From CERN: “CERN and ESA forge closer ties with cooperation protocol”

From CERN

26 July, 2019

A new collaboration agreement between CERN and ESA, signed on 11 July, will address the challenge of operating in harsh radiation environments, found in both particle-physics facilities and outer space. The agreement concerns radiation environments, technologies and facilities with potential applications in both space systems and particle-physics experiments or accelerators.

This first implementing protocol of CERN-ESA bilateral cooperation covers a broad range of activities, from general aspects like coordination, financing and personnel exchange, to a list of irradiation facilities for joint R&D activities. It also states the willingness of both organisations to support PhD students working on radiation subjects of common interest.

Franco Ongaro, Director of Technology, Engineering and Quality Head of ESTEC, European Space Agency (left) with Eckhard Elsen, CERN Director for Research and Computing (Image: Julien Ordan/CERN)

The agreement identifies seven specific projects with high priority: high-energy electron tests; high-penetration heavy-ion tests; assessment of EEE commercial components and modules (COTS); in-orbit technology demonstration; “radiation-hard” and “radiation-tolerant” components and modules; radiation detectors, monitors and dosimeters; and simulation tools for radiation effects.

In some cases, important preliminary results have already been achieved: high-energy electron tests for the JUICE mission were performed in the CLEAR/VESPER facility to simulate the environment of Jupiter. Complex components were also tested with xenon and lead ions in the SPS North Area at CERN for an in-depth analysis of galactic cosmic-ray effects. These activities will continue and the newly identified ones will be implemented under the coordination of the CERN-ESA Committee on Radiation Issues.

See the full article here.

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From CERN: “LS2 Report: 2000 kilometres of cable”

From CERN

25 June, 2019
Anaïs Schaeffer

During LS2, 20 000 optical fibres contained within 220 cables lie at the heart of the ALICE experiment (Image: CERN)

Some 40 000 cables will be installed or removed at CERN during LS2. Laid end to end, they would stretch for 2000 kilometres!

The work involves two types of cable: copper cables, which transmit signals to the accelerator systems and supply the magnets, and fibre-optic cables, which transmit data in the form of light signals. The latter weave through all of CERN’s installations, from Meyrin to Prévessin, including the accelerator tunnels, experiments and technical halls, like an enormous spider’s web.

“Optical fibres and copper cables transmit all the information collected or sent by the detectors, beam instrumentation, sensors, control panels, computing infrastructure, and so on,” explains Daniel Ricci, the leader of the section in charge of cabling (EN-EL-FC) within the EN department. “Our work covers all of CERN’s service networks: optical fibres and copper cables are everywhere.”

Water-cooled cables in the LHC tunnel. These cables carry the current (up to 13 000 amperes) from the power converters to the power supplies (Image: CERN)

They are indeed, and in impressive quantities: for example, some 20 000 optical fibres contained within 220 cables lie at the heart of the ALICE experiment, and 1200 copper signal cables are being installed in the SPS in the framework of the Fire Safety project. The EN-EL-FC section is also contributing to other major CERN projects during LS2, including the LIU (LHC Injectors Upgrade), the renovation of the East Area, the renovation of the SPS access system, the commissioning of the ELENA extraction lines and the HL-LHC.

“CERN is probably the only place in the world where several thousand kilometres of radiation-resistant optical fibre are needed,” says Daniel Ricci. “We maintain very close ties with industry, where our expertise is used to adapt and improve this type of fibre.”

Of the 40 000 cables to be dealt with during LS2, 15 000 are obsolete copper cables that need to be removed. But first, they need to be identified. Since CERN was founded 65 years ago, some 450 000 cables have been installed, and many of them are still snaking through the nooks and crannies of the Laboratory. “Since LS1, we have been methodically going through all of CERN’s old paper cable databases, identifying each cable and listing it in our digital database,” explains Daniel Ricci. “Of the 95 000 cables to be retained, 50 000 have already been digitised.”

Many cables that are still needed for operations were pulled out of their cable trays in order to facilitate the removal of obsolete ones (here, in the SPS) (Image: CERN)

CERN’s biggest ever cable removal campaign has been under way since 2016. During the most recent year-end technical stops (YETS and EYETS), the Booster and middle ring of the PS were relieved of their old, obsolete cables. Cable removal is currently under way at points 3 and 5 of the SPS.

