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Have a safe day!
Tuesday, April 19
3:30 p.m.
DIRECTOR'S COFFEE BREAK - 2nd Flr X-Over
4 p.m.
Accelerator Physics and Technology Seminar - One West
Speaker: Anna Grassellino, TRIUMF
Title: Investigation of Field Dependent Losses in Superconducting
Radio Frequency Niobium Resonators
Wednesday, April 20
2 p.m.
LHC Physics Center Topic of the Week Seminar - Sunrise, WH11NE
Speaker: Charles Plager, University of California, Los Angeles
Title: Top Quark Physics: Past, Present, and Future – Part 1
3:30 p.m.
DIRECTOR'S COFFEE BREAK - 2nd Flr X-Over
4 p.m.
Fermilab Colloquium - One West
Speaker: Neil Shubin, University of Chicago
Title: Fossils, Genes and the Origin of Organs
Click here for NALCAL,
a weekly calendar with links to additional information.
Upcoming conferences
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Tuesday, April 12
- Breakfast: Bagel sandwich
- Golden broccoli cheese soup
- Fish & chips
- Coconut crusted tilapia
- Burgundy beef tips
- La grande sandwich
- Assorted sliced pizza
- Chicken fajitas
Wilson Hall Cafe Menu
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Wednesday, April 20
Lunch
- Masala poached mahi mahi
- Gingered mango cucumber raita
- Coconut rice
- Cinnamon crepes w/ fresh berries
Friday, April 22
- Closed
Chez Leon Menu
Call x3524 to make your reservation.
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Electricity restored in Soudan laboratory
On Saturday, April 16, electricians installed a new power cable in the lower part of the Soudan mine shaft and restored full electric power to the Soudan Underground Laboratory, located a half mile underground in northern Minnesota. The laboratory only had limited power after a fire occurred in the mine’s access shaft in March (see this website). The laboratory, which is managed by the University of Minnesota, houses two large particle physics experiments, MINOS and CDMS.
With power fully restored, Soudan laboratory management is preparing for a general cleanup of the laboratory to remove the debris that was brought in by fire-fighting foam that covered parts of the MINOS and CDMS caverns. Repairs continue in the access shaft of the mine. In March, first inspections of the MINOS and CDMS experiments had revealed no significant damage (see Fermilab Today, March 31, 2011.
“This week, work in the underground laboratory will focus on finishing the assessment of the MINOS detector, beginning with checks of control-system electronics and drying out the cables of the magnet coil,” said Dan Bauer, Fermilab operations manager for experiments at Soudan. “We will also conduct final tests of the CDMS electronics.”
With the heating and air-conditioning system back on, Bauer expects the laboratory to return to normal temperature and humidity levels within a couple of days.
--Kurt Riesselmann
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Rain date for today's native tree planting - May 3
The native-tree planting originally scheduled for 11:30 a.m. today has been postponed due to inclement weather. The event will now take place on May 3. Tuesday, May 3, is also the date of the annual Arbor Day tree planting. |
Antiproton Source:
Transition ahead
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Wide-lens photo of the Debuncher and Accumulator rings in the Antiproton Source. Photo: Reidar Hahn, Fermilab. |
The Antiproton Source at Fermilab has been doing yeoman service for more than two decades. Even after the Tevatron has been switched off, scientists think that the Antiproton Source's equipment could be a valuable asset for future experiments.
Built in the early 1980s, the Antiproton Source began operation in 1985. It neatly solved a key problem: how to send two beams of particles through the Tevatron in opposite directions with only one ring of magnets. The solution: use particles with opposite electric charge. The Tevatron magnets guide the positively charged protons clockwise through the ring of magnets, while the negatively charged antiprotons travel counterclockwise through the same ring.
This technique was based on the success of a similar system at CERN's SPS accelerator. (The Large Hadron Collider, which accelerates two proton beams, uses two sets of magnets.)
