A humorous comparison depicts the Sesame Street characters Ernie and Bert as neutrinos that travel to Earth at high speed and are detected at the South Pole by the IceCube Observatory in August 2011 and January 2012 respectively, while fans of the series do not notice the analogy, but astrophysicists notice it.
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The IceCube Observatory at the South Pole was commissioned between August 2011 and January 2012 to detect neutrinos from space.
First up were Ernie and Bert. They came from far away, probably from another galaxy. Something had given them a huge push there. So big that the two of them raced through space towards Earth at almost the speed of light. Until they reached the South Pole sometime in August 2011 and January 2012, where their journey ended abruptly.
Sesame Street fans took no notice. But there were a few hundred astrophysicists who had just put a new type of observatory called IceCube into operation in the eternal ice. Its purpose: to detect ghostly elementary particles from space, so-called neutrinos.

Physicist Francis Halzen receives the Nobel Prize in Physics for his key role in the development of the IceCube Neutrino Observatory in Antarctica, which enabled the detection of high-energy cosmic neutrinos.

The Nobel Prize in Physics goes to particle researcher Francis Halzen for his contributions to the “IceCube” neutrino observatory at the South Pole.
Belgian-American astrophysicist Francis Halzen will receive the Nobel Prize in Physics for his vision and leadership of the IceCube neutrino observatory at the South Pole, which enabled the discovery of high-energy neutrinos from space.

Halzen realized that Antarctic ice is used for neutrino tracking. The reporting also sheds light on the history of the Nobel Prizes, their endowment and the upcoming announcements of the categories.
The 2026 Nobel Prize in Physics goes to Francis Halzen for his work on the “IceCube” neutrino observatory in the Antarctic ice. The award is worth the equivalent of around one million euros.
Belgian-American scientist Francis Halzen will receive the 2024 Nobel Prize in Physics for using the South Pole ice to track neutrinos and enabling the IceCube Observatory.