In 1998, in a memorable Neutrino98 conference in Takayama, Japan, the Super-Kamiokande collaboration made a stunning anouncement of evidence for neutrino oscillations in the atmospheric neutrinos. Since then, the finding has been confirmed internally by many other sets of data and analysis techniques, and externally by other experiments that utilize different neutrino detection techniques.
Discovery of neutrino oscillation phenomenon, which implies non-zero neutrino mass, is considered as one of the most important discoveries in particle physics in our generation. It is also considered as the only experimental evidence we have today for physics beyond the Standard Model, which is the modern paradigm of the particle physics.
In this talk, I will describe how we can observe neutrinos using an underground water Cherenkov detector: the Super-Kamiokande, and how we concluded that we observe a neutrino oscillation phenomemon in the atmospheric neurtinos. I will discuss implications of such a discovery. I will also present some historical perspective of neutrino physics and recent resolution on the so-called "Solar Neutrino Puzzle" for which Super-Kamiokande has made significant contributions.
Web site: http://ale.physics.sunysb.edu/~alpinist/