I agree with you, although HEPAP isn’t the right forum for that. NASA used to have a nice little program doing some of the things you’re mentioning, but recent cuts have decimated it. I wrote about this a little while ago, if it is useful at all

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/cosmicvariance/2006/05/22/from-quantum-to-cosmos-i/

To the extent that the “troublesome issues” are in the form of No-Go theorems:

the way to resolve whether or not Beck’s idea is valid is NOT to have debates about No-Go theorems (a lot of interesting physics has come about by regarding No-Go theorems, not as signals to give up, but as telling us to ask which of their assumptions need to be changed in order to evade them – for example, the use of Lie superalgebras to evade Coleman-Mandula No-Go restrictions on constructions with ordinary Lie algebras);

but

the way to resolve whether or not Beck’s idea is valid IS to DO EXPERIMENTS AND SEE WHAT HAPPENS.

That is what Warburton is doing, and maybe it will show that Beck’s ideas are correct, maybe it will indicate what types of superconductors should be used, and maybe it will show that Beck’s ideas are wrong,
but
whatever the results, they are guaranteed to be interesting,
and
cheap (less than 1/40 of the $20 million threshold for HEPAP to even consider it.

If (long shot) Beck turns out to be correct and Warburton shows how to control Dark Energy, then it is fair to hope (but not guaranteed) that people will use Dark Energy for constructive purposes.

Tony Smith
http://www.valdostamuseum.org/hamsmith/

PS – Do Nuclear warheads count as dark energy producers?
PPS – Never mind anti-matter, can anti-gravity be produced, and I don’t just mean conventional rocket or Space Shuttle propulsion systems

Apparently Beck’s idea for any Dark Energy measurement has run into a number of troublesome issues; see Moran & Jaeckel in astro-ph/0605711 and their Refs. 2-5.
It seems that this is not what we are after in a Dark Energy measurement..Of course we should all be reminded, as Sean will tell us, that it is not obvious whether or not Dark Energy (as a new form of matter) exists and even if it does it may be unrelated to the cosmological constant or the `vacuum energy’ of ordinary field theory.

I am not aware of any such projects in the US, but let me preface this comment with the remark that our committee is only charged at looking at experiments that cost $20 Million or more. Anything as inexpensive as you mention is way below our radar screen.

Is there any USA interest in non-astrophysical Dark Energy experimental work such as the Josephson Junction experiment recently begun by Warburton in London?

It is It is EPSRC Grant Reference: EP/D029783/1,
“Externally-Shunted High-Gap Josephson Junctions: Design, Fabrication and Noise Measurements”,
starting 1 February 2006 and ending 31 January 2009 with £ Value: 242,348 ?

Roughly it is based on Christian Beck’s idea (see astro-ph/0512327 ) that If vacuum fluctuations are responsible for Dark Energy then Josephson Junctions might detect and study it.

For details of Warburton’s experimental work, see the web page at
http://gow.epsrc.ac.uk/ViewGrant.aspx?GrantRef=EP/D029783/1

Isn’t it the kind of thing that might have such a high payoff that it is worth a gamble (especially if the cost is less than half a million US dollars) ?
Even a negative result would be useful, as it would rule out some types of Dark Energy models.

Tony Smith
http://www.valdostamuseum.org/hamsmith/

There are a variety of ways to measure the variables which parameterize dark energy: supernova surveys, baryon acoustic oscillations, weak lensing, and cluster surveys. From ground-based experiments or space-based experiments. Each technique is at a different stage of development (proven ability) and each has different features in terms of the precision with which it measures the parameters. Our job is to figure out which experiment(s) gives the best measurement of the parameters at an affordable cost. It’s tricky.

On the theoretical side, I think it’s safe to say that it’s fair game in explaining the source of dark energy. Many different options are being explored. We need the next generation of experiments to learn more.

There is a very nice Dark Energy Task Force report (sponsored by HEPAP) that was summarized by Risa.

You are correct in that the US got a really good deal in the negotiated contract with CERN management for our contribution to the LHC. And it is a problem for future projects such as the ILC. Some in our government are pleased with the bargin and wonder if we can get away with it again, while current CERN management is somewhat resentful. The amount of our contribution to the LHC is stipulated in a signed contract, agreed to by both sides, and is thus a done deal and can’t be changed.

Discussion is just beginning on how this tension might be eased for the benefit of future projects. One idea that has just been floated is that the US could contribute substantially to the LHC upgrade project. There’s alot of work to do to make this happen, and I don’t know what our funding agencies and government would think about it, but it sounds like an interesting idea in my book and worth pursuing.

Would HEPAP be in favor of:
1 – LHC giving the USA a role in management; and
2 – the USA contributing substantially to LHC operating costs ?

It seems to me that would create good will and set a precedent for a truly international ILC.

Tony Smith
http://www.valdostamuseum.org/hamsmith/

I hope you won’t mind asking how the dark energy surveys are going to work, what if anything definite they hope to find, etc?

Also, has anyone to your knowledge even considered the redshift effect on the energy of the gauge bosons presumed to be exchanged in causing quantum gravitation?

If these exchanged gauge bosons are red-shifted (by cosmic expansion) over large distances of exchange, gravity will be weakened, so there will be little or no no observable gravitational acceleration of the expansion of the universe?

So the empirical Hubble law will hold with no slowing down on expansion velocities at extreme distances. Which is just what is observed… A simple modification of general relativity is needed, not CC/dark energy.

I can’t understand why Occam’s razor seems to be ignored. Like caloric and phlogiston, and also like material aether, dark energy is ad hoc and not a falsifiable scientific prediction as such. Sorry if this sounds like bitter attack on dark energy theories (arxiv deleted my paper and cern doc server won’t allow my paper there to be updated now, nor other ext papers).