Director’s Corner 1 July 2010 Barry Barish Celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of the laser This year we are celebrating the 50th anniversary of Theodore Maiman’s demonstration of the first working laser at Hughes Research Laboratory in 1960. The laser has become so common that what began as an acronym describing a physics phenomenon (LASER for […]
Flexibility in the ILC design
Director’s Corner 24 June 2010 Ewan Paterson Flexibility in the ILC design Today’s issue features a Director’s Corner by Ewan Paterson, member of the Global Design Effort Executive Committee.In a new large accelerator complex which will take years to get approved and constructed, one must maintain some degree of flexibility in its design as many […]
Superconducting RF cavity industrialisation
Director’s Corner 17 June 2010 Barry Barish Superconducting RF cavity industrialisation Producing high gradient superconducting radiofrequency (SCRF) cavities that meet our demanding performance goals, are affordable and can be produced by industry represents one of the largest challenges on the way to making a solid project proposal for the ILC. The present 500-GeV ILC design […]
The latest ILC technical review
Director’s Corner 10 June 2010 Barry Barish The latest ILC technical review I periodically write about aspects of the review process for our work in the ILC Global Design Effort. Since such reviews represent checkpoints on our progress, independent assessments of our work, and also a mechanism for constructive advice, I feel that sharing some […]
Attracting women into science
Director’s Corner 3 June 2010 Barry Barish Attracting women into science Why don’t more women become scientists? Although there have been growing numbers of women going into the life sciences, the physical sciences lag woefully behind. Clearly, the health and advancement of science depends critically on attracting the best and the brightest minds into the […]
Baseline Assessment Workshops
Director’s Corner 27 May 2010 Barry Barish Baseline Assessment Workshops Over the past months we have developed a process for assessing the major changes to the ILC baseline that were proposed last year. The motivation for the proposed changes is to evolve the ILC design to better optimise cost to performance to risk, with special […]
International Linear Collider Steering Committee confronts ILC R&D support issues
Director’s Corner 20 May 2010 Barry Barish International Linear Collider Steering Committee confronts ILC R&D support issues Scientific oversight for the ILC Global Design Effort is provided by the International Linear Collider Steering Committee (ILCSC), a subcommittee of the International Committee for Future Accelerators (ICFA). The most recent meeting of the ILCSC, chaired by Jon […]
Keeping ILC costs under control
Director’s Corner 13 May 2010 Barry Barish Keeping ILC costs under control The cost of the project "next-generation linear collider" ILC has been a major issue, ever since we began our ILC design work in 2005. The scale of the project and the costs of the ILC are roughly equivalent to the largest present-day science […]
Cost and cost growth in science megaprojects
Director’s Corner 6 May 2010 Barry Barish Cost and cost growth in science megaprojects Many of the most important science questions facing us in the 21st century require developing very large facilities. Certainly, small-scale science is very much alive and innovative single-investigator research continues to produce many important discoveries. But, the trend towards larger science […]
ATF2 enters the nanometre world
Director’s Corner 29 April 2010 Toshiaki Tauchi ATF2 enters the nanometre world Today’s issue features a Director’s Corner from Toshiaki Tauchi, a member of the EC. The ATF2 collaboration has recently succeeded to obtain vertical beam size of less than one micrometre and consequently has now entered into the nanometre world in the final focus […]