To complete this gargantuan task, the EN-EL-FC section, which usually comprises 20 people, has recruited some outside help. Sixteen extra people – fellows, project associates and members of other groups – are lending a hand during LS2. The contractors’ teams, which comprise several dozen technicians working on site, have also been reinforced in order to keep up with the breakneck pace of work during the long shutdown. “Coordination, planning and teamwork are indispensable if we are to successfully complete the 120 cabling and cable removal projects scheduled for LS2,” says Daniel Ricci. “We’re lucky to have a very versatile team who are able to advise clients on different types of cable, carry out technical studies, organise logistics and coordination between the various parties and supervise the worksites.”

No fewer than 140 members of the CERN personnel and contractors’ personnel are working on the various LS2 cabling and cable removal projects, collaborating with the end users to ensure that quality control is as efficient as possible. “We would like to thank all the teams and users for their professionalism and their commitment. They are working to an extremely high standard while scrupulously respecting both deadlines and safety,” says Daniel Ricci.

See the full article here.

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CERN ATLAS Image Claudia Marcelloni CERN/ATLAS

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From CERN: “Four decades of gluons”

From CERN

18 June, 2019
Ana Lopes

A three-jet event detected by the TASSO detector at DESY (Image: Oxford PPU)

Forty years ago, in 1979, experiments at the DESY laboratory in Germany provided the first direct proof of the existence of gluons – the carriers of the strong force that “glue” quarks into protons, neutrons and other particles known collectively as hadrons. This discovery was a milestone in the history of particle physics, as it helped establish the theory of the strong force, known as quantum chromodynamics.

The results followed from an idea that struck theorist John Ellis while walking in CERN’s corridors in 1976. As Ellis recounts, he was walking over the bridge from the CERN cafeteria back to his office, turning the corner by the library, when it occurred to him that “the simplest experimental situation to search directly for the gluon would be through production via bremsstrahlung in electron–positron annihilation”. In this process, an electron and a positron (the electron’s antiparticle) would annihilate and would occasionally produce three “jets” of particles, one of which being generated by a gluon radiated by a quark–antiquark pair.

Ellis and theorists Mary Gaillard and Graham Ross then went on to write a paper titled “Search for Gluons in e+-e– Annihilation” in which they described a calculation of the process and showed how the PETRA collider at DESY and the PEP collider at SLAC would be able to observe it. Ellis then visited DESY, gave a seminar about the idea and talked to experimentalists preparing to work at PETRA.

A couple of years later, and following more papers by Ellis, Gaillard and other theorists, PETRA was being commissioned and getting into the energy range required to test this theory. Soon after, at the International Neutrino Conference in Bergen, Norway, on 18 June 1979, researchers presented a three-jet collision event that had just been detected by the TASSO experiment at PETRA.

At the European Physical Society conference at CERN a couple of weeks later, the TASSO collaboration presented several three-jet events and results of analyses that showed that the gluon had been discovered. One month later, in August 1979, three other experiments at PETRA showed similar events that lent support to TASSO’s findings.

Find out more about the discovery in DESY’s coverage of the 40-year anniversary, in Ellis’ account, and in this 2004 CERN Courier article.

See the full article here.

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CERN ATLAS Image Claudia Marcelloni CERN/ATLAS

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From Fermi National Accelerator Lab: “Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility pre-excavation work is in full swing”

FNAL Art Image by Angela Gonzales

From Fermi National Accelerator Lab , an enduring source of strength for the US contribution to scientific research world wide.

May 2, 2019
Kurt Riesselmann

Unlocking the mysteries of neutrinos in order to get a clearer picture of the universe and understand why we are here at all, is a monumental undertaking. However, before the international Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment, hosted by the Department of Energy’s Fermilab, can start solving those mysteries, a massive construction project is required to provide the necessary infrastructure, named the Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility.

The LBNF construction in Lead, South Dakota is under way, and a fleet of yellow pickup trucks has become the talk of the town and evidence of the beehive of construction activity that Fermilab is managing at the Sanford Underground Research Facility.

These trucks are owned by the company Kiewit, part of the Kiewit-Alberici Joint Venture, who are preparing the construction site at Sanford Lab for the excavation of about 800,000 tons of rock to create the huge caverns for the South Dakota-portion of the Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility. (Prep work for the Illinois-portion of the Long-Baseline Neutrino Facility, to be built at Fermilab, will start early next year.)

The excavation of LBNF/DUNE caverns requires the transport of about 800,000 tons of rock from a mile underground to the surface, and then transporting it to its final resting place in a former mining area known as the Open Cut. Credit: Fermilab

The excavation will create the three LBNF caverns that vary in length between 500 and 625 feet long, up to 70 feet wide and 95 feet tall. These caverns will house DUNE’s massive particle detectors and the necessary utilities.

