The event began with words of welcome from Dr. Volkmar Dietz, Ministerial Director at the Federal Ministry of Education and Research and Chairman of the GSI Supervisory Board, and Christoph Degen, State Secretary at the Hessian Ministry of Science and Research, Art and Culture. The Lord Mayor of Darmstadt, City of Science, Hanno Benz, delivered words of welcome. The President of the Helmholtz Association, Professor Otmar D. Wiestler, was connected via video message. Dr. Catarina Sahlberg as Chair of the FAIR Council and Alicja Nowakowska as Chair of the FAIR Administrative and Finance Committee contributed the perspective of the international partner countries. The former Scientific Managing Director and Research Director of FAIR/GSI, Professor Karlheinz Langanke led through the afternoon's program.
The renowned Swedish experimental physicist Professor Thomas Nilsson was Head of the Department of Physics at Chalmers University of Technology in Gothenburg before starting his position in Darmstadt in December 2024. As Scientific Managing Director, he is in charge of the entire scientific division of FAIR and GSI, and he is also the Spokesperson of the Management Board. In his inaugural speech, Professor Thomas Nilsson gave an exciting outlook on the future development of FAIR/GSI. “I am very proud to be part of a project that brings together scientists from all over the world, and thus plays a key role in the global research community. The progress we achieve here will not only advance physics, but also promote numerous other disciplines.” The new Scientific Director also emphasized the international dimensions: “It is fascinating to work on such a large international project that fosters the exchange of knowledge and innovation across national borders. I will do everything I can to ensure that FAIR/GSI continues to live up to its reputation as one of the world’s largest and most ambitious research projects in physics. The synergies between people of various institutions and nations are crucial to fully exploit the potential of FAIR.”
Together with Dr. Katharina Stummeyer, Administrative Managing Director, and Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director, the world-renowned researcher forms the top management of FAIR and GSI. In their welcome address, both looked forward to working together in the management team.
Dr. Katharina Stummeyer, Administrative Managing Director, emphasized: “With Professor Nilsson, we have gained an excellent and experienced scientist who will not only drive the scientific development of FAIR and GSI, but also contribute extensive experience in the cooperation of international research institutes and the networking of the scientific community. I look forward to the joint challenges and the further progress we will achieve as a team.”
Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director, said: “The technological innovations and infrastructure projects that we are implementing here require close cooperation and expertise from various fields. I am convinced that Professor Nilsson will succeed in further strengthening the profile of FAIR/GSI as one of the world’s leading research facilities. Our aim is to enable international research excellence at a facility that is technically customized for science.”
Professor Nilsson’s appointment comes at a very important time for FAIR and GSI, with a focus on preparing the experiments for the launch of the FAIR facility. The scientific research program is already running in parallel, and the current beam time offers scientists excellent conditions for their experiments. They are using the GSI accelerator facilities, which have been significantly improved for their later use as pre-accelerators for FAIR. Thanks to the detectors and instrumentation developed by the large international FAIR collaborations and the improved ion accelerators, it is already possible to break new ground in physics. (BP)
Dr. Volkmar Dietz, Federal Ministry of Education and Research and Chairman of the GSI Supervisory Board: “I am delighted that we were able to appoint Thomas Nilsson as Scientific Managing Director. I have known him as a strong leader who always acts clearly and calmly, even when FAIR has been in stormy seas in recent years. Now I see FAIR and GSI on a straight course: the exploitation of FAIR's enormous scientific potential is in sight. I am sure that with Thomas Nilsson and the entire team at FAIR and GSI, we will see FAIR and GSI achieve enormous scientific brilliance in the coming years.”
Christoph Degen, State Secretary in the Hessian Ministry of Science and Research, Arts and Culture: “Professor Thomas Nilsson, a renowned experimental physicist who has long been involved in the development of the FAIR facility – both scientifically and in the committees – is taking over as Scientific Managing Director. I am delighted that under Professor Nilsson’s leadership, fundamental physics research of outstanding global importance will soon be conducted at FAIR. The facility not only demonstrates the efficiency of the state of Hesse as a science and business location. It will make a significant contribution to scientific progress, the development of cutting-edge technologies and the training of specialists. I wish Professor Thomas Nilsson every success in this important task.”
Hanno Benz, Lord Mayor of Darmstadt, City of Science: “Scientific success is our most important resource and gives our location a real advantage. The success of our research facilities therefore also determines the competitiveness of our city. The GSI Helmholtzzentrum is a flagship project of our scientific infrastructure and has stood for world-class research for decades. The new Scientific Managing Director, Professor Nilsson, now has the responsible task of confirming these successes and leading the internationally active organization into a future rich in knowledge. With the new FAIR particle accelerator facility under construction and 3,000 researchers from 50 countries, he has the best conditions for this. We wish him all the best in his new role and look forward to working with him at the Darmstadt research location.”
Professor Otmar D. Wiestler, President of the Helmholtz Association: “Cutting-edge large-scale research infrastructures such as FAIR are an integral part of the Helmholtz mission. They are crucial to address some of the great challenges of our time in areas such as fundamental physics, materials research or the life sciences. Thomas Nilsson is an internationally outstanding scientist with extensive expertise in the strategic planning and implementation of major international research projects. He is an excellent choice for the position of the Scientific Managing Director of FAIR and GSI and a great benefit to the Helmholtz Association.”
Dr. Catarina Sahlberg, Chair FAIR Council: “As the Chair of the FAIR Council, it is my distinct honor to welcome Professor Thomas Nilsson as our new Scientific Managing Director. Having known Thomas for many years, I am confident that his exceptional expertise and visionary leadership will safely steer FAIR through the critical phases of commissioning and the start of full-scale operations at this unique research facility. Thomas' dedication to the FAIR project reflects the active participation of our international partners in ensuring the success of the facility. And with a wink, rest assured, the fact that there are now two Swedes — both Thomas and myself — serving at the highest governance level at FAIR does not mean we will introduce instructions for the accelerator assembly in the style of a well-known Swedish furniture store.”
Alicja Nowakowska, Chair of the FAIR Administrative and Finance Committee: “Professor Thomas Nilsson is a renowned scientist and expert engaged from the early beginning of FAIR project. We were always impressed with how he was able to find solutions and connect differing points of view. Professor Nilsson takes up the role of the Scientific Managing Director of FAIR and GSI not only with exceptional experience and competence, but also with vision and passion, which are essential for projects of this scale and complexity.”
Professor Thomas Nilsson studied Engineering Physics at Chalmers University of Technology in Gothenburg, Sweden, and was a PhD student at the former TH (now TU) in Darmstadt. After that, he worked as a physics coordinator at the ISOLDE facility at the CERN research center in Switzerland. From 2005 to 2006, he worked as a researcher at TU Darmstadt and Chalmers University. Since 2009, he has been a full professor in physics at Chalmers University and since 2017 Head of the Physics Department and part of the university management group. Professor Nilsson is also a member of the Physics Class of the prestigious Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, which is responsible for selecting Nobel Prize laureates. In his research, the experimental physicist focuses on how fundamental types of interactions manifest in subatomic systems, in particular in nuclei with large excesses of neutrons or protons, where exotic structures and properties emerge. The renowned scientist also has extensive experience in the strategic planning of large research projects and international collaborations. He took on scientific tasks in advisory bodies and program committees, for example, at the Canadian National Accelerator Center TRIUMF and at the RIKEN Research Center in Japan. In addition, he has already served in various positions on the FAIR Council and as a member of the GSI Supervisory Board.
FAIR will be one of the largest and most complex accelerator facilities in the world, with a central ring accelerator with a circumference of 1,100 meters. Engineers and scientists are working in international partnership to advance new technological developments in a number of areas, such as information technology and superconductor technology. Around 3,000 scientists from all over the world will be able to conduct top-level research at FAIR. Their outstanding experiments will generate new fundamental insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe.
Using cerebral organoids (mini-brains), the researchers were able to show that the lesions observed in brain MRI scans after radiotherapy are not due to the death of brain cells (brain necrosis), as generally stated. Rather, they are caused by abnormal generation of choroid plexus-like cells lining liquid-filled cavities. The choroid plexus (CP) is responsible for the production of cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) and is for example involved in detoxification processes of the brain. Therefore, the observed cavities indicate excessive liquor production. The researchers have now published their findings in the Nature partner journal “Communications Biology”. The results could help to better understand and prevent the side effects of radiotherapy.
The work was funded by the US National Institute of Health (NIH) and the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and was performed by the GSI Biophysics Department led by Professor Marco Durante in collaboration with the MD Anderson Cancer Center of the University of Texas and the University of Heidelberg. Another important partner of the study was the Heidelberg Ion Beam Therapy Center (HIT).
Radiotherapy is an important treatment for brain tumors, but the efficacy of the treatment is limited by its toxicity to normal tissue, including tissue damage (lesions) after radiation. These lesions occur in up to 25 percent of patients treated with radiotherapy. The understanding of this damage and its causes has so far been poor, making it difficult to develop countermeasures. This is where the current research work comes in as it may provide additional strategies for possible countermeasures.
Professor Marco Durante, Head of GSI Biophysics summarized: “This discovery changes our understanding of radiation damage in the brain. It could play a key role in the fight against radiation toxicity. If we understand the mechanisms more precisely, we can also open up new perspectives for better treatment of brain tumors.” The aim of the research is to develop therapeutic approaches that minimize the harmful side effects of radiotherapy on the brain without compromising the effectiveness of tumor treatment. The researchers emphasize that further studies and clinical trials will be needed to test the potential implementations of this discovery and develop therapeutic solutions that will benefit patients. (BP)
The scientists are using cerebral organoids, which are grown in vitro (“in glass”, outside the body) with the help of human stem cells, to study the effects of radiation therapy on the brain. These organoids are not fully formed organs, but are similar in structure and function to the human brain and therefore enable a more precise investigation of the tissue's reaction to radiation. Scientists hope that this will lead to substantial progress in research and therapy, not least for neurological diseases.
Publication in „Communications Biology“
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In an introductory lecture, Professor Silvia Masciocchi, head of the ALICE research department at GSI/FAIR, informed the guests about the research activities at GSI and the FAIR construction project. During a tour of the campus, the conference participants learned more about the activities at the experimental storage ring ESR, in tumor therapy and biophysics, as well as at the large-scale experiments HADES and R3B. The superconducting magnets for the FAIR Super Fragment Separator (Super-FRS), the innovative high-performance computing center Green IT Cube and the main control room of the accelerator facility were also part of the program.
Finally, the participants joined a bus tour of the FAIR construction site to take a look at the newly constructed buildings for experiments and accelerator facilities. (CP)
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This exchange fosters cross-cultural learning and academic collaboration, with a focus on science and technology. Throughout the day, the students took part in a campus tour, including main research and infrastructure areas such as the Main Control Room, experimental areas and the FAIR construction site. This allowed them to learn about various aspects of cutting-edge scientific work. The school students were guided by Dr. Danyal Winters (Accelerator), Dr. Marvin Kohls (HADES experiment) and Dr. Pradeep Ghosh (International Cooperations).
The study tour also provided the opportunity for exchange between students from both countries, encouraging discussions and networking in an international setting. The visiting teachers, including one with a background as a PhD student in the NUSTAR collaboration, reflect the strong academic ties to advanced research. Building on a successful visit last year, this event further strengthened the relationships between the schools and promoted educational outreach in science and technology.
At the end of the event, the GSI/FAIR management emphasized the importance of technology and science in international collaboration and the impact of cross-border learning. The visit concluded with a lively debate during the networking session, where students exchanged ideas and perspectives on science and technology.
The Scientific Managing Director of GSI/FAIR, Professor Thomas Nilsson, said: “Science is all about curiosity and discovery. I still remember the excitement of asking 'why' and 'how' when I was your age. Every question you ask brings you closer to understanding the universe and shaping the future. Never stop exploring! It’s truly a delight to see you here together with enthusiastic physics and mathematics teachers today because you are the future leaders who will push the boundaries of knowledge and innovation."
The Technical Managing Director of GSI/FAIR, Jörg Blaurock, stated: “Technology is everywhere, and we use it every day. The progress in science and engineering is what shapes our future. The key to innovation is curiosity—asking questions, exploring new ideas, and never being satisfied with just 'good enough'. It’s great to see you all here today because you are the future leaders who will make the next big breakthroughs! A big thanks to your teachers for choosing GSI/FAIR as one of the destinations for your visit.” (BP)
#CatchThemEarly is a pilot project focused on inspiring school-going children aged 14-18 with topics in big science. It aims to bridge the gap between academic research and everyday understanding of science, emphasizing the importance of STEM fields.
More information on the initiative #catchthemearly and GET_Involved Programme is available on the website www.fair-center.eu/get_involved or from Dr. Pradeep Ghosh via e-Mail International-Cooperations(at)fair-center.eu.
]]>The girls were welcomed by the organizing Public Relations Department and Dr. Katharina Stummeyer, Administrative Managing Director of GSI and FAIR. They were then taken on a tour of the campus to visit the experimental storage ring ESR, the experimental site for medical research and the large detector setup HADES, as well as marveling at the large FAIR construction site from the viewing platform.
