Ocean Networks Canada joins the world in congratulating SNOLAB’s Arthur McDonald on winning the Nobel Prize in Physics for 2015. He shares the world’s most prestigious award in science with Japan’s Takaaki Kajita for their discovery that neutrinos, labeled nature’s most elusive tiny particles, actually have mass.

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An expansion of the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory (SNO), SNOLAB is an underground science laboratory located two kilometres below the surface, 400 km northwest of Toronto, Ontario. The original SNO detector designed to detect solar neutrinos was turned on in May 1999, while SNOLAB had its official Grand Opening in May 2012.

“Thanks to the dedication and leading edge research from Arthur McDonald and SNOLAB, Canadians can be very proud of their scientists, and their accomplishments on the world stage,” says ONC President Kate Moran. “SNOLAB’s history-changing work, begun over  twenty years ago, proves that long-term support for Canadian science is worth preserving.”

SNOLAB, like ONC, is one of Canada’s four major science initiatives. The Canada Foundation for Innovation has supported a number of key national research facilities through the MSI program. These world-class facilities serve communities of researchers from across the country and internationally, ultimately contributing to the Canadian economy and global society.

“The discovery has changed our understanding of the innermost workings of matter and can prove crucial to our view of the universe,” the Nobel committee said in announcing the eight million Swedish kronor award. (That’s almost $1.3 million Cdn!)

Listen and learn more:

 ”It’s ironic, in order to observe the sun you have to go kilometers under ground.”  An interview with Arthur B. McDonald on being awarded the Nobel Prize.