PhysOrg is reporting about an ambitious new neutrino detector experiment near the South Pole.  By positioning sensors along a 1 cubic kilometer patch of ice buried below the Antarctic ice flows, NSF researchers anticipate detecting high energy neutrinos as they collide with atoms in the ice flow. 

High energy neutrinos are sub atomic particles.  Scientists are interested in cosmic neutrinos -- remnants of galactic explosions and other phenomena.  Typically, high energy neutrinos pass through the Earth without colliding with a single particle.  IceCube and other various neutrino detectors attempt to spot a neutrino as it collides with water molecules in the ice.  Only a few high energy neutrinos have been spotted in all detectors to date, but scientists find these collisions extremely useful because particle accelerators cannot propel neutrinos to speeds found naturally with these high energy neutrinos. 

The collisions of particles found in IceCube will be studied to see if they support or disprove string theory.  String theory is a proposed Theory of Everything -- a way to describe all physical phenomena in one concise set of laws.  In a nutshell, string theory claims that the universe is not made up of small particles, but rather small strings that vibrate.  The vibrations of these strings compose all physical matter and forces of the universe.