neutrino oscillation


neutrino oscillation

[nü¦trē·nō ‚äs·ə′lā·shən] (particle physics) A phenomenon in which a neutrino in one of the three known flavor states (electron neutrino, mu neutrino, or tau neutrino) becomes a mixture of flavor states that changes back and forth periodically as the neutrino travels through space; it will occur if neutrinos have mass and if each flavor state is a mixture of different mass states.