The Optimist (Abilene, Tex.), Vol. 82, No. 41, Ed. 1, Wednesday, February 16, 1994 Page: 3 of 6
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Physics
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Science's art of smashing atoms
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By Mark Houston
Accent Page Editor
Photo couftny of Of Doruld htnhowtr
Fermilab main building
The high-rise building marks the center of the Fermi National
Accelerator Labratory in Batavla III. Since 1988 the Department
of Physics has collaborated with 35 scientists from across the
nation in an experiment to monitor the smallest units of matter
quarks.
T cautiful is a relative
J j Nevertheless Dr.
V-V- Donald hcnliowcr al-
ways thought smashing atoms was
beautiful.
"I was always a tinkcrcr I like to
know how things work" the assis-
tant professor of physics said. "I
would take anything apart
motors pickups cars tractors
and usually get it back together.
"This is the ultimate tinkering"
he continued. "I'm taking apart
atoms protons and neutrons to find
out how they work at the smallest
level."
Since 1988 the Department of
Physics collaborated with 35 scien-
tists from across the nation to Con-
duct an experiment at Fcrmilab in
Batavin III. tracing odd decays of
one of nature's smallest particles.
In the experiment scientists stud-
ied the breakdown of particles after
a fixed target was hit by an acceler-
ated proton beam.
Specifically the scientists wat-
ched for the rare decay of B and D
mesons particles composed of
oppositely charged sub-units of pro-
tons and neutrons found in the
nuclei of atoms.
The sub-units called quarks arc
the smallest building blocks of
nature discovered.
The real reason Iscnhowcr calls
his work beautiful is because the
experiment focuses on the fifth and
highest quark observed the B
quark which also is called the Bot-
tom or Beauty quark. The sixth
quark Truth or Top has not been
recorded.
"What we're doing is trying to
figure out how quarks work" Iscn-
howcr said.
The experiment blasts a fixed tar-
get of Beryllium with an 800-clcc-tron
volt beam of accelerated pro-
tons. About 1 percent of the beam
reacts with the target and scatters
decaying particles downstream.
Detectors track the particles specif-
ically the B and D mesons and
record their deterioration.
"It's like hitting a Swiss watch
with a sledge hammer and trying to
learn how it works by observing
what pieces fly out" he said.
The experiment is fundamental
research to test current theories on
how the forces of nature work.
"Basically what we're doing is
raw research" he said adding that a
side-benefit of the experiment is
developing methods to process
large masses of information.
The experimenters started collect-
ing data in 1990 and ended in Jan-
uary 1992 producing 1300 2.5-
gigabytc tapes of data each capa-
ble of storing five complete sets of
the Encyclopedia Britannica
totalling roughly 2.5 billion charac-
ters. Aside from developing methods
to process data Iscnhowcr said the
experiment might result in possible
medical applications.
"The belter wc understand the
atom the better we'll understand
radiation. And radiation is used to
treat cancer" he said.
While the experiment searches
for the tiny quarks the equipment
for E789 dwarfs the scientists like
an Amazon python.
The equipment stretched for more
than 50 meters with innumerable
miles of wiring scries of sensitive
detectors two magnets and a copper
block used to absorb the leftover
proton beam that is so radioactive
the team of scientists do not handle
it if they can avoid it.
Unfortunately a thief did not.
"The block was clearly labeled as
radioactive and was locked in a
building behind two locked fences
and the guy still stole it" Iscnhowcr
said. "He had to peel off the radia-
tion stickers before he could try to
sell it back to a scrap metal place."
Unknown to the burglar workers
at a scrap metal yard must wear
radiation detectors because oil field
equipment is radioactive. When the
thief brought the copper block the
workers' detectors indicated the
block belonged to Fermilab.
"' hough the loss of the
ycoppcr block would have
slowed the experiment the
V S theft of any other piece of
equipment would have almost cer-
tainly delayed the experiment.
Members of the collaborating
team cither custom built or designed
much of the equipment.
Iscnhowcr said the science team
creates and assembles the equip-
ment used in the experiment
including computer chips. Items
that could not be produced at the
site were designed to specifications
by a manufacturing company.
One of the most important ele-
ments of the scries of detectors is
the silicon vortex processor the
brain of the silicon detectors. The
silicon vortex processor compiled
the information from its sensors antf
decided whether the event or tb'c.
occurrence of a particle was infdrf
mation desired by the experiment.!
"We used software to figure out
how to analyze the data" Iscnhowcr
explained. "Then we hired Motorqi$
to construct the chip wc ho'd-
designed." ;:
By programming the software
into circuits and electronics the sc$
cntists increased the speed of the;
silicon vortex processor's calcula
tions an important aspect because ;i
eacn event was separated oy oniyyy
nano-scconds apart 19 one-wj
liontli of a second. tK
"The silicon vortex processor
decides whether the particle origi-
nated at the target or downstrcamof
the target" Iscnhowcr said. "Ycji
can track most events from the tar-
get but we're only interestedjn
keeping one out of 10000 to one
out of 100000 events" when the
particle is a B or D meson.
"What we're looking for is some-
thing the theory says should never
happen but docs" he said. "What
we're actually doing is verifying or
disproving the theory."
The experiment may sound like
monotonous and tedious work but
Iscnhower loves high-energy phy-
sics and the experiment.
"Wc like to say we're Charming
Beautiful scientists because Wc
study the C and B quark" Iscnhow-
er laughed. "I just hope someday wc
. caabe.Truthful" .
But he will have to wait until the
discovery of the sixth quark
Truth or Top. Until then he will
have to settle for being Beautiful.
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Photo courtny of Or Don jld Knhowr
Spaghetti
The experiment named E789 boasted miles of cables and
electronics designed and mostly constructed by partici-
pants in the experiment.
CEsa
GeolfBrown a 1990 graduate of ACU and Randy
Schnathrost a 1992 graduate of ACU test equipment
Photo courttty of Or Doruld Ittnhowt r
during the 1989 that was later used in the experiment.
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Santa's helpers wtotourtyofrwD)rwiMflhptr
Much of the equipment used In E789 was produced by professional machinists
at the Fermilab worKsnop It tne instrument was too complicated ror xne mem-
bers of the collaborating team of scientists i
F7RP5 hoU5e PhototoorteiyofOr Oonld benhowtf
The experimental housing building where E789 was located measured more than
a mile from the central building.
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The Optimist (Abilene, Tex.), Vol. 82, No. 41, Ed. 1, Wednesday, February 16, 1994, newspaper, February 16, 1994; Abilene, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth92225/m1/3/?q=%22%22~1: accessed July 15, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Abilene Christian University Library.