In small groups, the girls then learnt more about the individual professions and fields of work on campus. This year, these included research work in materials research, atomic physics and biophysics as well as various professions in the specialist and infrastructure departments such as ion sources, linear accelerators, beam diagnostics, electronics, engineering, workshops, target laboratory, cryogenics, detector laboratory, vacuum, technology transfer, and IT. In a special FAIR construction program, some of the girls gained an insight into construction activities on the large construction site. Another group joined the PR team to document the day on social media.
“On Girls’Day, we offer many girls exciting insights into job profiles and the research here at GSI and FAIR,” said Dr. Katharina Stummeyer. “We want to spark their interest and inspire them to engage with GSI and FAIR. It would be wonderful to see some of them return to us later — whether as working students, in apprenticeships, during an internship or while pursuing their bachelor's, master's or PhD theses here.”
“The high number of participants is of course a great confirmation of the attractiveness of our offer for us organizers and for the supervisors from the technical and scientific departments,” explains organizer Carola Pomplun, who is a physicist herself and works in the PR department at GSI and FAIR. “In the small groups, the girls could ask their questions directly, see the work ‘live’ and often build something small to take home with them. A big thanks goes to our supervisors, who made this direct contact possible.”
Girls’Day is a day of action all over Germany. On this day, businesses, universities, and other institutions all over Germany open their doors to schoolgirls from grade 5 and above. The participants learn about courses of study and training in professions in the areas of IT, natural sciences, and technology — areas in which women have rarely been employed in the past. GSI and — since its foundation — also FAIR have been participating in the annual event since the early days of Girls’Day. (LK/CP)
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Dr. Guy Leckenby from TRIUMF and the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada, was awarded this year’s Young Scientist Award for his investigations of the decay of fully-ionized thallium-205 using the combination of Fragment Separator and Experimental Storage Ring (FRS-ESR) at GSI/FAIR to clarify open questions of the lead-205 dating in the early solar system.
The Young Scientist Award is presented annually by GENCO to outstanding young researchers working in the field of experimental or theoretical nuclear physics or chemistry. The winners are selected by an international jury. The prize is endowed with 1,000 euros.
In a memorial colloquium for the recently deceased GSI element discoverer Professor Gottfried Münzenberg, Professor Sir Martyn Poliakoff, University of Nottingham, UK, spoke about the periodic table of elements and Professor Walter Henning, Argonne National Laboratory, USA, and former Scientific Managing Director of GSI, shared his insights about Gottfried Münzenberg’s life, his scientific successes in the synthesis and investigation of exotic nuclei as well as his groundbreaking contributions to new experiments in FAIR’s NUSTAR collaboration.
As part of the NUSTAR plenary program, six GENCO Young Scientist Awardees of previous years provided an overview of the advancement of their fields, their professional careers since receiving the award, and their current projects. The presentations covered a wide range of research areas, from nuclear reactions, laser spectroscopy, nuclear theory and fundamental questions such as the lifetime of the neutron to applications of radioactive isotopes in medicine.
Furthermore, several new members of the FAIR-GENCO community received the “FAIR-GENCO Membership Award”:
FAIR/GSI welcomed the Big Science Sweden Steering Board for its General Board Meeting, marking an important milestone in Sweden’s ongoing contributions to the FAIR project. As a key shareholder alongside Finland, Sweden plays a vital role in FAIR’s funding and scientific collaborations, with institutions across the country driving innovation in the experiments NUSTAR, PANDA, APPA, and other programs. The delegation included representatives from Sweden’s leading research bodies, such as the Lulea University of Technology, Uppsala University, Lund University, and Chalmers University of Technology.
The Scientific Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, Professor Thomas Nilsson, who is originally from Sweden and came to Darmstadt last year from Chalmers University of Technology, said “I am extremely delighted with the decision by Big Science Sweden to choose FAIR/GSI as their location for the Steering board meeting. The visit of the Board underlines Sweden’s vital role and continued interest in FAIR’s scientific and technological endeavor. Through contributions to experiments and accelerators components, Sweden continues to push the boundaries of fundamental research, strengthening international collaboration and shaping the future of scientific discovery.”
The Technical Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, Jörg Blaurock, stated: “The visit of the Big Science Sweden Steering Board to FAIR highlights Sweden’s deep expertise in accelerator technology and instrumentation. Through strong collaboration between research institutions and industry, Big Science Sweden plays a vital role in driving technological advancements that will shape the future of scientific exploration at FAIR. This visit further strengthens our shared commitment to innovation, opening exciting new opportunities for Swedish science and industry to contribute to cutting-edge developments in global research.”
Dr. Katharina Stummeyer, the Administrative Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, said “Sweden's commitment to FAIR, reinforced by the visit of the Big Science Sweden Steering Board, is a wonderful example of active international partnership in research and technology. Together with our strong Swedish partners, we are advancing innovations, technology transfer, and scientific excellence with FAIR, creating new opportunities for collaboration between research and industry.”
The General Board Meeting kicked off with an introduction to FAIR and GSI, followed by a visit to the construction site, where participants witnessed the impressive progress. The delegation then took part in a guided tour of GSI, providing deeper insights into the cutting-edge research infrastructure and the scientific achievements.
Björn Ekelund of Ericsson Group and the Chair of Big Science Sweden said: “Visiting FAIR and GSI was a fantastic experience. Seeing the scale and ambition of these world-class facilities up close was truly inspiring. As Chair of Big Science Sweden, I am proud of the components, knowledge and expertise that Swedish researchers and companies have contributed to the FAIR project thus far. I hope that we can strengthen our collaboration with both FAIR and GSI, to open up further exciting opportunities for Swedish science and industry.”
Dr Fredrik Engelmark, Swedish Industrial Liaison Officer (ILO) for FAIR and GSI stated: “Visiting FAIR and GSI and engaging directly with key stakeholders has been incredibly valuable. The facility's cutting-edge research and advanced technology provide excellent opportunities for collaboration. Swedish industry possesses the expertise and innovation needed to contribute to both ongoing projects and future developments.”
The meeting emphasized Sweden’s strategic role in FAIR, future collaborations, and technological developments, reaffirming its commitment to research and innovation within the project. (BP)
FFor more information on Big Science Sweden interested persons can contact Frederik Engelmark (fredrik.engelmark(at)bigsciencesweden.se) and for international cooperation activities with Sweden and Swedish institutions please contact Dr. Pradeep Ghosh (International Cooperations Unit) via the e-mail international-cooperations(at)fair-center.eu.
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“We need an energy mix that is open to all technologies, because the sun doesn't always shine and the wind doesn't always blow. We can only secure our prosperity if energy is available at all times and remains affordable for everyone. Nuclear fusion can be the game changer and bring about the decisive breakthrough,” said Head of the State Government Boris Rhein in Biblis. Together with representatives from industry and research, the state government wants to move in the direction of commercial fusion energy. “We are committed to a common vision. We want to establish Hesse as a leading location for cutting-edge research and development in laser-based nuclear fusion and pave the way towards commercial fusion energy. To this end, a demonstration plant and later a power plant are to be funded at the Biblis site.”
Minister President Rhein emphasized the importance of innovation-friendly policies. “Cutting-edge research into innovative forms of energy must again take place in Germany. It is a very good signal that the future federal government wants to promote fusion research more strongly and is pursuing the goal of building the world's first fusion reactor in Germany. We must not phase out everywhere, but must also get back in,” said the head of the state government and added: “I am firmly convinced that we can make nuclear fusion the energy supplier of the future. Biblis is to become a nucleus for energy supply ‘made in Hesse’ — making Hesse the number one location for nuclear fusion. The state government will provide up to 20 million euros this year for research into nuclear fusion.” In addition to state investment, private funds and funding from federal and EU programs will also be used.
The Deputy Head of Government, Minister of Economic Affairs Kaweh Mansoori, made it clear that global energy demand will continue to grow in the coming decades. “This presents us with the urgent task of using all available options to ensure a climate-friendly, secure and economical energy supply. In addition to the expansion of wind and solar energy, we are therefore also focusing on investments in future technologies such as laser-based nuclear fusion. Germany and Hesse in particular are excellently positioned for this,” he said, adding: ”With companies such as Focused Energy in Darmstadt and the excellent local scientific institutions, we have players who are setting standards in international fusion research. It is a historic opportunity for Hesse not only to develop a key technology, but also to produce it competitively. This is a decisive step towards strengthening our innovative power and independence at a time when international supply chains and energy imports are becoming increasingly uncertain. I am convinced that the energy sector and the industrial landscape in Hesse can be developed in a sustainable manner. To this end, we want to drive forward the development of a highly developed infrastructure and the creation of new jobs in research, development and industrial production.”
“Fusion energy offers great long-term potential,” said Timon Gremmels, Hessian Minister for Science and Research, Art and Culture. “There is still a lot of exciting research work ahead of us before we get there. We want to establish Hesse as a leading location for cutting-edge research and the development of laser-based nuclear fusion. At the same time, we want to conduct research into marketable renewable energies and storage technologies in the short and medium term in order to become climate-neutral by 2045. With our strong research landscape and the planned Cluster of Excellence ‘Energy 2040’, we have the best prerequisites for this in Hesse. By driving both forward in equal measure, we can put an end to expensive dependencies on fossil fuels.”
“With their basic research and expertise in the fields of plasma physics and materials research, GSI and FAIR have been driving forward the technological maturity of laser-based fusion for decades,” said Professor Thomas Nilsson at the event. “By training young researchers, we are passing on the necessary knowledge to new generations and paving the way for future socially relevant applications. Our work is an indispensable backbone for industrial application and contributes to Hesse's pioneering role both nationally and internationally.”
In the MoU, representatives from politics, business and science commit to paving the way to commercial fusion energy for Hesse and establishing the state as a leading location for cutting-edge research and the development of laser-based nuclear fusion.
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The SCIENCE POP-UP project by GSI/FAIR will be implemented for a limited period over the summer in a currently unused store in Darmstadt's city center. It was developed in close cooperation with the store space and district management of Wissenschaftsstadt Darmstadt Marketing GmbH. The Stadtpunkte project of the store space and district management is testing new inner-city concepts in vacant spaces, and is funded by the inner city program “Sustainable inner cities and centers” of the Federal Ministry of Housing, Urban Development and Building.
The aim of the GSI/FAIR hands-on space is to temporarily bring a part of research and high-tech to the center of the city of science Darmstadt and to spark the fascination for physics in young and old. As a world-class research center with close roots in Darmstadt and the region, GSI/FAIR is also pleased to contribute to the revitalization of the city centre with the temporary use of a currently vacant store space.
The innovative project offers a wide range of topics, from creative knowledge transfer for all interested parties to targeted didactic support for future researchers. In the hands-on exhibition, passers-by as well as, for example, the physics club of a school can gain interesting insights into research at particle accelerators. Young teams and experienced researchers from GSI and FAIR present various topics and are available to answer any questions visitors may have. What are the smallest building blocks of the universe? How do detectors make the invisible visible? Where do the elements come from?
There are special offers for school classes, virtual tours and much more. In addition, workshops and lectures make it possible for people in and around Darmstadt to experience cutting-edge research at GSI and FAIR. At the interactive stations, explorers of all ages can learn what it means to discover the universe in the laboratory, for example by making natural radiation visible in a cloud chamber or playing the accelerator game to see how particles are brought up to speed in the GSI/FAIR linear accelerator. A VR station builds a virtual bridge from the city center to the GSI/FAIR campus in Darmstadt-Wixhausen and, using virtual reality glasses, takes visitors directly to the facilities of the existing research center and the FAIR mega construction project. A unique opportunity to get to know top international research up close and to take a look into the future of research with FAIR. (BP)
Professor Dr. Thomas Nilsson, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR: “We are very pleased to be able to provide an attractive and free educational offer in the STEM area. With this project, we want to spark curiosity and fascination for research in young people. Science needs interested young students and many bright minds who use their talent for research. But also the general public is also always welcome to experience and feel the enthusiasm that drives us researchers and to make exciting discoveries about the universe in the laboratory.”
Heike Hofmann, Hessian Minister for Labor, Integration, Youth and Social Affairs: “Children and young people are our future. They are our next scientists, engineers and teachers. I am therefore delighted that the SCIENCE POP-UP is creating a unique platform that invites all citizens to experience science up close and discover complex topics in a hands-on way. Especially at a time when scientific knowledge is shaping our daily lives, it is of vital importance to make research accessible to everyone.”
Hanno Benz, Lord Mayor of Darmstadt, City of Science: “Darmstadt is a city of science and shapes our daily lives. Therefore, it is all the more important to make science perceptible for everyone – especially for the younger generation. The SCIENCE POP-UP by GSI/FAIR does just that: it makes science tangible and exciting. I am delighted that this innovative project is contributing to the vitalization of our inner city and promoting new ideas. Retail, gastronomy, culture, science and urban society - they all belong together and are actively driving the transformation process of our city.”
The GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt operates a globally unique accelerator facility for ions. Researchers from all over the world use the facility for experiments and to develop new applications in medicine and technology. The new international accelerator center FAIR, one of the world's largest research projects, is currently under construction at GSI. At FAIR, matter that usually only exists in the depth of space will be produced in a lab for research. Scientists expect to gain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe from the Big Bang to the present.
Photo gallery of the opering
More information and announcements about events at SCIENCE POP-UP by GSI and FAIR
More information about the Stadtpunkte project of the retail space and neighborhood management
Dr. Kshitij Agarwal defended his PhD thesis at the University of Tübingen, Germany. With his thesis “Thermal Management of the Silicon Tracking System of the CBM Experiment at FAIR“, he made significant contributions to the design of the cooling element of the Silicon Tracking System (STS) and optimizing the construction of the STS modules as well as the monitoring of environmental parameters. As part of his dissertation, he developed a realistic CBM-STS thermal demonstrator to experimentally verify the cooling concept and simulation results.
Emphasized by the CBM Collaboration was the “high relevance of this work for the development of the concept of the STS cooling system and its direct implications in the final STS operation”.
The CBM Dissertation Prize Committee decided on the works submitted. It is formed by Petr Chaloupka, Krzysztof Piasecki und and Alberica Toia (Chair). CBM spokesperson is Tetyana Galatyuk, Chairman of the CBM Collaboration Committee Hanna Zbroszczyk. (LK/BP)
]]>The BIR Medal is awarded to recognize transformative and outstanding achievement in radiology, radiation oncology and the associated sciences across the world. Professor Durante is being honored for his important work on cancer therapy with high-energy heavy ions. Professor Durante, who was also invited to give a plenary lecture on particle therapy in London, was very pleased to receive the award.
The award is presented in the form of a medal and includes Honorary Fellow of the Institute. The British Institute of Radiology is the world’s oldest radiological society with an international and multi-disciplinary membership. Consideration of suitable recipients of the award is made every two years by the BIR nomination and judging panel.
Professor Marco Durante is an internationally recognized expert in the fields of radiation biology and medical physics, especially for therapy with heavy ions and radioprotection in space. He made important scientific progress in the field of biodosimetry of charged particles, optimization of particle therapy and shielding of heavy ions in space. He studied physics and got his PhD at the University Federico II in Italy. His post doc positions took him to the NASA Johnson Space Center in Texas and to the National Institute of Radiological Sciences in Japan. During his studies, he specialized in charged particle therapy, cosmic radiation, radiation cytogenetics and radiation biophysics.
He has received numerous awards for his research, including the Galileo Galilei prize from the European Federation of Organizations for Medical Physics (EFOMP), the Warren Sinclair award of the US National Council of Radiation Protection (NCRP), the IBA-Europhysics Prize of the European Physical Society (EPS), the Bacq & Alexander award of the European Radiation Research Society (ERRS), the Failla Award of the Radiation Research Society, the Henry Kaplan Prize of the International Association of Radiation Research (IARR) and Ellen Gleditsch Prize of the Norwegian Academy of Sciences and Letters. Additionally, he has been awarded an ERC Advanced Grant of the European Union for the continuation of his research activities and is president of the Particle Therapy Co-Operative Group (PTCOG), the global organization of particle therapy centers. (BP)
More about the British Institute of Radiology
More about the research of Professor Marco Durante and the Biophysics Department at GSI
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In the framework of the ALICE Masterclass, the students gained insight into the scientific work and data analysis. Under the expert guidance of the scientists on site, they analyzed the ALICE experiment data taken in proton-proton collisions as well as collisions of lead nuclei. On a tour of the GSI/FAIR campus, they learned about accelerator and detector components and took a look at the FAIR construction site from the viewpoint. To conclude the day of research, they discussed their results with other participants in a joint video conference with other research institutions.
ALICE is one of the four large-scale experiments at the LHC collider at the CERN research center in Geneva and deals in particular with heavy-ion collisions of lead atomic nuclei. When lead atomic nuclei collide with unimaginable impact in the LHC, conditions are created similar to the first moments of the universe. During the collisions, a so-called quark-gluon plasma is created for a very short time - a state of matter that existed in the universe shortly after the Big Bang. This plasma transforms back into normal matter within fractions of a second. The particles produced in the process provide information about the properties of the quark-gluon plasma. Thus, the measurements can peer into the birth of the cosmos and reveal information about the basic building blocks of matter and their interactions.
The relationship between GSI and ALICE is very close: The two large ALICE detector systems Time Projection Chamber (TPC) and Transition Radiation Detector (TRD) were designed and built with significant contributions of GSI’s ALICE department and Detector Laboratory. Today scientists from both departments focus on the TPC, which is the centerpiece for track reconstruction in the central ALICE barrel setup and is also indispensable for particle identification. Scientist from GSI's IT department contribute strongly to the new data acquisition and analysis software O2, and the GSI/FAIR computing center is an integral part of the network for data analysis of the ALICE experiment.
The Masterclasses are organized by the IPPOG (International Particle Physics Outreach Group), of which GSI is an associate member. Each year, more than 13,000 students from over 60 countries take part in the events of about 225 universities or research centers for a day to unlock the mysteries of particle physics. All events in Germany are held in collaboration with the Netzwerk Teilchenwelt, of which GSI/FAIR is a member. The goal of the nationwide network for communicating particle physics to young people and teachers is to make particle physics accessible to a broader public. (CP)
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At the beginning, the visitors received a comprehensive presentation on the current research activities as well as on the construction and development progress of FAIR, the milestones already achieved and the further plans for the operation of the upcoming accelerator center.
A tour of the GSI campus then took the guests to some of the main research and infrastructure areas. Among other things, they visited the target laboratory, where wafer-thin films for experiments are produced using various processes. They also visited the experimental area of the Biophysics Department, where, for example, cancer therapy with ion beams has been developed and where research in the fields of space research, therapy and radiation biology continues. The CRYRING experimental storage ring, which is used for precise measurements of atomic, astrophysical and nuclear processes, and the HADES detector, which is used to study heavy ion collisions and matter under extreme conditions such as those that occur inside neutron stars, were also on the program.
Another highlight of the program was a tour of the FAIR construction site, where the guests were able to see at first hand the latest construction developments and the installation of FAIR high-tech accelerator components in the tunnel. They also visited the main supply building, the SIS100 accelerator tunnel located 17 meters underground, the central beamline and transfer building, the building for the CBM experiment and the NUSTAR experimental hall.
The members of the state parliament were very positive about the progress made at GSI/FAIR since their last visit and emphasized the important role of the research center for Hesse as a science hub and for the international research community. They were particularly impressed by the efficient cooperation between the various departments - from infrastructure and research to accelerator technologies. This complex interaction is crucial for the successful operation of a state-of-the-art facility like GSI/FAIR. (JL)
]]>After his dissertation under the supervision of Rudolf Bock in 1970 Hans Gutbrod continued his research on heavy ion physics at low energies in Heidelberg and Rochester.
Hans Gutbrod shaped the beginnings of the relativistic heavy ion physics at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. He collaborated with Arthur Poskanzer and Hans-Georg Ritter to construct and build the GSI-LBL 4π-Detector „Plastic Ball“. They discovered the collective behavior of nuclear matter (called “flow”) which is still considered one of the most significant observations in relativistic heavy ion physics today. Together with Reinhard Stock he was awarded the Robert-Wichard-Pohl-Preis of the German Physical Society in 1988.
At the CERN accelerator SPS he continued his research efforts as spokesman of the WA80/90/93 experiments, which also became groundbreaking experiments of heavy ion physics. With Jürgen Schuhkraft and others he initiated the ALICE experiment at the LHC at CERN where he had very strong influence on the detector’s design and layout.
In 1995 Hans Gutbrod became director of the newly founded SUBATECH in Nantes (France), where he also took charge as the French spokesman of ALICE-FRANCE, as deputy spokesman of the ALICE Collaboration and as project leader of the ALICE Dimuon Spectrometer. He played a driving role in the development of the institute.
In 2001 he returned to GSI to work on the GSI Future Project, now known as FAIR. The next seven years he worked as leader of the “FAIR Joint Core Team”, organizing and working on the scientific scope of the project. His inspiring personality and imagination were invaluable to establish the project.
He was very active to communicate among scientists to foster broad cooperation in the FAIR project. He exploited for example his tight collaborations with Indian institutes vested at CERN to have them join FAIR.
He held an honorary professorship at the Physics Department of the Goethe University Frankfurt am Main and an honorary doctorate of the University of Lund (Sweden). Since 1992 he also was a Fellow of the American Physical Society.
Hans Gutbrod will be remembered by GSI and FAIR as outstanding scientist, treasured colleague and, even more important, as a marvelous person. His enthusiasm and openness for new ideas will remain in our hearts. GSI and FAIR thank Hans Gutbrod for his contribution to our cause and bid him farewell with the greatest gratitude and respect. We extend our deepest sympathy to his family.
Management and Employees of the GSI and FAIR GmbH
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GSI/FAIR presented themselves at the recruiting event with a booth and promotional materials on the apprenticeships for systems mechanics, electronic technicians, IT specialists, industrial mechanics, construction mechanics and office management clerks as well as dual study opportunities and internships. Four employees from the training departments and Human Resources Development were on hand to talk to the young people and, of course, to play a game of table football.
Karriere Kick is Germany's most innovative career fair for apprenticeship employers. There is a certain distance in traditional job interviews. The tabletop soccer game makes it possible to break these rigid patterns of behavior and get back into authentic encounters. The barrier to entry is low and the fear of contact disappears. Young people and companies come into contact at eye level. The emotions that arise during the game ensure that young people and companies remember each other. The game reveals the social skills of applicants and company representatives within a few minutes and both can assess whether they are a good match. (CP)
The two guests were welcomed by Professor Thomas Nilsson, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Dr. Katharina Stummeyer, Administrative Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, and Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR.
First, the ministers were given an informative overview of the FAIR project, one of the largest construction projects for cutting-edge research worldwide, as well as GSI's research successes and current campus development. The program then included insights into some of the research facilities for FAIR, such as the R3B experiment with FAIR detectors and tumor therapy with ion beams.
During a tour of the construction site, Ministers Özdemir and Gremmels had the opportunity to inspect at the FAIR construction activities on the 20-hectare construction site located to the east of the existing GSI/FAIR campus and the substantial construction progress. Several important stages have been reached in recent months: The technical building installations are already well advanced, the shell for the current stage of FAIR has been completed. In addition, the installation of the FAIR accelerator machine has begun and a number of high-tech magnets and accelerator structures have already been installed in the underground ring tunnel.
The FAIR facility will provide outstanding experimental opportunities for researchers from all over the world to produce and study matter in the laboratory that usually only exists in the depth of space. In large planets, stars and stellar explosions, matter is exposed to extreme conditions, such as extremely high temperatures, pressures or densities. Researchers can produce these conditions at the FAIR facility. (BP)
Cem Özdemir, Federal Minister of Education and Research: FAIR will provide a unique infrastructure at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt, which will be of outstanding importance for the German and international research community. These research facilities not only push the boundaries of knowledge and of what is technically feasible, they are also an important driving force for innovation and a pillar of German and European technological sovereignty. As an international center for basic research – especially for young researchers – FAIR is a true investment in the future.
Timon Gremmels, Hessian Minister of Higher Education, Research, Science and the Arts: Similar to the Federal Government, the State of Hesse has been investing in the GSI Helmholtzzentrum and the FAIR facility for many years. FAIR's status as an internationally important research facility is ensured not least by the excellent research environment in Darmstadt, in particular for young scientists. Scientific knowledge, as generated by FAIR, is an indispensable basis for development and progress and creates an important foundation for tomorrow's society. This makes the State of Hesse one of the top locations for science in Europe and worldwide.
Professor Dr. Thomas Nilsson, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR: GSI/FAIR will create something unique in the world. FAIR will provide a first-class experimental environment and enable unprecedented, forward-looking research across a broad spectrum, from basic to applied research disciplines. Strong collaborations such as these make it possible to explore new scientific and technological territories and are important drivers of innovation for society.
Dr. Katharina Stummeyer, Administrative Managing Director of GSI and FAIR: As a non-university research facility, GSI/FAIR makes a significant contribution to strengthening Germany as a hub for science and technology. The facility is an important example of international cooperation and, through its affiliation with the Helmholtz Association of German Research Centers, also has a strong national foundation. GSI/FAIR is international scientific cooperation in action. With excellent flagship projects such as FAIR, Germany and Europe can sustainably enhance their competitiveness in the international research landscape.
Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR: At GSI and FAIR, it is impressive to see how a vision becomes reality. Through customized technological, structural and scientific excellence, we can set the course for excellent research at FAIR. The international FAIR project guarantees future-oriented development at the Darmstadt site and offers innovative prospects for research and technology. Researchers from all over the world can use the existing facilities already, but the FAIR project will significantly expand the dimensions.
