This is the Miniball germanium array, which is using the first HIE-ISOLDE beams for the experiments described below (Image: Julien Ordan /CERN)
For the first time in 2017, the HIE- ISOLDE linear accelerator began sending beams to an experiment, marking the start of ISOLDE’s high-energy physics programme for this year.
The HIE-ISOLDE (High-Intensity and Energy upgrade of ISOLDE) project incorporates a new linear accelerator (Linac) into CERN’s ISOLDE facility (which stands for the Isotope mass Separator On-Line). ISOLDE is a unique nuclear research facility, which produces radioactive nuclei (ones with too many, or too few, neutrons) that physicists use to research a range of topics, from studying the properties of atomic nuclei to biomedical research and to astrophysics.
Although ISOLDE has been running since April, when the accelerator chain at CERN woke up from its technical stop over winter, HIE-ISOLDE had to wait until now as new components, specifically a new cryomodule, needed to be installed, calibrated, aligned and tested.
Each cryomodule contains five superconducting cavities used to accelerate the beam to higher energies. With a third module installed, HIE-ISOLDE is able to accelerate the nuclei up to an average energy of 7.5 MeV per nucleon, compared with the 5.5 MeV per nucleon reached in 2016.
This higher energy also allows physicists to study the properties of heavier isotopes – ones with a mass up to 200, with a study of 206 planned later this year, compared to last year when the heaviest beam was 142. From 2018, the HIE-ISOLDE Linac will contain four of these cryomodules and be able to reach up to 10 MeV per nucleon.
“Each isotope we study is unique, so each experiment either studies a different isotope or a different property of that isotope. The HIE-ISOLDE linac gives us the ability to tailor make a beam for each experiment’s energy and mass needs,” explains Liam Gaffney, who runs the Miniball station where many of HIE-ISOLDE’s experiments are connected.
The HIE-ISOLDE beams will be available until the end of November, with thirteen experiments hoping to use the facility during that time – more than double the number that took data last year. The first experiment, which begins today, will study the electromagnetic interactions between colliding nuclei of the radioactive isotope Selenium 72 and a platinum target. With this reaction they can measure whether or not the nuclei is more like a squashed disc or stretched out, like a rugby ball; or some quantum mechanical mixture of both shapes.
CERN’s Data Centre (Image: Robert Hradil, Monika Majer/ProStudio22.ch)
On 29 June 2017, the CERN DC passed the milestone of 200 petabytes of data permanently archived in its tape libraries. Where do these data come from? Particles collide in the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) detectors approximately 1 billion times per second, generating about one petabyte of collision data per second. However, such quantities of data are impossible for current computing systems to record and they are hence filtered by the experiments, keeping only the most “interesting” ones. The filtered LHC data are then aggregated in the CERN Data Centre (DC), where initial data reconstruction is performed, and where a copy is archived to long-term tape storage. Even after the drastic data reduction performed by the experiments, the CERN DC processes on average one petabyte of data per day. This is how the the milestone of 200 petabytes of data permanently archived in its tape libraries was reached on 29 June.
This map shows the routes for the three 100 Gbit/s fibre links between CERN and the Wigner RCP. The routes have been chosen carefully to ensure we maintain connectivity in the case of any incidents. (Image: Google)
richardmitnick
2:05 pm on July 4, 2017 Permalink
| Reply Tags: CERN, Today July 4 2017 the Republic of Slovenia becomes an Associate Member in the pre-stage to Membership at CERN
Today, the Republic of Slovenia becomes an Associate Member in the pre-stage to Membership at CERN. This follows official notification to CERN that the Republic of Slovenia has completed its internal approval procedures as required for the entry into force of the Agreement, signed in December 2016, granting that status to the country.
Slovenia to enter the Associate Member State family of CERN
16 Dec 2016
Today, the Slovenian Minister of Education, Science and Sport, Dr Maja Makovec Brenčič, together with CERN Director-General Fabiola Gianotti signed the agreement at CERN.
Geneva, 16 December 2016. At its 183 session, CERN1 Council voted unanimously to admit the Republic of Slovenia to Associate Membership in the pre-stage to Membership of CERN.
Today, the Slovenian Minister of Education, Science and Sport, Dr Maja Makovec Brenčič, together with CERN Director-General Fabiola Gianotti signed the agreement at CERN.
“It is a great pleasure to welcome Slovenia into our ever-growing CERN family as an Associate Member State in the pre-stage to Membership,” said CERN Director-General Fabiola Gianotti. “This now moves CERN’s relationship with Slovenia to a higher level.”
