High Energy Physics Seminars

NOνA is a long-baseline neutrino oscillation experiment with two highly segmented liquid-scintillator detectors: a near detector at Fermilab and a much larger far detector in Ash River, Minnesota. The far detector is at the surface with little overburden.  It has been running with nearly continuous livetime since 2014.  The enormous surface area of 4200 m² of the far detector and its surface location make it ideal for sensitive searches for intermediate- to high-mass magnetic monopoles 10⁶-10¹⁸ GeV, as well as other exotic highly ionizing, subliminal particles. This search implements a unique data-driven trigger.  We describe how the enormous cosmic-ray muon rate is defeated to allow a background-free search to be obtained and compare our sensitivity to previous results.