The National Research Center for Applied Cybersecurity ATHENE and the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung are launching a cooperation in the fields of scientific data processing and cybersecurity. The aim of the collaboration is to set up and use high-performance infrastructures for research projects and to improve the security of data center technologies. ATHENE will install high-performance AI computers in GSI’s data center “Green IT Cube” and operate them together with GSI as a living laboratory. The powerful AI research facility can be used to analyze large amounts of data with the help of complex AI models without external parties gaining access to information. Researchers can also analyze highly sensitive data or simulate AI attacks.
Artificial intelligence plays a central role in cybersecurity research at ATHENE. Advances in AI enable new types of cyberattacks, but also new types of security solutions. Applications that use AI must be protected against attacks. For its research work, ATHENE requires a great amount of computing power, which is therefore bundled in its own ATHENE AI lab. The Fraunhofer Institute for Secure Information Technology SIT is responsible for this AI lab. In the new AI lab, ATHENE will install a high-performance AI cluster consisting of twelve nodes, each with eight high-end GPUs, in the Green IT Cube and operate it together with GSI as ATHENE living laboratory.
The Green IT Cube is one of the most powerful and – thanks to its innovative water cooling system – most sustainable scientific data centers in the world. A central component of the cooperation is the provision of four server racks in the Green IT Cube, which can be expanded to up to six if required. These racks provide a high-performance infrastructure for servers, storage and network infrastructure. Both partners are contributing their extensive experience in dealing with racks and data centers and want to use the living laboratory for research activities together and with other partners.
GSI is one of eight sites of the Helmholtz Association which are opening up their high-performance computing infrastructure for cooperative projects with companies as part of the HPC Gateway Initiative. The initiative aims to support companies in overcoming challenges in the field of AI. GSI contributes many years of experience with the GSI/FAIR Digital Open Lab, a living laboratory for the development and testing of energy-efficient high-performance computing. In the framework of the Digital Open Lab, experience has been gained in coordinating computer and storage systems with an efficient cooling system and developing sustainable solutions for industry.
The aim of the HPC Gateway initiative is to strengthen the transfer of knowledge between research and industry, promote regional innovation ecosystems and better understand the requirements of industry for the use of AI. By combining access to HPC technology, AI expertise and support from experienced consultants, the initiative aims to support companies on their path to innovative solutions.
“This cooperation is an important step towards strengthening digital information security and promoting innovative solutions in the field of IT security,” says Prof. Michael Waidner, ATHENE CEO and Director of Fraunhofer SIT. “We are looking forward to the cooperation with GSI and to the joint projects.”
“Our high-performance computing center Green IT Cube offers a unique and high-performance infrastructure that we aim to make accessible not only to our own researchers, but also to the wider community as part of the GSI/FAIR Digital Open Lab,” explains Dr. Katharina Stummeyer, Administrative Managing Director of GSI and FAIR. “With Fraunhofer SIT, we have gained a strong partner in the field of IT security and AI research.”
ATHENE is a research center of the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft with its two institutes SIT and IGD and with the involvement of the universities TU Darmstadt, Goethe University Frankfurt am Main and Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences. It has been funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and the Hessian Ministry of Science and Research, Arts and Culture (HMWK) since 2019. Today, ATHENE is the largest and most successful research center for cybersecurity in Europe and conducts mission-oriented cutting-edge research aimed at directly achieving impact.
The visit began with an introduction and overview on the research activities and the progress of FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research), presented by Prof. Thomas Nilsson, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Dr. Katharina Stummeyer, Administrative Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, and Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR. They discussed the ongoing developments at FAIR and the future plans for operations.
The delegation was given a tour of some of the key research areas, including the Super-FRS (Super Fragment Separator), experimental labs for NUSTAR, the experimental station of the Biophysics department, the HADES detector, Green IT Cube and the Plasma Physics laboratories. Professor Vincent Bagnoud and Dr. Haik Simon provided in-depth insights into the cutting-edge scientific work being carried out in these fields at FAIR/GSI.
The International Cooperation’s Unit also organized an engaging interaction between the delegation and French-origin scientists, as well as young students. This meaningful exchange emphasized the importance of international collaboration in advancing scientific research. The visit concluded with a tour of the ongoing construction project, where Jörg Blaurock showcased the latest infrastructure developments.
This visit of the French delegation highlights the commitment to further strengthening scientific ties between Germany and France, with a shared focus on advancing research and technological innovation.
Professor Thomas Nilsson said: “Scientific progress thrives on collaboration. The visit of the French delegation from the Embassy of France in Berlin underlines the strong ties between our research communities, reinforcing our joint ambition to push the boundaries of fundamental physics. As a hub of talent and a factory of innovation, FAIR and GSI provides unique opportunities for young scientists across Europe to participate in shaping the future of cutting-edge research.”
Counselor Siegfried Martin-Diaz stressed: “FAIR represents an extraordinary scientific endeavor, where international collaboration drives innovation at the forefront of physics. The partnership between France and Germany in such cutting-edge research is a testament to our shared commitment to advancing knowledge and technology for the benefit of all. I look forward to the next milestones of FAIR."
For more information on the international cooperation activities with France and French institutions please contact Dr. Pradeep Ghosh (International Cooperations Unit) via the e-mail international-cooperations(at)fair-center.eu. (BP)
Professor Ludhova was honored for her outstanding contributions to the development of the Slovak Republic in the field of science and technology and for her extraordinary efforts to promote the reputation of the Slovak Republic abroad. The award particularly recognizes Professor Ludhova's pioneering work in the field of neutrino research and her many years of cooperation with international research institutes, including the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt and the Forschungszentrum Jülich.
Professor Livia Ludhova is one of the world’s leading scientist in the field of neutrino physics. Born in Bratislava, she initially completed her master and doctorate in geology there and obtained a master's degree in physics. She then moved to Fribourg in Switzerland, where she completed her doctorate in experimental nuclear and particle physics. Her research focuses on the measurement of solar neutrinos, geoneutrinos, and reactor neutrinos, specializing in the study of neutrino properties with large-volume liquid scintillator detectors.
In 2005, she became a member of the Borexino collaboration, the underground experiment to study low-energy solar neutrinos in Gran Sasso, Italy, and is currently its physics coordinator. Since 2014 she is also a member of the international JUNO collaboration, the underground observatory in Jiangmen, China, for the study of neutrinos with its unique 20,000-ton liquid scintillator detector. Professor Livia Ludhova is a member of its executive board and her research group is now focusing on understanding the first commissioning data.
Professor Livia Ludhova's work contributes significantly to the understanding of fundamental physical processes and promotes scientific exchange between Slovakia and international partners. She is an active representative of the international scientific orientation of GSI/FAIR and an outstanding example for the promotion of research excellence and innovation. (BP)
The Order of Ľudovít-Štúr is one of the highest state honors in Slovakia and is awarded by the President of Slovakia on the recommendation of the government. It is awarded to citizens of the Slovak Republic and honors personalities who have made a significant contribution to the development of society through their outstanding achievements and international influence.
Press release of the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz
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In his dissertation, Reichert systematically investigated heavy ion collisions over a wide range of energies, from SIS energies at GSI/FAIR to RHIC and LHC energies. He focused on the equation of state of matter, a key element in describing the properties of the quark-gluon plasma and phase transitions in QCD. The work combines state-of-the-art theoretical models with experimental data and opens up new perspectives for the investigation of fundamental processes in the universe.
A central result of the dissertation is the detailed analysis of flux coefficients, which provides valuable insights into the dynamics of heavy-ion collisions and the thermodynamic properties of hot and dense matter. Of particular note is the extension of the theoretical models to the production and flux properties of hypernuclei. This research has the potential to better understand the interactions between hyperons and nucleons and to contribute to the clarification of the mass-radius relation of neutron stars – an important aspect in the connection between nuclear physics and astrophysics.
The results of his work have attracted international attention and provide important foundations for the planned experiments at the future accelerator facility FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research). Reichert's research is exemplary of the interdisciplinary and innovative approach being pursued in heavy ion research.
Dr. Tom Reichert said, “It is a great honor to receive this award. It reflects not only the recognition of my work, but also the support of my colleagues and supervisors. I look forward to continuing my research and tackling the exciting challenges of heavy ion physics at FAIR.”
The annual FAIR-GSI PhD Award honors an excellent PhD thesis completed during the previous year. Eligible for nominations are dissertations that were supported by GSI in the context of GSI's strategic partnerships with the universities of Darmstadt, Frankfurt, Giessen, Heidelberg, Jena, and Mainz, or through the research and development program. In the framework of the Helmholtz Graduate School for Hadron and Ion Research (HGS-HIRe), more than 300 PhD students currently perform research for their PhD theses on topics closely related to GSI and FAIR. GSI has a long-standing partnership with the award sponsor, Pfeiffer Vacuum+Fab Solutions. Pfeiffer is part of the global Busch Group and a world-leading provider of solutions for high and ultra-high vacuum technology with a comprehensive product portfolio also including leak detectors, measurement and analysis devices, components as well as vacuum chambers and systems. Solutions from Pfeiffer have been successfully used in GSI's facilities for decades. (CP)
]]>“The cluster is an ideal platform for building interdisciplinary partnerships, gaining new impulses and further developing our own research approaches in an application-oriented way”, explains Stummeyer. “A particular appeal of the cooperation lies in the unique opportunity to combine our scientific expertise with a dynamic, innovation-driven community here in our region.”
“For us, GSI is the ‘perfect match’!” says von Hagen following the signing of the cooperation agreement at GSI in Darmstadt. “We have now succeeded in integrating GSI, one of Germany's leading research institutions, into the Rhine-Main-Neckar GreenTech Cluster – this underlines the fact that we are on the right track.”
Why the two institutions will work together in the future, adds Dr. Tobias Engert, Head of Technology Transfer at GSI: “The cluster creates a network that specifically transfers scientific findings and technological developments into sustainable solutions for practical application. The focus on forward-looking topics such as energy efficiency and the circular economy is particularly exciting for us. These aspects are not only crucial for our research, but also for the transformation of society.”
The start-ups associated with the cluster will benefit in particular, as GSI offers them significant advantages by giving them access to scientific expertise, innovative technologies and a high-performance infrastructure. There are already specific examples – such as the Green IT Cube, one of the most energy-efficient data centers in the world. The Green IT Cube shows how cutting-edge research and sustainability can be combined. Start-ups could benefit from this infrastructure in the “Digital Open Lab” to carry out data-intensive projects or to test and scale data center technologies.
In addition, GSI can help green start-ups to bring innovative products to market by transferring knowledge from research projects, particularly in the areas of materials research and energy efficiency. With its international network and cooperation with industrial partners, the research facility offers an ideal bridge between basic research and practical application.
The GreenTech Accelerator ryon is a cluster supported by the shareholders Goethe University Frankfurt, Technische Universität Darmstadt, Merck, Hessen Trade & Invest and Wirtschafts- und Infrastrukturbank Hessen with the mission of providing a launch pad for green innovation. The cluster aims to promote green technologies and create sustainable jobs in the Rhine-Main-Neckar region by accelerating start-ups on their path to success and networking research institutions, companies, investors and politicians in the region in the GreenTech Cluster. (ryon/CP)
Walter Oelert was born in Dortmund on July 14, 1942. He studied physics in Hamburg and Heidelberg, got his diploma in 1969 with a work on solid state detectors in Hamburg and finished his doctoral thesis in 1973 with a work on transfer reactions on samarium isotopes in Hamburg. As postdoc he stayed for two years from 1973 to 1975 with Professor Cohen in Pittsburg doing nuclear physics mainly in the field of transfer reactions on rare earth elements. In 1975 he got a position at the Institute for Nuclear Physics (IKP1) at that time the KFA, later renamed to FZJ (Forschungszentrum Jülich) where he worked on nuclear physics experiments at the Jülich cyclotron.
With the decision to build the cooler synchrotron COSY at FZJ he terminated his work on transfer reactions, summarized it in a review article and switched to the field of medium energy physics. At the end of 1985 he conducted a research stay at CERN, contributing with his working group to the PS185 and the JETSET (PS202) experiments at the antiproton storage ring LEAR. Another external activity was the collaboration with the Swedish partners at the CELSIUS synchrotron in Uppsala.
In 1986 he habilitated at the Ruhr-University Bochum and in 1996 was granted an APL professorship there. With the experience gained in the CERN activities he proposed various experiments for the COSY accelerator. As spokesman of an international collaboration, he was involved in the construction of the COSY-11 experiment, which began experiments in 1996. For more than eleven years, the experiment was successfully in operation and produced important results for various meson production channels. COSY-11 was an internal experiment at the COSY storage ring, allowing reaction studies with full acceptance for the reaction products.
Beside the activities at COSY, he continued the investigations at CERN and, as a last experiment before the shutdown of LEAR, he proposed the production of antihydrogen in the interaction of the antiproton beam with a xenon cluster target. In 1995 the experiment was performed, resulting in the production of nine antihydrogen atoms. This result was an important factor for the decision of the CERN management to build the Antiproton Decelerator (AD). In order to continue anti-hydrogen studies, he got substantial support from Jülich for a partnership in the new ATRAP experiment with the spokesman Jerry Gabrielse aiming for CPT violation studies in the anti-hydrogen spectroscopy.
