Researchers want the lead ingots because over the centuries the material has almost lost its natural radioactivity. It’s an important feature of the substance, as it will be used for shielding the sensitive equipment inside the CUORE from radiation. Previously, particle scientists around the world used lead from old churches or keels of wrecked ships for the same reason, but the Italian experiment will use the record four tons of the metal out of the total 33 tons recovered, and the great age of the lead is significant too.

For the National Archaeological Museum in Cagliari, where the Roman lead is stored, parting with the precious artifacts is somewhat painful, says archaeologist Donatella Salvi. They selected the most damaged ingots, and physicians will remove and return inscriptions – trademarks of the mining firms – before melding the metal. However the collaboration was also fruitful one, since the INFN performed several important analysis and helped historians clarify several things about the cargo and the ship’s route.

What the physicians hope to get from the CUORE experiment is an insight into the nature of neutrinos. The particle has no electrical charge and has long being thought to have no mass. The detector will look for a rare radioactive event, a neutrino-less double beta-decay, which unlike the standard version of the event is not accompanied by a release of two neutrinos. By observing this predicted but as of unseen event, the physicists hope to estimate neutrino mass and to establish whether or not the neutrino and its antimatter counterpart are two different particles or not.