Fermilab TodayMonday, March 14, 2005  
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Monday, March 14
2:30 p.m. Particle Astrophysics Seminar - Curia II
Speaker: S. Ando, University of Tokyo
Title: Neutrino Probes of Extragalactic Supernovae
3:30 p.m. DIRECTOR'S COFFEE BREAK 2nd Flr X-Over
4:00 p.m. All Experimenters' Meeting - Curia II

Tuesday, March 15
3:30 p.m. DIRECTOR'S COFFEE BREAK - 2nd Flr X-Over
THERE WILL BE NO ACCELERATOR PHYSICS AND TECHNOLOGY SEMINAR TODAY

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Weather Partly Cloudy 37º/20º

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Secon Level 3

Cafeteria
Monday, March 14
Wisconsin Cheese Soup
Corned Beef Reuben $4.75
Chicken Provencale $3.75
Shepherd's Pie $3.75
BBQ Panini with Pepper Jack Cheese $4.75
Meat Lovers Pizzas $2.75
Kung Pao Chicken with Peanuts & Scallions $4.75

The Wilson Hall Cafe now accepts Visa, Master Card, Discover and American Express at Cash Register #1.

Wilson Hall Cafe Menu
Chez Leon is now open. Call x4512 to make your reservation.

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Director's Letter Today Explains Staff Reductions
Fermilab Director Michael Witherell will send a letter to all employees today,
Mike Witherell
Fermilab Director
Michael Witherell
discussed "The Budget
and Prospects for the
Future" at a series of
All Hands Meetings on
Feb. 17 in Ramsey
Auditorium.
describing the laboratory program that has been put in place for voluntary separations as part of the planned staff reduction.

All regular, active full-time and part-time employees who have passed their probation period are eligible for the voluntary separation. The "window" for taking part in the voluntary program is open from March 15 to April 29. Employees can obtain a packet of information starting March 15 from Human Resources on the 15th floor, from the Library on the 3rd floor, or online at http://lss.fnal.gov.

HR reps will be available for question-and-answer sessions in One West on March 16 from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m., and March 17 from 2 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. In addition, on March 21 at 1:30 p.m. in One West, a representative from TIAA-CREF will make a presentation and answer questions on retirement benefits at the lab.

Accelerator Update
March 9- March 11
- During this 48 hour period Operations established one store that provided the experiments with approximately 2 hours and 37 minutes of luminosity
- Tevatron plagued with quenches and aborts

Read the Current Accelerator Update
Read the Early Bird Report
View the Tevatron Luminosity Charts

In the News
From St. Charles Republican
City Council urges Congress to fully fund Fermilab
By Eric Walter
The Batavia City Council hopes the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory will not lose any funding, something proposed by President George W. Bush.

The president's Office of Management and Budget proposed reducing Fermilab's funding from the $308 million appropriated last year to $307.6 million, according to a fiscal year 2006 Congressional budget document from the Department of Energy, which oversees the Batavia facility. The budget cuts are part of the president's proposed 3.8-percent cut in overall science funding.
read more

From New Scientist, March 12, 2005
Evidence of dark energy missed 30 years ago
By Stuart Clark
The discovery in the 1990s that there could be some kind of mysterious dark energy that is accelerating the expansion of the universe came from studies of supernovae billions of light years away. Now, it turns out that the evidence for dark energy was there in our cosmic backyard all along, and that astronomers could have discovered it nearly 30 years ago.

It has been known since the late 1920s that the universe is expanding and that this so-called Hubble expansion is the dominant factor controlling the speed of galaxies in the distant universe. In 1972, Allan Sandage of the Carnegie Observatories in Pasadena, California, reasoned that in the nearby universe - where the expansion is at its slowest - the gravitational attraction between groups and clusters of galaxies should produce significant deviations in their velocities from the otherwise largely smooth speed of expansion. These deviations are called "peculiar velocities", but Sandage pointed out that galaxies in our vicinity - those lying just beyond our "Local Group" of the Milky Way and its immediate neighbours - showed abnormally low peculiar velocities.
read more

Safety Tip
Material Handling
Tote Handler
Tote Handler makes moving and dumping recycling bins an easy job in Technical Division.
As a general rule, particle physics is a science that employs big heavy components. Unfortunately for the people involved, the manual movement of heavy and awkward loads by lifting, carrying, pushing or pulling continues to account for a significant fraction of our injuries.

That is not to say our training and lifting devices have been ineffective. Back Works and Industrial Ergonomics are two courses specifically geared toward manual material handling. The former is required for workers whose jobs require heavy lifting and must be repeated every three years. Industrial Ergonomics training provides information on preventive measures for non-office cumulative trauma disorders.

Besides cranes and forklifts, Fermilab has numerous examples of devices that can reduce the stress of material handling. Two years ago, the Technical Division purchased a Tote Handler to ease the moving and dumping of their gray recycling bins (pictured). The Business Services Section has a drum grabber at the Railhead that fits onto a forklift to securely move 55 gal drums. In order to transfer loads weighing up to 500 pounds between floor levels at MI-12, the Accelerator Division uses a motor-driven stair-climber. This device is necessitated by the absence of cranes and elevators at this location, not to mention that a worker was hurt there while moving items by hand. The Accelerator and Technical Divisions also have special carts to assist the raising and lowering of gas cylinders used in welding apparatus.

If your job involves the handling of heavy or awkward loads, you are encouraged to explore options such as these with your supervisor or division/section ES&H organization.

Have a great day and let's work safely all week!
Safety Tip of the Week Archive

Announcements
Women's Personal Protection and Self Defense Spring Class
Due to its success, we will be offering another class session in the spring from April 6 to May 18. Classes are held in Kuhn Barn from 5:30-7:30PM. The cost is $35.00. This class is open to Fermilab women, their mothers and daughters, minimum age is 12, no maximum age. For more information and testimonials from past participants visit the Recreation Office website.

Fermilab Children's Summer Day Camp
Day Camp is offered in three, three-week sessions: Session I: June 13 - July 1, Session II: July 5- July 22, Session III: July 25 - August 12. The program is held in the lower level of the Kuhn Barn in the village from 7:30 AM - 5:30 PM. Admission is made through a lottery held on the last weekday in March. You can choose any or all of the sessions. The fee for each Day Camp session is $265.00 per camper. A $100.00 deposit per session per camper must accompany the registration form. Registrations will be accepted beginning March 1 until 5:00 PM on March 30. Admission is made through a lottery held on the last weekday in March. An information Booklet and registration form can be found on the Recreation Website, Recreation Office, Users Office and the Housing Office.

Upcoming Classes
March 15 - Access 2000 Intro
March 16 - Excel 2000 Intro
March 22 - Access 2000 Intermediate
March 23 - Excel 2000 Intermediate
March 29 & 30 - Behavioral Interviewing (two consecutive half-days)
April 5 - Access 2000 Advanced
more information

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