Speaker
Description
Sterile neutrinos are a possible extension of the Standard Model of particle physics. If their mass is in the keV range, they are a suitable dark matter candidate. One way to search for sterile neutrinos in a laboratory-based experiment is via tritium beta decay. A sterile neutrino with a mass up to 18.6 keV would manifest itself in the decay spectrum as a kink-like distortion.
The Karlsruhe Tritium Neutrino (KATRIN) experiment currently investigates the endpoint region of the tritium beta-decay spectrum to measure the effective electron anti-neutrino mass. The main objective of the TRISTAN project is to extend this energy range to measure the entire beta-decay spectrum. To this end, a novel multi-pixel silicon drift detector and readout system is currently being developed which enables the search for sterile neutrinos in the keV-mass range. This poster will give an overview on the design and development of the new detector and show first test measurements of a detector module.
