Researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory have built a particle accelerator on a chip. They contend that this novel technology could eventually lead to cost- and space-saving devices for science and medicine. To construct an accelerator on a nanostructured glass chip smaller than a grain of rice, researchers turned to a laser to speed up electrons at a rate 10 times faster than conventional technology. “We still have a number of challenges before this technology becomes practical for real-world use, but eventually it would substantially reduce the size and cost of future high-energy particle colliders for exploring the world of fundamental particles and forces,” said Joel England, an SLAC physicist. “It could also help enable compact accelerators and X-ray devices for security scanning, medical therapy and imaging, and research in biology and materials science.” The tiny accelerator could match the accelerating power of SLAC’s two-mile-long linear accelerator in just 100 feet if working at its full potential. Under these conditions, the tiny accelerator could also deliver a million more electron pulses per second than SLAC’s linear accelerator. According to a news release from the DOE’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, the initial trial achieved an acceleration gradient of 300 million electronvolts per meter, which is about 10 times the acceleration delivered by the two-mile-long linear accelerator. “Our ultimate goal for this structure is one billion electronvolts per meter, and we’re already one-third of the way in our first experiment,” said Robert Byer of Stanford University. The researchers turned to lasers because they offer a less expensive alternative to the use of microwaves to boost the energy of electrons.
Posted on: Sun, 29 Sep 2013 21:20:44 +0000
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