The Cryogenic Underground Observatory for Rare Events (CUORE, pronounced ) is a particle physics facility located underground at the Laboratori Nazionali del Gran Sasso in Assergi, Italy. CUORE was designed primarily as a search for neutrinoless double beta decay in Te, a process that has never been observed. It uses tellurium dioxide (TeO2) crystals as both the source of the decay and as bolometers to detect the resulting electrons. CUORE searches for the characteristic signal of neutrinoless double beta decay, a small peak in the observed energy spectrum around the known decay energy; for Te, this is Q = 2527.518 ± 0.013 keV. CUORE can also search for signals from dark matter candidates, such as axions and WIMPs.
