It appears that new measurements and calculations that pin down the W mass even more has lowered the upper limit for the Higgs boson. This has increased the chances for the Tevatron at Fermilab to be the first to detect the Higgs in what could possibly the last big hurrah for the lab before its scheduled shut down by the end of 2009. With the looming operation of the LHC at CERN, the next couple of years will be the Tevatron's last grasp for glory it it's long and illustrious history.
Just think. For the first time in the history of the high energy physics field, by the end of 2009, there will be ZERO major high energy physics experiment on US soil. The nation that gave birth to high energy physics experiment will soon have none. If that doesn't tell you something, nothing will.
Zz.
3 comments:
I must be doing something wrong in my searches. Is there a page outlining the shutdown of the TeVatron in 2009? I see lots of notes of the end of Run II but not that it's gone for good...
Thanks
You'll note that there's no funding for Run III, i.e. no new money has been allocated for the continuation of the Tevatron. This is another word for "shut down".
Fermilab's booster will still be in operation, because other projects such as MINOS and possibly NOvA will need accelerated particles to produce muons and neutrinos. However, like SLAC, it will cease being a particle collider lab and morph into a different creature.
Zz.
[[You'll note that there's no funding for Run III,]]
I guess that's what I meant. Whatever brain bubble I have regarding my search criteria seems to be keeping me from a "here's an entire page on what's happening with the Tevatron" result. Maybe I'm expecting too much out of the FNAL website, as really, who there would be jumping up and down to talk about the end?
Is there some budgetary page I'm not seeing?
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