The Parno Group

Experimental neutrino physics at Carnegie Mellon University

Welcome!

I am an experimental physicist at Carnegie Mellon University. I'm currently involved in three experiments: KATRIN (an effort in southwestern Germany to measure the absolute mass scale of the neutrino using tritium beta decay), COHERENT (an effort in Tennessee to precisely measure coherent elastic neutrino-nucleus scattering, or CEvNS, using several different types of detectors), and TRIMS (an effort in Seattle to test the molecular-physics theories that are used in extracting the final KATRIN result). Between these experiments, my group works on everything from simulation to detector design to operations to data analysis.

Recent Group News

  • 2024: New KATRIN results: We now know the effective neutrino mass is less than 0.45 eV (90% confidence level) based on our first 259 days of measurement! Check out our preprint.
  • 2024: New COHERENT results: First measurement of CEvNS on Ge! Check out our preprint.
  • 2024: The Magnificent CEvNS workshop and Neutrino conference are happening in June. Diana is giving the overview talk on the COHERENT experiment at Magnificent CEvNS. Gen and Kirsten will give a poster on Module 2 of the heavy-water detector at both conferences. Byron will give a poster on the KATRIN rear wall at Neutrino.
  • 2024: The DPF/PHENO meeting is happening in Pittsburgh in May. Diana is on the local organizing committee. Byron, Gen and Kirsten will give talks.
  • 2023: The Workshop on Neutrino Interaction Measurements for Supernova Neutrino Detection is happening at Oak Ridge National Lab in March. Diana is an organizer and is giving a talk on the COHERENT experiment.
  • 2023: Byron Daniel is a finalist in CMU's Three Minute Thesis competition -- the only finalist doing basic science research.
  • 2022: Our KATRIN Snowmass white paper has been published in J. Phys. G!. Read it here. Diana was the primary editor.
  • 2022: Our KATRIN review paper has been published at Annual Reviews of Nuclear and Particle Science. Read it here. Diana is one of five authors.
  • 2022: Congratulations to Dr. Rebecca Rapp for successfully defending her PhD thesis, Characterizing neutrino and neutron fluxes from the Spallation Neutron Source for the COHERENT experiment! Becca is going on to a faculty position in Computer & Information Studies at Washington & Jefferson University in Washington, PA.
  • 2022: The COHERENT paper on simulating the SNS neutrino flux has been published in Phys. Rev. D! Read it here. Becca was lead author with substantial contributions from undergraduate student Aria Salyapongse.
  • 2021: Congratulations to Dr. Ana Paula Vizcaya Hernandez for successfully defending her PhD thesis, Toward a Measurement of the Neutrino Mass with Tritium: Ion Studies for the KATRIN and TRIMS Experiments! Ana Paula is going on to a postdoc position at Colorado State.
  • 2021: Congratulations to Dr. Larisa Thorne for successfully defending her PhD thesis, modeling and fitting KATRIN spectra with CMKAT! Larisa is going on to a postdoc position at University of Mainz.
  • 2021: Dr Parno has been granted an Early Career Award to help build a D2O detector for the COHERENT experiment! See CMU writeup
  • 2021: KATRIN's new physics result from its second run: Check preprint here
  • 2021: COHERENT paper on plans for the D2O detector: Check preprint here
  • 2021:The KATRIN hardware paper has been accepted by JINST! Larisa is one of four main editors/authors on this gigantic effort. Check preprint here
  • 2021: The long paper on analysis methods for KATRIN's first neutrino-mass results has been accepted by PRD! Diana is one of two main authors on this paper. Check preprint here.
  • 2020: Congratulations to PhD student Rebecca Rapp, who will work at ORNL for six months on a Department of Energy graduate fellowship.
  • 2020:COHERENT's discovery of CEvNS on liquid argon has been accepted by PRL! Published paper here
  • 2020: TRIMS' first results are published in PRL! Here's the paper showing agreement with theory.