Speaker
Description
The question of whether the neutrino is identical to its anti-particle, i.e., a Majorana particle, is one of the most fundamental challenges in particle physics. This basic property is connected to the origin of the neutrino mass and could help explain the predominance of matter over antimatter in our Universe. Neutrinoless double-beta ($0\nu\beta\beta$) decay - a so-far unobserved radioactive transition - is the only known, feasible method to probe the Majorana nature of the neutrino in the laboratory. A discovery of $0\nu\beta\beta$ decay would unambiguously demonstrate that new lepton-number-violating physics exists and connect it to the origin of the neutrino mass.
The Large Enriched Germanium Experiment for Neutrinoless $\beta\beta$ Decay (LEGEND) is an ton-scale, $^{76}$Ge based, experimental program with discovery potential at half-lives beyond $10^{28}$ years.
In this contribution I will discuss the discrete, low-mass & low-background, germanium detector front-end (FE) electronics for the first 200-kg phase of the experiment (LEGEND-200), which is currently under construction at the Gran Sasso underground laboratory (Laboratori Nazionale del Gran Sasso, LNGS, Italy). In addition, I will present the R&D efforts on ASIC-based readout electronics for the ton-scale phase of the experiment (LEGEND-1000).
This work is supported by the U.S. DOE, and the NSF, the LANL, ORNL and LBNL LDRD programs; the European ERC and Horizon programs; the German DFG, BMBF, and MPG; the Italian INFN; the Polish NCN and MNiSW; the Czech MEYS; the Slovak SRDA; the Swiss SNF; the UK STFC; the Russian RFBR; the Canadian NSERC and CFI; the LNGS and SURF facilities.
