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LHC accelerates its first "atoms"
Protons might be the Large Hadron Collider's bread and butter, but that doesn't mean it can't crave more exotic tastes from time to time. On Wednesday, 25 July, for the very first time, operators injected not just atomic nuclei but lead "atoms" containing a single electron into the LHC. This was one of the first proof-of-principle tests for a new idea called the Gamma Factory, part of CERN's Physics Beyond Colliders project.
"We're investigating new ideas of how we could broaden the present CERN research programme and infrastructure," says Michaela Schaumann, an LHC Engineer in Charge. "Finding out what's possible is the first step."
During normal operation, the LHC produces a steady stream of proton–proton collisions, then smashes together atomic nuclei for about four weeks just before the annual winter shutdown. But for a handful of days a year, accelerator physicists get to try something completely new during periods of machine development. Previously, they accelerated xenon nuclei in the LHC and tested other kinds of partially stripped lead ions in the SPS accelerator.
[...] Physicists are doing these tests to see if the LHC could one day operate as a gamma-ray factory. In this scenario, scientists would shoot the circulating "atoms" with a laser, causing the electron to jump into a higher energy level. As the electron falls back down, it spits out a particle of light. In normal circumstances, this particle of light would not be very energetic, but because the "atom" is already moving at close to the speed of light, the energy of the emitted photon is boosted and its wavelength is squeezed (due to the Doppler effect).
Not to be confused with mere lead ions/nuclei.
Also at Popular Mechanics.
(Score: 2) by tfried on Wednesday August 01 2018, @07:44AM (1 child)
Indeed. It would be rather interesting to know, why the submitter thinks, these are "not to be confused with mere lead ions".
To in fact, either way I don't get what exactly is the "all new" aspect in this story. The summary states:
But a bit later:
So for the very first time, they are doing .., what? Perhaps the novelty has more to do with that laser shooting thing described in the last paragraph of the summary. That does sound sort of cool, although I have no clue, whether it would be a "new" idea.
Besides, no mention of sharks, yet?
(Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Wednesday August 01 2018, @09:53AM
This gamma factory concept is novel because to get the sort of high energy gammas you need a big Lorentz boost i.e. you need the LHC high energy. Using a very highly ionized high atomic number nucleus I guess means that the energy of the gammas in the Centre of Mass is already keV scale.