The Baikal Neutrino Telescope has been operating in its NT200 configuration since April, 1998. The telescope has been upgraded in April, 2005, to the 10 Mton scale detector NT200+. It's main physics goal is the detection of signals from high energy neutrino cascades. NT200+ reaches a 3-year sensitivity of 2 \times 10^{ -7}cm^{ -2}s^{ -1}sr^{ -1}GeV for an all-flavor diffuse cosmic E^{ -2} neutrino flux for energies 10^2 TeV \div 10^5 TeV. Desgin and sensitivity of NT200+ are described. NT200+ is forming the basic building block of a future km3-scale (Gigaton-Volume) Baikal Telescope. Research and development work on that next stage detector has started.
Categories: astro-ph