“Slovenia’s membership in CERN will on the one hand facilitate, strengthen and broaden participation and activities of Slovenian scientists (especially in the field of experimental physics), on the other it will bring full access of Slovenian industry to CERN orders which will help to breakthroughs in demanding markets with products with a high degree of embedded knowledge,” said Dr Maja Makovec Brenčič, Slovenian Minister of Education, Science and Sport today on her visit to CERN. “Slovenia is also aware of the CERN offerings in the areas of education and public outreach, therefore it will try to put them to good use for the motivation and education of high-school students and for the training of the young generation of scientists and engineers, and we are therefore looking forward to become eligible for participation in CERN’s Fellows, Associate and Student programmes.”
Slovenian physicists contributed to the CERN programme long before Slovenia became an independent state in 1991, participating in an experiment at LEAR (the Low Energy Antiproton Ring) and on the DELPHI experiment – part of CERN’s previous large accelerator, the Large Electron Positron collider (LEP). In 1991, CERN and the Executive Council of the Assembly of the Republic of Slovenia concluded a Co-operation Agreement concerning the further development of scientific and technical co-operation in the research projects of CERN. In 2009, Slovenia applied to become a Member State of CERN.
For the past 20 years, Slovenian physicists have been participating in the ATLAS experiment at the Large Hadron Collider, from research and development, through construction and commissioning, to harvesting the physics results. Their focus has been on silicon tracking, protection devices and computing at the Slovenian TIER-2 data centre. They remain committed to the tracker upgrade, making use of the research reactor in Ljubljana for neutron irradiation studies.
Following the notification of the completion of its internal approval procedures, Slovenia will join Cyprus and Serbia as an Associate Member State in the pre-stage to Membership of CERN. After a period of five years, Council will decide on the admission of Slovenia to full Membership.
Footnote(s)
1. CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, is the world’s leading laboratory for particle physics. Its headquarters are in Geneva. Its Member States are: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Israel, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and United Kingdom. Cyprus and Serbia are Associate Member States in the pre-stage to Membership. Pakistan, Turkey and Ukraine are Associate Member States. The European Union, India, Japan, JINR, the Russian Federation, UNESCO and the United States of America currently have Observer status.
(Image: Official Office of the President of the Republic of Lithuania by Robertas Dačkus) No image credit.
Today, in Vilnius, Lithuania, CERN Director General, Fabiola Gianotti, and the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Lithuania, Linas Linkevičius, in the presence of the President of the Republic of Lithuania, Dalia Grybauskaitė, signed the Agreement admitting Lithuania as an Associate Member of CERN. The last step for the Agreement to enter into force requires final approval by the Government of Lithuania.
“Signing an agreement with CERN means recognition of Lithuanian science and talents as well as our common efforts in strengthening research, innovation and centres of excellence in the Baltic region,” said Dalia Grybauskaitė, President of the Republic of Lithuania. “We are proud of this Associate Membership – cooperation with CERN gives a new impetus for economic growth, provides an opportunity for us to take part in global research and opens a wide horizon for our youth.”
“The involvement of Lithuanian scientists at CERN has been growing steadily over the past decade, and Associate Membership can now serve as a catalyst to further strengthen particle physics and fundamental research in the country,” said Fabiola Gianotti. “We warmly welcome Lithuania into the CERN family, and look forward to enhancing our partnership in science, technology development and education and training.”
Lithuania’s relationship with CERN dates back to 2004, when an International Cooperation Agreement was signed between the Organization and the government of the Republic of Lithuania. This set priorities for the further development of scientific and technical cooperation between CERN and Lithuania in high-energy physics. One year later, in 2005, a Protocol to this Agreement was signed, paving the way for the participation of Lithuanian universities and scientific institutions in high-energy particle physics experiments at CERN.
Lithuania has contributed to the CMS experiment since 2007 when a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed marking the beginning of Lithuanian scientists’ involvement in the CMS collaboration. Lithuania has also played an important role in database development at CERN for CMS data mining and data quality analysis. Lithuania actively promoted the BalticGrid in 2005.
In addition to its involvement in the CMS experiment, Lithuania is part of two collaborations that aim to develop detector technologies to address the challenging upgrades needed for the High-Luminosity LHC.
Since 2004, CERN and Lithuania have also successfully collaborated on many educational activities aimed at strengthening the Lithuanian particle physics community. Lithuania has been participating in the CERN Summer Student programme and 53 Lithuanian teachers have taken part in CERN’s high-school teachers programme.
Associate Membership will allow Lithuania to take part in meetings of the CERN Council and its committees (Finance Committee and Scientific Policy Committee). It will also make Lithuanian nationals eligible for limited-duration staff appointments. Last but not least, Lithuanian industry will be entitled to bid for CERN contracts, opening up opportunities for industrial collaboration in areas of advanced technology.
The ” Charging Cavaliers” (on the left) and “TCO-ASA” (on the right).
Geneva, 13 June 2017. CERN today announced the winners of its 2017 Beamline for Schools competition. “Charging Cavaliers” from Canada and “TCO-ASA” from Italy were selected from a total of 180 teams from 43 countries around the world, adding up to about 1500 high-school students. The winners have been selected to come to CERN in September to carry out their own experiments using a CERN accelerator beam.
