CDMS Workshop Focuses on Dark Matter Detector
Dedicated collaboration members continue their work on the Kavli patio during a break. (Photo by Lori Ann White.)
by Lori Ann White
More than 50 members of the Super Cryogenic Dark Matter Search collaboration came to SLAC for two days last week to discuss the nuts and bolts of dark matter detection. The goals of the workshop were to close in on an initial design for the dark matter detectors for SuperCDMS-SNOLAB—the version of the experiment to be installed in the SNOLAB underground laboratory near Sudbury, Canada—and to determine what roadblocks may still stand in their way.
"We're trying to get together all the people who are thinking about this to come up with a baseline design," explained Richard Partridge, a SLAC scientist and event co-organizer. "A lot of details go into making one of these work."
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Energy Task Force Seeks Your Input
from Z-X Shen, SLAC chief scientist
In preparation for the February 4 Town Hall Meeting,
the SLAC Energy Task Force has been reaching out to stakeholders at SLAC and
Stanford, exploring new strategic directions in energy-related research. For each potential area of emphasis, we ask:
- Why is this area of research important?
- What will be our scientific approach to this research?
- Why SLAC?
- What critical components are required to be successful?
We would also like your input as members of the SLAC community. Please
share your ideas through the Energy Task Force
online feedback form.
Input before the end of the day on February 18 is very much appreciated.
RSB Coffee, Donuts, and Q&A Today
by Lorrie Coon
Remember to drop by the Linear Cafe today between 8:30 and 10 a.m. for the
Research Support Building and Infrastructure Modernization Project team's third
"coffee hour." In addition to coffee and donuts, we will dole out information about the
construction and renovation that will soon begin with Buildings 28 and 52, and
answer your questions one on one.
We look forward to seeing you there!
(Poster by SLAC Information Management and Portal
Services.)
Lunchtime Lecture Today: Archaeopteryx
Today from noon to 1 p.m. in Kavli Auditorium, SLAC researcher Uwe
Bergmann will present a reprise of last night's public lecture:
"Archaeopteryx: Bringing the Dino-Bird to Life."
Some 150 million years ago, a strange creature died in a tropical lagoon that today is located in Bavaria, Germany. In 1861, a single feather of this creature was discovered. Not long afterward, a complete fossil was found with the same bird-like feathers but dinosaur-like anatomical features.
Recently, two of the now eleven discovered
Archaeopteryx fossils, and that first feather, were brought to SLAC.
Here, using the intense X-ray beam of the Stanford Synchrotron Radiation
Lightsource, researchers
searched for the chemical remains of the original living creatures.
This lecture will explain how the studies attempt to bring the original dino-bird
"back to life." This lecture is open to all SLAC employees.
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