Status of Neutrion Factory Design and R&D

Neutrino physics has become increasingly interesting to the high-energy physics community, as it may provide clues to new physics beyond the standard model. The physics potential of a Neutrino Factory— a facility to produce high-energy, high-intensity, high-brightness neutrino beams from decays of muons stored in a muon storage ring— is thus very high. There has been a global R&D effort aimed at a Neutrino Factory design that meets the physics requirements and addresses the key technologies, such as targetry, muon ionization cooling and acceleration. Tremendous progress has been made in the past few years in many aspects of accelerator technology. In this paper, we will review recent worldwide progress toward a cost-effective Neutrino Factory design, with emphasis on the associated R&D programs under the auspices of the U.S. Neutrino Factory and Muon Collider Collaboration [1].