With the Beamline for Schools competition, high-school students are enabled to run an experiment on a fully-equipped CERN beamline, in the same way that researchers do at the Large Hadron Collider and other CERN facilities. Students had to submit a written proposal and video explaining why they wanted to come to CERN, what they hoped to take away from the experience and initial thoughts of how they would use the particle beam for their experiment. Taking into consideration creativity, motivation, feasibility and scientific method, CERN experts evaluated the proposals. A final selection was presented to the CERN scientific committee responsible for assigning beam time to experiments, who chose two winning teams to carry out their experiments together at CERN.
“The quality and creativity of the proposals is inspiring. It shows the remarkable talent and commitment of the new generation of potential scientists and engineers. I congratulate all who have taken part this year; they can all be proud of their achievements. We very much look forward to welcoming the two winning teams and seeing the outcome of their experiments,” said CERN Director for International Relations, Charlotte Warakaulle.
“Charging Cavaliers” are thirteen students (6 boys and 7 girls) from the “École secondaire catholique Père-René-de-Galinée” in Cambridge, Canada. Their project is the search for elementary particles with a fractional charge, by observing their light emission in the same type of liquid scintillator as that used in the SNO+ experiment at SNOLAB. With this proposal, they are questioning the Standard Model of particle physics and trying to get a glimpse at a yet unexplored territory.
“I still can’t believe what happened. I feel incredibly privileged to be given this opportunity. It’s a once a lifetime opportunity It opens so many doors to a knowledge otherwise inaccessible to me. It represents the hard work our team has done. There’s just no words to describe it. Of course, I’m looking forward to putting our theory into practice in the hope of discovering fractionally charged particles, but most of all to expanding my knowledge of physics.” said Denisa Logojan from the Charging Cavaliers.
“TCO-ASA” is a team from the “Liceo Scientifico Statale “T.C. Onesti”” in Fermo, Italy, and comprises 8 students (6 boys and 2 girls). They have taken the initiative to build a Cherenkov detector at their school. This detector has the potential of observing the effects of elementary particles moving faster than light does in the surrounding medium. Their plan is to test this detector, which is entirely made from low-cost and easily available materials, in the beam line at CERN.
“I’m really excited about our win, because I’ve never had an experience like this. Fermo is a small city and I’ve never had the opportunity to be in a physics laboratory with scientists that study every day to discover something new. I think that this experience will bring me a bit closer to my choices for my future” said Roberta Barbieri from TCO-ASA team.
The first Beamline for Schools competition was launched three years ago on the occasion of CERN’s 60th anniversary. To date, winners from the Netherlands, Greece, Italy, South Africa Poland and the United Kingdom have performed their experiments at CERN. This year, short-listed teams[1] each receive a Cosmic-Pi detector for their school that will allow them to detect cosmic-ray particles coming from outer space.
“After four editions, the Beamline for Schools competition has well established itself as an important outreach and education activity of CERN. This competition has the power to inspire thousands of young and curious minds to think about the role of science and technology in our society. Many of the proposals that we have received this year would have merited an invitation to CERN.”, said Markus Joos, Beamline for School project leader.
Beamline for Schools is an education and outreach project supported by the CERN & Society Foundation, funded by individuals, foundations and companies.
The project was funded in 2017 in part by the Arconic Foundation; additional contributions were received by the Motorola Solutions Foundation, as well as from National Instruments. CERN would like to thank all the supporters for their generous contributions that have made the 2017 competition possible.
Beamline for schools 2018 is confirmed: you can already find information here.
Further information:
Team “TCO-ASA”: Extract from their proposal “In BL4S 2016 the proposal of our school received the status of highly commended, which really intrigued us. The basic idea is to achieve an authentic detector by using some simple instruments. We wanted to study the Cherenkov’s effect that is radiation emitted when a charged particle passes through a dielectric medium at a speed greater than the phase velocity of light in that medium. […]This year we made a new box with new sensors and we started the tests on the Cherenkov’s effect from the beginning. Our research gave us satisfying results with which we hope to win the BL4S 2017 competition. […]”
Team “Charging Cavaliers”: Extract from their proposal “Generally, the idea that electric charge exists in integer multiples of electron charges is well supported by the scientific community. Be that as it may, the Standard Model, which includes three generations of quarks and leptons, does not establish charge quantization. To be able to enforce charge quantization, physics beyond the limits of the Standard Model is imperative. […] Our experiment will search for fractionally charged particles using proton interactions at the Proton Synchrotron with the goal of identifying fractionally charged particles by observing their light emission in a liquid scintillator, comparatively to a conventionally charged particle. […] It is our duty to encourage the pursuit of knowledge, and beginning with this privileged occasion would only advocate for this cause. We must think forward, and this would be our first big step toward doing so.”
