The European Organization for Nuclear Research, known as CERN, is an intergovernmental organization that operates the largest particle physics laboratory in the world. Established in 1954, it is based in a northwestern suburb of Geneva, on the France–Switzerland border. It comprises 23 member states. Israel, admitted in 2013, is the only non-European full member. CERN is an official United Nations General Assembly observer.
The Tevatron was a circular particle accelerator in the United States, at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, east of Batavia, Illinois, and is the second highest energy particle collider ever built, after the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) of the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) near Geneva, Switzerland. The Tevatron was a synchrotron that accelerated protons and antiprotons in a 6.28 km (3.90 mi) ring to energies of up to 1 TeV, hence its name. The Tevatron was completed in 1983 at a cost of $120 million and significant upgrade investments were made during its active years of 1983–2011.
The Large Electron–Positron Collider (LEP) was one of the largest particle accelerators ever constructed. It was built at CERN, a multi-national centre for research in nuclear and particle physics near Geneva, Switzerland.
Simon van der Meer was a Dutch particle accelerator physicist who shared the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1984 with Carlo Rubbia for contributions to the CERN project which led to the discovery of the W and Z particles, the two fundamental communicators of the weak interaction.
The Underground Area 2 (UA2) experiment was a high-energy physics experiment at the Proton-Antiproton Collider — a modification of the Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS) — at CERN. The experiment ran from 1981 until 1990, and its main objective was to discover the W and Z bosons. UA2, together with the UA1 experiment, succeeded in discovering these particles in 1983, leading to the 1984 Nobel Prize in Physics being awarded to Carlo Rubbia and Simon van der Meer. The UA2 experiment also observed the first evidence for jet production in hadron collisions in 1981, and was involved in the searches of the top quark and of supersymmetric particles. Pierre Darriulat was the spokesperson of UA2 from 1981 to 1986, followed by Luigi Di Lella from 1986 to 1990.
The UA1 experiment was a high-energy physics experiment that ran at CERN's Proton-Antiproton Collider, a modification of the one-beam Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS). The data was recorded between 1981 and 1990. The joint discovery of the W and Z bosons by this experiment and the UA2 experiment in 1983 led to the Nobel Prize for physics being awarded to Carlo Rubbia and Simon van der Meer in 1984. Peter Kalmus and John Dowell, from the UK groups working on the project, were jointly awarded the 1988 Rutherford Medal and Prize from the Institute of Physics for their outstanding roles in the discovery of the W and Z particles.
The Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS) is a particle accelerator of the synchrotron type at CERN. It is housed in a circular tunnel, 6.9 kilometres (4.3 mi) in circumference, straddling the border of France and Switzerland near Geneva, Switzerland.
The ISR was a particle accelerator at CERN. It was the world's first hadron collider, and ran from 1971 to 1984, with a maximum center of mass energy of 62 GeV. From its initial startup, the collider itself had the capability to produce particles like the J/ψ and the upsilon, as well as observable jet structure; however, the particle detector experiments were not configured to observe events with large momentum transverse to the beamline, leaving these discoveries to be made at other experiments in the mid-1970s. Nevertheless, the construction of the ISR involved many advances in accelerator physics, including the first use of stochastic cooling, and it held the record for luminosity at a hadron collider until surpassed by the Tevatron in 2004.
The Proton Synchrotron is a particle accelerator at CERN. It is CERN's first synchrotron, beginning its operation in 1959. For a brief period the PS was the world's highest energy particle accelerator. It has since served as a pre-accelerator for the Intersecting Storage Rings (ISR) and the Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS), and is currently part of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) accelerator complex. In addition to protons, PS has accelerated alpha particles, oxygen and sulfur nuclei, electrons, positrons, and antiprotons.
NA61/SHINE is a particle physics experiment at the Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS) at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN). The experiment studies the hadronic final states produced in interactions of various beam particles with a variety of fixed nuclear targets at the SPS energies.
The Antiproton Accumulator (AA) was an infrastructure connected to the Proton–Antiproton Collider – a modification of the Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS) – at CERN. The AA was built in 1979 and 1980, for the production and accumulation of antiprotons. In the SppS the antiprotons were made to collide with protons, achieving collisions at a center of mass energy of app. 540 GeV. Several experiments recorded data from the collisions, most notably the UA1 and UA2 experiment, where the W and Z bosons were discovered in 1983.
Luigi Di Lella is an Italian experimental particle physicist. He has been a staff member at CERN for over 40 years, and has played an important role in major experiments at CERN such as CAST and UA2. From 1986 to 1990 he acted as spokesperson for the UA2 Collaboration, which, together with the UA1 Collaboration, discovered the W and Z bosons in 1983.
Pierre Darriulat is a French experimental particle physicist. As staff member at CERN, he contributed in several prestigious experiments. He was the spokesperson of the UA2 collaboration from 1981 to 1986, during which time the UA2 collaboration, together with the UA1 collaboration, discovered the W and Z bosons in 1983.
The Super Proton–Antiproton Synchrotron was a particle accelerator that operated at CERN from 1981 to 1991. To operate as a proton-antiproton collider the Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS) underwent substantial modifications, altering it from a one beam synchrotron to a two-beam collider. The main experiments at the accelerator were UA1 and UA2, where the W and Z bosons were discovered in 1983. Carlo Rubbia and Simon van der Meer received the 1984 Nobel Prize in Physics for their contributions to the SppS-project, which led to the discovery of the W and Z bosons. Other experiments conducted at the SppS were UA4, UA5 and UA8.
UA4 experiment (COULOMB) was a high-energy physics experiment at the Proton-Antiproton Collider at CERN. The UA4 collaboration consisted of physicists from Amsterdam, Genova, Napoli, Pisa, Roma, California and CERN. UA4 was approved on 18 January 1979, and the first phase of data taking lasted until 17 June 1985. The spokesperson of UA4 was Giorgi Matthiae.
UA8 experiment was a high-energy physics experiment at the Proton-Antiproton Collider at CERN. The proposal for the experiment was done by physicists at the University of California, and it was approved in April 1985. Its spokesperson was Peter Schlein.
John Gordon Rushbrooke (1936–2003) was an Australian particle physicist.
The Underground Area 3 (UA3) experiment was a high-energy physics experiment at the Proton-Antiproton Collider, a modification of the Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS), at CERN. The experiment ran from 1978 to 1988 with the objective of searching for magnetic monopoles. No evidence for magnetic monopoles was found by the UA3 experiment.
The Underground Area 6 (UA6), also referred to as PHOTONS, experiment was a high-energy physics experiment at the Proton-Antiproton Collider, a modification of the Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS), at CERN. The experiment ran from 1984 to 1990, with the purpose of studying inclusive electromagnetic final states and lambda production in proton-antiproton and proton-proton interactions. Towards the end of its run it focused more on direct-photon and J/ψ production. The experiment is complementary to the UA1, UA2 and CDF experiments.
