Louis Barrett, physicist at Western Washington University, drives a lot. His daily commute to the university, located in Bellingham, Washington, is more than 80 miles.
More than 500 tons of niobium would go into building the ILC. What's so great about niobium? Where does it come from? And is the Earth's supply going to run out?
Almost in time with the rhythmic open-mouthed chewing and the occasional call for more ketchup during lunchtime at Fermilab's day care center comes the repeated mantra, "Careful of your milk."
Travel is an integral part of the life and work of particle physicists. Since the beginning of the year, some 30 physicists known as the Quantum Diarists have criss-crossed the world to meet collaborators at distant accelerators, attend conferences, teach a seminar, or interview for jobs.
Only detectors with the greatest precision capabilities will measure up to the machine seeking to explore supersymmetry, dark matter, the Higgs mechanism, and new physics that hasn't yet been imagined.
