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Tevatron Shutdown at Fermilab Today: Audience to Watch Last Run

The U.S. famed particle accelerator comes to a close as the Batavia-based lab looks ahead to advanced projects. The Tevatron was active for 28 years.

It's the end of one era, and the beginning of another.

The will began the shutdown process for the Tevatron Friday.

The Tevatron is the second-highest energy proton-antiproton collider, or particle accelerator.

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It was the world's largest particle accelerator until 2009, falling behind only to the Switzerland-based Large Hadron Collider. Massive amounts of data have been collected from the Tevatron's cycles, which take place underground.

Unfortunately the Tevatron, like many people and programs of these recent years, was . The lab did not receive enough funding to run the accelerator and officials hope to save money with its closure.

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Not all is lost with this shutdown. Some of the Tevatron employees will be transferred to other initiatives at the lab, such as , the MicroBooNe and the Illinois Accelerator Research Center.

Here's a list of other projects, courtesy of the lab's Office of Communication:

  • The NOvA neutrino experiment, currently under construction at Fermilab and in Minnesota, which will use the world’s most powerful neutrino beam.
  • The Dark Energy Camera, which will have the largest optical survey power in the world and will carry out the largest galaxy survey. The Fermilab-built camera is currently being installed on a telescope in Chile.
  • The CMS experiment in Europe at the Large Hadron Collider. Fermilab is the lead U.S. institution in the experiment and supports hundreds of U.S. researchers through a remote operation center for CMS analysis and ongoing R&D for future upgrades.

Scientists will also be processing data from this last stretch of the Tevatron's run for years to come.

"The Tevatron has exceeded all expectations," Fermilab Director Pier Oddone said in a statement posted Jan. 10, 2011 on the lab’s website. "The life of this legendary machine has been marked by historic discoveries made possible by its innovative accelerator and detector technologies."


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