In 2008, Walter Oelert officially retired, but he kept active with the antiproton activities at the AD for more than ten years, during which he was affiliated with the Johannes Gutenberg-University of Mainz. He was a main driving force on the way to the Extra Low Energy Antiproton ring (ELENA) which finally was built and drastically improves the performance for the antimatter experiments.
During his activities he received a number of honors; notable are the awarding of the Merentibus Medal of the Jagiellonian University of Cracow and the election as an external member of the Polish Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Walter Oelert’s personality – competent, inspiring, open minded and friendly – was the type of glue which made active, successful and happy collaborations.
With his groundbreaking work in antimatter research, Walter Oelert has also laid decisive foundations for research with antiprotons at FAIR. GSI and FAIR bid farewell to Walter Oelert with the greatest gratitude and respect.
Management of GSI and FAIR
(Text: Dieter Grzonka, Kurt Kilian and Thomas Sefzick)
]]>The strong force ensures cohesion in atomic nuclei consisting of protons and neutrons. However, as the positively charged protons repel each other, nuclei with too many protons are at risk of splitting — a challenge in the production of new, superheavy elements. Certain combinations of protons and neutrons, the so-called “magic numbers”, give nuclei additional stability. When taking these magic combinations into account, theoretical works dating back to the 1960s predict an island of stability in the sea of unstable superheavy nuclei, where very long lifetimes could be achieved, even approaching the age of the Earth.
The concept of this island has since been confirmed, with the observation of increasing half-lives in the heaviest currently known nuclei as the predicted next magic number of 184 neutrons is approached. However, the location of the peak of this island, its height (reflecting the maximum expected half-life), and also the island’s extension are still unknown. Researchers at GSI/FAIR in Darmstadt, the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU) and the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM) have now come a step closer to mapping this island, by discovering the shortest-lived superheavy nucleus known thus far, which marks the position of the island’s shoreline in nuclei of rutherfordium (Rf, element 104).
To allow experimental detection, the minimum lifetime of superheavy nuclei is on the order of a millionth of a second, which renders extremely short-lived superheavy nuclei in the vicinity of sea of instability inaccessible. But there is a trick: Sometimes, excited states, stabilized by quantum effects, show longer lifetimes and open a doorway to the short-lived nuclei. “Such long-lived excited states, so-called isomers, are widespread in superheavy nuclei of deformed shape according to my calculations,” says Dr. Khuyagbaatar Jadambaa, first author of the publication from GSI/FAIR’s research department for superheavy element chemistry. “Thus, they enrich the picture of the island of stability with ‘clouds of stability’ hovering over the sea of instability.”
The research team from Darmstadt and Mainz succeeded in examining these predictions by searching for the hitherto unknown nucleus Rf-252. The researchers used an intense beam of titanium-50 available at the GSI/FAIR’s UNILAC accelerator to fuse titanium nuclei with lead nuclei supplied on a target foil. The fusion products were separated in the TransActinide Separator and Chemistry Apparatus TASCA. They implanted into a silicon detector after a flight-time of about 0.6 microseconds. This detector registered their implantation as well as their subsequent decay.
In total, 27 atoms of Rf-252 decaying by fission with a half-life of 13 microseconds were detected. Thanks to the fast digital data acquisition system developed by GSI/FAIR’s Experiment Electronics department, electrons emitted after the implantation of the isomer Rf-252m and released in its decay to the ground state, were detected. Three such cases were registered. In all cases, a subsequent fission followed within 250 nanoseconds. From these data, a half-life of 60 ns was deduced for the ground-state of Rf-252, which is now the shortest-lived superheavy nucleus currently known.
“The result decreases the lower limit of the known lifetimes of the heaviest nuclei by almost two orders of magnitude, to times that are too short for direct measurement in the absence of suitable isomer states. The present findings set a new benchmark for further exploration of phenomena associated with such isomer states, inverted fission-stability where excited states are more stable than the ground state, and the isotopic border in the heaviest nuclei.” says Professor Christoph E. Düllmann, head of the research department for superheavy element chemistry at GSI/FAIR.
In future experimental campaigns, the measurement of isomeric states with inverted fission stability in the next heavier element seaborgium (Sg, element 106) is envisioned and to be used for the synthesis of Sg istopes with lifetimes below a microseconds in order to further map the isotopic border. The result also opens new perspectives for the international facility FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research), which is currently under construction in Darmstadt. (CP)
In the 2024 publication, the researchers, from the GSI Biophysics department led by Professor Marco Durante and the University of Surrey, report on a novel, innovative computer model of human lung tissue that is helping scientists to simulate, for the first time, how a burst of radiation interacts with the organ on a cell-by-cell level. A crucial step that could lead to more targeted treatments for cancer and reduce the damage caused by radiotherapy. Dr. Nicolò Cogno, now at Harvard Medical School, worked on this project for his PhD thesis in physics at TUDa under the supervision of Professor Marco Durante. The researchers reported their findings in the scientific journal „Communications Medicine“, a journal in the Nature Portfolio.
Today, over half of all patients with lung cancer are treated with radiotherapy – an effective approach. However, a dose that is too heavy can damage the lungs and lead to further diseases. This is where research by GSI, TUDa and the University of Surrey comes in to further optimize treatment. In future, doctors could use the 3D model to plan the appropriate range and strength of radiotherapy – tailored in even greater detail to the individual patient.
Professor Dr Marco Durante, Head of GSI’s Biophysics Department, explains: “This is an important step towards further personalizing radiotherapy in cancer treatment and limiting radiation damage to healthy tissue. In the future, this could allow us to model the lungs of individual patients in a way that is not yet possible with the general statistical methods we currently use. It will also allow us to study how diseases such as fibrosis and pneumonitis are caused by conventional X-ray treatments and heavy ion therapy.”
This is the second time within a short period of time that an aspect of biophysics research at GSI/FAIR has been recognized as a breakthrough of the year. Another important scientific approach had already been one of the breakthroughs of the year in 2022. This involved FLASH radiation – the application of an ultra-high dose of radiation in a very short time – which also opens up promising new prospects for tumor therapy.
The ten most important “Breakthroughs of the Year” are selected annually by “Physics World”. The awards have been running since 2009, honoring research that represents a significant advance in knowledge or understanding, is important for scientific progress and/or practical applications and is of general interest to Physics World readers. (BP)
Top ten breakthroughs of the year 2024
Scientific publication in the journal "Communications Medicine"
Press release 2024 of GSI/FAIR
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Traditional digital computers are approaching their physical limits, for example in terms of practicable clock frequencies or integration densities. As a result, new technologies are coming to the fore. In addition to quantum computers, which are known at least conceptually, these are also analog and hybrid computers. They work differently from digital computers on a fundamental level and could complement them in the future as co-processors for the energy- and time-efficient solution of certain system classes. The lecture will cover the history of the computers, as well as basics of their programming and possible areas of application.
Professor Bernd Ulmann studied mathematics and philosophy at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz and received his doctorate from the University of Hamburg with a thesis on analog computers. He has been a professor at the Frankfurt/Main School of Economics and Management since 2009. He is also co-founder of anabrid GmbH, which develops modern analog and hybrid computers.
In the further course of the program - with the support of the regional astronomical-physical associations - insights into the mysteries of the universe, the life cycle of light stars and the changes that our brain undergoes in space will be offered. The series is complemented by contributions on the benefits and properties of the chemical element technetium as well as an insight into the “million-volt machine”, the particle accelerator at GSI/FAIR.
The lectures start at 2 p. m., further information about registration, access and the course of the event can be found on the event website at www.gsi.de/wfa.
The lecture series “Wissenschaft für Alle” is aimed at all persons interested in current science and research. The lectures report on research and developments at GSI and FAIR, but also on current topics from other fields of science and technology. The aim of the series is to prepare and present the scientific processes in a way that is understandable for laypersons in order to make the research accessible to a broad public. The lectures are held by GSI and FAIR staff members or by external speakers from universities and research institutes. (CP)
The FAIR Council is the highest decision-making body of FAIR GmbH. It consists of the shareholders from nine countries. At their most recent meeting, they confirmed their joint goal of commissioning the FAIR facility with the First Science Plus program by 2028. Key decisions were made on the procurement and production of high-tech components, such as the engineering for the technical building installations for the CBM experiment, as well as the modalities for a smooth commissioning phase. The necessary financial commitments were made or initiated by the shareholders.
‘FAIR will open new dimensions in basic research in physics and application-oriented fields. Around 3,000 scientists from over 50 countries will conduct research at FAIR and we can expect groundbreaking results. We are all looking forward to the commissioning of the FAIR facility,’ says Thomas Nilsson, the new Scientific Managing Director of FAIR and GSI.
The First Science Plus program includes the underground SIS100 accelerator ring with a circumference of 1100 meters. It accelerates ions of all elements to almost the speed of light, enabling a unique research program. This is connected to the Super-FRS separator, which generates particle beams from unstable rare isotopes that only exist in the outer universe. These can be studied in the High-Energy NUSTAR Cave so that completely new knowledge about processes inside stars can be gained, e.g. on the question of how chemical elements are formed naturally. The FAIR research program First Science Plus also includes the CBM experiment, which enables the unprecedented investigation of hot compressed matter as it occurs in neutron stars. Neutron stars are key objects for our fundamental understanding of the entire universe.
The FAIR Council meets twice a year, usually at the FAIR location in Darmstadt. The perfect organisation and extraordinary hospitality of the Indian Bose Institute, which hosted the meeting this time, are a perfect example of an international joint project such as FAIR. It shows once again how harmoniously and co-operatively the partners in the FAIR project work together.
As the third largest shareholder, India is one of FAIR's most important partner countries. Dozens of institutions are significantly involved in the scientific research program as well as in the development and production of high-tech components. India plays a crucial role in the scientific program of CBM and others. They are also at the forefront of the development and production of ultra-high vacuum chambers, beam catchers, IT and diagnostic cables and ultra-stable power converters.
FAIR is one of the largest projects and one of the most innovative high-tech facilities for international cutting-edge research worldwide. FAIR will enable unique and multidisciplinary research, scientists from all over the world will perform a variety of novel experiments, from astrophysics to cancer research. FAIR is a talent factory and a magnet for the best minds in science and technology. The realisation of the FAIR facility is on track: The current stage of FAIR's civil construction has been completed. The technical building installations are already well advanced and the installation of the FAIR accelerator machine, which began in January 2024, is in full swing.
The key decisions now taken by the FAIR shareholders are a milestone for the further realisation steps of FAIR and the planned commissioning of the First Science Plus program in 2028.
]]>What does a data center actually look like from the inside? On the "Open Data Center Day," the Green IT Cube opened its doors, inviting visitors to take a look behind the scenes and learn about the complex operations and importance of the data center for GSI and FAIR. Numerous technology enthusiasts and experts took the opportunity to experience the center up close and gain insight into how the immense volumes of data from GSI/FAIR’s physical experiments are processed. The towering rows of server racks and the background hum made a particular impression, giving visitors a tangible sense of the infrastructure’s capacity and significance.
The Green IT Cube is an environmentally friendly high-performance data center with a special cooling system. The generated heat is dissipated through water cooling on the racks’ back doors and supplies an adjacent canteen and office building with heat. By dispensing with complex cooling of the high-volume room air and instead using an innovative water cooling system, the energy required for cooling is reduced to about one tenth compared to conventional data centers (Power Usage Effectiveness PUE≈1.07). With half the floor height, the computer cabinets can be arranged much more densely, as in a high-bay warehouse, which reduces investment costs. For its special environmental friendliness, the Green IT Cube received, among other awards, the Blue Angel, the Federal German Government's eco label.
The Green IT Cube at GSI is mainly used to store and process measurement data from physical experiments with the particle accelerator and for simulations. It will also provide the necessary capacity for the future research center FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research), which is currently being built at GSI. Furthermore, it hosts the so-called Digital Open Lab, a living laboratory that provides an environment for the development, testing and upscaling of energy-efficient high-performance computing to the scale of industrial demonstrators.
The TdoRZ is the highlight of the awareness campaign “Where does the Internet actually live?”, which was initiated by the German Datacenter Association (GDA), the representative body for the data center industry in Germany. 13 data centers in Germany opened their doors. During guided tours, interested visitors had the opportunity to find out what goes on in data centers and what central importance they have for modern life. (CP)
LOREX is the only long-time geochemical solar neutrino experiment still actively pursued. Proposed in the 1980s, it aims to measure solar neutrino flux averaged over a remarkable four million years, corresponding to the geological age of the lorandite ore.
Neutrinos produced in our Sun interact with thallium (Tl) atoms, present in the lorandite mineral (TlAsS2), and convert them into lead (Pb) atoms. The isotope 205Pb is particularly interesting due to its long half-life time of 17 million years, making it essentially stable over the four million years timescale of the lorandite ore. As it is currently not feasible to directly measure the neutrino cross-section on 205Tl, researchers at GSI/FAIR in Darmstadt, Germany, came up with a clever method to measure the relevant nuclear physics quantity needed for the determination of the neutrino cross section. They exploited the fact that this quantity, the nuclear matrix element, also determines the bound-state beta decay rate of fully ionized 205Tl81+ to 205Pb81+.