1. A.O.C group from Israel Absolute Uncertainty from the United Kingdom Beamcats from the Philippines Bojos per la Física 2017 from Spain Brazinga from Brazil Cherenkov Radiation Busters from Poland Club de Física Enrico Fermi from Spain CURIEosity Team from Greece Dawson Technicolor from Canada Deep Impact from Chile DITI – Deep In The Ice from Poland G-Y-V-V Amavet 964 from Slovakia Hildebrandianer from Germany LEAM TEAM – Learning About Materials Team from Timor-Leste Newton’s apples from Spain Pigeon Detectors from the United Kingdom P.R.O.ME.THE.U.S from Italy Q=MC² from the United Kingdom Salty Brits from the United Kingdom Sparticles Particles 2.0 from the United States Surfing the Wave Function from the United States Team Hephaestus from India Team Muonicity from India Terrella from New Zealand THE BIG BANG TEAM from Italy United World Astronauts from the Netherlands Vacuum Dunes from Spain Y=GC2 from the United Kingdom
The world’s largest particle hunter of its kind will travel across the ocean from CERN to Fermilab this summer to become an integral part of neutrino research in the United States.
It’s lived in two different countries, and it’s about to make its way to a third. It’s the largest machine of its kind, designed to find extremely elusive particles and tell us more about them. Its pioneering technology is the blueprint for some of the most advanced science experiments in the world. And this summer, it will travel across the Atlantic Ocean to its new home (and its new mission) at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory.
The ICARUS detector, seen here in a cleanroom at CERN, is being prepared for its voyage to Fermilab. Photo: CERN
It’s called ICARUS, and you can follow its journey over land and sea with the help of an interactive map on Fermilab’s website.
The ICARUS detector measures 18 meters (60 feet) long and weighs 120 tons. It began its scientific life under a mountain at the Italian National Institute for Nuclear Physics’ (INFN) Gran Sasso National Laboratory in 2010, recording data from a beam of particles called neutrinos sent by CERN, Europe’s premier particle physics laboratory. The detector was shipped to CERN in 2014, where it has been upgraded and refurbished in preparation for its overseas trek.
INFN Gran Sasso ICARUS, moving to FNAL
Gran Sasso LABORATORI NAZIONALI del GRAN SASSO, located in the Abruzzo region of central Italy
When it arrives at Fermilab, the massive machine will take its place as part of a suite of three detectors dedicated to searching for a new type of neutrino beyond the three that have been found. Discovering this so-called “sterile” neutrino, should it exist, would rewrite scientists’ picture of the universe and the particles that make it up.
“Nailing down the question of whether sterile neutrinos exist or not is an important scientific goal, and ICARUS will help us achieve that,” said Fermilab Director Nigel Lockyer. “But it’s also a significant step in Fermilab’s plan to host a truly international neutrino facility, with the help of our partners around the world.”
First, however, the detector has to get there. Next week it will begin its journey from CERN in Geneva, Switzerland, to a port in Antwerp, Belgium. From there the detector, separated into two identical pieces, will travel on a ship to Burns Harbor, Indiana, in the United States, and from there will be driven by truck to Fermilab, one piece at a time. The full trip is expected to take roughly six weeks.
An interactive map on Fermilab’s website (IcarusTrip.fnal.gov) will track the voyage of the ICARUS detector, and Fermilab, CERN and INFN social media channels will document the trip using the hashtag #IcarusTrip. The detector itself will sport a distinctive banner, and members of the public are encouraged to snap photos of it and post them on social media.
The ICARUS neutrino detector prepares for its trip to Fermilab. Follow #IcarusTrip online! Photo: CERN
Once the ICARUS detector is delivered to Fermilab, it will be installed in a recently completed building and filled with 760 tons of pure liquid argon to start the search for sterile neutrinos.
The ICARUS experiment is a prime example of the international nature of particle physics and the mutually beneficial cooperation that exists between the world’s physics laboratories. The detector uses liquid-argon time projection technology – essentially a method of taking a 3-D snapshot of the particles produced when a neutrino interacts with an argon atom – which was developed by the ICARUS collaboration and now is the technology of choice for the international Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE), which will be hosted by Fermilab.
FNAL LBNF/DUNE from FNAL to SURF, Lead, South Dakota, USA
FNAL DUNE Argon tank at SURF
Surf-Dune/LBNF Caverns at Sanford
SURF building in Lead SD USA
“More than 25 years ago, Nobel Prize winner Carlo Rubbia started a visionary effort with the help and resources of INFN to make use of liquid argon as a particle detector, with the visual power of a bubble chamber but with the speed and efficiency of an electronic detector,” said Fernando Ferroni, president of INFN. “A long series of steps demonstrated the power of this technology that has been chosen for the gigantic future experiment DUNE in the U.S., scaling up the 760 tons of argon for ICARUS to 70,000 tons for DUNE. In the meantime, ICARUS will be at the core of an experiment at Fermilab looking for the possible existence of a new type of neutrino. Long life to ICARUS!”