FNAL DUNE Argon tank at SURF

Excavating such an enormous amount of rock a mile underground, bringing it to the surface, and then transporting it to its final resting place is a huge job. And creating the infrastructure for that job is a huge amount of work by itself—and is going on right now. Fortunately, the mile-deep shaft that workers will use to bring rock to the surface—known as the Ross Shaft—already exists and the seven-year-long shaft renovation project will soon wrap up. But other pre-excavation work remains to be done. The main tasks are (see photo gallery):

Renovating the area at the bottom of the mile-deep Ross Shaft, where rock will be loaded into large buckets, called skips, that will travel up the shaft;
Strengthening the Ross headframe—the structure that holds and operates the hoist that conveys the skips filled with rock to the surface;
Refurbishing the three-story-tall rock crushing system next to the Ross headframe; it was last used in 2001 when the Ross Shaft was still used by the Homestake gold mine.
Building and installing the three-quarter-mile-long conveyor system that will transport the crushed rock to the Open Cut, an open pit mining area excavated by the Homestake mining company in the 1980s. Despite the massive amount of rock to be excavated for the LBNF caverns, the deposited rock will fill less than one percent of the Open Cut.
Rehabbing the existing tramway tunnel to prepare it for the installation of the conveyor system;
Establishing the power infrastructure for operating the LBNF/DUNE experiment, which will include 70,000 tons of liquid argon cooled to minus 300 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 184 degrees Celsius).

And remember, this massive construction project will enable some truly groundbreaking science. DUNE, hosted by Fermilab, will be the world’s most advanced experiment dedicated to studying the properties of mysterious subatomic particles called neutrinos.

FNAL LBNF/DUNE from FNAL to SURF, Lead, South Dakota, USA

The DUNE detectors will enable scientists to study a neutrino beam generated at Fermilab. The DUNE collaboration includes more than 1,000 scientists from more than 30 countries around the world. A large prototype detector for the experiment, constructed at the European research center CERN, successfully began recording particle tracks in September.

CERN Proto Dune

For more information on LBNF/DUNE, see http://www.fnal.gov/dune.

See the full article here.

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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.

FNAL MINERvA front face Photo Reidar Hahn

FNAL DAMIC

FNAL Muon g-2 studio

FNAL Short-Baseline Near Detector under construction

FNAL Mu2e solenoid

Dark Energy Camera [DECam], built at FNAL

FNAL DUNE Argon tank at SURF

FNAL/MicrobooNE

FNAL Don Lincoln

FNAL/MINOS

FNAL Cryomodule Testing Facility

FNAL MINOS Far Detector in the Soudan Mine in northern Minnesota

FNAL LBNF/DUNE from FNAL to SURF, Lead, South Dakota, USA

FNAL/NOvA experiment map

FNAL NOvA Near Detector

FNAL ICARUS

FNAL Holometer

From CERN: “LS2 Report: consolidating the energy extraction systems of LHC superconducting magnet circuits”

From CERN

13 May, 2019
Anaïs Schaeffer

The LS2 team from the NRC Kurchatov-IHEP Institute, Protvino, Russia, with a 13 kA energy extraction system (Image: NRC Kurchatov-IHEP Institute)

In the LHC, 1232 superconducting dipole magnets and 392 quadrupole magnets guide and focus the beams around the accelerator’s 27-kilometre ring, which is divided into eight sectors. These magnets operate at very low temperatures – 1.9 K or −271.3 °C – where even a tiny amount of energy released inside a magnet can warm its windings to above the critical temperature, causing the loss of superconductivity: this is called a quench. When this happens, the energy stored in the affected magnet has to be safely extracted in a short time to avoid damage to the magnet coil.

To do so, two protection elements are activated: at the level of the quenching magnet, a diode diverts the current into a parallel by-pass circuit in less than a second; at the level of the circuit, 13 kA energy extraction systems absorb the energy of the whole magnet circuit in a few minutes. There are equivalent extraction systems installed for about 200 corrector circuits with currents up to 600 A.

