UChicago introduces Collaborative Initiative

The University of Chicago announced today a new program to initiate new projects that provide the basis for future collaborative research with Fermilab.

"I am pleased to announce a new program of Strategic Collaborative Initiatives designed to provide support for collaborative research projects between University of Chicago faculty and Fermilab scientists/engineers," wrote Donald Levy, Vice President for Research and National Laboratories at the University of Chicago, in an email to scientists.

Proposals must include at least one applicant from each institution. Proposal budgets should be in the range of $50k-$100k for one year. The deadline for the first round of proposals is June 30, 2007. Support for ongoing work, or work being performed mainly by one of the principal investigators, will not be considered.

For more information on the program and how to apply, please read the announcement (pdf file).

Nobel winner George Smoot to speak at Users meeting

George Smoot

On Wednesday, June 6, a much admired man will talk among us. Nobel Prize winning astrophysicist and cosmologist George Smoot will speak as part of Fermilab's annual Users' meeting.

Titled "Relics of Creation: The Big Bang, the COBE Satellite and the Cosmic Microwave Background" Smoot said his talk will detail "the events leading to the study of CMB and the discovery and utilization of CMB anisotropies to understand the structure of space time and the contents of the universe."

"I hope people will see that we have made very substantial progress toward making a model of the universe's beginning and evolution and have it checked substantially with observations that give us details and demonstrate our understanding of the universe," said Smoot.

Smoot said he was last at Fermilab five years ago for an education meeting and a discussion of a PBS show. This year's visit may not involve any television opportunities, but Smoot said he is looking forward to returning to the lab to connect with his Fermilab colleagues and glean an understanding of Fermilab's efforts in the increasingly unified fields of cosmology and particle physics.

Smoot, who has been affiliated with Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory since 1970, is famous for his research on cosmic background radiation, which is thought to be the relic of the Big Bang's intense heat. He and John C. Mather were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2006 for measuring spectrum and anisotropy of the cosmic microwave background radiation. He is a professor of physics at the University of California, Berkeley and was awarded the Einstein Medal in 2003.

Other speakers at the Users' meeting include Norman Ramsey, professor of physics at Harvard University and former president of Universities Research Association, Inc. Fermilab pioneers Ned Goldwasser, Fermilab's founding deputy director, and James Sanford, first chair of the NAL Users Organization in 1967 and Fermilab's former associate director for program planning, will speak Wednesday afternoon. Smoot will speak at 8:00 p.m. on June 6. Tickets for his talk and more information on the Users' meeting can be located on the Users' meeting web site.

--Rhianna Wisniewski

From The Hindu
May 28, 2007

Searching for the God particle

Line and engineered to one-billionth of a metre accuracy, the $6bn, 27km circular proton accelerator deep beneath the Swiss-French border is the world's largest machine. And it's been built to uncover the smallest fragments of the cosmos. Robin McKie travels to Geneva to meet the scientists determined to prove the existence of the God particle.

Physicist David Evans has an unusual take on the $6bn underground particle accelerator he is helping to complete on the Swiss-French border outside Geneva. 'If it works, we will have built the most complex machine in history,' says the Birmingham University researcher. 'If it doesn't, we will have assembled the world's most expensive piece of modern art.' These sentiments suggest a certain nervousness among Europe's scientific elite as their great project reaches fruition - though most researchers say they are confident of success. They insist that when Europe's Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is switched on in November, it will hum into life as expected. Beams of protons, one of the key constituents of an atom's nucleus, will be hurtled at colossal velocities around the machine's 27km circular tunnel and made to smash into each other.

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