CERN’s contribution to ICARUS, bringing the detector in line with the latest technology, expands the renowned European laboratory’s participation in Fermilab’s neutrino program.
It’s the first such program CERN has contributed to in the United States. Fermilab is the hub of U.S. participation in the CMS experiment on CERN’s Large Hadron Collider, and the partnership between the laboratories has never been stronger.
ICARUS will be the largest of three liquid-argon neutrino detectors at Fermilab seeking sterile neutrinos. The smallest, MicroBooNE, is active and has been taking data for more than a year, while the third, the Short-Baseline Neutrino Detector, is under construction.
FNAL/MicrobooNE
FNAL Short-Baseline Near Detector
The three detectors should all be operational by 2019, and the three collaborations include scientists from 45 institutions in six countries.
Knowledge gained by operating the suite of three detectors will be important in the development of the DUNE experiment, which will be the largest neutrino experiment ever constructed. The international Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility (LBNF) will deliver an intense beam of neutrinos to DUNE, sending the particles 800 miles through Earth from Fermilab to the large, mile-deep detector at the Sanford Underground Research Facility in South Dakota. DUNE will enable a new era of precision neutrino science and may revolutionize our understanding of these particles and their role in the universe.
Research and development on the experiment is under way, with prototype DUNE detectors under construction at CERN, and construction on LBNF is set to begin in South Dakota this year.
CERN Proto DUNE Maximillian Brice
A study by Anderson Economic Group, LLC, commissioned by Fermi Research Alliance LLC, which manages the laboratory on behalf of DOE, predicts significant positive impact from the project on economic output and jobs in South Dakota and elsewhere.
This research is supported by the DOE Office of Science, CERN and INFN, in partnership with institutions around the world.
Follow the overseas journey of the ICARUS detector at IcarusTrip.fnal.gov. Follow the social media campaign on Facebook and Twitter using the hashtag #IcarusTrip.
Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab), located just outside Batavia, Illinois, near Chicago, is a US Department of Energy national laboratory specializing in high-energy particle physics. Fermilab is America’s premier laboratory for particle physics and accelerator research, funded by the U.S. Department of Energy. Thousands of scientists from universities and laboratories around the world
collaborate at Fermilab on experiments at the frontiers of discovery.
The first students participating in the High-School Students Internship Programme (HSSIP) during their visit to SM18 (Image: Julien Marius Ordan/CERN)
At CERN, you can see student interns all year round, but this year you may also spot the first participants of the official High-School Students Internship Programme (HSSIP). HSSIP is a programme developed by the ECO group’s Teacher and Student Programmes section to engage students from a young age with scientific research and innovation.
The HSSIP was launched in May 2017 with the arrival of a group of 22 Hungarian students, aged between 16 and 19. They were offered an intense two-week internship at CERN, during which they took part in many diverse activities. Accompanied by mentors of the same nationality, the students got a deeper insight into particle physics by working on their own projects, through a variety of visits, and through a cloud chamber workshop at CERN’s S’Cool Lab. The students also participated as a team in the CERN Relay Race – the annual running competition held on CERN’s campus – and finished second.
The students were selected by a national committee headed by Dezsö Horváth – Professor Emeritus at Wigner Research Centre for Physics in Budapest. High-school physics teachers were asked to propose their best students to take part in the programme. “More than 50 applications were received and the selection of the final students was a challenging task. We paid special attention to diversity and finally we selected students from 21 different high schools in Hungary,” says Peter Jurcso, who is responsible for the Hungarian Programme at CERN.
“Participating in the programme had many benefits for me. I learned a little bit of programming and how to work efficiently in a team. The people here are great – I can talk to anybody and I can ask anything. I definitely want to come back here one day as engineer,” said Daniel Nagy, one of the students who took part.
“It is wonderful to get out of the classroom where everything is in theory and to see how things are happening in the real world. It is amazing for me to see how every physicist programmes, and how managing big data requires such types of knowledge as well,” commented Balazs Mehes, also part of the group.
The Hungarians had the opportunity to discover science, technology, engineering, and mathematics in the CERN context and environment, to strengthen their understanding of science and to develop their skills in a high-tech environment. “We are delighted that the HSSIP is now officially included among our various educational offerings,” commented Sascha Schmeling, head of the Teacher and Student Programmes section at CERN.
Hungary is one of the five pilot states – Bulgaria, France, Hungary, Norway and Portugal – that will participate in the programme. Over the following years, the programme will be made available to all CERN Member States. The internship is held in one of the national languages of the Member State concerned.
More information about the upcoming programmes can be found here.
