The superconducting Tevatron is the lower ring of magnets (the old main ring is above).

High-energy particle accelerators help explain many mysteries of matter, space, and time, enabling physicists to study the smallest objects ever found and recreate the conditions of the early universe. Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory's Tevatron, which accelerates and collides protons and antiprotons in a four-mile underground ring, is the most powerful accelerator in the world. It began operating in 1986, achieving collisions at energies of 1.6 trillion electron volts, about 1,600 times the rest mass of the proton. Among its innovations, the Tevatron pioneered the use of superconducting accelerator magnets, which, by generating increased magnetic fields with no resistive losses, help raise energy levels by keeping the speeding particles within the ring. The higher the energy levels in a particle collider, the smaller the structures that can be probed.

Scientific Impact: The Tevatron enables scientists to push the frontiers of both particle physics and cosmology. In 1995, research using this machine led to the discovery of the "top" quark, a fundamental constituent of matter. Superconducting accelerator magnets have become essential to many high-energy accelerators, both already built and planned for the future.

Social Impact: Particle collisions at the Tevatron give humans a way to see the smallest constituents of matter. Studies performed here expand human understanding of nature and contribute to improvements in science education.

Reference: "Initial Operation of the Tevatron Collider," Rolland Johnson, Proceedings of the 1987 IEEE Particle Accelerator Conference (87CH2387-9).

URL: http://www.fnal.gov/pub/about/tour/decades.htm

Technical Contact: Dr. Bruce Strauss, bruce.strauss@science.doe.gov

Press Contact: Jeff Sherwood, DOE Office of Public Affairs, 202-586-5806

SC-Funding Office: Office of High Energy and Nuclear Physics