The experimental measurement of the half-life of the bound-state beta decay of fully ionized 205Tl81+ ions was only possible thanks to the unique capabilities of the Experimental Storage Ring (ESR) at GSI/FAIR. The ESR is presently the only facility where such measurements are feasible. The 205Tl81+ ions were produced using nuclear reactions in GSI/FAIR’s Fragment Separator (FRS) and then stored long enough for its decay to be observed and successfully measured in the storage ring. “Decades of continuous advancements in accelerator technology made it possible to generate an intense and pure 205Tl81+ ion beam and measure its decay with high precision,” said Professor Yuri A. Litvinov, spokesperson for the experiment and principal investigator of the European Research Council (ERC) Consolidator Grant ASTRUm.
“The team measured the half-life of 205Tl81+ beta decay to be 291 (+33/-27) days, a key measurement which allows to determine the Solar neutrino capture cross-section”, explained Dr. Rui-Jiu Chen, a postdoctoral research associate involved in the project. Once the concentration of 205Pb atoms in the lorandite minerals is determined by the LOREX project, it will be possible to provide insights into the Sun’s evolutionary history and its connection to Earth’s climate over millennia.
“This milestone experiment highlights the power of nuclear astrophysics in answering fundamental questions about the universe,” said Professor Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo and Dr. Thomas Neff, who led the theoretical work to convert the measurement into the neutrino cross section.
Dr. Ragandeep Singh Sidhu, the first author of the publication, emphasized its broader significance: “This experiment highlights how a single, albeit challenging, measurement can play a pivotal role in addressing significant scientific questions related to the evolution of our Sun.”
The publication is dedicated to the memory of late colleagues Fritz Bosch, Hans Geissel, Paul Kienle, and Fritz Nolden, whose contributions were integral to the success of this project. (BP)
Scientific publication in the journal „Physical Review Letters“
]]>The plating system is capable of coating large components, such as the new UNILAC cavities, with precise and evenly distributed copper layers. The Alvarez tank, which measures approximately 2.2 x 2.4 metres, has undergone a special multi-stage process to ensure that the copper adheres perfectly and shines, thus enabling the accelerator to perform at its maximum. Electroplating the components is a complex and demanding process, as the coated surfaces must meet the highest quality requirements to ensure the efficiency and performance of the accelerator.
The commissioning of the electroplating facility is an important step in the thorough modernization of the UNILAC accelerator, which will serve as the pre-accelerator for FAIR. As part of a comprehensive package of upgrades to meet the high beam quality requirements for FAIR, the Alvarez accelerator structure, a central part of UNILAC, will be renewed and equipped with new cavities. Over the next few years, a total of 25 tanks and 10 end flanges will be coated in this way at GSI. (JL)
]]>The welcoming address was given by Professor Thomas Nilsson, the new Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR. Dr. Hartmut Eickhoff, chair of the board of the association, welcomed the participants. Professor Sebastian Adeberg from the University Hospital Gießen and Marburg gave the keynote speech. He reported on “Clinical evidence in particle therapy – results of ion beam therapy on patients”.
Dr. Katrin Beatrix Schnürle was awarded the prize for her dissertation entitled “Integration Mode Proton Imaging with a CMOS Detector for a Small Animal Irradiation Platform”; she optimized detector systems for imaging with proton beams and developed corresponding analysis methods. Her developments allow the preclinical application of proton radiography with high measurement accuracy of water-equivalent layer thicknesses and high spatial resolution.
Dr. Yuri Simeonov has developed and characterized range modulators for his doctoral thesis on “Development, manufacturing and validation of patientspecific 3D range-modulators for the very fast irradiation of moving tumours in particle therapy”. These allow a considerable reduction in radiation time and enable, for example, improvements in the radiation of moving tumors or the use of so-called FLASH therapy, i.e. irradiation with ultra-high dose rates.
Annika Schlechter is being honored for her master’s thesis entitled “2.5D Imaging: Accessing 3D Information of a 2D Ion-beam Radiograph”. She demonstrated experimentally for the first time that additional information regarding the third dimension, i.e. the depth of structures in patients, can be obtained from two-dimensional ion beam radiographs with clinically relevant accuracy.
The prize money for the dissertations is 1500 Euro each, for master's theses 750 euros. The award is named after Professor Christoph Schmelzer, co-founder and first Scientific Managing Director of GSI. The promotion of young scientists in the field of tumor therapy with ion beams has meanwhile been continuing for many years, and the award was presented for the 26th time. The topics of the award-winning theses are of fundamental importance for the further development of ion beam therapy and often find their way into clinical application. (BP)
Association for the Promotion of Tumor Therapy with Heavy Ions
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Sydney Gales was a distinguished French nuclear physicist and influential research organizer who rendered outstanding services beyond national borders to European and international cooperation in the field of nuclear physics and nuclear astrophysics research.
Close cooperation between GSI and GANIL as well as the nuclear physics institutes of the CNRS/IN2P3 and CEA were particularly important to Sydney Gales, as were the two lighthouse projects of the European nuclear physics community - FAIR in Darmstadt and SPIRAL II in Caen, the full realization of which he strongly supported. He was also involved in the development and realization of laser-driven nuclear physics research facilities as part of the European NP-ELI project in Romania, as well as in various nuclear physics institutes and projects in South Africa, Japan and Korea.
At GSI and FAIR, Sydney Gales has served on numerous advisory boards and committees; since 2017, as dedicated Chairperson of the G-PAC, he has been instrumental in establishing a balanced and successful FAIR Phase-0 experimental program under the difficult conditions of limited beam time. His expert advice will be missed in the future.
Sydney Gales received numerous high-ranking honors and awards for his achievements, including Chevalier de l'Ordre Orange de la Reine des Pays-Bas (1996), Chevalier de l'Ordre National du Mérite (1997), Flerov Prize of the Joint International Institute for Research in Dubna, Russia, (2009), Elected Member of Academia Europaea (2012), Prix Félix-Robin (2014) and Chevalier dans l'Ordre National de la Légion d'Honneur (2015).
GSI and FAIR bid farewell to Sydney Gales with great respect and deep gratitude. Our condolences go to his wife and family.
Management and Works Council of GSI and FAIR
]]>As Scientific Managing Director, Professor Thomas Nilsson is in charge of the entire scientific division of GSI and FAIR, and he is also the Spokesperson of the Management Board. Together with the Administrative Managing Director Dr. Katharina Stummeyer and the Technical Managing Director Jörg Blaurock, he forms the joint management board of GSI and FAIR and ensures the implementation of the strategic goals: To conduct international cutting-edge research on site, to realize the future FAIR accelerator facility in international cooperation and to also modernize the campus and the existing facilities.
“I am very much looking forward to actively advance the scientific development of GSI and FAIR in close collaboration with the international partners and an outstanding team of researchers. For decades, GSI has stood for excellent, internationally renowned cutting-edge research. The FAIR accelerator center will expand the global scale of research in a forward-looking way. My particular focus is on optimally promoting research work at GSI and FAIR through strategic planning and on offering researchers ideal conditions for outstanding scientific achievements. I would like to express my heartfelt thanks for the trust placed in me,” said Professor Thomas Nilsson on taking office.
With the appointment of Professor Thomas Nilsson, the international selection committee, consisting of representatives of the GSI Supervisory Board and the FAIR Council as well as renowned scientists, has gained an outstanding leader. The managing directors Dr. Katharina Stummeyer and Jörg Blaurock are looking forward to working together with their new colleague and emphasize: “GSI and FAIR will benefit significantly from Thomas Nilsson's broad scientific and strategic expertise. He is recognized worldwide for his research in the scientific fields relevant to FAIR and GSI. In addition, he has been closely associated with GSI and FAIR through his dedicated work on various committees for a long time. The decision to appoint Professor Nilsson as new Scientific Managing Director is an excellent choice. Together we will continue to successfully shape the future of GSI and FAIR.”
Professor Thomas Nilsson studied Engineering Physics at Chalmers University of Technology and was a PhD student at the former TH (now TU) in Darmstadt, among others. From 1998 to 2004, he worked as a physics coordinator at the ISOLDE facility at the CERN research center in Switzerland, where he was also deputy group leader of the ISOLDE physics group. From 2005 to 2006, he worked as a researcher at TU Darmstadt and Chalmers University. At Chalmers University, he has been a full professor in physics since 2009 and Head of the Physics Department and part of the university management group since 2017.
In his research, Professor Thomas Nilsson focuses on how fundamental types of interactions manifest in subatomic systems, in particular in nuclei with large excesses of neutrons or protons, where exotic structures and properties emerge. His research is carried out with experiments using facilities providing beams of exotic nuclei, like CERN (ISOLDE facility) in Switzerland or GSI/FAIR in Darmstadt. He plays a significant role in the development of such facilities and the connected instrumentation, in particular at FAIR.
With his projects and commitment, the renowned scientist not only makes important contributions to physics and research infrastructures, but also has extensive experience in the strategic planning of large research projects and international collaborations. He took on scientific tasks in advisory bodies and program committees, for example, at the Canadian National Accelerator Center TRIUMF and at the RIKEN Research Center in Japan.
Professor Thomas Nilsson has been significantly involved in the FAIR project for a long time. Now he will develop it further from a different perspective. He has already served in various positions on the FAIR Council and as a member of the GSI Supervisory Board. He has also been Vice-Chair of the Joint Scientific Council of FAIR and Chair of the Scientific Advisory Board of GSI since 2020. With his deep understanding of the international research landscape and his ability to develop and implement complex scientific strategies, Professor Thomas Nilsson will make a valuable contribution to the future of FAIR and GSI. (BP/IP)
Release of the Chalmers University of Technology
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Employees of GSI and FAIR can pick up the calendar in the foyer, in the reception area in Borsigstraße and in the main warehouse. External interested parties can order the calendar by mail. Please send an e-mail to gsi-kalender(at)gsi.de with the following information Name, full address and number of calendars required.
Due to the limited edition, a maximum of three calendars can be sent per order - only while stocks last. (JL)
]]>Following a brief introductory lecture, students had the opportunity to learn more about carbon ion therapy, which was developed at GSI, the HADES experiment and atomic physics at the ESR storage ring. The program also included visits to the main control room and the UNILAC linear accelerator. From the observation platform, students were able to get a glimpse into the future by viewing the mega-construction site of FAIR.
The “Saturday Morning Physics” series has been organized by the Department of Physics at TU Darmstadt for 25 years and aims to foster young people’s interest in physics. During the events, students learn more about physics research at the university and can, with successful participation, receive the “Saturday Morning Physics” diploma. GSI and, since its founding, FAIR have been sponsors and supporters of the series from the very beginning. (MK)
]]>Anomaly is about twenty-year-old Jan, whose life is turned upside down by the sudden death of his mother. Has she been lying to him for decades? Was she not his mother at all? The first clues in his search for his biological parents lead Jan from tranquil Bremerhaven to Darmstadt. In the unfamiliar city, events come thick and fast, hoped-for answers lead to new questions. Plagued by strange visions, he finds the first clues and perhaps even friends. Together they come across an experiment that was covered up decades ago and draw the attention of the wrong people. Hunted from all sides, Jan not only puts himself and those around him in danger, but also faces an emerging threat that goes beyond the boundaries of reality.
The series has an age rating of FSK12. A registration is required for the event. Further information and the electronic registration form can be found at www.gsi.de/anomalie.
Event schedule
18:00 — Start / Introduction to the series / Making-of / What has happened so far
18:30 — Screening of three selected episodes with GSI/FAIR reference
19:45 — Talk with the production team / Visit to the main control room and the Crystal Ball Detector on the GSI/FAIR campus
21:00 — End
If case of questions, please contact us via info(at)gsi.de.(CP)
]]>Current calculations estimate that the formation of our Sun from the progenitor molecular cloud took about a few tens of million years. Scientists derive this number from long-lived radionuclides produced just before the Sun’s formation by what is called the astrophysical s-process. The s-process had operated in the solar neighborhood in asymptotic giant branch (AGB) stars — intermediate mass stars at the end of their burning cycles. The radionuclides, all long decayed since the birth of the Sun 4,6 billion years ago, left their imprints as small excess abundances of the decay products in meteorites where they can now be detected. The ideal candidate is a radionuclide that is purely produced by the s-process and does not have pollutions from other nucleosynthesis processes. The “s-only” nucleus 205Pb is the sole candidate that fulfils these properties.
On Earth, it is atomic 205Pb that decays to 205Tl by converting one of its protons and an atomic electron into a neutron and an electron neutrino. The energy difference between 205Pb and its daughter 205Tl is so tiny that the larger binding energies of the electrons in 205Pb (with charge Z=82 compared to only 81 electrons in 205Tl) tip the scale. In other words, if all electrons are removed the role of daughter and mother in the decay is inverted, and 205Tl undergoes a beta minus decay to 205Pb. This is what happens in AGB stars where the temperatures of a few 100 million Kelvin are sufficient to fully ionize the atoms. The amount of 205Pb being produced in AGB stars depends crucially on the rate at which 205Tl decays to 205Pb. But this decay cannot be measured under normal laboratory conditions because there 205Tl is stable.
