 | Tuesday, November 8, 2005 |
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Tuesday, November 8
Wednesday, November 9 |
 Mostly Cloudy 62º/54º
Extended Forecast |
Secon Level 3 |
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Tuesday, November 8 - Tomato Bisque - Lemon Pepper Club - Burgundy Beef Tips - Baked Fish Creole over Rice - Grilled Chicken Caesar Wrap - Supreme - Rio Grande Taco Salads The Wilson Hall Cafe accepts Visa, Master Card, Discover and American Express at Cash Register #1. |
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Wednesday, November 9
Chez Leon Menu |
| Fermilab Today is online at: http://www.fnal.gov/today/ Send comments and suggestions to today@fnal.gov Fermilab Today archive Fermilab Today PDF Version Fermilab Result of the Week archive Fermilab Safety Tip of the Week archive Linear Collider News archive Fermilab Today classifieds Subscribe/Unsubscribe to |
| On a Roll: The Tevatron Breaks More Records |
| Last week, the Fermilab accelerator complex had its best performance so far. In addition to setting a peak luminosity record (Fermilab Today reported on Nov. 1), the Tevatron produced the highest integrated luminosity in a single week, achieving 21 inverse picobarns, the highest number of collisions per week so far. Also, the weekly antiproton production was the highest ever, exceeding 1500 mA of antiprotons. "It was a great week," said Bob Mau, head of Accelerator Operations, at a meeting on Monday afternoon. |
Fermilab Trees Tested in Emerald Ash Borer Survey |
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Fermilab ash trees recently were tested for the presence of an invasive beetle that is spreading across the Midwest. The Morton Arboretum tested some of the lab's trees as part of a northeastern Illinois survey for the emerald ash borer, an Asian beetle that has infested or killed more than 5 million ash trees in southeast Michigan. "I'm happy to say we didn't find any at Fermilab," said Morton Arboretum Research Assistant Jan Watson. Tests from sample trees in the nine surrounding counties are not all completed.
Emerald ash borer larvae feed in the inner bark of ash trees, prohibiting the trees from moving water and food and eventually killing them. Three of Fermilab's young ash trees were used for the Arboretum survey, which was funded by the USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service and the US Forest Service. The trees were girdled, dressed with a sticky substance to trap insects and monitored throughout the summer. In late October, Watson chopped down the trees and stripped their bark to look for emerald ash borer larvae and the serpentine tunnels they form in the inner wood. "Because this has been found in neighboring states, early detection of the emerald ash borer is needed in hopes of minimizing tree loss," she said.
The Arboretum gave Fermilab an emerald ash borer test kit to continue monitoring for the beetle. The lab will share the kit with the cities of Batavia, St. Charles and Geneva, said Bob Lootens, of Roads & Grounds. "It's important to work together to keep an eye out for these guys," he said. "I know that I could just make one phone call if something looks suspect here."
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| From PhysicsWeb, November Forum, 2005
Ian Glynn believes that inadequate textbooks are partly to blame for the steady decline in the number of pupils taking physics at school
About a year ago my 15-year-old granddaughter asked me to explain something in her physics homework. The previous time she had sought my help she had wanted to know how far individual electrons in the AC mains moved backwards and forwards; this time she was less demanding. But it was more than half a century since I had been a 15 year old doing physics homework, and having spent the bulk of my career as a research physiologist, I thought I ought to find out what 15 year olds are meant to learn today.
I therefore bought and read copies of the five GCSE physics textbooks that were on the shelves of two of Cambridge's biggest bookshops. These books are aimed at pupils in the two years before they take their GCSE exams at the age of 16. What I found may go some way to explaining why there has been a 35% decrease since 1991 in the number of pupils who go on to take A-level physics at schools in England, Wales and Northern Ireland.
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| The Power of "WE" | ||
Last Tuesday evening members of the Community Task Force were welcomed back
I was very encouraged by the seriousness of the discussion. We received wise advice from several community members. A shared view was that, were Fermilab to lose its facilities and not replace them with world-leading facilities, it would be a great loss for the entire region. At the end of the evening one member made the remark that when listening to the folks from Fermilab she had heard a lot of "we" while references to the community were to "they." She inferred that the laboratory viewed itself as separate from the community as if it had to ask permission from the community. In her view, however, Fermilab was part of the community. She suggested that we should not frame the discussion in terms of "we" and "they," but rather with only "WE." WE the members of this local community that includes Fermilab are working together for the future of our region. |
| NALWO Bench Dedication for Sue Mendelsohn Today
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In memory of Sue Mendelsohn, NALWO is presenting a bench
to the lab, which has been placed outside the Lederman Center. Mendelsohn, an employee of the Lederman Center and longtime secretary
of NALWO, Fermilab's women's organization, died last year on November 12
after a valiant fight with cancer. The bench was
made of teak and white oak by Sue's husband, Michael Church, of the
Accelerator Division.
Anyone who would like to remember Sue and her contributions to the lab, NALWO and the community, is invited to an informal ceremony to dedicate this special bench. It will be held in front of the Lederman Center, at 1 p.m. on Tuesday, November 8. In case of rain, the dedication will be postponed to 1 p.m. Thursday, November 10.
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November 4 - 7 - 4 stores provide 53 hours and 39 minutes of luminosity. - P1 suffers from vacuum bursts. - Recycler stash aborted.
Read the Current Accelerator Update |
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Scottish Country Dancing Scottish Country Dancing will meet Tuesday, November 8, at Kuhn Barn on the Fermilab site. Instruction begins at 7:30 p.m. and newcomers are always welcome. Most dances are fully taught and walked through, and you do not need to come with a partner. Info at 630-840-8194 or 630-584-0825 or folkdance@fnal.gov
International Folk Dancing |