“In the framework of a long-lasting and fruitful collaboration between CERN and the Russian Federation, energy extraction systems for quench protection of the LHC superconducting magnets were designed in close partnership with two Russian institutes, the NRC Kurchatov-IHEP Institute in Protvino for the 13 kA systems and the Budker Institute in Novosibirsk for the 600 A systems. Russian industry was involved in the manufacturing of the parts of these systems,” explains Félix Rodríguez Mateos, leader of the Electrical Engineering (EE) section in the Machine Protection and Electrical Integrity (MPE) group of CERN’s Technology department.

With a wealth of expertise and know-how, the Russian teams have continuously provided invaluable support to the MPE group. “Our Russian colleagues come to CERN for every year-end technical stop (YETS) and long shutdown to help us perform preventive maintenance and upgrade activities on the energy extraction systems,” says Rodríguez Mateos.

During LS2, an extensive maintenance campaign is being performed on the 13 kA systems, which already count 10 years of successful operation in the LHC. “We are currently replacing an element, the arcing contact, in each one of the 256 electromechanical switches of the energy extraction systems to ensure their continuous reliable operation throughout the next runs,” adds Rodríguez Mateos. “In February, we fully replaced 32 switches at Point 8 of the accelerator in anticipation of consolidation for the future HL-LHC.”

During LS2, the Electrical Engineering section is involved in many other activities that will be the subject of future articles.

See the full article here.

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From CERN: “In Granada, the European particle physics community prepares decisions for the future of the field”

From CERN

13 May, 2019

The European particle physics community is meeting this week in Granada, Spain, to discuss the roadmap for the future of the discipline.

Geneva and Granada. The European particle physics community is meeting this week in Granada, Spain, to discuss the roadmap for the future of the discipline. The aim of the symposium is to define scientific priorities and technological approaches for the coming years and to consider plans for the medium- and long-term future. An important focus of the discussions will be assessing the various options for the period beyond the lifespan of the Large Hadron Collider.

“The Granada symposium is an important step in the process of updating the European Strategy for Particle Physics and aims to prioritise our scientific goals and prepare for the upcoming generation of facilities and experiments,” said the President of the CERN Council, Ursula Bassler. “The discussions will focus on the scientific reach of potential new projects, the associated technological challenges and the resources required.”

The European Strategy Group, which was established to coordinate the update process, has received 160 contributions from the scientific community setting out their views on possible future projects and experiments. The symposium in Granada will provide an opportunity to assess and discuss them.

“The intent is to make sure that we have a good understanding of the science priorities of the community and of all the options for realising them,” said the Chair of the European Strategy Group, Professor Halina Abramowicz. “This will ensure that the European Strategy Group is well informed when deciding about the strategy update.”

The previous update of the European Strategy, approved in May 2013, recommended that design and feasibility studies be conducted in order for Europe “to be in a position to propose an ambitious post-LHC accelerator project.” Over the last few years, in collaboration with partners from around the world, Europe has therefore been engaging in R&D and design projects for a range of ambitious post-LHC facilities under the CLIC and FCC umbrellas.

CLIC collider

CERN FCC Future Circular Collider details of proposed 100km-diameter successor to LHC

A study to investigate the potential to build projects that are complementary to high-energy colliders, exploiting the opportunities offered by CERN’s unique accelerator complex, was also launched by CERN in 2016. These contributions will feed into the discussion, which will also take into account the worldwide particle physics landscape and developments in related fields.

“At least two decades will be needed to design and build a new collider to succeed the LHC. Such a machine should maximise the potential for new discoveries and enable major steps forward in our understanding of fundamental physics” said CERN Director-General, Fabiola Gianotti. “It is not too early to start planning for it as it will take time to develop the new technologies needed for its implementation.”

The Granada symposium will be followed up with the compilation of a “briefing book” and with a Strategy Drafting Session, which will take place in Bad Honnef, Germany, from 20 to 24 January 2020. The update of the European Strategy for Particle Physics is due to be completed and approved by the CERN Council in May 2020.

An online Q&A session will be held on Thursday 16 May – 4pm CEST

Reporters interested in participating are invited to register by sending an e-mail to press@cern.ch

https://europeanstrategy.cern/

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From CERN: “CERN unveils its Science Gateway project”

From CERN

8 April, 2019

CERN is launching a new scientific education and outreach centre. The building will be designed by world-renowned architects, Renzo Piano Building Workshop and funded through external donations, with the leading contribution coming from FCA Foundation.

Artistic view of the Science Gateway. (Image: RPBW)

CERN is launching the Science Gateway, a new scientific education and outreach centre targeting the general public of all ages. The building will be designed by world-renowned architects, Renzo Piano Building Workshop. The project will be funded through external donations, with the leading contribution coming from FCA Foundation, a charitable foundation created by Fiat Chrysler Automobiles. Construction is planned to start in 2020 and to be completed in 2022.

