ORNL Detects Never Before Seen Neutrino Interactions

[Spinnor]

" But in a study published today in Science, researchers working at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) detected never-before-seen neutrino interactions using a detector the size of a fire extinguisher. "

From, https://www.scientificamerican.com/...otted-bouncing-off-nuclei-for-the-first-time/

 

[DrChinese]

Some additional detail about the experimental setup and related theory:

https://arxiv.org/abs/1509.08702

 

[mfb]

I don't see the "monumental" advancement. It is a great measurement, but it is not surprising. It is a nice demonstration what future detectors will have as background.
This process will ultimately slow down future improvements of dark matter detectors because the neutrino recoils are indistinguishable from dark matter recoils. DARWIN plans to reach this limit somewhere between 2025-2030. With natural neutrinos, not with a focused neutrino beam from accelerators. I wrote a bit about dark matter detectors in this Insight article.