28
Epilogue
This book is supposed to give an abbreviated impression [50] of how important
an elusive, ultra weakly interacting, super light, fully invisible particle called
the neutrino can be to the evolution of the universe. It takes a homogenous
hot soup, repulsive to the existence of any ordered structure, to the present
day—one which is a full, ordered, and hospitable universe. The neutrinos
had a role in building the elements of the periodic table little by little, slowly
but steadily. Sometimes it helped this by being there as at the time of Big
Bang Nucleosynthesis and sometimes by not being there. In the latter case, it
would hinder element formation by being nearby such as in binary neutron
star merger. It is playing a key role in our daily existence since it makes the sun
shine every moment of the day. It also provides important clues to the nature
of new forces and new matter beyond the standard model [49].
So how well do we understand a particle that has been so vital to the
universe as we see it today? There have certainly been major developments
in our understanding of the neutrino in the past nine decades, since the time
it was first imagined by Pauli. We understand many things starting from what
kind of force it participates in to what its properties are. Yet a lot remains to be
understood. Scientists are working hard to figure the rest of the properties out
using different experiments like neutrinoless double beta decay, long baseline
oscillation experiments, searches for sterile neutrinos using the reactors, etc.
That various governments the world over have invested in major experiments to unravel the remaining unknown properties of neutrinos is very
encouraging. We need to build major observatories to unravel the rest of the
mysteries of the neutrino and possibly use them for practical purposes such as
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer
Nature Switzerland AG 2021
R. N. Mohapatra, The Neutrino Story: One Tiny Particle’s Grand Role in the Cosmos,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-51846-2_28
207
Epilogue
This book is supposed to give an abbreviated impression [50] of how important
an elusive, ultra weakly interacting, super light, fully invisible particle called
the neutrino can be to the evolution of the universe. It takes a homogenous
hot soup, repulsive to the existence of any ordered structure, to the present
day—one which is a full, ordered, and hospitable universe. The neutrinos
had a role in building the elements of the periodic table little by little, slowly
but steadily. Sometimes it helped this by being there as at the time of Big
Bang Nucleosynthesis and sometimes by not being there. In the latter case, it
would hinder element formation by being nearby such as in binary neutron
star merger. It is playing a key role in our daily existence since it makes the sun
shine every moment of the day. It also provides important clues to the nature
of new forces and new matter beyond the standard model [49].
So how well do we understand a particle that has been so vital to the
universe as we see it today? There have certainly been major developments
in our understanding of the neutrino in the past nine decades, since the time
it was first imagined by Pauli. We understand many things starting from what
kind of force it participates in to what its properties are. Yet a lot remains to be
understood. Scientists are working hard to figure the rest of the properties out
using different experiments like neutrinoless double beta decay, long baseline
oscillation experiments, searches for sterile neutrinos using the reactors, etc.
That various governments the world over have invested in major experiments to unravel the remaining unknown properties of neutrinos is very
encouraging. We need to build major observatories to unravel the rest of the
mysteries of the neutrino and possibly use them for practical purposes such as
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer
Nature Switzerland AG 2021
R. N. Mohapatra, The Neutrino Story: One Tiny Particle’s Grand Role in the Cosmos,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-51846-2_28
207