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> particle physicists should focus on developing new technologies that could bring colliders back in a reasonable price range and hold off digging more tunnels
by knzhou 6y ago
> particle physicists should focus on developing new technologies that could bring colliders back in a reasonable price range and hold off digging more tunnels
People keeping saying this, but we haven't been permitted to dig a single new tunnel since 1983. Multiple proposed colliders have been shot down, with the US's attempt defunded in the middle of construction. The LHC doesn't even have its own tunnel; it was put in the 1983 tunnel to save money. To save more money, the LHC is going to run for another 20 years, so any future collider's tunnel won't be dug until 2040 at the earliest.
That is a nearly 60 year gap between new tunnels, which I find incredibly depressing. What I find almost incomprehensible, though, is that the people who successfully argued to defund earlier proposed colliders now argue to defund the next one on the basis that our field is progressing slowly! I wonder why that is?
- pugworthy 6y agoNot a facetious question, but what is the purpose of the tunnel? To protect the infrastructure of the collider?
- osrec 6y agoI believe the tunnel contains the "track" that allows the particles to whizz around and be accelerated to very high speeds and eventually smash into each other, hopefully causing them to smash apart and reveal their inner contents.
- knzhou 6y agoIt helps shield the detectors from cosmic radiation, shields people living on the ground from radiation produced by the collider, and helps with vibrational isolation. But those are just nice bonuses. The most important reason is that there are already lots of people living a nice small-town life on the surface, and erecting a giant, dangerous ring would wreak havoc. It would require land rights, cut towns in half, split highways, trigger lawsuits, and probably end up costing more money and time than just digging.