The next particle accelerator will be three times larger than the LHC, with double-strength magnets enabling researchers to smash particle beams together with a power equivalent to 10 million lightning strikes. Image credit: CERN
An international league of scientists is kicking off the decades-long process of developing the successor to the Large Hadron Collider, the world’s largest and most powerful particle accelerator.
More than 500 scientists gathered in Berlin, Germany, from 29 May to 2 June to discuss the future of particle physics. The event was organised by the Future Circular Collider (FCC) Study, an international collaboration of physicists, and focused on developing the next Large Hadron Collider (LHC), which will be seven times more powerful.
Hosted by CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, the LHC is at the forefront of particle research and accelerates high-energy particle beams around a 27-kilometre looped tunnel. It collides these particles to release extreme levels of energy, and in doing so, seeks to reveal the elusive building blocks of the universe.
In 2012, the LHC confirmed the existence of the Higgs boson — the last unseen elemental particle in the Standard Model of physics, the one giving mass to all matter in our universe. But finding the Higgs boson ended up leaving physicists with more questions than answers.
EuroCirCol, a four-year European-funded study, is now investigating future experiments and the technology needed to get there. The project is laying the foundation for a particle accelerator three times larger than the LHC, with double-strength magnets enabling researchers to smash particle beams together with a power of up to 100 tera electron Volts [TeV]— an acceleration of particles roughly equivalent to 10 million lightning strikes.
“When you look into things like the movement of galaxies, we see that we can only understand and explain about 5 % of what we observe.”
Professor Michael Benedikt, CERN, Switzerland
According to Professor Michael Benedikt, leader of the FCC, this energy leap could let us spot previously unobserved particles even heavier than the Higgs boson, which would give a deeper insight into the laws that govern the universe.
‘When you look into things like the movement of galaxies, we see that we can only understand and explain about 5 % of what we observe,’ says Prof. Benedikt, who is also the project coordinator of EuroCirCol.
‘But with questions like the so-called problem of dark matter, which is linked to the fact that galaxies and stars are not moving as you would expect them to, the only explanation we have is that there must be matter we do not see which distorts the movement accordingly.’
Another question bound to be asked is why a new collider is needed when construction of the LHC, the world’s largest science facility, was only finished in 2008 and cost around EUR 4 billion.
For a start, the LHC is not sitting idle. It’s hunting for further particles and signatures of physics until the mid-2020s, after which it should be upgraded for ten years with a boosted rate of particle collisions.
And the fact that the LHC officially took almost 30 years to create, from initial planning through to flicking the switch, means researchers already have to start plotting for its successor.
Professor Carsten P. Welsch, head of physics at the University of Liverpool, says that mankind wanting to understand the underlying principles of nature is not the only driver behind such science.
“The beauty of physics is that we have these two strands,” said Prof. Welsch, who is also the communications coordinator for EuroCirCol. “On the one hand it’s asking those very fundamental questions, but on the other hand, it’s not forgetting that there is almost always a direct link to applications that benefit society immediately.”
Tim Berners-Lee, a British scientist at CERN, invented the World Wide Web in 1989, but the LHC also led to other breakthroughs like hadron therapies for treating cancer and medical imaging advances. According to Prof. Welsch, the next LHC could lead to more radiation-resistant materials that can carry greater power, which is applicable to future nuclear reactors and power networks.
‘Likewise, the high-field magnets will find direct applications in hospitals where technologies like MRI scans can improve on their resolutions with increased magnetic field strengths.’
Future physics
Prof. Benedikt is confident the accelerator design concepts ‘will lead to the performance we want and need’. A prototype of the advanced cryogenic beam vacuum system required for the FCC is already being tested in Germany, but whatever the final concept, Prof. Benedikt says 2018 will shape technical requirements and feed into the FCC study to kick off preparations.
The formidable feat of creating the next LHC would require global cooperation, heavy funding and researchers still active in 20 years, by which point Prof. Welsch reckons he’ll have retired.
Which is why he says much of the FCC event is dedicated to outreach; tempting schools and the public with proton football, an interactive LHC tunnel, and augmented reality accelerators.
The proposed site for the Future Circular Collider includes an 80-100 km long circular tunnel. Image credit: CERN
Prof. Welsch says the latter allows anyone to make their own virtual particle accelerator using a smartphone app that turns paper cubes printed with QR codes into high-tech components.
‘I put a paper box on the table, the camera and app see it as an ion particle source sitting on my office table — similar to Pokémon Go — and here I can see particles flying all over my desk. Adding a second box, I can see how a magnet bends my particles and so on.’
He says such outreach is vital for not only bringing the next generations into science but ensuring anyone can still connect to and get excited by more specialised research.
‘We’ve had seven-year-old kids, who, when asked what they’re doing, tell their mothers they are deflecting charged particles using dipole magnets.’
Fermilab is an enduring source of strength for the US contribution to scientific research world wide.
May 25, 2017
No writer credit found.
