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European first as ALICE achieves energy recovery
UK scientists have successfully demonstrated energy recovery on the ALICE
advanced particle accelerator design, potentially paving the way for new
accelerators using a fraction of the energy required under conventional
methods.
HRH The Duke of Kent visits ALICE at STFC Daresbury Laboratory
At 2am on 13 December, ALICE's superconducting linear accelerator
accelerated electrons to 99.9% of the speed of light, creating a beam with a
total energy of 11 million electron volts.
This was the first time the ALICE beam had been successfully transported
around the entire circuit.
ALICE is operated by the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) at
its Daresbury Laboratory in Cheshire. It is a world-class R&D prototype
designed to open the way for advances in a broad range of exciting accelerator
science applications.
ALICE is the first accelerator in Europe to use the energy recovery process
which captures and re-uses the initial beam energy after each circuit. At the
end of the circuit, rather than throwing out the used beam of high-energy
electrons, its energy is extracted for continued use before being safely
discarded at an extremely low energy.
HRH The Duke of Kent visits ALICE at STFC Daresbury Laboratory
Susan Smith, Head of the Accelerator Physics Group at STFC Daresbury
Laboratory said: "Energy recovery means a massive saving of power or
alternatively, for the same power usage, light sources and colliders of
unprecedented power and intensity. The ALICE team have been working
tremendously hard to demonstrate energy recovery and when we did this in the
small hours of Saturday morning, it felt like Christmas had come early."
Dr Smith said the milestone was important but more work was required to
fully validate the design.
"We have proven energy recovery, but not yet quantified it. Once fully
commissioned ALICE will accelerate to 35 million volts, electrons will be sent
round the accelerator at 99.99% of the speed of light and 99.9% of the power at
the final accelerator stage will be recovered, making the power sources for the
acceleration drastically smaller and cheaper and therefore economically
viable," she said.
Professor Keith Mason, Chief Executive of STFC, said: "This is an impressive
and significant step forward for ALICE. In itself, the concept of energy
recovery is not new, but the application of this technique in combination with
advanced accelerator technologies, such as super-conducting cavities, has
exciting prospects for the future of next generation light sources and particle
colliders."
Notes for editors
About ALICE
ALICE is an acronym standing for Accelerators and Lasers In Combined
Experiments. Financed by the Science and Technology Facilities Council with
seed funding from the North West Development Agency, the project is designed to
produce light from both the accelerator and advanced lasers that can be used
simultaneously in cutting edge experiments.
Contact
- Wendy Taylor MCIPR
STFC Press Officer
Daresbury Laboratory
Tel: + 44 (0)1925 603232
About STFC
Page last updated: 15 December 2008
by Wendy Taylor