As part of its mission to educate and engage the public in science, and to share knowledge and technology with society, CERN is launching the Science Gateway, a new facility for scientific education and outreach. The purpose of the project is to create a hub of scientific education and culture to inspire younger generations with the beauty of science. Aimed at engaging audiences of all ages, the Science Gateway will include inspirational exhibition spaces, laboratories for hands-on scientific experiments for children and students from primary to high-school level, and a large amphitheatre to host science events for experts and non-experts alike.

With a footprint of 7000 square metres, the iconic Science Gateway building will offer a variety of spaces and activities, including exhibitions explaining the secrets of nature, from the very small (elementary particles) to the very large (the structure and evolution of the universe). The exhibitions will also feature CERN’s accelerators, experiments and computing, how scientists use them in their exploration and how CERN technologies benefit society. Hands-on experimentation will be a key ingredient in the Science Gateway’s educational programme, allowing visitors to get first-hand experience of what it’s like to be a scientist. The immersive activities available in the Science Gateway will foster critical thinking, evidence-based assessment and use of the scientific method, important tools in all walks of life.

“The Science Gateway will enable CERN to expand significantly its education and outreach offering for the general public, in particular the younger generations. We will be able to share with everybody the fascination of exploring and learning how matter and the universe work, the advanced technologies we need to develop in order to build our ambitious instruments and their impact on society, and how science can influence our daily life,” says CERN Director-General Fabiola Gianotti. “I am deeply grateful to the donors for their crucial support in the fulfilment of this beautiful project.”

The overall cost of the Science Gateway is estimated at 79 million Swiss Francs, entirely funded through donations. As of today, 57 million Swiss Francs have been already secured, allowing construction to start on schedule, thanks in particular to a very generous contribution of 45 million Swiss Francs from the FCA Foundation, which will support the project as it advances through the construction phases. Other donors include a private foundation in Geneva and Loterie Romande, which distributes its profits to public utility projects in various areas including research, culture and social welfare. CERN is looking for additional donations in order to cover the full cost of the project.

John Elkann, Chairman of FCA and the FCA Foundation, said: “The new Science Gateway will satisfy the curiosity of 300,000 visitors every year – including many researchers and students, but also children and their families – providing them with access to tools that will help them understand the world and improve their lives, whatever career paths they eventually choose. At FCA we’re delighted to be supporting this project as part of our social responsibility which also allows us to honour the memory of Sergio Marchionne: in an open and stimulating setting, it will teach us how we can work successfully together, even though we may have diverse cultures and perspectives, to discover the answers to today’s big questions and to those of tomorrow”.

As part of the educational portfolio of the Science Gateway, CERN and FCA Foundation will develop a programme for schools, with the advice of Fondazione Agnelli. The main goal will be to transmit concepts of science and technology in an engaging way, in order to encourage students to pursue careers in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics). According to the approach of enquiry-based learning, students will be involved in hands-on educational modules and experiments in physics. Special kits will be delivered to classes, containing all necessary materials and instructions to run modules throughout the school year. As a follow-up, classes will be invited to take part in a contest, with the winners awarded a 2-3 day visit to the Science Gateway and CERN. There will be an initial period of experimentation, with a pilot programme in Italy focusing on junior high schools and involving up to 550,000 students. After the pilot, CERN plans to extend this initiative to all its Member States.

The Science Gateway will be hosted in a new, iconic building, designed by world-renowned architects Renzo Piano Building Workshop, on CERN’s Meyrin site adjacent to another of CERN’s iconic buildings, the Globe of Science and Innovation. The vision for the Science Gateway is inspired by the fragmentation and curiosity already intrinsic to the nature of the CERN site and buildings, so it is made up of multiple elements, embedded in a green forest and interconnected by a bridge spanning the main road leading to Geneva. “It’s a place where people will meet,” says Renzo Piano. “Kids, students, adults, teachers and scientists, everybody attracted by the exploration of the Universe, from the infinitely vast to the infinitely small. It is a bridge, in the metaphorical and real sense, and a building fed by the energy of the sun, nestling in the midst of a newly grown forest.”

Also inspired by CERN’s unique facilities, such as the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the world’s largest particle accelerator, the architecture of the Science Gateway celebrates the inventiveness and creativity that characterise the world of research and engineering. Architectural elements such as tubes that seem to be suspended in space evoke the cutting-edge technology underpinning the most advanced research that is furthering our understanding of the origins of the universe.

