Paarl Africa Underground Laboratory (PAUL)

TL;DR

The paper discusses the PAUL initiative, a proposed deep underground physics laboratory in Africa, highlighting its potential for advancing neutrino and dark matter research with existing infrastructure and suitable geology.

Contribution

It introduces the PAUL project, detailing its scientific goals, site advantages, and plans for establishing a major underground research facility in Africa.

Findings

Site geology is suitable for underground experiments

PAUL has strong potential for neutrino and dark matter research

The initiative promotes international scientific collaboration

Abstract

Establishing a deep underground physics laboratory to study, amongst others, double beta decay, geoneutrinos, reactor neutrinos and dark matter has been discussed for more than a decade within the austral African physicists' community. PAUL, the Paarl Africa Underground Laboratory, is an initiative foreseeing an open international laboratory devoted to the development of competitive science in the austral region. It has the advantage that the location, the Huguenot tunnel, exists already and the geology and the environment of the site is appropriate for an experimental facility. The paper describes the PAUL initiative, presents the physics prospects and discusses the capacity for building the future experimental facility.