JULOC: A local 3-D high-resolution crustal model in South China for forecasting geoneutrino measurements at JUNO

Publication date: Available online 6 December 2019Source: Physics of the Earth and Planetary InteriorsAuthor(s): Ruohan Gao, Zhiwei Li, Ran Han, Andong Wang, Yufeng Li, Yufei Xi, Jingao Liu, Xin Mao, Yao Sun, Ya XuAbstractGeothermal energy is one of the keys for understanding the mechanisms driving the plate tectonics and mantle dynamics. The surface heat flux, as measured in boreholes, provides limited insights into the relative contributions of primordial versus radiogenic sources of the interior heat budget. Geoneutrino, electron antineutrino that is produced from the radioactive decay of the heat producing elements, is a unique probe to obtain direct information about the amount and distribution of heat producing elements in the crust and mantle. Cosmochemical, geochemical, and geodynamic compositional models of the Bulk Silicate Earth (BSE) individually predict different mantle neutrino fluxes, and therefore may be distinguished by the direct measurement of geoneutrinos. Due to low counting statistics, the results from geoneutrino measurements at several sites are inadequate to resolve the geoneutrino flux. However, the JUNO detector, currently under construction in South China, is expected to provide an exciting opportunity to obtain a highly reliable statistical measurement, which will produce sufficient data to address several vital questions of geological importance.However, the detector cannot separate the mantle contribution from the crust contribution. To test dif...
Source: Physics of the Earth and Planetary Interiors - Category: Physics Source Type: research