The decay of 205Tl is only energetically possible if the produced electron is captured into one of the bound atomic orbits in 205Pb. This is an exceptionally rare decay mode known as bound-state beta decay. Moreover, the nuclear decay leads to an excited state in 205Pb which is situated only by minuscule 2.3 kiloelectronvolt above the ground state but is strongly favored over the decay to the ground state. The 205Tl-205Pb pair can be imagined as a stellar seesaw model, as both decay directions are possible, and the winner depends on the stellar environment conditions of temperature and (electron) density — and on the nuclear transition strength which was the great unknown in this stellar competition.
This unknown has now been unveiled in an ingenious experiment conducted by an international team of scientists coming from 37 institutions representing twelve countries. Bound-state beta decay is only measurable if the decaying nucleus is stripped of all electrons and is kept under these extraordinary conditions for several hours. Worldwide this is only possible at the GSI/FAIR heavy-ion Experimental Storage Ring (ESR) combined with the fragment separator (FRS). “The measurement of 205Tl81+ had been proposed in the 1980s, but it has taken decades of accelerator development and the hard work of many colleagues to bring to fruition,” says Professor Yury Litvinov of GSI/FAIR, spokesperson of the experiment. “A plethora of groundbreaking techniques had to be developed to achieve the required conditions for a successful experiment, like production of bare 205Tl in a nuclear reaction, its separation in the FRS and accumulation, cooling, storage and monitoring in the ESR.”
“Knowing the transition strength, we can now accurately calculate the rates at which the seesaw pair 205Tl-205Pb operates at the conditions found in AGB stars,” says Dr. Riccardo Mancino, who performed the calculations as a post-doctoral researcher at the Technical University of Darmstadt and GSI/FAIR.
The 205Pb production yield in AGB stars has been derived by researchers from the Konkoly Observatory in Budapest (Hungary), the INAF Osservatorio d'Abruzzo (Italy), and the University of Hull (UK), implementing the new 205Tl/205Pb stellar decay rates in their state-of-the-art AGB astrophysical models. “The new decay rate allows us to predict with confidence how much 205Pb is produced in AGB stars and finds its way into the gas cloud which formed our Sun,” explains Dr. Maria Lugaro, researcher at Konkoly Observatory. “By comparing with the amount of 205Pb we currently infer from meteorites, the new result gives a time interval for the formation of the Sun from the progenitor molecular cloud of ten to twenty million years that is consistent with other radioactive species produced by the slow neutron capture process.”
„Our result highlights how groundbreaking experimental facilities, collaboration across many research groups, and a lot of hard work can help us understand the processes in the cores of stars. With our new experimental result, we can uncover how long it took our Sun to form 4.6 billion years ago,” says Guy Leckenby, doctoral student from TRIUMF and first author of the publication.
The measured bound-state beta decay half-life is essential to analyze the accumulation of 205Pb in the interstellar medium. However, other nuclear reactions are also important including the neutron capture rate on 205Pb for which an experiment is planned utilizing the surrogate reaction method in the ESR. These results clearly illustrate the unique possibilities offered by the heavy-ion storage rings at GSI/FAIR allowing to bring the Universe to the lab.
The work is dedicated to deceased colleagues Fritz Bosch, Roberto Gallino, Hans Geissel, Paul Kienle, Fritz Nolden, and Gerald J. Wasserburg, who were supporting this research for many years. (CP)
Elements beyond uranium (element 92), like for example Fermium (element 100), do not occur naturally in the Earth's crust. To be studied, they thus have to be produced artificially. They bridge from the heaviest naturally occurring elements to the so-called superheavy elements, which start at element 104. Superheavy elements owe their existence to stabilizing quantum mechanical shell effects, which add about two thousandths of the total nuclear binding energy. Albeit a small contribution, it is decisive in counteracting the repelling forces between the many positively charged protons.
Quantum mechanical effects induced by the building blocks of atomic nuclei, the protons and neutrons, which together make up the nucleus, are explained by the nuclear shell model. Similar to atoms, where filled electron shells lead to chemical stability and inertness, nuclei with filled nuclear shells (containing so-called “magic” numbers of protons/neutrons) exhibit an increased stability. Consequently, their nuclear binding energies and their lifetimes increase. In lighter nuclei, filled nuclear shells are known to also influence trends in the nuclear charge radii.
Using laser spectroscopy methods, subtle changes in the atomic structure can be analyzed, which in turn provide information about nuclear properties such as the nuclear charge radius, i.e. the distribution of protons in the atomic nucleus. Studies of several atomic nuclei of the same element, but with different neutron numbers, have revealed a steady increase in this radius, unless a magic number is crossed. Then, a kink is observed, as the slope of the radial increase changes at the shell closure. This effect was found for lighter, spherical atomic nuclei up to lead.
“Using a laser-based method, we investigated fermium atomic nuclei, which possess 100 protons, and between 145 and 157 neutrons. Specifically, we studied the influence of quantum mechanical shell effects on the size of the atomic nuclei. This allowed shedding light on the structure of these nuclei in the range around the known shell effect at neutron number 152 from a new perspective,” explains Dr. Sebastian Raeder, the spokesperson of the experiment at GSI/FAIR. “At this neutron number, the signature of a neutron shell closure was previously observed in trends of the nuclear binding energy. The strength of the shell effect was measured by high-precision mass measurements at GSI/FAIR in 2012. As mass is equivalent to energy according to Einstein, these mass measurements gave hints about the extra binding energy the shell effect provides. Atomic nuclei around neutron number 152 are an ideal testbench for deeper studies, as they happen to be shaped more like a rugby-ball, rather than spherical. This deformation allows the many protons in their nuclei to be further apart than in a spherical nucleus.”
For the current measurements, an international collaboration of 27 institutes from seven countries examined fermium isotopes with lifetimes ranging from a few seconds to a hundred days, using different methods for producing the fermium isotopes and by methodological developments in the applied laser spectroscopy techniques. The short-lived isotopes were produced at the GSI/FAIR accelerator facility, with only a few atoms per minute being available for the experiments in some cases. To probe them, a tailored laser spectroscopy method was used that researchers had developed a few years ago for measurements on nobelium isotopes. The produced nuclei were stopped in argon gas and picked up electrons to form neutral atoms, which were then probed by laser light.
The neutron-rich, long-lived fermium isotopes (fermium-255, fermium-257) were produced in picogram amounts at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Oak Ridge, USA, and at Institut Laue-Langevin at Grenoble, France. A radiochemical preparation of the samples was performed at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU). Using a different method, they were subsequently evaporated in a reservoir and examined in vacuum with laser light.
Laser light of a suitable wavelength lifts an electron in the fermium atom to a higher-lying orbital, and then removes it from the atom altogether, forming a fermium ion, which can be detected efficiently. The exact energy required for this stepwise ion-formation process varies with neutron number. This small change in excitation energy was measured to obtain information about the change in size of the atomic nuclei.
The investigations provided insight into the changes of the nuclear charge radius in fermium isotopes across the neutron number 152 and showed a steady, uniform increase. The comparison of the experimental data with various calculations performed by international collaboration partners using modern theoretical nuclear physics models allows an interpretation of the underlying physical effects. Despite different calculation methods, all models were found to be in good agreement with each other as well as with the experimental data.
“Our experimental results and their interpretation with modern theoretical methods show that in the fermium nuclei, nuclear shell effects have a reduced influence on the nuclear charge radii, in contrast to the strong influence on the binding energies of these nuclei,” says Dr. Jessica Warbinek, doctoral student at GSI/FAIR and JGU at the time of the experiments and first author of the publication. “The results confirm theoretical predictions that local shell effects, which are due to few individual neutrons and protons, lose influence when the nuclear mass increases. Instead, effects dominate that are to be attributed to the full ensemble of all nucleons, with the nuclei rather seen as a charged liquid drop.”
The experimental improvements of the method pave the way to further laser spectroscopic studies of heavy elements in the region around and beyond neutron number 152 and represent a step towards a better understanding of stabilization processes in heavy and superheavy elements. Ongoing developments hold the promise that future studies will be able to also reveal weak effects of nuclear shell structure, which, though, are at the heart of the existence of the heaviest known elements. (CP)
With this result, experiments at GSI/FAIR now provide data on the three superheavy elements 113, 114 and 115, allowing for a reliable classification of their properties and an assessment of the structure of the periodic table in this extreme region. As elements become heavier, their many protons in the nucleus accelerate the electrons spinning around the core to ever higher velocities – so high that effects explicable only with Einstein’s famous relativity theory kick in. The sheer speed renders electrons heavier.
In lead (element 82), for example, the effects of such processes are already at work and contribute to the chemical processes in lead batteries. The neighbors left and right – thallium and bismuth – behave differently. The effect, albeit small, is localized at lead. Could a superheavy element be a lead alternative? How about the heavier neighbor down the group of the periodic table, flerovium, element 114, discovered and chemically studied only in the last 20 years? It was found to be quite unlike lead, transforms into a gas easily and is less chemically reactive.
To find answers, the two neighbors, elements 113, nihonium, and 115, moscoivum, needed to be tested as well. While first hints at the chemistry of nihonium were reported, nobody had so far achieved a study of the chemistry of moscovium – where the best-suited isotope exists for only about 20 hundredths of a second.
This very feat has now been achieved by the international collaboration at GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt, Germany. The team reported that both neighbors, nihonium as well as moscovium, show a higher chemical reactivity than the intermediate flerovium. The local effect seen in lead is thus also seen in flerovium, however, much more strongly, which comes as no surprise given the much higher nuclear charge.
The observation of a mere handful of atoms was sufficient for obtaining this result. Still, it took two months of continuous around the clock work at the GSI/FAIR’s heavy ion accelerator facility to achieve this. To produce the superheavy elements, the team irradiated thin foils containing americium-243 (element 95), itself an artificial element, with intense ion beams of calcium-48 (element 20). Their fusion led to nuclei of moscovium-288 (element 115), which transformed within a fraction of a second to nihonium-284 (element 113).
Inert gas flushed both elements through a detector array covered with a thin quartz layer. The detectors register the decay of the individual superheavy atoms and determine if the atoms form a chemical bond with quartz strong enough to hold them where they first encounter the surface. Weaker binding leads to further transport by the gas. In this way, the pattern registered in the detector array provides information on the strength of the chemical bonds – hence the chemical reactivity of the elements. Elements of low reactivity could even exit the array, but only to encounter gold-covered detectors. Bonds with gold are generally stronger than with quartz, thus ensuring that each studied atom is indeed retained and registered.
“Thanks to a newly developed setup for chemical separation and detection in combination with the electromagnetic separator TASCA, our gas chromatography studies could be extended to more reactive chemical elements like nihonium and moscovium,” explains Dr. Alexander Yakushev of GSI/FAIR, the spokesperson of the international collaboration. “We have succeeded in increasing the efficiency and reducing the time required for the chemical separation to such an extent that we were able to observe the very short-lived moscovium-288, and at an even larger rate of about two detected atoms every week its daughter nihonium-284.”
In total, four moscovium atoms were registered, all in the quartz-covered array. Among the 14 detected nihonium atoms, deposition mostly on quartz was observed, pointing to the formation of a chemical bond. One atom reached the gold-covered array, indicating that the quartz bond is not very strong. This is in contrast to the behavior of the lighter homologs thallium (for nihonium) and bismuth (for moscovium), which are both known to form strong bonds with quartz. Similarly, lead, the homolog of flerovium, forms strong bonds with quartz, whereas flerovium does not.
The complete data set on these elements shows that the superheavy elements are much less reactive than their lighter homologs, ascribed to inertness associated with the occurrence of relativistic effects. The most pronounced effect is seen locally at flerovium, which is still a metal, but a very weakly reacting one – a behavior that indicates the presence of closed electron (sub)shells, almost as in the non-reactive noble gases. The results demonstrate the influence of Einstein’s relativity theory in the periodic table and at the same time set a new record for the heaviest element ever chemically studied.
With technological advances, new requirements for materials emerge. Could new elements contribute? Like cars transform from fossil to electricity-driven, also other items of our daily life phase out, being replaced by technology based on novel materials. The first flerovium-based device is not around the corner yet. Only single atoms per week – which last for less than a second – can currently be produced. As technology advances, this may change, eventually making larger amounts available. Whether they might serve in future batteries, as medical agents, or enrich our lives in ways inconceivable today, we do not know. But thanks to the groundbreaking experiments at Darmstadt, future researchers will have a head-start and already know the chemical character of these new materials. The result also opens new perspectives for the international facility FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research), which is currently under construction in Darmstadt. (CP)
The PANDA Theory PhD Prize was handed over at the recent Panda Collaboration meeting at GSI in Darmstadt by the spokesperson of the PANDA Collaboration, Professor Klaus Peters, and the chair of the Theory Advisory Group, Professor Christian Fischer from the University of Giessen, during a festive evening event. Dr. Bruschini used Coupled-Channel Schrödinger Equations in adiabatic and diabatic forms for Charmonium-like Mesons below and above threshold. The diabatic Born-Oppenheimer approximation allows for a unified study of conventional and exotic Charmonium-like mesons, which has a great impact to the PANDA physics program.
