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Massive cryogenic device will help Fermilab explore mysteries of the universe

As the massive 95-metric ton coldbox completed its cross-ocean journey, the crowd at Fermilab braving frigid winter temperatures last week could imagine what the particle accelerator being chilled to minus 456 Fahrenheit by the device must feel like.

The coldbox is part of Fermilab’s Proton Improvement Plan II (PIP-II) project, a new 215-meter linear accelerator. When completed in 2029, it will fire a high-energy beam 800 miles to a repurposed mine shaft one mile beneath Lead, South Dakota. The accelerator will be the world’s most powerful continuous-wave proton accelerator. The beam will contain neutrinos — the most mysterious fundamental particles known in the universe.

Leaving from France on Oct. 14, the 55-by-14-foot coldbox was shipped across the Atlantic Ocean, barged up the Mississippi and Illinois rivers, and hauled into Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in Batavia — to explain the universe’s mysteries.

Scientists will try to solve puzzles like why post-Big Bang matter conquered antimatter and what undiscovered secrets unify all the fundamental forces of nature.

The groundbreaking project, known as the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE), will be the most innovative neutrino experiment in the world, making Fermilab distinct from other global particle accelerators, like CERN in Europe.

Neutrinos come in three different “flavors” — electron, muon, and tau. While traveling at nearly the speed of light, they alter their properties, switching back and forth between the different types. Physicists believe studying these transitions could provide insights into dark energy, the evolution of the universe, and perhaps lead to a “theory of everything,” unifying our knowledge of all the fundamental forces.

“Neutrinos could explain why we have this matter and antimatter asymmetry,” said Pantaleo Raimondi, director of the PIP-II project. “In the sun, where nuclear fusion produces trillions of neutrinos, they somehow produce matter when they interact with matter. Because they have energy, the energy can be reconverted into matter. However, if neutrinos are to change flavors while traveling, they create an exotic matter that is not stable, so it decays in fractions of a second. This means the overall balance of matter in the universe is related to neutrinos’ tricky behavior.”

The coldbox is the heart of the PIP-II cryogenic system, cooling helium gas to below the average temperature of outer space. That allows the particle beam to fire at full power without losing energy from radiated heat. The superconductive materials within the accelerator, made from the element niobium, are chilled to minus 452 F to further prevent energy loss. As electric fields bounce back and forth, Fermilab’s physicists can precisely time their waves to accelerate the particle beams.

Physicists at Fermilab and in South Dakota will try to capture and detect neutrinos as they oscillate during their rapid journey through the Earth’s mantle.

“The advances in superconducting materials have an impact on medical technologies, like MRI systems, which use the same materials,” said Christian Boffo, PIP-II’s project manager. “We are also working on projects where it can be used for water purification using an electron beam that we developed in our accelerators.”

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