Comments on: UK Physics Investment Decimated

By: Jonathan

Jonathan — Wed, 19 Dec 2007 19:03:52 +0000

There's a campaign afoot to protest the proposed STFC cuts and lobby the UK government to reverse this decision. Find out more at http://www.saveastronomy.org.uk/.

By: Jim Miles

Jim Miles — Mon, 17 Dec 2007 13:01:52 +0000

Reminded me of this:

http://www.qwantz.com/archive/001025.html

By: Blake Stacey

Blake Stacey — Sat, 15 Dec 2007 23:21:00 +0000

The ILC is certainly on shaky ground; if countries start dropping out, the LHC might very well be the last particle accelerator at the energy frontier built in our lifetimes.

C’mon, Singularity. . . .

By: Ellipsis

Ellipsis — Sat, 15 Dec 2007 18:06:31 +0000

Peter — construction of an ILC with a given specific set of design parameters has always (or at least in the last 8 years, once it became entirely clear that the LHC would start up well before the ILC began construction) been dependent, in the minds of most of the involved physicists, on what the LHC would find. It would indeed be fairly crazy to build a 500 GeV machine knowing that the interesting physics might lie at 600 GeV and above. People knew this and know this. Nevertheless, most of the development work (for example, on the superconducting cavities, the beam injection system, and on the basic parts of civil construction), is entirely independent of whether the machine is set to start up at 500 GeV, 700 GeV, or 1 TeV (or even a little beyond). A 500 GeV startup is not mandated by the design, it could certainly be higher if more cavities are added. The “wrong physics” really only means one’s energy is set too low, and it is known that the ILC can be pushed higher if needed. So cutting off all funding for development in Britain doesn’t open up options, it just works in the direction of closing them. Nevertheless, it is clear that physics will, as it always does, win in the end, and if (when) the LHC sees something interesting, I’m sure Britain will resume funding for ILC work.

By: dark-matter

dark-matter — Sat, 15 Dec 2007 04:55:14 +0000

Mark, Stuart, Peter – all of your views are correct and contribute to understanding of the situation. Appreciate.
UK is wealthy enough to do just about any science in a leadership role if the government and people desire so. But have chosen not do. Indeed having a launch capability is not essential to do the science. But it is very important for public support, funding, and secondary benefits. France has a world class launch capability you know – second only to the American. And she can design advanced space crafts. Therefore it is a small jump to play a lead role in space science, which will likely expand now that UK is out.

By: Peter Shor

Peter Shor — Fri, 14 Dec 2007 20:39:49 +0000

I still think the particle physicists may have shot themselves in the foot. The only figure I could find for how much the Brits were going to spend was $28 million. Looked at one way, that’s pretty small compared to the eventual cost of $6 billion total for the machine. Looked at in another way, that’s a fairly large amount of money for something that may be just be wasted effort if the LHC finds the wrong physics.

And anyway, if the LHC finds new and interesting stuff, there would presumably be lots of things for particle physicists to do while waiting for the ILC to come online. If the LHC doesn’t find any new and interesting stuff (meaning it finds the Higgs and not much more), then looking at it realistically, I don’t see how the ILC is ever going to get built.

By: Sean

Sean — Fri, 14 Dec 2007 19:37:13 +0000

Peter, it takes a really long time to plan and build one of these machines. If they had put off thinking about the ILC (it’s not like huge amounts of money were being spent) until interesting physics came from the LHC, there wouldn’t be anyone around still doing particle physics by the time it came online.

I don’t think that more money would be flowing to particle physics if they hadn’t started planning for the ILC.

By: Peter Shor

Peter Shor — Fri, 14 Dec 2007 19:12:32 +0000

And of course I meant handwringing and not handwaving in my last post.
Oops.

By: Peter Shor

Peter Shor — Fri, 14 Dec 2007 19:10:31 +0000

My question is whether the funding agencies have started killing particle physics, or whether particle physics has shot itself in the foot by starting planning for the ILC before it was clear that a new accelerator was warranted by discoveries at the LHC.

Hopefully, if a new accelerator really is warranted, one will be built, despite all the handwaving now.

By: UK young physicists speak up against STFC funding cuts « An American Physics Student in England

Fri, 14 Dec 2007 14:47:35 +0000

[...] cuts in particle physics and astronomy, so I wont recap. See the discussion and links at NEW and CV for [...]