From Fermilab Today: “Proton beam upgrade team springs into action this week”
Fermilab continues to be a great source of strength in the U.S. Basic Research Community.
“Technicians and engineers have a lot of work ahead as the beam line and accelerator complex is revamped to sustain a faster-pulsed, more intense proton beam. The 11-month long shutdown of the beam line for upgrades begins today.
‘This is going to be the most work done on the beam line and its supporting infrastructure since the main injector was constructed in the mid-1990s,’ said Cons Gattuso, who is responsible for coordinating the upgrades during the shutdown. ‘We have a lot of work to do, and we’re eager to get started.’
The upgrades will prepare the beam line for the NOvA experiment, as well as experiments like Mu2e and g-2, which require more protons than the accelerator complex and beam line were originally configured to create and sustain.
This Fermilab Accelerator Complex Illustration shows the upgrade plan. Photo: Reidar Hahn
‘In the current set up, the main injector accumulates the protons, bunches them and ramps up their energy, Gattuso said. ‘In the new set up, all the accumulating, batching and processing will occur in the recycler, which will then deliver the ready-to-go protons packets to the main injector. Metaphorically speaking, it’s like switching from retail to whole sale—we’re outsourcing the boxing and packaging work to the recycler so that we can more-efficiently disseminate the pre-packed protons from the main injector to the rest of the accelerator complex.’”
See the full and exciting article here.
