CERN announces new start-up schedule for world's most powerful particle acceleratorJune 25, 2007Speaking at the 142nd session of the CERN[1] Council today, the Organization's Director General Robert Aymar announced that the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) will start up in May 2008, taking the first steps towards studying physics at a new high-energy frontier. A low-energy run originally scheduled for this year has been dropped as the result of a number of minor delays accumulated over the final months of LHC installation and commissioning, coupled with the failure in March of a pressure test in one of the machine's components. The LHC is a scientific instrument of unprecedented complexity, and at 27 kilometres in circumference, the world's largest superconducting installation. Cooling the first sector of the machine to a temperature of 1.9 K (-271.3°C), colder than outer space, began earlier this year and has provided an important learning process. The first sector cool down has taken longer than scheduled, but has allowed the LHC's operations team to iron out teething troubles and gain experience that will be applied to the machine's seven remaining sectors. Now cold, tests on powering up the sector have begun and the cool down of a second sector will soon be underway. In March, a magnet assembly known as the inner triplet, provided to CERN as part of the contribution of the US to the LHC project, failed a pressure test. A repair has been identified and is currently being implemented.
"The low-energy run at the end of this year was extremely tight due to a number of small delays, but the inner triplet problem now makes it impossible," said LHC Project Leader Lyn Evans. "We'll be starting up for physics in May 2008, as always foreseen, and will commission the machine to full energy in one go." The new schedule foresees successively cooling and powering each of the LHC's sectors in turn this year. Throughout the winter, hardware commissioning will continue, allowing the LHC to be ready for high-energy running by the time CERN's accelerators are switched on in the spring. Commissioning a new particle accelerator is a complex task. Beams will be injected at low energy and low intensity to give the operations team experience in driving the new machine. Intensity and energy will then slowly be increased. "There's no big red button when you're starting up a new accelerator," said Evans, "but we aim to be seeing high energy collisions by the summer." Installation of the large and equally innovative apparatus for experiments at this new and unique facility will continue at the same time. This huge effort will be completed on a schedule consistent with that of the accelerator. In another important development, the CERN Council agreed to increase CERN's funding over the years 2008-2011 as an important first step towards implementing the decisions Council made in July 2006 for a European strategy for particle physics. "This is an important vote for the future of particle physics in Europe," said CERN Director General Robert Aymar, "it allows us to consolidate the laboratory's infrastructure, prepare for future upgrades of the LHC and to re-launch a programme of R&D for the long-term future." The LHC relies on a chain of particle accelerators, the oldest of which was constructed in the 1950s. Their successful operation is essential to the smooth running of the LHC. These additional resources will be used to consolidate CERN's infrastructure, and build on it for the future. [1] CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, is the world's leading laboratory for particle physics. It has its headquarters in Geneva. At present, its Member States are Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. India, Israel, Japan, the Russian Federation, the United States of America, Turkey, the European Commission and UNESCO have Observer status. CERN Science News and Science Current Events Tag Cloud This tag cloud is a visual representation of term frequencies of random science news topics with common terms grouped together and emphasized by their display size. Hurricane Katrina Abdominal Pain Parkinson’s Disease Clinical Trials Carotid endarterectomy Neurons Magnetic resonance imaging Bisphosphonates Ethanol Stomach Cancer Occupational Therapy Cirrhosis Carbon Nanotube AIDS Hip Fracture Alcohol Consumption Drug-eluting Stents Ovarian Cancer Oxytocin Carbon Nanotubes Incontinence Population Growth Working Memory Hippocampus Fish Oil
See More: Science News Tags | |||||||||||||||||||||
|
Related Particle Accelerator Current Events and Particle Accelerator News Articles Intense heat killed the Universe's would-be galaxies, researchers say Our Milky Way galaxy only survived because it was already immersed in a large clump of dark matter which trapped gases inside it. Atomic physics study sets new limits on hypothetical new particles In a forthcoming Physical Review Letters article, a group of physicists at the University of Nevada, Reno are reporting a refined analysis of experiments on violation of mirror symmetry in atoms that sets new constraints on a hypothesized particle, the extra Z-boson. Particle physics study finds new data for extra Z-bosons and potential fifth force of nature The Large Hadron Collider is an enormous particle accelerator whose 17-mile tunnel straddles the borders of France and Switzerland. A group of physicists at the University of Nevada, Reno has analyzed data from the accelerator that could ultimately prove or disprove the possibility of a fifth force of nature. Genetic switch potential key to new class of antibiotics Researchers have determined the structure of a key genetic mechanism at work in bacteria, including some that are deadly to humans, in an important step toward the design of a new class of antibiotics. Fermilab collider experiments discover rare single top quark Scientists of the CDF and DZero collaborations at the Department of Energy's Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory have observed particle collisions that produce single top quarks. Research team co-led by UC Riverside physicist observes production of single-top-quarks A group of 28 scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, co-led by UC Riverside's Ann Heinson, has made the first observation of the production of single top quarks - an observation that resulted from proton-antiproton collisions measured by the DZero detector in Fermilab's Tevatron, the world's highest-energy particle collider. STFC Daresbury Laboratory's ALICE accelerates to 4 million volt milestone A major milestone has been achieved in the completion of the UK's next-generation particle accelerator, ALICE, which is set to produce an intense beam of light that will revolutionise the way in which accelerator based light source research facilities will be designed in the future. 21st century detective work reveals how ancient rock got off to a hot start A new technique using X-rays has enabled scientists to play 'detective' and solve the debate about the origins of a three billion year old rock fragment. Einstein's relativity survives neutrino test Physicists working to disprove "Lorentz invariance" -- Einstein's prediction that matter and massless particles will behave the same no matter how they're turned or how fast they go -- won't get that satisfaction from muon neutrinos, at least for the time being, says a consortium of scientists. U-M physicists' analysis leads to discovery of new particle University of Michigan physicists played a leading role in the discovery of a new particle, the Omega b baryon, which is an exotic relative of the proton. More Particle Accelerator Current Events and Particle Accelerator News Articles |
|||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||