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Transportation
Vancouver Skytrain
Ankara, Turkey, Metro Subway System
Detroit People Mover
Toronto Transit Commission, Sheppard Subway.
 Sudbury Neutrino Observatory
The Sudbury Neutrino Observatory (SNO) is taking data that will provide revolutionary insight into the properties of
neutrinos and the core of the sun. The detector, shown in the artist's conception below, was built 6800 feet below
ground, in INCO's Creighton mine near Sudbury, Ontario. SNO is designed to detect neutrinos produced by fusion
reactions in the sun. SNO is a heavy-water Cherenkov detector. It uses 1000 tonnes of heavy water, on loan from
Atomic Energy of Canada Limited (AECL), contained in a 12m diameter acrylic vessel. Neutrinos react with the heavy
water (D2O) to produce flashes of light called Cherenkov radiation. This light is then detected with a geodesic array
of 9600 photomultiplier tubes surrounding the heavy water vessel. The detector is immersed in light (normal) water
within a 30m barrel-shaped cavity excavated from Norite rock. Location in the deepest part of the mine provides an
overburden of rock to shield from cosmic rays. The detector laboratory is immensely clean to reduce background
radiation signals which would otherwise hide the very weak signal from neutrinos.
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