A bridge over the Route de Meyrin will dominate the brand-new Esplanade des Particules and symbolise the inseparable link between science and society. Construction is planned to start in 2020 and be completed in 2022.

About FCA Foundation
The FCA Foundation, the charitable arm of FCA, supports charitable organizations and initiatives that help empower people, build strong, resilient communities and generate meaningful and measurable societal impacts particularly in the field of education.

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THE FOUR MAJOR PROJECT COLLABORATIONS

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CERN/ALICE Detector

CMS

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LHC

CERN map

OTHER PROJECTS AT CERN

CERN AEGIS

CERN ALPHA

CERN ALPHA

CERN ALPHA-g Detector

CERN ALPHA-g Detector

CERN AMS

CERN ACACUSA

CERN ASACUSA

CERN ATRAP

CERN ATRAP

CERN AWAKE

CERN AWAKE

CERN CAST

CERN CAST Axion Solar Telescope

CERN CLOUD

CERN CLOUD

CERN COMPASS

CERN COMPASS

CERN DIRAC

CERN DIRAC

CERN GBAR

CERN GBAR

CERN ISOLDE

CERN ISOLDE

CERN LHCf

CERN LHCf

CERN NA62

CERN NA62

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CERN UA9

CERN Proto Dune

CERN Proto Dune

From CERN: “Moriond 2019 feels the strong force”

From CERN

2 April, 2019

Pentaquarks, charmed beauty particles and more from the Moriond conference’s second week, which is devoted to studies of the strong nuclear force.

Last week, physicists from all over the world gathered in La Thuile, Italy, for the second week of the Rencontres de Moriond conference. This second week of the annual meeting features new and recent findings in all things related to quantum chromodynamics (QCD) – the theory of the strong force that combines quarks into composite particles called hadrons – and to high-energy particle interactions. This year, results from the main experiments at the Large Hadron Collider (ALICE, ATLAS, CMS and LHCb) included new pentaquarks, new charmed beauty particles, a more precise measurement of matter–antimatter asymmetry in strange beauty particles, and new results from heavy-ion collisions.

Discovery of new pentaquarks

The LHCb collaboration announced the discovery of new five-quark hadrons, or “pentaquarks”. Quarks normally aggregate into groups of twos and threes, but in recent years the LHCb team has confirmed the existence of exotic tetraquarks and pentaquarks, which are also predicted by QCD. In a 2015 study, the LHCb researchers analysed data from the decay of the three-quark particle Λb into a J/ψ particle, a proton and a charged kaon and were able to see two new pentaquarks (dubbed Pc(4450)+ and Pc(4380)+) in intermediate decay states. After analysing a sample of nine times more Λb decays than in the 2015 study, the LHCb team has now discovered a new pentaquark, Pc(4312)+ as well as a two-peak pattern in the data that shows that the previously observed Pc(4450)+ structure is in fact two particles.

A Bs candidate decaying to a J/psi and a phi, where the J/psi decays to two opposite-charge muons (red lines) and the phi decays to two opposite-charge kaons (blue). The event was recorded by ATLAS on 16 August 2017 from proton–proton collisions at 13 TeV. (Image: CERN)

Charmed beauty particles in focus

Notwithstanding significant progress over the past two decades, researchers’ understanding of the QCD processes that make up hadrons is incomplete. One way to try and understand them is through the study of the little-known charmed beauty (Bc) particle family, which consists of hadrons made up of a beauty quark and a charm antiquark (or vice-versa). In 2014, using data from the LHC’s first proton–proton collision run, the ATLAS collaboration reported [Physical Review Letters]the observation of a Bc particle called Bc(2S). A very recent analysis by the CMS collaboration of the full LHC sample from the second run, published today in Physical Review Letters and presented at the meeting, has unambiguously observed a two-peak feature in this dataset that corresponds to Bc(2S) and to another Bc particle called Bc*(2S). Meanwhile, the LHCb team, which in 2017 reported no evidence for Bc(2S) in its 2012 data, has now analysed the full 2011–2018 data sample and has also observed the Bc(2S) and Bc*(2S), lending support to the CMS result.

