Dr. Raimund Strauß

ERC Starting Grant

Exploring coherent neutrino-nucleus scattering with gram-scale cryogenic calorimeters (NU-CLEUS)

Chair of Experimental Astro­particle Physics

Academic Career and Research Areas

Dr. Raimund Strauss studied physics at the Technical University of Munich and the Università degli Studi di Cagliari (Italy). He pursued his graduate work in the framework of Dark Matter Search with the CRESST experiment under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Franz v. Feilitzsch at TUM. He spent 5 years as post-doc at the Max-Planck-Institut für Physik in Munich working on highly-sensitive low-temperature detectors for astroparticle physics, with numerous research stays at the Gran Sasso underground laboratory in Italy. Since 2018, Dr. Raimund Strauss is leading the research group “Cryogenic Detectors” at the chair for experimental astroparticle physics of Prof. Dr. Stefan Schönert, is PI in the collaborative research center SFB1258 and leading the international NUCLEUS collaboration.

Unravelling the nature of Dark Matter in the Universe and understanding the fundamental properties and interaction of neutrinos are among the most challenging tasks of astroparticle physics. Since his early career, Dr. Raimund Strauss (b. 1984) conducts research in the field of direct Dark Matter search with the CRESST experiment that is based on single crystals operated as cryogenic particle detectors. He has played an important role in the development of the ultra-low threshold detectors for CRESST, which currently provides the world-leading sensitivity for low-mass Dark Matter particles. Based on that experience, Dr. Raimund Strauss initiated the new neutrino experiment NUCLEUS aiming for the exploration of coherent neutrino-nucleus scattering using antineutrinos from a nuclear power reactor. Accessing this novel interaction channel allows for a miniaturization of neutrino detectors, the study of new physics beyond the Standard model of Particle Physics and yields interesting applications for the surveillance of nuclear reactors. 

    Awards

    • ERC Starting Grant “NU-CLEUS” (2018)
    • Physics of the Dark Universe Award, TeVPA Tokio (2015)

    R. Strauss et al., Phys. Rev. D 96 (2017) no.2, 022009 - Gram-scale cryogenic calorimeters for rare- event searches

    Abstract

    R. Strauss et al., Eur. Phys. J. C 77 (2017) 506 - The ν-cleus experiment: A gram-scale fiducial-volume cryogenic detector for the first detection of coherent neutrino-nucleus scattering 

    Abstract

    R. Strauss et al., Eur. Phys. J. C 75 (2015) no.8, 352 - A detector module with highly efficient surface- alpha event rejection operated in CRESST-II Phase 2 

    Abstract

    R. Strauss et al. (CRESST Collaboration), JCAP 1506 (2015) no.06, 030 - Beta/gamma and alpha backgrounds in CRESST-II Phase 2 

    Abstract

    R. Strauss et al., Eur. Phys. J. C 74 (2014) 2957 - Energy-Dependent Light Quenching in CaWO4 Crystals at mK Temperatures 

    Abstract