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If you think of a particle accelerator, what may come to mind is something like CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC): a multibillion-dollar colossus that’s dozens of miles wide and crosses international borders in the name of unlocking how the universe works.
But particle accelerators take many forms. There are more than 30,000 accelerators in the world today. While some of them—including LHC—are designed to unveil the universe’s secrets, the vast majority have far more Earthly purposes. They’re used for everything from generating beams of brilliant light to manufacturing electronics to imaging the body and treating cancer. In fact, a hospital can buy a room-sized medical accelerator for just a few hundred thousand dollars. And, as of last month, scientists have made another curious addition to the list: the smallest particle accelerator yet.
Physicists have fabricated an accelerator the size of a coin, publishing their work in Nature on October 18. This device is just a tech demo, but its creators hope it opens the gateway to even smaller accelerators that could fit on a silicon chip.
“I consider this paper to be really interesting and cool physics, for sure, and it’s been an effort that’s been going on for a long time,” says Howard Milchberg, a physicist at the University of Maryland, who was not involved with the research.
www.popsci.com
But particle accelerators take many forms. There are more than 30,000 accelerators in the world today. While some of them—including LHC—are designed to unveil the universe’s secrets, the vast majority have far more Earthly purposes. They’re used for everything from generating beams of brilliant light to manufacturing electronics to imaging the body and treating cancer. In fact, a hospital can buy a room-sized medical accelerator for just a few hundred thousand dollars. And, as of last month, scientists have made another curious addition to the list: the smallest particle accelerator yet.
Physicists have fabricated an accelerator the size of a coin, publishing their work in Nature on October 18. This device is just a tech demo, but its creators hope it opens the gateway to even smaller accelerators that could fit on a silicon chip.
“I consider this paper to be really interesting and cool physics, for sure, and it’s been an effort that’s been going on for a long time,” says Howard Milchberg, a physicist at the University of Maryland, who was not involved with the research.
How physicists built the world’s smallest particle accelerator
The chip-sized device is a proof-of-concept technology, but its creators say it could inspire future medical devices.
www.popsci.com
