Ih r lleppitrr (> Jfrllr 1 n»it*\ ll r p p n r i. OrrKon VSrtliu siijv
‘Worlds Within the Atom' .
The follow ing e x c e rp ts from
■■Worlds Within the A tom ," an arti
tie by John Hoslough in the May
1SKS "N ational G eographic m aga
zinc Vol 167 No $), pages 634 663
explain som e basic theories about
atom s, describe the wav a super
collider works and pros ide some of
the reasons scientists give for studs
ing atom s by m eans of a super
collider
A site near B oardm an is being
considered among several proposed
sites for a superconducting super
collider
A task force has been
form ed to help m ake the Boardm an
site m ore attractiv e to the agency
selecting a final site
Man has speculated endlessly
about the nature of m a tte r Some
2 .* » years ago the Greek philoso
phers Democritus and la*ucippus
proposed that if you cut an object,
such as a loaf of bread, in half, and
then in half again and again until
you could do it no longer, you would
reach the ultim ate building block
They called it an atom
The atom is infinitesim al Your
every breath holds a trillion trillion
atom s And because atom s in the
everyday world we inhabit are
virtually indestructible, the a ir you
Specializing in
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. a l(K)k at the Superconducting Super Collider
suck into your lungs may include an
ato m or tw o g a sp e d o u t by
D emocritus with his dying breath
To grasp the scale of the atom and
the world within, look at a letter " i"
on this page
Magnify its dot a
million tim es with an electron
microscope, and you would see an
a rray of a million ink molecules
This is the dom ain of the chem ist
look closely at one ink m olecule and
you would see a fuzzy im age of the
largest atom s that compose it
W hether by eye. c a m e ra , or
microscope, no one has ever seen the
internal, stru ctu re of an atom
Minute as atom s a re they consist of
still tinier subatom ic particles
Protons, carry in g a positive electric
charge, and electrically neutral
particles called neutrons cluster
within the ato m 's central region or
nucleus one
hundred thousandth
the diam eter of the atom Nuclear
physicists work at this level of
m atter
Whirling around the nucleus is a
third subatom ic particle, the elec
Iron, which c a rrie s a negative
charge Klectric cu rren t consists of
flowing electrons, point like parti
cles literally impossible to m easure
E le c tro n s "o rb it'' an a to m s
n u cleu s a c c o rd in g to p rin c ip le s
governing the motion of waves
I'nlike planets revolving around the
sun. electrons do not follow fixed
paths Yet the prohable location of
electrons can be calculated using
quantum m echanics, a m athem ati
cal system developed in the 1920a to
desenlie the weird behavior of mat
ter and energy at the suliatormc
level, the world of p article physi
cists
That p articles can act like waves
may seem b izarre But no m ore so
than some other oddities suggested
by quantum theory
That how we
probe m atter affects its behavior
and fo rm . that som e particles exist
so briefly that they a re not real but
"v irtu a l'
and that well ordered
reality the whole of the universe
rests on chance and random ness at
the subatom ic level
Besides quantum m echanics, the
other concept crucial to our m odern
view of the atom and its p a rts in
E instein's special theory of re la ti
vity His form ula. E equals mc2.
