Have you ever noticed that building that’s tucked away across the parking lot from Clippinger? It’s the Edwards Accelerator Lab. And by accelerator, I mean, particles are accelerated. Have you heard of the Large Hadron Collider, or CERN? Read “Angels and Demons” or seen the movie? Yeah, that.
Now, first things first, those who work there aren’t accelerating particles to 99.99 percent the speed of light, or producing antimatter, or anything as on-the-frontier as the kinds of things CERN works on. But they do reach a solid 14 percent, and the facility does a good deal of work with nuclear physics and everything from studying nuclear structure to researching potential cancer treatments. They’re also doing a lot of work with the ways in which nuclear physics and astrophysics are related — for those of you who might not quite know what that means, they’re taking all of the things we know about little, nuclear physics and applying it to outer space. That’s pretty cool.
The Accelerator Lab opened in 1968, and since then it’s undergone countless renovations, expansions and installations of new equipment. It started out with no more than a 150-kV accelerator in an old car garage and has since developed into the 17,400 square-foot building, equipped with a 4.5-MV tandem accelerator, 30-meter long underground time-of-flight tunnel and rotating beam-swinger magnet. It has also led to the installation of tons of programs, new hires and groups devoted to specific types of research. It has also been the recipient of millions of dollars in funding and grants.
Initially, it was simply called the OUAL (Ohio University Accelerator Laboratory), but it was eventually renamed after John E. Edwards, the former chairman of OU’s physics department and a recipient of the Kennedy Distinguished Professor Award. He served on OU’s faculty for 40 years, from 1932 to 1972, and was the first person at OU to begin working with radioactive isotopes. He was a prolific national authority on nuclear physics and an invaluable contributor to the field.
Amidst all of its prestigious history and achievements, the Edwards Accelerator Lab allows visitors. If you feel like learning a little bit about a cool piece of technology, I suggest you make the trip. It’s a particle accelerator — I mean, come on.
Kyle Burback is a sophomore studying English. Do you know what a particle accelerator is? Email him at kb931012@ohio.edu.
