Letter of Intent: Jinping Neutrino Experiment

TL;DR

The Jinping Neutrino Experiment aims to enhance low-energy neutrino measurements using China's unique underground lab, with a large target mass and low background, to study solar and geoneutrinos and address key neutrino physics questions.

Contribution

This paper proposes a new large-scale neutrino experiment in China with unprecedented sensitivity and background conditions, enabling advanced studies of solar and geoneutrinos.

Findings

Initial sensitivity studies show potential to detect CNO solar neutrinos.

The experiment could distinguish between high and low metallicity solar models.

It may resolve U and Th decay signals from crustal neutrinos.

Abstract

Jinping Neutrino Experiment (Jinping) is proposed to significantly improve measurements on solar neutrinos and geoneutrinos in China Jinping Laboratory - a lab with a number of unparalleled features, thickest overburden, lowest reactor neutrino background, etc., which identify it as the world-best low-energy neutrino laboratory. The proposed experiment will have target mass of 4 kilotons of liquid scintillator or water-based liquid scintillator, with a fiducial mass of 2 kilotons for neutrino-electron scattering events and 3 kilotons for inverse-beta interaction events. A number of initial sensitivities studies have been carried out, including on the transition phase for the solar neutrinos oscillation from the vacuum to the matter effect, the discovery of solar neutrinos from the carbon-nitrogen-oxygen (CNO) cycle, the resolution of the high and low metallicity hypotheses, and the unambiguous separation on U and Th cascade decays from the dominant crustal anti-electron neutrinos in China.