SNOLab's underground laboratory $50 million expansion nearing completion.

A $50 million project currently under construction deep beneath Sudbury may have implications in the fundamental understanding of science as it investigates the building blocks of the universe. Located two kilometres underground, on the 6,800ft Level of the CVRD Inco Creighton Mine, the future site of a major research facility known as SNOLAB is being excavated to create nearly 51,000 square feet of space.

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Performed by J.S. Redpath Limited, the work is expanding the existing Sudbury Neutrino Observatory (SNO). Its completion is weeks away, meaning the laboratories may be in use by spring 2008.

Following the recent completion of SNO's seven-year research into the properties of elementary particles known as neutrinos, scientists were left with a series of additional questions related to the nature of low-energy neutrinos, dark matter, and the role of neutrinos in supernovas.

As the depth of the facility filters out many of the interfering particles hitting the Earth's surface, its role is being expanded to look at a greater number of experiments. When complete, the facility will be the deepest of its kind in the world, though similar facilities exist in Japan and Italy. As a result, the SNOLAB has already received research proposals from scientists in 11 different countries.

"The first experiment was a huge success, with all sorts of international recognition, so the whole world has been taking note of this," says David Sinclair, director of SNOLAB and physics professor at Ottawa's Carleton University.

"We're looking at the physics questions that these discoveries have led to."

This project will seek to leverage the engineering and mining strengths earned through the development of the SNO project, which created the largest safe underground cavern of its depth. What's more, the cavern was built to house the largest acrylic structure ever made, a tank which can contain up to 7,000 tons of the cleanest water in the world.

This knowledge has contributed to the current stages of the project, which has allowed for the creation of new personnel facilities, a service facilities area, a network of drifts for small and medium-sized experiments known as the "Ladder Labs", and a large experimental space known as the "Rectangular Hall."

These components represent the first phase of the project. If financial support can be obtained for a second phase, another large hall called the Cryopit will be excavated to host various large-scale cryogenic experiments.

While SNO took nearly 17 years to conceptualize and build, work on SNOLAB began a few short years ago in anticipation of the completion of the SNO project.

"We don't want to wait for another seven or eight years doing work off in the labs before we're ready to come here and mount an experiment," says Sinclair. "What we'd like is the ability to do three or four experiments at once with some in the early prototype stage, some in the construction stage, while some others are being dismantled."

Shotcreting the walls has already begun, and is nearly 75 per cent complete. Internal systems including electricity and ventilation are due to be installed over the summer, alongside concrete floors, steel work, interior walls and painting.

Due to the sensitive nature of the research, individuals passing through the facility will have to be as contaminant-free as possible. Even a small amount of dirt could contain enough radioactivity to throw off certain experiments; as a result, a "clean room" is being established for workers and visitors alike. Devices will clean the very air surrounding the individual before they're allowed to move on, while specialized shower and laundry facilities will clean the rest.

"You can't get much dirtier than a mine, so we have to accept that and make the transition from the mine-type conditions to what is as clean as a hospital operating theatre. It really is quite critical to the process."

While the SNO experiment made use of nearly 200 researchers, most of which worked remotely from their home universities, Sinclair says up to three times that number could eventually be involved in SNOLAB. Dozens of visitors traveled to the Sudbury facility every week to tend to the initial SNO experiment, he says, and that number will scale much higher following the completion of SNOLAB. He adds that up to 30 people are permanently employed on-site.

This work will be complemented by the 33,000-square-foot facility built on surface in 2005, which helped somewhat with the SNO experiment, but is largely designed to handle the needs for SNOLAB.

"It's nice, because we lived in the last 10 years or so in small construction trailers, and we now have a nice building with very unique, clean labs that we can do preparation for underground studies in. So that's another aspect of the work, and that's been provided entirely by Northern Ontario people."

By NICK STEWART

Northern Ontario Business