Fermilab Today

	Tuesday, Aug. 9, 2011

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Calendar

Have a safe day!

Tuesday, Aug. 9
10:30 a.m.
Research Techniques Seminar - Curia II
Speaker: Y. P. Prabhakara Rao and Rejeena Rani, Bharat Electronics, Ltd.
Title: Detector Development at Bharat Electronics
3:30 p.m.
DIRECTOR'S COFFEE BREAK - 2nd Flr X-Over
THERE WILL BE NO ACCELERATOR PHYSICS AND TECHNOLOGY SEMINAR TODAY

Wednesday, Aug. 10
3:30 p.m.
DIRECTOR'S COFFEE BREAK - 2nd Flr X-Over
4 p.m.
Fermilab Colloquium - One West
Speaker: Seth Darling, Argonne National Laboratory
Title: The Energy Challenge: The Current and Future Role of Solar Energy

Click here for NALCAL,
a weekly calendar with links to additional information.

Upcoming conferences

Campaigns

Take Five

Weather

Chance of thunderstorms 82°/58°

Extended Forecast
Weather at Fermilab

Current Security Status

Secon Level 3

Wilson Hall Cafe

Tuesday, Aug. 9

- 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

Chez Leon

Wednesday, Aug. 10
Lunch
- Spring roll salad w/ red curry shrimp
- Pineapple flan

Friday, Aug. 12
Dinner
Closed

Chez Leon Menu
Call x3524 to make your reservation.

Generator plaque ceremony

On Aug. 8, representatives from Fermilab's Directorate, the DOE Fermi Site Office, FESS and general contractor Pandecon Inc. celebrated the completion of the generator project in Wilson Hall with the dedication of a plaque. The generator, which will provide electricity to Wilson Hall in the event of a power outage, was completed with funding from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Photo: Cindy Arnold

Milestone

Nelly Stanfield retires after 32 years of dedication

Nelly Stanfield

There will be a farewell party in Nelly Stanfield's honor today from 1 to 3 p.m. on the second floor crossover in Wilson Hall.

Nelly Stanfield is starting her next adventure—but she’s not planning it out. After 32 years at Fermilab, Stanfield, retiring on Aug. 15, said it’s time to be carefree.

“I’m going to travel. Austin and Denver are up first," Stanfield said. "After that, it’s open.” She’s hitting the road with her husband Ken, deputy director emeritus of Fermilab. “I have a lot places I want to visit.”

Stanfield is excited about her future, but she’s sad to leave Fermilab. Starting in 1979, Stanfield made her way through neutrino experiments, PPD, AD and CD. She spent the past 15 years working on information technology, helping to keep the science databases for CDF and DZero running 24 hours a day, seven days a week. She is now leader of the database enterprise foundations group.

“I feel like I grew up here,” Stanfield said. “The people at Fermilab invested their time in me, and really allowed me to grow.” Stanfield earned her four-year degree as well as her master’s degree while working at Fermilab.

In 1983, Stanfield worked in Roger Dixon’s office. Now the head of the Accelerator Division, Dixon was then the head of the Experimental Areas Department of the Research Division.

“Nelly was the youngest of the group in that office. She was very lively, and she has the personality to make things happen,” Dixon said. “She was very good at her job.”

After working in the mechanical support group of AD, she moved to CD where she reported to Vicky White, the head of the Computing Division, for many years.

“Nelly has been a shining star in everything she has done throughout her career at Fermilab," White said. "We will sorely miss her energy, good humor and dedication.”

Julie Trumbo, the group leader of enterprise applications, worked as Stanfield’s supervisor for the past 10 years. She describes Stanfield as professional, dependable and a good friend.

—Ashley WennersHerron

In the News

Antiproton ring found around Earth

From New Scientist, Aug. 4, 2011

Antiprotons appear to ring the Earth, confined by the planet's magnetic field lines. The antimatter, which may persist for minutes or hours before annihilating with normal matter, could in theory be used to fuel ultra-efficient rockets of the future.

Charged particles called cosmic rays constantly rain in from space, creating a spray of new particles - including antiparticles - when they collide with particles in the atmosphere. Many of these become trapped inside the Van Allen radiation belts, two doughnut-shaped zones around the planet where charged particles spiral around the Earth's magnetic field lines.

Satellites had already discovered positrons - the antimatter partners of electrons - in the radiation belts. Now a spacecraft has detected antiprotons, which are nearly 2000 times as massive.

Heavier particles take wider paths when they spiral around the planet's magnetic lines, and weaker magnetic field lines also lead to wider spirals. So relatively heavy antiprotons travelling around the weak field lines in the outer radiation belt were expected to take loops so big they would quickly get pulled into the lower atmosphere, where they would annihilate with normal matter. The inner belt was thought to have fields strong enough to trap antiprotons, and indeed that is where they have been found.

Director's Corner

Solving problems at Fermilab

Fermilab Director Pier Oddone

We are approaching the end of the fiscal year. All machines have run well, despite many difficult weather-related issues this summer. The heat and humidity have been extreme, limiting our ability to cool many components. The thunderstorms brought additional problems. A large power failure about a week ago brought the complex down hard. It took a large effort to bring accelerators and detectors back up to full production.

The Tevatron has already produced more than 2.2 inverse femtobarns of data this year, and it has a shot at having another record year. The experiments continue to publish important results, and they will dominate the search for a Higgs boson at the lowest mass range for another year. Indirect measurements suggest the Standard Model Higgs - if it exists - ought to be in this low-mass range. Analysis of the data sample will continue for a few more years. In the relay race to reach new discoveries at the energy frontier, the Tevatron will have done its leg brilliantly.

Another area that has been quite difficult for us has been the NuMI neutrino beam, where target failures have affected the MINOS and MINERvA programs. Based on the lifetime of early targets, we expected the number of spare targets on hand would carry the program through next year. However, the most recent targets failed quickly, and we ran out of spares. We made heroic efforts to recover the first two targets ever used in the beamline, and we are now running with one of them for a few more weeks while we prepare new modified targets. Recycling the early targets was no easy feat since the used targets are highly activated. It continues to be a learning experience for us, in particular the need to have command of this difficult technology at Fermilab rather than relying entirely on outside suppliers.

In its full run-through today, despite these target problems, MINOS has collected a total of more than 12x10²⁰ protons on target. MiniBooNE, which profits whenever the NuMI beamline is down, is up to 14x10²⁰ protons on target. These are formidable data sets and are producing exciting results for the summer conferences.

As usual, the ingenuity and dedication of Fermilab staff was on display during this difficult period for both the Tevatron and the neutrino programs. Nothing shows the strength of our lab better than when we are challenged with nasty problems. This year has been no exception.

Accelerator Update

August 5-8

- Five stores provided ~20.25 hours of luminosity
- Tevatron cryo systems and vacuum prepared
- Tevatron quenched during turn on
- Store 8954 aborted due to loss of power to control rack
- Pelletron problems continued to delay it use

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

Announcements

Windows 7 Introduction class - Aug. 9

NALWO - Bus trip to the Museum of Science & Industry - Aug. 11

SciTech summer camps - through Aug. 12

G.E.M.S. summer workshop - Aug. 13

Bohr and Heisenberg at Elgin Arts Theatre - Sept. 16 through 25

Fermi Kiki-Do Martial Arts session - Aug. 15

Fermilab blood drive Aug. 15-16

Fermilab prairie quadrat study - Aug. 16 and 20

Exterior and interior window washing - through Aug. 19

University of Chicago Tuition Remission Program - deadline Aug. 19