Page "Sudbury Neutrino Observatory" Paragraph 3

In 1984, Herb Chen of the University of California at Irvine first pointed out the advantages of using heavy water as a detector for solar neutrinos.

Unlike previous detectors, using heavy water would make the detector sensitive to two reactions, one sensitive to all neutrino flavours, which would allow a detector to measure neutrino oscillations directly.

The Creighton Mine in Sudbury, among the deepest in the world and accordingly low background radiation, was quickly identified as an ideal place for Chen's proposed experiment to be built.