when- E is energy m is m ass and c
is the unvarying speed of light,
s t a i n that m ass and energy are
merely different versions of the
sam e thing
E instein, however,
never accepted quantum m echa
ntes He felt that random ness could
not be the ultim ate reality , and he
debated the point with another titan
of atom ic theory, Danish physicist
Niels Bohr
On this point Einstein has been
proved wrong yet his special relat
ivlty theory is routinely pul to work
in accelerators, w here energy is
transform ed into subatom ic parti
cles in a hint of how the universe
may have com e to be
P a r a d o x ic a lly . e x p lo rin g th e
sm allest things in the universe
requires the iargest m achines on
earth
As physicists have pene
trated from the m olecule to the atom
and then to the ato m 's nucleus with
its protons and neutrons, they have
pulled hack layer a fte r layer of
m atter as if peeling an artichoke To
reveal each layer requires increas
ing am ounts of energy prov ided by
m assive atom sm ashers
No two of these giants a re alike,
but there are two basic ty pi’s Some,
like Stanford s linear accelerato r
near Palo Alto. C alifornia, fire
negatively charged electron» at
atom ic nuclei Two m iles long and
as straight as the laser twain used to
align it. the accelerato r hurls elec
Irons at 99 99 percent the speed of
light
But like the one at CERN
most accelerators a re circu lar and
use protons as projectiles Protons
are heavier and gen erate m ore
collisions However, collisions in an
electron accelerato r a re easier to
analyze
Almost every A m erican home has
a primi ive accelerato r the televi
sion picture tube Inside it e le c tri
city heats a m etal filam ent, boiling
off negatively charged electrons and
accelerating them through a posi
lively charged wire grid A m agnet
then steers them at the phosphorus
coated TV screen, which glows from
the collisions
In most high energy physics labs
the first step in accelerating sub
atom ic particles depends upon a
accelerator invented in 1932 by John
Cockcroft and E rnest Malton It
ex tracts protons and electrons from
atom s of hydrogen gas
IN 197H an elderly E rnest Walton
visited E erm ilab and inspected such
an accelerator Covered with met
allie balls for discharging elccrtical
energy, the m onstrous contraption
seem ed fit for a horror movie, and
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as Walton looked on. it spat a huge
bolt of lightning
Ah." said the
delighted Walton, "th e m achine
knows its m aster
The particles liberated by a Cock
cro ft W alton
a c c e le r a to r
a re
boosted to greater and g reater velo
city in copper cham bers called
radio frequency cavities E lectric
pulses led to the cavities millions of
times each second lift the particles
to high energy and sweep them down
an accelerator's beam line on travel
ing radio waves, like surfers riding a
crest In ring shaped m achines such
as ihe CERN accelerator, electro
magnets focus the particles into a
pencil thin beam and steer it in a
circle To prevent unw anted colli
sums with stray atom s, oxygen and
other gases a re pumped from the
(warn line tube, leaving It nearly as
airless as the moon
Particle physicists m easure an
acclerator s power in electron volts,
the more electron volts that an
accelerator produces, the deeper it
can delve into the atom
One
electron volt ceV> is about the
energy gained by a single electron
flowing from the negative to the
positive end of a flashlight battery
Shghtlv greater energies can strip
electrons from atom s but it takes
millions of electron volts MeV to
probe the nucleus Energy a thou
sand tim es higher stiij. in the
billion« V ior GeV. for giga electron
volt i range, is needed to propel
particles with enough force to shat
ter protons and electrons and thus
create new m atter
tine way to boost energy is to fire
two ts-ams o( particles in opposite
directions around a ring s o that (ties
slam together
This doubles the
energy giving the CERN ac c e lrra
tor, for instance, an energy of 630
GeV
Yet Ihe a ttractiv e force
binding together the constituents of
protons and neutrons is so im m ense
trillio n s of trillio n s of tim e s
stronger than earth s gravity that
even the CERN m achine can only
pick and poke at the atom 's inner
structure
It's a bit like finding out how
c a rs w ork by sm a sh in g them
together and seeing what falls out."
Dr Carlo Kubbia told m e at CERN.
w here he w as on le a v e from
H arvard
But in particle physics,
when you sm ash two c a rs together,
you get 20 or 30 new cars, or even a
truck or two W e re repealing one of
the m iracles of the universe trans
(oring energy into m atter
A Unification of Forces
A' the Big Bang, when tim e,
space, and energy cam e into being
was there an essential unity io
n a tu re ’’ Theorists think that before
gravity separated at 1043 second, it,
the strong and weak nuclear forces,
and the electrom agnetic force were
unified As Ihe universe cooled, the
unity and sym m etry of those inter
actions w ere broken one by one
First steps in reunifying them a re by
m athem atical constructions called
guage theories Eor their concep
tual work in unifying the weak and
electrom agnetic forces into the "ele
ctrow eak." Steven Weinberg, Abdus
Salam . and Sheldon Glashow shared
a 1979 Nobel prize
Theory requires proof by ox pen
inent
C ER N p h y sic ist C arlo
Kubbia. whose personal energy is
legendary, led a team that found the
W and Z particles, which c arry the
weak force Noliel winning work
A problem
Big hang energies
can never be duplicated, yet e x p e ri
m ents rely on applying ever m ore
energy to the atom Atoms a re end
products, Ixirn to a in imh > year old
universe and far rem oved from
big bang conditions
A P article Factory Tevatron
That relativity is Heal, that m ass
and energy a re equivalent as in
Einstein s E equals mc2. is the basis
for E erm ilab* collider now being
built
Protons will be boosted to
m ore than 9» percent Ihe speed of
light then routed to collide with
m anufactured antiprotuns of oppu
site charge Upon collision, these
particles of m atter and an tim atter
annihilate each other in a burst of
energy The energy then congeals
into o th e r p a r tic le s th a t le a v e
characteristic tracks in a m agnetic
field
The hardw are is laid out in an
exploded view The top tier contains
sy stem c o n tro l and m o n ito rin g
cables
Next a re pipes carrying
w ater to cool Ihe iong narrow
m agnets below The bottom train
m agnets is supercooled with liquid
helium
The m agnets direct the
particles, while radio waves accele
rate them
Finally Ihe particle
beam s a re (orced to collide, and
lb-tec tors record the results
No accelerator will ever m atch the
energy released in the big lu n g , and
some physicists once thought it
might be a w aste of money to build
bigger m achines However, Sheldon
Glashow says
\Se will (ind noth
ing i( we do not look We theorists
a re dependent upon experim ental
discoveries Without them we a re no
better than m edieval theologians,
who endlessly debated how many
angels might dance on the head of a
pin "
Theorists like Glashow work in a
delicate balance with e x p e rim e n t
lists to uncover the hidden unity
linking the three basic forces to
gravity Says avowed experim en
lalist t'a rlo Kuhhia
T heorists tend
to forget that every tim e we look
so m ep lace new w ith a b ig g e r
m achine a surprise aw aits u s."
