IceCube-Gen2, the planned extension of the IceCube Neutrino Observatory at the South Pole, was among nine projects selected for the Federal Ministry of Research, Technology, and Space’s (BMFTR) short list of the most important and promising research infrastructure projects. Federal Research Minister Dorothee Bär made the announcement earlier this month. The BMFTR is the German […]
The 39th International Cosmic Ray Conference (ICRC), the largest conference in the world for cosmic ray physics, was held on July 14-July 24 at the Geneva International Conference Center in Geneva, Switzerland. The main topics covered included cosmic-ray physics, gamma-ray astronomy, neutrino astronomy and neutrino physics, dark matter physics, solar and heliospheric physics, multimessenger astronomy, […]
What’s black and white and red all over? All the images from last week at the Pole. First of all, it’s winter, it’s dark, and the ground is covered in snow—there’s your black and white. The red? Well, the Dark Sector at the South Pole is home to many light-sensitive experiments, so in the dark […]
At the South Pole, there exists the IceCube Neutrino Observatory, a gigaton-scale detector that detects tiny, nearly massless particles called neutrinos. Neutrinos can travel unhindered through space and, thus, can help uncover otherwise obscured parts of the universe. Many IceCube analyses study a diffuse neutrino flux—coming from all directions across the entire sky—that originate mostly […]
Blazars are active galactic nuclei (AGN)—supermassive black holes at the centers of galaxies—that shoot out powerful jets of particles and light directed at Earth, making them some of the brightest objects in the universe. Because blazars can accelerate particles to extremely high energies, they are an attractive candidate as sources for high-energy neutrinos, the subject […]
Last week was mostly quiet again at the South Pole. The snow drifts continue to grow, as clearly seen in front of the IceCube Lab, above. From farther away, we see the snowed-in IceCube Upgrade hose reel and storage containers, under a bright moon (not sun!) through overcast skies. The activity for last week came […]
IceCube collaborator Ali Kheirandish received a 2025 International Union of Pure and Applied Physics (IUPAP) Early Career Scientist Prize. Kheirandish accepted the award on July 15 during the opening ceremony of the 39th International Cosmic Ray Conference (ICRC) held in Geneva, Switzerland. He was recognized for “his theoretical insights in associating X-ray emitting active galaxies […]
There’s a lot of snow around at the South Pole for a place that’s classified as a desert. That’s because it is carried in from strong winds that blow across the continent. And the blowing snow accumulates around the station and all the structures located at the Pole, including the IceCube Upgrade storage containers as […]
The origins of cosmic rays—and the astrophysical sources responsible for producing and accelerating them—remain an open question in science. However, high-energy neutrinos, nearly massless subatomic particles, may hold the key to resolving this long-standing mystery. At the South Pole, the IceCube Neutrino Observatory occupies a cubic kilometer of ice in search of high-energy neutrinos from […]
Cosmic rays are charged particles that rain down on Earth from space, with energies that can reach as high as a fast-thrown baseball packed into a single subatomic particle. Although a lot is known about cosmic rays, their origin still remains a century-old mystery. The highest energy particles, called ultra-high-energy cosmic rays (UHECRs), are closely […]