Elementary particle physics studies the fundamental building blocks of nature in order to anwer deep questions about the world around us: how did the universe evolve to its current form? what is dark matter? why do we live in a universe dominated by matter instead of anti-matter? Neutrinos, elusive fundamental particles, are shrouded in mystery and may hold the key to uncovering the answer to some of these questions.

Neutrino Physics and Astrophysics

Neutrinos are elementary particles and one of the building blocks of nature. Abundant yet elusive, they play a key role in the evolution of the universe. Understanding their many quirks can help shed light on unanswered questions about how the universe evolved the way it did. Electrically neutral, neutrinos interact only rarely: one hundred billion neutrinos travel through each one of us every second, yet they pass right through us as if unobstructed. What makes neutrinos special are both the wide range of sources that produce them (natural and artificial) as well as the many open questions regarding their fundamental properties. In recent decades, we dicovered that neutrinos have non-zero mass, something that the ``standard model'' (the theory that describes particles and their interactions) does not predict. And while they are not massless, their mass is extremely small: one millon times ligher than an electron. Why neutrinos have mass at all, and why their mass is so small, are questions that test our fundamental understanding of nature. The study of neutrinos and their properties can also help us measure fundamental physics quantities that may help address why we live in a matter, rather than anti-matter dominated universe. Furthermore, by leveraging the sensitive experiments we set up to study neutrinos, we can search for rare particle signatures that may help shed light on questions such as the nature of Dark Matter, which makes up 85% of the mass of the universe but which we currently know little about.

Neutrinos are produced in nuclear interactions that occur via the Weak force. This makes them ubiquitus in astrophysical processes that range from the nuclear fusion that powers stars such as our Sun, to violent explosions including the death of massive stars. The variety of physical processes, and corresponding neutrino signatures from astrophysical sources is very broad, leading to a wide range of experiments that aim to detect astrophysical neutrinos with different setups all across the world. A particularly interesting source of astrophysical neutrinos is the death of massive stars, which, under the right conditions, can go ``Supernova''. In this process, much of the star's internal energy is released in just a few seconds as a burst of neutrinos. Even from across the galaxy, this huge rate of neutrinos is large enough to reach the Earth and be observed by our detectors. The DUNE experiment will be able to observe this signature if a star were to go supernova in our galaxy. This dataset, collected in just a few seconds, would allow us to learn about the violent mechanisms that drive the explosion in these massive stars.

Neutrino Oscillations and Searches for New Physics The 2015 Nobel prize in physics was awarded for the discovery of neutrino oscillations and the implication this carries: neutrinos have non-zero mass. This observation puts neutrinos at odds with the Standard Model of particle physics and has prompted a broad effort to understand how neutrinos acquire their mass. In essence, the fact that neutrinos ``oscillate'' refers to their ability to ``change'' properties as they travel: what started out as an electron neutrino (a neutrino that shares certain quantum numbers with electrons and interacts with them) can suddenly transorm into a muon-type neutrino (i.e. one that interacts with muons, not electrons). Neutrino oscillations are one of our best pieces of evidence for limitations in our understanding of fundamental physics, and their study can help fill this gap in our theories. My research focuses both on performing measurements of neutrino oscillation parameters with ever increasing precision, as well as addressing past anomalies in the study of neutrino oscillations that could hint at new physics. In December 2025 with the MicroBooNE experiment we published on Nature a result which rules out one of the leading hypotheses that could explain these anomalies, a major breakthrough in a puzzle that has lingered for three decades. The Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE) is the a next-generation neutrino oscillation experiment. DUNE will focus on measuring differences between neutrino and anti-neutrino (their corresponding anti-particle) oscillations in order to help understand what is the origin of the matter-antimatter asymmetry in the universe (i.e. why we live in a world with matter and not anti-matter).

Neutrino Experiments

In my research, I leverage the powerful accelerator complex at Fermilab combined with massive and sophisticated particle detectors to study the properties of this fundamental particle with unprecedented resolution. This work takes many forms which include building particle detectors and performing R&D to further improve their performance, performing data analysis with large-scale datasets, and training young scientists from institutions across the globe. As an experimental particle physicist I collaborate with scientists from around the world. Currently I am a member of the MicroBooNE collaboration (a part of Fermilab's Short Baseline Neutrino program - SBN) and the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE).

MicroBooNE

MicroBooNE is the first large-scale LArTPC detector to operate in the US. The experiment collected data between 2015 and 2021, has released over 80 physics papers, and continues to deliver exciting physics results. The experiment has layed the foundation for the broader LArTPC physics program now being carried out with the Short Baseline Neutrino (SBN) program and DUNE experiment, demonstrating the ability to stabily operate and then effectively analyze data from a large LArTPC detector in a reliable way. MicroBooNE's key physics goal is to address a previous anomaly in neutrino physics observed by its predecessor, the MiniBooNE experiment. With results in 2021 and 2025, MicroBooNE has ruled out an electron-neutrino origin of this anomaly, a hypothesis that had been associated with a potential ``sterile'' neutrino. The experiment also has an active program measuring neutrino-argon scattering cross sections and searching for exotic signatures of new physics.

Short Baseline Near Detector (SBND)

The Short Baseline Near Detector (SBND) is a second-generation LArTPC detector that started taking data in 2024. It is only 100 meters away from the neutrino production point along the beam, which means it is exposed to a huge flux of neutrinos. Because of this, SBND can collect a huge dataset of neutrino interactions making it particularly powerful in measurements of neutrino-argon cross sections as well as searches for rare signatures of possible new particles. My group is using data from SBND to make precise measurements of rare neutrino interactions that can help better understand the complex nuclear physics that occurs when a neutrino strikes an argon atom. These studies will help improve the modeling of important backgrounds to new physics searches, and reduce systematic uncertainties in precision measurements of neutrino oscillation parameters performed by DUNE.

Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE)

The Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE) is a massive project in experimental particle physics. Aiming to make precise measurements of neutrino oscillations, this experiment relies on huge kilo-ton LArTPC detectors (think a cryogenic swimming pool the size of a football stadium) located one mile underground in the Homestake gold mine in South Dakota. Neutrinos will travel from Fermilab, 800 miles away, and the few that will interact in the DUNE experiment will be measured to study differences in neutrino vs. anti-neutrino oscillation with the hope of helping understand the origin of the matter-antimatter asymmetry in our universe. DUNE will start operating in a few years, and currently the UCSB neutrino group is focused on building and testing electronics that are employed to measure scintillation light and ionization charge produced in neutrino interactions.

Detector R&D

Progress in particle physics goes hand in hand with advances in detector technology. My interest in detector R&D is focused on developing solutions that can allow noble element detectors to expand their physics reach at low energy. Large-scale LArTPC detectors are currently used to image MeV and above particles produced in GeV neutrino interactions. The R&D efforts I am pursuing hope to expand the physics potential to keV signatures from nuclear recoils, which are the primary manifestation of coherent elastic neutrino nucleus scattering (CEvNS) and Dark Matter weakly interacting particles alike. Detecting the feeble signatures from such processes can open new avenues in searches for new physics at facilites with intense neutrino sources such as Fermilab. The LArCADe program aims to study the feasibility of obtaining stable electron amplification in liquid argon, thus lowering detector thresholds.

My email address is dcaratelli with domain name ucsb.edu.

My office is located in 5119 Broida Hall. My office phone number is (805) 893-7567.

My full publication list is available on inspire-hep.

Coding projects I collaborate on are available on github.