When the Homestake mine closed in 2003 after producing 42 million ounces of gold, it left a colorful gold rush history, tall steel headframes looming over a town of 3000 people, and an enormous hole in the ground: North America's largest and deepest underground mine.
In September 2009, I began my new assignment as director of the Gran Sasso National Laboratory, the biggest underground laboratory in the world devoted to neutrino and astroparticle physics.
