The ANTARES underwater neutrino telescope

The ANTARES collaboration has built an underwater neutrino telescope at 2500 m depth in the Mediterranean Sea, 40 km off the shore of Toulon. The experiment aims to detect high-energy cosmic neutrinos using a 3D array of 900 photomultipliers distributed along 12 lines. PMTs collect the Cherenkov light induced by charged particles in the water. Upward going muons and showers produced in neutrino interactions with the surrounding matter will allow the search and study of possible sources of extra-terrestrial neutrinos. The experiment delivers data since March 2006, when the first line was connected. Since January 2007 the ANTARES telescope consists of 5 lines. The completion of the detector has been made by the time of the Conference, on May 30, 2008.