Rika Takahashi | 17 March 2011As many people in the world already know, Japan is currently dealing with its worst disaster: Japan's biggest earthquake on record and the fourth largest in history. Thousands of lives have been lost. Tens of thousands people are forced to evacuate and live without basic necessities. Hundreds of thousands are still missing.
Category: Feature | Tagged: earthquake, Japan, KEK
Toshiaki Tauchi | 17 March 2011A huge 9.0-magnitude earthquake descended on us at about 14:46 on 11 March 2011 Japan standard time. The ATF (accelerator test facility) was operating for ATF2 beam-tuning and we were going to have a background study for the interaction point beam size monitor.
Category: Feature | Tagged: ATF, ATF2, earthquake, Japan, KEK
10 March 2011Experiments in particle physics have decades of experience as thoroughly international collaborations. Can the giant accelerators that power these experiments make the leap to go global as well? The global physics community has kept the lessons of the Superconducting Super Collider and the LHC in mind while planning for the next international accelerator project. This time, countries are working together from the beginning and physicists have already demonstrated this attitude in developing future accelerators. Read more in Symmetry Magazine.
Category: Feature | Tagged: CERN, future accelerators, global collaboration, LHC, Superconducting Super Collider
Elizabeth Clements | 17 February 2011Sure, particle physics machines are highly functional beasts, but their visual allure also becomes clear in the photographs from the first Global Particle Physics Photowalk, soon to be on exhibit around the world. Learn more about the photowalk.
Category: Feature | Tagged: particle physics, photography, photowalk
Rika Takahashi | 9 December 2010Designing and fabricating an optimal accelerating cavity is not so simple. There are two important parameters scientists are looking for: the gradient of 35 megavolts per meter (MV/m) and the quality factor (Q0) of greater than 0.8×10^10. A Japanese cavity now fulfilled those requirements for the first time at a test which took place at the Superconducting radiofrequency Test Facility (STF) at KEK, adding momentum towards future mass production.
Category: Feature | Tagged: accelerating gradient, cavity gradient, KEK, Kyoto camera, nine-cell cavity, quality factor, STF
2 December 2010The "What is it?" image of last week's ILC NewsLine is a picture-perfect example of why we now often call the calorimeter prototypes for the ILC "imaging calorimeters". To start with the solution, if you quickly want to know if you got it right: The picture shows three different types of particles in the CALICE tungsten hadron calorimeter prototype. From left to right, they are an electron, a muon and a pion. The images come from the recent test beam at CERN.
Category: Feature | Tagged: CALICE, event display
Leah Hesla | 2 December 2010To see one example of tunnel safety done right, scientists and engineers in the linear collider community took a tour of the Mont Blanc tunnel earlier this autumn. The road tunnel, an 11.6-kilometre thoroughfare that connects France and Italy, is a model of safety in civil engineering.
Category: Feature | Tagged: CFS, conventional facilities and siting, tunnel
Rika Takahashi | 24 November 2010What will happen when the ILC is built? One hopes discoveries will change the way we see the universe. It will answer the questions about what the universe is made of. And maybe it will help generate new Nobel Prize winners...
Category: Feature | Tagged: ILC site, Japan
