Status and prospects of astroparticle physics, January 2026.

Session

Session 2

22 Jan 2026, 13:40

Conversi (Physics Department Sapienza University)

6. From Majorana to the Search for Matter Creation in Lab.

Francesco Vissani (Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare)

22/01/2026, 13:40

The debate on matter stability and the contributions of key figures is explored. The legacy of the Roman School, from Fermi's beta-ray theory to the pioneering work of Majorana and Pontecorvo, as well as the ongoing quest to observe the 'creation of matter' through 'neutrinoless double beta decay', at the Gran Sasso Lab, is explored.

10. 1956-2026: the contribution of artificial neutrino sources to neutrino physics .

Domizia Orestano (Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare)

22/01/2026, 14:20

In 1956 Reines and Cowan observed for the first time the interaction of (anti)neutrinos from a reactor. Since then, both reactors and accelerators have been exploited as neutrino sources in experiments identifying their three flavors and corroborating the evidence for oscillations coming from solar and atmospheric neutrinos. A review of the main experimental techniques will be presented,...

7. Outlook on direct dark matter searches

Marco Vignati (Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare)

22/01/2026, 15:00

The nature of Dark Matter is one of the most challenging problems ever tackled in physics.
Cosmology and astrophysics provide strong and compelling evidence for the existence of a “dark” form of matter in the Universe, yet it has not been directly detected or identified so far.
Two main hypotheses are currently being tested regarding the nature of Dark Matter: it may consist of particles (such...