"To the Borexino collaboration for being the first to detect neutrinos from the main nuclear reaction that powers the Sun", this id the motivation with which Physics World has included the experiment in his top ten 2014 of the main scientific results.
The Borexino's study was published last August in the prestigious international journal Nature. The neutrino experiment in the INFN Gran Sasso Laboratories has managed to measure the energy of our star in real time: the energy released today at the centre of the Sun is exactly the same as that produced 100,000 years ago. For the first time in the history of scientific investigation of our star, solar energy has been measured at the very moment of its generation. This has been announced by the Borexino experiment at the Gran Sasso National Laboratories (LNGS) of the Italian National Institute for Nuclear Physics (INFN).
"This recognition - says Gianpaolo Bellini, scientist among the fathers of Borexino - rewards excellence of the Borexino experiment, to which INFN research groups have given a fundamental contribution. But it rewards the excellance also of the INFN Gran Sasso National Laboratories, that is a large infrastructure with unique features in the world and a research center of prestige on the international scene. "