We have been asked to organize an NSF “Project Scoping Workshop” on the calculation of the matrix elements governing neutrinoless double-beta decay. The first stage in the Project Scoping process is an online meeting to elucidate the challenges to the theory community, discuss the opportunities to address those challenges, and map out a path forward for near-term progress. The workshop will lead to a white paper that we all will co-author and post on the arXiv. We could then, if we wished, follow up in the summer of 2022 with an in-person workshop near NSF headquarters, allowing us to explore the details of the path(s) identified in the white paper. The recent effort to define the US’s role in ton-scale experiments, together with the recent conclusion of the DOE Topical Collaboration on neutrinoless double beta decay, make such an exercise extremely timely.
The beginning of the workshop will consist of a few overview talks on physics and uncertainty quantification. The rest of the 1.5-day meeting will be devoted to a discussion of the charge from NSF, breakout sessions to discuss the several kinds of physics that affect neutrinoless double-beta matrix elements and the uncertainty quantification thereof, sessions to plan the white paper, and the assignment of tasks for completing the paper. Our goal is to complete and post the white paper by the end of February, 2022.
Workshop Organizers: Jon Engel, Daniel Phillips, Witek Nazarewicz (Chair)