Accelerators
Obtaining high energy electrically charged nuclear “projectiles”
Basic principle: using electric field to accelerate charges
Two main types of accelerators:
- linear accelerators: passing the charged particles through several consecutive accelerating regions (ex. Stanford Linear Accelerator, 3km long, electrons with energies up to: 50 GeV)
- circular accelerators (sincrotron) : allows the particles to pass through a single accelerating region many times; particles kept on circular trajectories by strong magnetic fields; maximum
energy limited by the overall size; important radiation losses for light particles--> appropriate for heavier charged particles
(Fermilab near Chicago, up to 1 TeV!)