Covered with a budget of 3 million euros, Holmes, the italian research  project coordinated by the National Institute of Nuclear Physics (INFN ) and University of Milano - Bicocca, wins one of the 19 Advanced Grants awarded by the European Research Council (ERC).

The ERC Advanced Grant funded in 18 European countries are 284 in total, aimed at cutting-edge projects with a strong component of innovation and experimentation, in fields ranging from medicine to physics, humanities astronomy. The project Holmes , in particular, will study place in the hearth of the neutrino mass at the Gran Sasso Laboratory of the National Institute of Nuclear Physics for the next five years .
Led by a team of researchers from INFN and University of Milano- Bicocca and Genoa , the project will be coordinated by Stefano Ragazzi , Professor of Experimental Physics at the University of Milano- Bicocca and director of the National Laboratories of Gran Sasso. " This funding - said Ragazzi - is an important recognition for the activities of neutrino research conducted by INFN and cutting-edge developments Infn carried out in collaboration with the University of Milan Bicocca and Genoa. The success of Holmes open a new road to the measures kinematics of the neutrino mass, in a time in which the most commonly used technique is reaching its limit of applicability .

" The primary objective of Holmes is the development of a new technique for the indirect measurement of very precise mass of neutrinos , thanks to the measurement of the energy that they release during the decay of a particular artificial radioactive isotope, holmium -163. For the pourpose highly sensitive micro- calorimeters cooled to a temperature close to absolute zero ( -273.15 ° C) will be used. The very low temperature, and the cosmic silence that characterizes the National Laboratories of Gran Sasso, which is the almost total absence of background nois, ensuring optimum environmental conditions for the delicate measure.
" We are surrounded by neutrinos - explains Angelo Nucciotti professor of nuclear physics and scientific director of the project for the University of Milano-Bicocca - There are a hundred per cubic centimeter. Measure the mass of the neutrino , it also means understanding how the universe is evolving and therefore understand everything that surrounds us - continues Nucciotti - We will give a fundamental contribution to the research, introducing a new approach and demonstrating , if possible , that the mass of the neutrino is identified ".