University-Based Accelerator R&D For A Linear Collider

Cornell University, Ithaca NY

Investigators

Abstract

This proposal requests support for a university-based Physics Accelerator Research and Development (R&D) program aimed particularly at a future Linear Collider (LC). In recent years, a world consensus has developed that an international LC should be the next major facility for high energy physics. Abroad, the European and Asian communities have come to this conclusion, and here in the U.S., the High Energy Physics Advisory Panel (HEPAP) identified the LC as the highest priority for the US program in elementary particle physics. The technical challenges lie in both detector and accelerator areas and derive from the need for high luminosity and high precision of measurement. In response to these challenges, nineteen U.S. universities have banded together to form the University Consortium for Linear Collider R&D (UCLC) with Cornell as Project Manager. The physics goals require a starting center-of-mass energy of 500 GeV, upgradeable to approximately 1 TeV or more, and a luminosity of an ambitious four orders of magnitude larger than the luminosity achieved by the Stanford Linear Collider. Achieving the high energy and ultra-low emittance of the LC requires significant new advances in many areas of accelerator physics and technology. This proposal addresses leading challenges in these areas, bringing to bear the talents of both experienced accelerator scientists and experimental physicists with expertise in instrumentation. There are a number of broader impacts to be expected from this proposal. The accelerator physics R&D will push the state of the art in many areas that have applications across the whole spectrum of accelerators. Benefits will accrue to fields such as materials science, condensed matter physics, biophysics, and medical science. In addition, this proposal will provide training opportunities that can begin to address the current national shortage of accelerator physicists. In addition, the PIs propose a new outreach program that will allow teachers and students to join in the LC research work at UCLC universities. This program will bring to high school classrooms a taste of the exciting energy frontier physics to be studied by the LC and the state-of-the-art technologies required for its implementation.