SHEFFIELD, England (Reuters) - Scientists Tuesday came up with a novel way of star-gazing -- by studying the depths of the sea.

A special telescope to be installed at the bottom of the Mediterranean could help explain the origin of cosmic rays, a member of the international team of scientists conducting the project said.

Their Antares telescope, which they will this week begin installing 2.4 kilometers under the sea some 40 kilometers off the coast of Marseille in southern France, would focus on the seabed, searching for subatomic particles called neutrinos.

``Neutrinos rattle through the Earth without being detected most of the time,'' Professor Lee Thompson, of the University of Sheffield, told a press conference at a British science conference.

``When neutrinos undergo collisions with matter they liberate something called a muon. What Antares is setting out to do is to detect the light given off by the muons that are liberated when the neutrino interacts with matter.''

The telescope looks down, not up, because it uses the mass of the Earth as a shield from cosmic rays so scientists know that the only thing coming through are neutrinos. Scientists hope the Antares will detect high-energy muons which radiate light as they travel in the sea.

``Antares is unique in bringing big science to the deep sea,'' Thompson added.

He explained that neutrinos, which pass through vast amounts of matter and can escape from dense regions of the cosmos where light cannot penetrate, could help scientists map the heaven in a new way. Because they are undeflected by magnetic fields they can point straight back to their origins.

``The Earth is constantly bombarded by cosmic rays and we don't know where they are coming from,'' said Professor Susan Cooper from the University of Oxford said in a statement.

``I hope Antares will finally solve this mystery.''