Director’s Corner 4 December 2008 Barry Barish Discussing the future — SLAC ICFA Seminar Visionary thinkers converged at SLAC for an ICFA Seminar (International Committee for Future Accelerators) on possible future projects for particle physics during the last week in October. This was the ninth such ICFA-sponsored seminar, held every three years with the expressed […]
From SLAC Today: Marx Modulator Begins Testing in End Station B
This week SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory moves one step closer to producing an innovative new piece of the International Linear Collider. The first-generation model of a new design for equipment that helps power the accelerator is moving from the SLAC Power Conversion Department to End Station B, where it will undergo long-term testing. The new […]
From SLAC Today: ICFA Sharpens Focus on the Energy Frontier
“Particle physics is at a crossroads,” said Chairperson Albrecht Wagner of the International Committee for Future Accelerators, in the opening moments of the ninth ICFA Seminar last Tuesday in Kavli Auditorium. “The Standard Model stands triumphant,” Wagner said, “yet incomplete.” Evidence from past and present particle accelerators supports the Standard Model of the fundamental particles […]
From SLAC Today: Bob Siemann Has Passed Away
From SLAC Today: symmetry Magazine launches new online format
The latest issue of symmetry launches the next phase of the magazine’s development. Our readers now use the magazine in different ways, and we are reaching a much larger audience. While readers are outspoken in wanting to keep the print magazine, many of them are now more comfortable reading online. Starting from this issue, we will […]
SiD detector concept meeting at SLAC
The SiD detector concept collaboration met at SLAC from January 28 to 30. This meeting was planned last October at the ALCPG07 meeting at Fermilab, as part of the preparation for the Letter of Intent (LOI). Graphic from an engineering study of SiD on beamline. (credit: Marco Oriunno, SLAC) After the news about budget reductions, […]
Congratulations Tor
Director’s Corner 23 August 2007 Barry Barish Congratulations Tor! For more than two decades now, SLAC has been pursuing R&D toward a TeV-scale linear collider. In the GDE, SLAC accelerator scientists played leading roles in almost all aspects of the ILC’s design effort that produced our Reference Design Report,. As we move into the future, […]
Getting the interaction point right
Like the rest of society, the ILC community is split into two categories: the early risers and the night owls. Workshop organiser Andrei Seryi considers himself a night owl. Nevertheless he is up at 5 and in the lab at 6 am many days per week these weeks, holding phone meetings with the rest of […]
From SLAC Today: Clearing Clouds
Clouds might be welcome during a drought, but you definitely don’t want them in your beam pipes. Researchers around the world are working out how to keep a section of the proposed International Linear Collider—the positron damping ring—clear of electron clouds. In curved sections of accelerators, such as a damping ring, the beam throws off […]
From SLAC Today: ILC Coupler Activities at SLAC
While other labs concentrate on developing superconducting cavities for the International Linear Collider (ILC), SLAC is focusing on the technology needed to power them. In addition to klystron, modulator and radio frequency (RF) distribution development, this effort includes a coupler program. A coupler is basically a coaxial transmission line that connects normal-conducting, air-filled, room-temperature waveguides […]