Gathering enough antiprotons for the Tevatron is quite a trick. Since they’re not found readily in nature, every antiproton must be manufactured, collected and prepared for transfer into the Tevatron. That's where the Antiproton Source comes in. Every 2.2 seconds, a beam of protons from the Main Injector strikes a nickel target, and a lithium lens focuses the emerging antiprotons so that they can be guided into the Debuncher ring, which is where the delicate process of cooling starts. The cooling process reduces the antiprotons’ spread in direction and speed so that the particles can form a compact beam. The beam then is transferred to the Accumulator ring, where more cooling takes place. Since 2005, the final cooling occurs in the Recycler ring with the aid of an intense electron beam.
Read more
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Sustainable Acquisition training is coming soon
Fermilab has developed the Sustainable Acquisition program to support Fermilab’s commitment to an executive order regarding federal leadership in environmental, energy and economic performance. To comply with the order, Fermilab must ensure, through sustainable acquisition, that 95 percent of actions in contracts, including task and delivery orders for products and services, are energy efficient, water efficient, bio-based, environmentally preferable, non-ozone depleting, contain recycled content or are non-toxic or less-toxic alternatives.
The new training is one aspect of Fermilab’s Pollution Prevention and Waste Minimization program and will help Fermilab to reduce its impact on the environment.
The training is a short (12-minute), online presentation that explains employees’ responsibilities in regards to sustainable acquisition. The training also introduces employees to the SA webpage, which is a useful tool for product research. |
Neutrons could test Newton's gravity and string theory
From BBC News, April 17, 2011
A pioneering technique using subatomic particles known as neutrons could give microscopic hints of extra dimensions or even dark matter, researchers say.
The idea rests on probing any minuscule variations in gravity as it acts on slow-moving neutrons in a tiny cavity.
A Nature Physics report outlines how neutrons were made to hop from one gravitational quantum state to another.
Read more
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The story continues
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Fermilab Director Pier Oddone
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The Continuing Resolution enacted last week for the remainder of this fiscal year contains cuts that amount to approximately $38 billion compared to the FY10 budget, the current level of government spending. The cuts to the DOE Office of Science represent about 1 percent of its FY10 budget but are larger when compared to the proposed President’s budget for FY11. Nevertheless, these cuts are much smaller than the cuts proposed several months ago in the House. The relatively small cuts to the DOE Office of Science in the final bill reflect the role that the DOE Office of Science plays in the future of our country.
At this time I cannot tell you exactly what the situation will be at Fermilab for the rest of the year since we have not received the final bottom line for the year from the DOE Office of Science. We should receive the number in the next few days. I would expect that we will be able to run the Tevatron as planned and that we will have an orderly transition after the Tevatron is shut down at the end of September.
We are very appreciative of the support we have received from our neighbors, the mayors of various surrounding communities, the business and scientific communities and the many citizens who have voiced the need for science and innovation in this country. We are especially appreciative of the support we’ve received from our legislators throughout the last few months. Senator Richard Durbin has played a leadership role in the budget negotiations and has eloquently articulated the value of the national laboratories. Our Representative Randy Hultgren has visited the laboratory several times and I have met with him in DC several more times to provide information on the impact that various budget scenarios would have. He has been a strong supporter of Fermilab in his speeches and in interactions with his colleagues. We also received support from Senator Mark Kirk. (On a side note: I will be co-chairing his Energy Advisory Board with Dan Ustian, the CEO of Navistar.) Of course it has taken many more legislators both in Illinois and throughout the country to recognize the values of the Office of Science laboratories as represented in the budget compromise.
This concludes the first chapter in the debates about how to bring the federal deficit under control. It is soon to be followed by the much more serious debates on the FY12 budget. They will have to look at all aspects of both government income and outlays, and we again could be in the line of fire. Continuing the excellent performance of our laboratory in all domains will be our best defense.
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April 15-18
- Five stores provided ~61.5 hours of luminosity
- Pbar personnel work on their dump LCW system
- NuMI beam intensity lowered to 1.4E13 due to target LCW leak
- MiniBooNE beam intensity lowered due to MiniBooNE and MI beam permit trips
*The integrated luminosity for the period from 4/11/11 to 4/18/11 was 36.6 inverse picobarns. NuMI took 4.9E18 of beam during this same time period.
Read the Current Accelerator Update
Read the Early Bird Report
View the Tevatron Luminosity Charts
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Rain likely
