Page 24 - EUREKA! Fall 2017

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By Dan Rubinstein
Photos by Justin Tang and CERN
Detector Doctors A7,000-tonne ATLAS detector
t 46 metres long, 25 metres
high and 25 metres wide, the
is the largest particle detector ever
built. It’s one of two general-purpose
detectors and one of four major
Radiation is killing a crucial part of the ATLAS experiments at the Large Hadron
Collider (LHC) particle accelerator, a
27-kilometre ring of superconducting
experiment, and a team from Carleton is magnets buried beneath the French- phase of research at the LHC begins. The experiment is being conducted
Swiss border near Geneva.
ATLAS played a central role in the
playing a key role in the response 2013 Nobel Prize-winning discovery
of the Higgs boson particle, a
breakthrough that confirms the
24 science.carleton.ca
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Standard Model of physics and helps CERN. “We knew we would have to
us understand how the basic building replace it sooner or later. Now the goal
blocks of the universe acquire mass. is to replace it by 2023. It’s the ‘guts’
Scientists are using the detector’s of the whole detector. Without it, we
precise measurements to improve our cannot do the physics.”
understanding of the fundamental
constituents of matter, to explore the The scale and complexity of the LHC
fundamental forces of nature and to and ATLAS experiment are truly
search for new physics phenomena impressive. Running the LHC requires
that don’t mesh with the Standard more energy per second than it took to
Model. But the ATLAS inner tracker — sail the 342-metre-long USS Enterprise
the first part of the module to see the — a recently decommissioned U.S.
decay products of the high-energy Navy aircraft carrier that is the longest
collisions between particles, and the warship ever built — at 55 kilometres an
largest component of ATLAS — is hour. CERN is such a major consumer
starting to deteriorate. of power, in fact, that the accelerator
CERN, the European Organization doesn’t run during the winter; people
for Nuclear Research, knew this would who live in the area need that electricity
happen when it conceived of ATLAS to heat their homes.
in the 1980s and turned the detector As the CERN website explains,
on for the first time in 2008. The ATLAS “consists of six different
collision area at the heart of ATLAS detecting subsystems wrapped
is one of the most radioactive places concentrically in layers around the
on the planet, and that takes a toll on collision point to record the trajectory,
the highly sensitive equipment used momentum and energy of particles,
and charge of electrically-charged identified and measured…. Over
to measure “the direction, momentum
allowing them to be individually
a billion particle interactions take
particles produced in each proton-
place in the ATLAS detector every
proton collision.” Carleton physicists
simultaneous telephone conversations
working on the ATLAS experiment
such as Gerald Oakham have been second, a data rate equivalent to 20
since its inception, and now a multi- held by every person on the earth.
Only one in a million collisions are
disciplinary team at the university have
a hand in the upgrade project that will flagged as potentially interesting
replace the inner tracker as the next
and recorded for further study.”
by about 3,000 scientists from 180
“The inner tracker will die a natural
death at some point in the next institutions in 38 countries — “one of
the largest collaborative efforts ever
decade,” says Prof. Thomas Koffas,
attempted in science.”
who came to Carleton in 2011 after
seven years on the research staff at The $370-million ATLAS-ITk (inner
science.carleton.ca 25