E xperim entalists like Kubbia pre
vail for the mom ent at CERN. and
they are building a new accelerator
17 m iles in c ir c u m f e re n c e The
m am m oth m achine will cost half a
billion dollars, a rem ark ab le invest
men I considering that in its lifetim e
it will propel less than a gram of
m atter
At E erm ilab in Illinois physicists
have doubled up by constructing a
new accelerator ring inside Ihe
tunnel housing their first m achine
Eventually the new er accelerator
will IxNist protons and antiprotons to
a colossal collison energy ol two
trillion electron volts as they travel
a circuit equal in distance to five
round trip journeys to the moon.
2,400.000 miles Even m ore am hiti
ous is the accelerator, perhaps too
miles around, that U S scientists
want to build
II would dw arf
E erm tlab's four mile accelerator,
visible from MX) m iles in space
P erhaps the biggest obstacle to
such mega engineering projects is
Ihe shrinking federal science budget
"We practically have to beg for
m oney." says Eerm ilba director
Leon l.cdorm an CERN, a conipar
able laboratory, enjoys about twice
as much funding as E erm ilab
Lederm an and other A m erican part
icle physicists fear that tight bud
gets may cost the l' S its traditional
iead in the exploration of the atom
Money conscious federal officials
often ask l.eon Lcderni.in why Ihe
l? S needs costly m achines that
cannot help solve pressing social
problem s ills answ er never varies
"Learning about the ultim ate nature
of m atter is of fundam ental im port
unce to the hum an race It gives us a
Sert icp Report
A irm an 1st P lu s s D avid A
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Lincoln Pity has tieon nam ed out
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Squadron
The com petition was based on job
knowledge, significant sell im prove
m enl, leadership qualities, ability to
liean articu late and positive s|x>ki’s
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T albert is a broadcasting special
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Alaska
Ills sister. Helen I. T albert, re
sides at lleppner
The airm an is a I9H2 g raduate ol
Pendleton High School
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vision of ourselves, who we a re
w here we a re going '
Physics has alw ays draw n power
ful intellects and personalities, such
as M urray Gell M ann, who with
Lederm an anti others has set the
pace of particle research for three
decades Small and intense, with
steel gray hair and penetrating eyes
G ell M an n 's m ind e n c o m p a s s e s
quarks and proton decay as easily a s
mushrooms or obscure languages,
two of his other num erous interests
I asked him one day if physicists
w ere not profoundly arro g an t to
think that they could explain the
origin of the universe and every
thing in it by using only a c c e le ra t
ors. telescopes, and equations
"We believe, he said, "th at our
calculations a re essentially co rrect
and that we are on the edge of fully
understanding the atom as well as
the beginnings of the universe IPs a
little like the ant contem plating the
skyscraper, isn't it* "
And where will an understanding
of Ihe universe's deepest secrets
lead us*
There will tie new
tech n o lo g y , c e rta in ly
M urray
Gell Mann went on
"But most
rem arkable will lie that a handful of
twings on a sm all planet circling an
insignificant star will have traced
their origin back to the very tiegm
ning a sm all s ^ v k of the universe
com prehending the whole
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