An event recorded by CMS showing a candidate for the Bc(2S*). The signature for this new particle is the presence of two pions (green lines) and a Bc meson, that decays into a pion (yellow line) plus a J/psi that itself decays to two muons (red). (Image: CERN)

Matter–antimatter asymmetry in strange beauty particles

The meeting’s second week also saw the announcement of a new result concerning the amount of the matter–antimatter asymmetry known as CP violation in the system of strange beauty (Bs) particles, which are made of a bottom quark and a strange quark. Bs mesons have the special feature that they oscillate rapidly into their antiparticle and back, and these oscillations can lead to CP violation when the Bs decays into combinations of particles such as a J/ψ and a ϕ. The amount of CP violation predicted by the Standard Model and observed so far in experiments is too small to account for the observed imbalance between matter and antimatter in the universe, prompting scientists to search for additional, as-yet-unknown sources of CP violation and to measure the extent of the violation from known sources more precisely. Following hot on the heels of two independent measurements of the asymmetry in the Bs system reported by ATLAS and LHCb during the meeting’s first week, a new result that combined the two measurements was reported during the second week. The combined result is the most precise measurement yet of the asymmetry in the Bs system and is consistent with the small value precisely predicted by the Standard Model.

Heavy-ion progress

The ALICE collaboration specialises in collisions between heavy ions such as lead nuclei, which can recreate the quark–gluon plasma (QGP) that is believed to have occurred shortly after the Big Bang. ALICE highlighted its observation that three-quark particles (baryons) containing charm quarks (Λc) are produced more often in proton–proton collisions than in electron­–positron collisions. It also showed that its first measurements of such charmed baryons in lead–lead collisions suggest an even higher production rate in these collisions, similar to what has been observed for strange-quark baryons. These observations indicate that the presence of quarks in the colliding beams affects the hadron production rate, shedding new light on the QCD processes that form baryons. The collaboration also presented the first measurement of the triangle-shaped flow of J/psi particles, which contain heavy quarks, in lead–lead collisions. This measurement shows that even heavy quarks are affected by the quarks and gluons in the QGP and retain some memory of the collisions’ initial geometry. Finally, ALICE also presented measurements of particle jets in lead–lead collisions that probe the QGP at different length scales.

For other results, check out the conference page.

See the full article here.

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THE FOUR MAJOR PROJECT COLLABORATIONS

ATLAS

ALICE

CERN/ALICE Detector

CMS

LHCb

LHC

CERN map

OTHER PROJECTS AT CERN

CERN AEGIS

CERN ALPHA

CERN ALPHA

CERN ALPHA-g Detector

CERN ALPHA-g Detector

CERN AMS

CERN ACACUSA

CERN ASACUSA

CERN ATRAP

CERN ATRAP

CERN AWAKE

CERN AWAKE

CERN CAST

CERN CAST Axion Solar Telescope

CERN CLOUD

CERN CLOUD

CERN COMPASS

CERN COMPASS

CERN DIRAC

CERN DIRAC

CERN GBAR

CERN GBAR

CERN ISOLDE

CERN ISOLDE

CERN LHCf

CERN LHCf

CERN NA62

CERN NA62

CERN NTOF

CERN TOTEM

CERN UA9

CERN Proto Dune

CERN Proto Dune

From CERN: “Serbia joins CERN as its 23rd Member State”

From CERN

24 March, 2019

Visit of Ana Brnabić, Prime Minister of the Republic of Serbia, with Mladen Šarčević, Minister of Education, Science and Technological Development (Image: CERN)

Today, CERN welcomes Serbia as its 23rd Member State, following receipt of formal notification from UNESCO that Serbia has acceded to the CERN Convention.

Today, CERN welcomes Serbia as its 23rd Member State, following receipt of formal notification from UNESCO that Serbia has acceded to the CERN Convention.

“Investing in scientific research is important for the development of our economy and CERN is one of the most important scientific institutions today. I am immensely proud that Serbia has become a fully-fledged CERN Member State. This will bring new possibilities for our scientists and industry to work in cooperation with CERN and fellow CERN Member States,” said Ana Brnabić, Prime Minister of Serbia.

“Serbia has a longstanding relationship with CERN, with the continuous involvement of Serbian scientists in CERN’s major experiments. I’m very happy to see that Serbia’s initiative to seek membership status of CERN has now converged and that we can welcome Serbia as a Member State,” said Ursula Bassler, President of the CERN Council.

“It is a great pleasure to welcome Serbia as our 23rd Member State. The Serbian scientific community has made strong contributions to CERN’s projects for many years. Membership will strengthen the longstanding relationship between CERN and Serbia, creating opportunities for increased collaboration in scientific research, training, education, innovation and knowledge-sharing,” said Fabiola Gianotti, CERN Director-General.

