How does the particle accelerator work?
A particle accelerator is a physical device that uses electric fields to accelerate charged particles to huge speeds, sometimes significant fractions of light speed. Common particles that can be found in particle accelerators include protons and electrons, building blocks of the atom. Particle accelerators are often used to break particles against each other at very high speeds, revealing their basic components. The X -ray generator and TV ensemble are common examples of particle accelerators with the same basic design as their larger cousins used in high -energy physics experiments. particle accelerator falls into one of two categories: circular or linear.
In the circular accelerator particles, the particles accelerate through the continuous circular road. The advantage of this arrangement is that the particle can be directed many times in a circle and saves hardware. The disadvantage is that the particles in circular accelerators emit electromagnetic radiation, NazEmpty synchrotron radiation. Because their momentum is constantly encouraging them to fly to the tangential trajectory to the circle, energy must be constantly spent to keep them on the circular road, which means that the accelerators of circular particles are less effective. For large accelerators, synchrotron radiation is so intense that the entire accelerator must be buried underground to maintain safety standards. Fermilab accelerator in Illinois has a circular path of 4 miles (6.43 km).
Linear accelerators Fire particles in a straight line at a fixed goal. The cathode beam tube on your television is a low -energy particle accelerator that is eating photons in the visible range of light on the glass plate, on the screen. The stream of photons is constantly redirected to fill the pixels screen. This redirection occurs quickly enough to perceive the alternating stream of photons as a continuous image.
High -energy linear accelerators or linacs Calcal applications. Many boards alternatively attract and repel charged particles that move through them, attract particles forward when they have not yet passed, and move them away. In this way, an alternating electric field can be used to accelerate particles to very high speed and energy. Physicists use these accelerators to simulate exotic conditions, such as the conditions in the center of the star or at the beginning of the universe. The "particle zoo" described by the standard model of particle physics has been uncovered gradually in experiments with particle accelerator. The largest linear acceleration particlerator is the linear accelerator Stanford with a length of 2 miles (3.2 km).