The Large Hadron Collider sets new world record

CERN just issued a press release announcing that the Large Hadron Collider is now the world's highest energy particle accelerator. Over the weekend the LHC accelerated beams of protons to an energy of 1.18 TeV, breaking the previous world record of 0.98 TeV that had been held by Fermilab since 2001.

Text of CERN press release:

LHC sets new world record

Geneva, 30 November 2009. CERN's Large Hadron Collider has today become the world's highest energy particle accelerator, having accelerated its twin beams of protons to an energy of 1.18 TeV in the early hours of the morning. This exceeds the previous world record of 0.98 TeV, which had been held by the US Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory's Tevatron collider since 2001. It marks another important milestone on the road to first physics at the LHC in 2010.

"We are still coming to terms with just how smoothly the LHC commissioning is going," said CERN Director General Rolf Heuer. "It is fantastic. However, we are continuing to take it step by step, and there is still a lot to do before we start physics in 2010. I'm keeping my champagne on ice until then."

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Read the story by the Associated Press.

How to turn on the Compact Muon Solenoid detector

The 13,800-ton Cosmic Muon Solenoid detector in August 2008 before it was closed by construction crews.

When two proton bunches traveling in opposite directions at close to the speed of light first met on Nov. 23 within the Compact Muon Solenoid detector at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN, 100 million detection elements were ready to record.

The trickle of collisions recorded so far at CMS will gradually increase to a flood as LHC operators ramp up the collision energy to 7 trillion electron volts. Scientists expect this to generate a data stream of about 100 megabytes per second.

Before detection equipment could record any data from those first collisions, scientists actually had to turn the detector on. Read on to find out how hundreds of scientists and maintenance personnel power up the CMS detector.

First step: perform maintenance

The size and complexity of modern detectors makes it difficult for scientists to find defective or malfunctioning parts until they have thoroughly tested the whole detector. Because of these challenges, detectors often have a breaking-in period with crews performing the most maintenance after the first run. The nine-day operational period in 2008, although brief, gave CMS scientists an adequate glimpse of the detector, allowing them to perform most of the maintenance associated with a first run.

"During the first operational period, things move in the magnetic field and you really have to understand how they move," said Fermilab's Jeff Spalding, project manager for the hadron calorimeter sub-detector. "When you open the detector you have to inspect and look for any sign of movement."

During the initial testing period, maintenance crews located and repaired minor leaks in the cooling system and adjusted some of the mounting to account for the effects of the 3.8 Tesla magnetic field, Spalding said. Crews turned on and tested individual parts of the detector as they performed maintenance so if there were problems, they could find out before reassembling the detector.

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— Chris Knight

Physical inventory off to a good start

The Tune IT Up team will post this sign in your office area before they come by for a physical inventory.

On behalf of the Tune IT Up team, I would like to thank the employees and users who have helped make the launch of the Tune IT Up physical inventory a success. Check out the milestones page on the Tune IT Up site to view our progress.

Contractors from the Kemtah Group IT organization report that Fermilab employees and users consistently have asked to see their Fermilab IDs before allowing them access to their computers. Several employees also have called the Service Desk to verify the identity of contractors, pictured here.

The inventory visits tend to last about 15 minutes per laptop or desktop.

The Tune IT Up team will notify managers and system administrators before visiting each area of the laboratory and will display the sign pictured above the day before they arrive. If you will not be present during the contractors' visit to your area, you can reschedule by opening a Service Desk ticket. We will continue to visit Mac, Linux and Windows machines through the end of the calendar year.

If you have any questions about the inventory, please submit a question to the Tune IT Up team or call the Service Desk at x2345.

Thanks again for your cooperation and for helping to make this a safe, efficient process that will improve cybersecurity across the laboratory.

— Mark Kaletka, Tune IT Up

Energy push spurs shift
in U.S. science

From The Wall Street Journal, Nov. 25, 2009

The Obama administration's push to solve the nation's energy problems, a massive federal program that rivals the Manhattan Project, is spurring a once-in-a-generation shift in U.S. science.

The government's multibillion-dollar push into energy research is reinvigorating 17 giant U.S.-funded research facilities, from the Oak Ridge National Laboratory here to the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California. After many years of flat budgets, these labs are ramping up to develop new electricity sources, trying to build more-efficient cars and addressing climate change.

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