced software and physics analysis deliverables.
We are well advanced to completing our production runs, and this milestone is a key step towards our goal of having detectors installed underground and taking physics data.
What DUNE could discover
Neutrinos are among the most abundant particles in the Universe, but they rarely interact with matter, making them extremely difficult to detect.
DUNE will use enormous detectors filled with liquid argon to record the tiny signals produced when neutrinos interact.
It will send a beam of neutrinos and antineutrinos from Fermilab, near Chicago, to detectors 1,300 kilometres away in South Dakota.
By comparing the particles detected at the two ends of this journey, scientists hope to shed light on some of the most fundamental questions in physics, including:
- why the Universe contains so much more matter than antimatter
- how neutrinos behave and change as they travel
- what neutrinos can reveal about exploding stars, including supernovae
The deep underground location will shield the detectors from cosmic rays and other background radiation, helping scientists identify the extremely faint signals they are designed to detect.
A rendering of one of the cryostat modules that will house the liquid argon detector
Investing in UK science and technology
In 2017, the UK committed £79 million to DUNE and its supporting infrastructure, making it the largest international country investor in the project outside the US.
The investment supports three key areas: DUNE itself, the PIP-II accelerator upgrade at Fermilab, and the associated detector and accelerator infrastructure.
UK researchers and engineers are designing and delivering critical components for the experiment, while developing expertise in:
- advanced instrumentation
- precision engineering
- computing
- accelerator technology
Worldwide collaboration
The UK also has an important role in DUNE’s scientific leadership, with Professor Dave Newbold, Executive Director of National Laboratories at STFC, recently elected as co-spokesperson of the DUNE collaboration.
Professor Newbold said:
The DUNE experiment has the potential to change our understanding of the universe.
Neutrinos are amongst the most abundant, but also the most mysterious particles in our picture of nature, and they may have influenced the shape of our world in profound ways.
Investigating their properties to the limits of technology will allow for important discoveries.
DUNE is one of the largest and most ambitious scientific projects to date, and demonstrates what can be achieved through worldwide collaboration between countries.
The UK contributions to the experiment have been produced by academics and students, but also by engineers and technicians in our national laboratories and in British industry.
We’re proud of what we’ve accomplished so far, and looking forward to taking the next steps in unravelling the mysteries of nature.
Building DUNE’s giant detectors
One of the UK’s biggest contributions to DUNE is the production of 137 of the 150 Anode Plane Assemblies (APAs) required for the experiment.
These giant, highly sensitive detector panels are being built at STFC’s Daresbury Laboratory, in collaboration with six UK universities.
Each APA is around 6.3 metres tall and 2.3 metres wide, roughly the height of a two-storey building.
It carries around 24 kilometres of hair-thin wire, which detects the tiny electrical signals produced when neutrinos interact inside DUNE’s detector.
In October 2026, the team reached a major production milestone, completing half of the 137 APAs it is responsible for delivering.
Six universities are contributing components, testing, quality assurance and scientific expertise, alongside engineers and technicians at Daresbury Laboratory.
Capturing the data
DUNE will produce enormous amounts of data as neutrinos interact inside its detectors.
Researchers at STFC’s Rutherford Appleton Laboratory are playing a major role in developing the data-acquisition system that will capture and record these interactions.
The UK is the largest contributor to the system’s development, providing expertise in the hardware and software needed to both capture and analyse the data reliably.
Keeping DUNE’s detectors cool
CERN is leading the construction of two enormous cryostats that will house the detectors deep underground at SURF in South Dakota.
With steel support structures made from thousands of beams transported underground, each giant insulated vessel will hold around 17,000 tonnes of liquid argon, cooled to approximately -184°C.
At this temperature, the argon remains liquid, allowing the detectors to record the tiny signals produced when neutrinos interact.
DUNE will also have a detector at Fermilab, which will measure neutrinos close to their source before they travel 1,300 kilometres to South Dakota.
From collaboration to installation
Together, the facilities in Illinois and South Dakota form the Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility (LBNF), which provides the infrastructure for DUNE.
Mark Thomson, director general of CERN, said:
Collaboration is in CERN’s DNA, and our contribution to DUNE is a brilliant example of cross-organisational partnership.
After years of planning and careful coordination, I am thrilled to see that we are ready to start installation.
Powering the beam
DUNE’s neutrino beam will be generated at Fermilab using a major accelerator upgrade known as PIP-II (the Proton Improvement Plan-II), which will provide the high-energy beam needed to produce neutrinos.
STFC’s Daresbury Laboratory is delivering three superconducting accelerator modules and components for a fourth, which will help accelerate the protons used to generate the beam.
Researchers at STFC’s Rutherford Appleton Laboratory have contributed specialist expertise to the design and development of the target system at Fermilab.
When the proton beam strikes the target, it produces the neutrinos that will travel towards the detectors in South Dakota.
Countdown to discovery
The underground space of DUNE is planned to be completed by 2029, and the detector apparatus in 2030.
From that date, an 1,800-strong worldwide team of researchers will begin probing the laws of nature more deeply than ever before, observing particles from the Sun and outer space.
Using Fermilab’s PIP-II accelerator upgrade, the terrestrial neutrino beam is expected to be sent to the underground detectors in South Dakota by 2031, enabling DUNE’s long-term scientific programme.
Professor Ryan Nichol of University College London said:
Once they are built, the DUNE detectors will be some of the most precise scientific instruments ever constructed.
They will be capable of detecting particles from stars exploding on the other side of our galaxy, and of using quantum physics to measure the difference in mass between two of the lightest particles in the universe.