Neutrino Telescope in Lake Baikal: Present and Nearest Future

The Baikal Gigaton Volume Detector (Baikal-GVD), the largest neutrino telescope in the Northern Hemisphere, is making significant strides in the search for high-energy neutrinos—elusive particles whose cosmic sources remain unidentified. Currently operational with 2000 optical modules arranged on 64 strings, covering an effective volume of 0.4 km³, Baikal-GVD detects cascades with energies above 100 TeV. This summary reviews the scientific rationale behind the detector, its construction progress, and preliminary findings from the partially built experiment. As the telescope continues to expand, it promises to deepen our understanding of neutrino astrophysics and potentially uncover the origins of these high-energy particles.

Belolaptikov, I., Allakhverdyan, V. A., Avrorin, А. D., Avrorin, A. V., Aynutdinov, V. M., Bannasch, R., Bardаčová, Z., Belolaptikov, I. A., Borina, I. V., Brudanin, V., Budnev, N. M., Dik, V. Y., Domogatsky, G. V., Doroshenko, A. A., Dvornicky, R., Dyachok, A. N., Dzhilkibaev, Zh.-A. M., Eckerová, E., Elzhov, T. V., et al. (2021). Neutrino Telescope in Lake Baikal: Present and Nearest Future. Proceedings of 37th International Cosmic Ray Conference — PoS(ICRC2021), 2. https://doi.org/10.22323/1.395.0002