Technicians assemble for ICARUS the warm vessel steel structure that will host two detection chambers. Photo: Reidar Hahn
No fewer than three particle physics laboratories lay claim to some aspect of the detector, called ICARUS, that will soon become the newest member of Fermilab’s neutrino family. The Italian INFN Gran Sasso National Laboratory took data using the 760-ton, 65-foot-long detector for its ICARUS experiment from 2010 to 2014. The European laboratory CERN sent beam to the detector when it was at Gran Sasso. And Fermilab is soon to inherit the detector for its Short-Baseline Neutrino Program. Fermilab is currently awaiting the detector’s arrival from CERN, where staff have been refurbishing it for use in the SBN Program.
Thanks to the CERN, Fermilab and INFN crew for paving the way for ICARUS. First row, from left: John Anderson III, Justin Briney, Ben Ogert, Daniel Vrbos (all Fermilab), Marco Guerzoni (INFN), David Augustine (Fermilab), Vincent Togo (INFN), Timothy Griffin, Thomas Olszanowski, Michael Cooper (all Fermilab). Second row, from left: John Voirin (Fermilab), Francois-Andre Garnier, Anatoly Popov, Filippo Resnati, Frederic Merlet (all CERN), Jason Kubinski, Bob Kubinski (both Fermilab). Third row, from left: Pierre-Ange Giudici (CERN), Michael Jeeninga, Mark Shoun (both Fermilab). Not pictured: Joseph Harris, Kelly Hardin, Bryan Johnson and Craig Rogers, all of Fermilab. Photo: Reidar Hahn
So it is fitting that technicians, led by Frederic Merlet of CERN, from the two European laboratories recently converged at Fermilab to work with the U.S. ICARUS team, led by Fermilab’s David Augustine.
During the visit, which took place from May 1-21, the technicians assembled the steel structure that will host the detector’s two 300-ton time projection chambers.
“They accomplished this amazing task with absolutely superb work ethic and cooperation,” said Fermilab physicist Fernanda G. Garcia, who is the project installation and integration manager. “The installation went smoothly thanks in great part to Dave and Frederic’s leadership skills.”
It was not only just technicians, but also machinists, quality and safety personnel, business administrators, and transportation coordinators who came together to prepare the detector’s future home.
The contributions of our trans-Atlantic partners at CERN and INFN demonstrate once more that the science of particle physics is a global pursuit.
INFN Gran Sasso ICARUS, since to move to FNAL
Gran Sasso LABORATORI NAZIONALI del GRAN SASSO, located in the Abruzzo region of central Italy
Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab), located just outside Batavia, Illinois, near Chicago, is a US Department of Energy national laboratory specializing in high-energy particle physics. Fermilab is America’s premier laboratory for particle physics and accelerator research, funded by the U.S. Department of Energy. Thousands of scientists from universities and laboratories around the world
collaborate at Fermilab on experiments at the frontiers of discovery.
Pioneering SESAME light source officially opened .
SESAME | Synchrotron-light for Experimental Science and Applications in the Middle East
This schematic of France’s Synchrotron Soleil gives a good idea of what the completed SESAME synchrotron might look like. Image: EPSIM 3D/JF Santarelli, Synchrotron Soleil.
The SESAME light source was today officially opened by His Majesty King Abdullah II. An intergovernmental organization, SESAME is the first regional laboratory for the Middle East and neighbouring regions The laboratory’s official opening ushers in a new era of research covering fields ranging from medicine and biology, through materials science, physics and chemistry to healthcare, the environment, agriculture and archaeology.
Speaking at the opening ceremony, the President of the SESAME Council, Professor Sir Chris Llewellyn Smith said: “Today sees the fulfilment of many hopes and dreams. The hope that a group of initially inexperienced young people could build SESAME and make it work – they have: three weeks ago SESAME reached its full design energy. The hope that, nurtured by SESAME’s training programme, large numbers of scientists in the region would become interested in using SESAME – they have: 55 proposals to use the first two beamlines have already been submitted. And the hope that the diverse Members could work together harmoniously. As well as being a day for celebration, the opening is an occasion to look forward to the science that SESAME will produce, using photons provided by what will soon be the world’s first accelerator powered solely by renewable energy.”
SESAME, which stands for Synchrotron-light for Experimental Science and Applications in the Middle East, is a particle accelerator-based facility that uses electromagnetic radiation emitted by circulating electron beams to study a range of properties of matter.
Its initial research programme is about to get underway: three beamlines will be operational this year, and a fourth in 2019. Among the subjects likely to be studied in early experiments are pollution in the Jordan River valley with a view to improving public health in the area, as well as studies aimed at identifying new drugs for cancer therapy, and cultural heritage studies ranging from bioarcheology – the study of our ancestors – to investigations of ancient manuscripts.