“As a CERN Member State, Serbia is poised to further the development of science and education as our scientists, researchers, institutes and industry will be able to participate on the world stage in important scientific and technological decision-making,” said Mladen Šarčević, the Serbian Minister of Education, Science and Technological Development.

When Serbia was a part of Yugoslavia, which was one of the 12 founding Member States of CERN in 1954, Serbian physicists and engineers took part in some of CERN’s earliest projects, at the SC, PS and SPS facilities. In the 1980s and 1990s, physicists from Serbia worked on the DELPHI experiment at CERN’s LEP collider. In 2001, CERN and Serbia concluded an International Cooperation Agreement, leading to Serbia’s participation in the ATLAS and CMS experiments at the Large Hadron Collider, in the Worldwide LHC Computing Grid, as well as in the ACE and NA61 experiments. Serbia’s main involvement with CERN today is in the ATLAS and CMS experiments, in the ISOLDE facility, which carries out research ranging from nuclear physics to astrophysics, and on design studies for future particle colliders – FCC and CLIC – both of which are potentially new flagship projects at CERN.

As a CERN Member State, Serbia will have voting rights in the Council, CERN’s highest decision-making authority, and will contribute to the Organization’s budget. Membership will enhance the recruitment opportunities for Serbian nationals at CERN and for Serbian industry to bid for CERN contracts.

See the full article here.

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From CERN: “LS2 Report: Rejuvenation for the Antiproton Decelerator”

From CERN

12 March, 2019
Achintya Rao

The Antiproton Decelerator will see refurbishment work that will help its experiments to trap more antimatter than before.

CERN Antiproton Decelerator

The Antiproton Decelerator (AD), sometimes known as the Antimatter Factory, is the world’s largest source of antimatter and has been operational since 2000. Here, antiprotons are slowed down and sent into the experiments, where they are combined with antielectrons to produce the most basic antiatom: that of antihydrogen. Over the course of the second long shutdown of CERN’s accelerator complex (LS2), the AD will receive several enhancements as well as repairs and refurbishments.

The recently installed ELENA ring, which was commissioned over 2017 and 2018, is designed to slow down even further the antiprotons decelerated by AD to ensure that the experiments can trap up to 100 times more antiprotons than they could without it.

CERN ELENA

At the moment, ELENA is only connected to one of the experiments within the AD hall, the new GBAR experiment.

CERN GBAR

The main work being done on the AD during the next two years is to extend the beam line from ELENA to all of the existing experiments and get ELENA fully operational. The lines that took the particles from the AD to the experiments have now been fully dismantled to prepare for the new injection lines from ELENA.

Other planned and ongoing activities involve the AD’s 84 magnets, which focus and steer the whizzing antiprotons along their racetrack. Most of these magnets were recycled from previous accelerator facilities and are much older than the AD itself. They are in need of repairs and refurbishment, which started during the previous long shutdown (LS1) and was pursued during subsequent year-end technical stops (YETS). So far, nine of the magnets have been treated, and 20 of them are scheduled for treatment during LS2. The remaining magnets will either be treated in situ or will undergo refurbishment during the next YETS and the third long shutdown (LS3).

Removing the magnets to take them to the treatment facility is no easy task. The AD ring is encased in a large shielding tunnel made of concrete blocks. Therefore, the blocks making up the ceiling near the magnet in question have to first be removed and stored, allowing a crane to descend though the opening and extract the magnet (which weighs up to 26 tonnes), sometimes with a margin of only 1 cm. Related work is being done to consolidate other elements of the AD, such as the kicker magnets, the septa magnets and the radiofrequency cavities.

One of the main tasks of LS2 that has already been achieved was the installation of a new cooling pump for the AD. Previously, a single set of pumps were operated, connected to both the AD itself and to its experiments. This meant that the pumping system was operational year round next to the AD ring, producing a constant noise at over 100 decibels in some places. The new dedicated pump allows the main pumping group to be turned off without affecting the experiments’ cooling systems, saving money and improving working conditions for those who need to be in close proximity to the AD over the shutdown period. It also provides much-needed redundancy to the cooling circuits.

By the end of LS2, the AD hall will look very different from what it does today, but the changes are not merely superficial. They will ensure that CERN’s antimatter factory continues to operate with high efficiency and help explore the mysteries surrounding elusive antimatter.

See the full article here.

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