Professor Khaled Toukan the Director of SESAME, said “In building SESAME we had to overcome major financial, technological and political challenges, but – with the help and encouragement of many supporters in Jordan and around the world – the staff, the Directors and the Council did a superb job. Today we are at the end of the beginning. Many challenges lie ahead – including building up the user community, and constructing additional beamlines and supporting facilities. However, I am confident that – with the help of all of you here today, including especially Rolf Heuer, who will take over from Chris Llewellyn Smith as President of the Council tomorrow (and like Chris and his predecessor Herwig Schopper is a former Director General of CERN) – these challenges will be met.”
The opening ceremony was an occasion for representatives of SESAME’s Members and Observers to come together to celebrate the establishment of a competitive regional facility, building regional capacity in science and technology.
NOTES FOR EDITORS:
1. There are some 50 synchrotron light sources in the world, including a few in developing countries. SESAME (Synchrotron-light for Experimental Science and Applications in the Middle East) is the first light source in the Middle East, and also the region’s first true international centre of excellence.
2. The Members of SESAME are currently Cyprus, Egypt, Iran, Israel, Jordan, Pakistan, the Palestinian Authority and Turkey (others are being sought). Brazil, Canada, China, the European Union, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Japan, Kuwait, Portugal, the Russian Federation, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the UK, and the USA are Observers. SESAME was set up under the auspices of UNESCO, but is now a completely independent intergovernmental organisation.
3. SESAME will both:
• Foster scientific and technological capacities and excellence in the Middle East and neighbouring regions (and help prevent or reverse the brain drain) by enabling world-class research in subjects ranging from biology and medical sciences through materials science, physics and chemistry to archaeology – much focussed on issues of regional importance, e.g. related to the environment, health, and agriculture, and
• Build scientific links and foster better understanding and a culture of peace through collaboration between peoples with different creeds and political systems.
4. At the heart of SESAME is a 2.5 GeV electron storage ring. The first electron beam was circulated on 11 January. The design energy of 2.5 GeV was reached on 27 April. A beam of 30 mA has been stored, and steps are now in train to bring the current up to the ultimate design value of 400 mA.
5. Synchrotron light source are equipped with beamlines that focus the light on samples that scientists wish to study. Each beamline can support several experiments in series and in parallel. Two beamlines (an X-ray Absorption Fine Structure/X-ray Fluorescence Spectroscopy Beamline and an Infrared Beamline, which will support work in basic materials science, life sciences and environmental science, biochemistry, microanalysis, archaeology, geology, cell biology, biomedical diagnostics, environmental science, etc.) will be in operation initially. A third (Materials Science) beamline (which will support studies of disordered/amorphous material on the atomic scale and the evolution of nano-scale structures and materials in extreme conditions of pressure and temperature) will come into operation in late 2017. A Macromolecular Crystallography beamline and a protein expression/crystallization facility for structural molecular biology (aimed at elucidating the mechanisms of proteins at the atomic level and providing guidelines for developing new drugs) will come into operation in 2019. Three more beamlines are being planned which will be added when funds permit.
6. The users of SESAME will be based in universities and research institutes in the region. They will visit the laboratory periodically to carry out experiments, generally in collaboration, where they will be exposed to the highest scientific standards. The potential user community, which is growing rapidly and already numbers over 300, has been, and is being, fostered by a series of Users’ Meetings and by training opportunities (supported by the IAEA, various governments and many of the world’s synchrotron laboratories) which are already bringing significant benefits to the region.
7. Some $90 million have so far been invested in SESAME (including the value of the land and building provided by Jordan and of donated equipment, and all operational costs). Staff costs, provision of power, and other operational costs are provided by the Members’ annual contributions. Capital funding has been provided by the Governments of Jordan, Israel, and Turkey, the Royal Court of Jordan, and by the European Union (through CERN and directly) and Italy.
8. SESAME is coming into operation with minimal supporting infrastructure and only two beamlines. Challenges for the future include: fully equipping the protein expression, crystallization and characterization laboratory and the end station for the Materials Science beamline; funding the three more beamlines that are planned in phase 1 of SESAME; funding construction of a conference centre, which (when SESAME is not in use during maintenance work) will be used for regional meetings on other issues (water resources, agriculture, pollution, disease,..); building a new full energy injection system in order to produce much greater integrated fluxes of synchrotron light; and last but not least further building up the user community.
9. In common with all other accelerators, synchrotron light sources use large amounts of electrical power. Once SESAME is fully in operation, the bill for electricity (for which SESAME is currently paying $375/MWh) would be beyond the means of the SESAME Members. SESAME’s longstanding intention to build a solar power plant was recently turned in to a reality when the Government of Jordan generously agreed to provide SESAME with JD5 Million ($7.05 million) of EU funds that support deployment of renewable energy in neighbouring countries. A call for tender to build the plant was issued in April: the power that it sends to the grid will be provided to SESAME as/when needed (not just when the sun is shining). SESAME will be the first accelerator in the world powered entirely by renewable energy.
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