The Panda Collaboration awards the Theory PhD Prize to specifically honor students’ contributions related to the Panda project. Candidates for the PhD Prize are nominated by their doctoral advisors. In addition to being directly related to the Panda Experiment, the nominees’ doctoral degrees must have received a rating of “very good” or better. Up to three candidates are shortlisted for the award and can present their dissertations at the Panda Collaboration meeting. The winner is chosen by a committee that is appointed for this task by the Panda Collaboration. (BP)
Website of the PANDA Collaboration
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The program began with an overview of current research topics, campus development and technology transfer, as well as the progress of the FAIR project. During a tour of the FAIR construction site with an insight into the current construction highlights, the guests could witness the latest developments for themselves. The installation of the FAIR high-tech accelerator components in the tunnel had begun recently. The work is progressing steadily. The main supply building, the SIS100 accelerator tunnel located 17 meters underground, the central beamline and transfer building and the NUSTAR experiment were also visited.
The visitors were impressed by the developments at GSI and FAIR. Michael Ruhl said: “I am enthusiastic about this ambitious and unique project for international cutting-edge research. The accelerator center FAIR will further strengthen our science and business location and is a flagship project for the state of Hesse. Our ministry will constructively support and implement the upcoming development steps for the commissioning and operation of FAIR within its area of responsibility.” (BP)
]]>In numerous talks and poster exhibitions, international experts presented their latest advancements and discussed challenges and future research approaches. The conference fostered scientific dialogue, laying the foundation for new research collaborations. ECRIS 2024 covered a wide range of topics reflecting current trends and future developments in ECR ion sources.
The main topics included innovations in ion source technology, in particular advancements in magnet technology and improvements in beam quality, as well as practical insights into the operation of ECR ion sources and approaches to overcoming technical challenges. The application of ECR ion sources in nuclear physics, materials science and industry was also an important point. There were also discussions on advances in the theoretical modeling and simulation of processes in ECR ion sources.
One of the highlights of the conference was the awarding of the Richard Geller Prize by the company PANTECHNIK. The prestigious prize recognizes outstanding contributions to the development of ECR ion sources and supports young scientists. There were also an excursion to Frankfurt and guided tours of the GSI facilities and the FAIR construction site, which gave participants an insight into the practical application of accelerator technology.
The organizers drew a positive balance after the event: “ECRIS 2024 was a resounding success and has sustainably strengthened the ECR ion source community. The research results and discussions have provided valuable impulses for future developments. We are proud that GSI hosted this important international conference, and we look forward to sharing the results and insights with the scientific community.” (BP)
]]>Following a welcome the delegations visited the FAIR construction site, where they could witness the new buildings, which are currently being equipped with infrastructure and first accelerator components. The visitors could gather an overview of the facility from the roof of the cross-building, where all the necessary cooling turrets are already installed. Of particular interest were the power converters provided as an Indian In-Kind contribution to FAIR, some of which are already installed in their final location. Other sights were the first already installed superconducting magnets in the SIS100 tunnel, the Super-FRS area and the experimental areas of CBM and NUSTAR.
After a bilateral meeting, the delegations met with Indian researchers at GSI/FAIR for an informal exchange. The participants discussed stumbling blocks and opportunities for Indian researchers in Germany and possibilities to stay connected with India.
Stefan Müller concluded by saying: “BMBF is very grateful for the visit of the Indian DST secretary. FAIR is a cornerstone of the cooperation with India and a hub of Indo-German science. FAIR has made a lot of progress despite all recent challenges. FAIR is now developing on schedule, all of which would not have been possible without our Indian partners.”
Prof. Abhay Karandikar stated: “For India, FAIR is very important, in particular, as we celebrate 50-years of Indo-German cooperation in science and technology this year. A large research community in India is looking forward to perform experiments in FAIR. Currently, there are 40 to 50 groups from various institutions in India engaged in FAIR and we are prepared to take it to the next level.” (BP)
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GSI and FAIR offer a unique working environment that combines highly complex technical tasks with an international focus. The trainees benefit from the opportunity to get to know state-of-the-art technologies and to actively participate in innovative research projects. The support of young talent plays a central role in the research center's human resources strategy, as long-term success depends to a large extent on the qualification and development of young talent. Practical projects and the use of cutting-edge technology ensure that trainees are continually developing their skills and are well prepared for future challenges.
Two of the twelve new trainees are starting a three-year apprenticeship as office clerks and will work in the Human Resources, Procurement and Finance departments, among others. Four other trainees will specialize as electronics technicians for devices and systems in the Control Systems department. One prospective IT specialist will start his training in the IT department. In addition, one future plant mechanic, two industrial mechanics and two construction mechanics will start their three-and-a-half year training in the technical workshops.
The application phase for the training year 2025 has started, so that we can continue to count on committed young talent in the future. We are looking for trainees in technical professions, including industrial mechanics, for the coming year. (JL)
Interested parties can apply online at:
https://www.gsi.de/en/jobscareer/ausbildung_duales_studium
Radiation therapy (RT) is a cornerstone of modern cancer treatment. Conventionally, patients are treated in a lying position while the beam is guided around the body with a gantry, allowing it to be directed at the tumor from any angle. In contrast, UPLIFT concentrates on an alternative method, where treatment is carried out in an upright position, allowing patients to be positioned in front of a fixed beam. This approach could offer clinical advantages while also saving space and reduce costs — two key factors in making advanced treatment methods more accessible worldwide.
Due to this reduced space requirement and lower treatment costs, upright radiotherapy aligns with the UN's sustainable development goals: currently, 80 percent of cancer patients live in countries that only have access to five percent of global radiation therapy capacity. Upright patient positioning can help bridge this gap by making life-saving or life-extending treatments more accessible globally. Additionally, upright treatment improves patient comfort and is associated with anatomical and physiological benefits, such as reduced respiratory motion.
Upright patient positioning and corresponding imaging solutions are generating significant interest. However, important scientific questions remain unanswered, and there are no international guidelines for upright radiotherapy yet. Additionally, current radiation therapy workflows are designed for treating recumbent patients. With currently 17 individual projects, and two additional UK projects planned, UPLIFT will investigate key questions in the areas of treatment planning, clinical workflows, and equipment design. A particular focus of research will be on meeting the high precision demands of modern radiation therapy in the upright position. Questions such as ‘Which patients are suitable for upright radiotherapy ?’ and ‘How can new equipment, such as treatment chairs or state-of-the-art imaging systems, be optimally used?’ will be addressed by the project.
UPLIFT aims not only to achieve technical and scientific breakthroughs but also to develop the next generation of experts trained with this unconventional patient positioning. As the first clinics introduce new technologies for upright radiotherapy, there is already a global need for trained professionals in industry, clinics, and universities to reach the intended benefits for patient care. Through UPLIFT, which connects academic and clinical centers with leading industrial partners, a Europe-wide network of such specialists will be created. The project utilizes the latest technologies for upright radiotherapy provided by the involved high-class industrial representatives from across Europe.
“UPLIFT will revolutionize modern radiation therapy, making it more patient-centered, accessible, and sustainable”, say the two project leaders, Professor Graeff and Dr. Volz. “The research project could not only reduce treatment costs but also improve comfort and outcomes for patients, positioning Europe at the forefront of the upright radiotherapy paradigm shift.” The head of GSI’s Biophysics Department, where the project is coordinated, Professor Marco Durante, emphasizes: “I am delighted that Professor Graeff and Dr. Volz are leading such a large-scale funding project. It is a groundbreaking sign of our biomedical research expertise and an important stimulus for particle therapy. UPLIFT has the potential to significantly expand future treatment methods in the fight against cancer.” (BP)
A total of 15 scientific institutions as well as industrial partners are involved in the project, including three Helmholtz Centers in Germany (GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, German Cancer Research Center DKFZ, Helmholtz Center Dresden-Rossendorf), ASG Superconductors and Centro Nazionale di Adroterapia Oncologia in Italy, Centre Léon Bérard and TheraPanacea in France, Jagiellonian University in Poland, Czech Technical University in the Czech Republic, Cosylab in Slovenia, RaySearch Laboratories in Sweden, Paul Scherrer Institute in Switzerland, Sheffield Hallam University, Leo Cancer Care and Loughborough University in England.
More about the UPLIFT project
More about "MSCA Doctoral Networks"
]]>The Ellen Gleditsch Prize is presented to scientists who gave outstanding contribution in the field of radiation research and/or radioactivity. The award that consists of a bronze statue representing Ellen Gleditsch and a diploma honors Professor Durante for his important work in the field of biophysics and the application of particle therapies in cancer research. Marco Durante, who also gave a lecture at the Academy in Oslo, was very pleased to receive the award in memory of Ellen Gleditsch.
Ellen Gleditsch was a Norway-born chemist and one the first female members of the Norwegian Academy of Sciences and Letters. As a student and colleague of Marie Curie, she made a decisive contribution to the development of radioactivity research in Norway. The prize is named after her to honor the legacy of this pioneer. Marco Durante is the first winner of this innovative prize.
At the award ceremony, he gave a lecture at the Academy in Oslo on the progress of particle therapy and the challenges of interdisciplinary collaboration between medicine, oncology and biophysics in order to realize optimally the great potential of tumor therapy with charged particles for the future. His presentation met with great interest and was accompanied by a lively Q/A session. Two proton therapy facilities are currently being built in Norway, at Radiumhospitalet, Oslo University Hospital, and at Haukeland University Hospital in Bergen. These facilities, with a total investment of several billion Norwegian kroner, are due to go into operation soon.
Marco Durante is an internationally recognized expert in the fields of radiation biology and medical physics, especially for therapy with heavy ions and radioprotection in space. He made important scientific progress in the field of biodosimetry of charged particles, optimization of particle therapy, and shielding of heavy ions in space. He studied physics and got his PhD at the University Federico II in Italy. His post doc positions took him to the NASA Johnson Space Center in Texas and to the National Institute of Radiological Sciences in Japan. During his studies, he specialized in charged particle therapy, cosmic radiation, radiation cytogenetics and radiation biophysics.
He has received numerous awards for his research, including the Galileo Galilei prize from the European Federation of Organizations for Medical Physics (EFOMP), the Warren Sinclair award of the US National Council of Radiation Protection (NCRP), the IBA-Europhysics Prize of the European Physical Society (EPS), the Bacq & Alexander award of the European Radiation Research Society (ERRS) the Failla Award of the Radiation Research Society and the Henry Kaplan Prize of the International Association of Radiation Research (IARR). Additionally, he has been awarded an ERC Advanced Grant of the European Union for the continuation of his research activities and is president of the Particle Therapy Co-Operative Group (PTCOG), a global organization of researchers and professionals in the field of radiation therapy with protons, light ions, and heavy charged particles. (BP)
The event on the YouTube channel of the Norwegian Academy of Sciences and Letters
More about the Norwegian Academy of Sciences and Letters
More about the research of Professor Marco Durante and the Biophysics Department at GSI
]]>Hands-on science: Last Saturday, visitors from near and far flocked to Roßmarkt to find out more about research from Frankfurt and the surrounding area. The big event, put together by the Frankfurt Alliance, featured an exciting stage program and lots of activities. GSI/FAIR offered insights into the function of particle accelerators and their scientific work with two hands-on experiments.
The weather played along on September 28, the day Frankfurt’s first Science Festival, organized by the Frankfurt Alliance founded at the beginning of the year, officially kicked off in the city center. The alliance consisting of non-university research institutes and Goethe University Frankfurt had put together the big festival to showcase the strength and diversity of research in the science city of Frankfurt and the wider Rhine-Main region. The diverse program had something in store for everyone, from science slams, musical contributions and debates on stage, to lots of hands-on activities and things to discover in the tents of the participating institutions. Among others, visitors young and old were able to explore a giant model of the human heart, immerse themselves in a cell using VR glasses, experiment and paint in open studios, or submit ideas for peace.
At the GSI/FAIR booth, visitors of all ages took part in two hands-on experiments to find out how the particles are brought up to speed at the accelerator facilities and how a new element can be produced by nuclear fusion. A total of six elements were produced at GSI/FAIR, including Darmstadtium (named after the city of Darmstadt) and Hassium (named after the federal state of Hesse).
Dr. Bastian Bergerhoff, Frankfurt City Treasurer and Head of Human Resources, said in his welcoming address, held in the morning: “This festival is a monument to the science location Frankfurt: Our city is a city of science. Roßmarkt has turned into an open-air laboratory, making science tangible and alive, and taking it out of its supposed ivory tower. In so doing, the participating institutions are also sending a clear signal that science is also a driving force for economy, culture and urban society.”
Goethe University President Prof. Enrico Schleiff said: “Frankfurt is known for its lively sports, cultural and museum landscape and its role as a banking and data center hub. This, our first science festival, shows that science also constitutes a strong pillar of our international reputation. The city of Frankfurt especially, which stands for openness, diversity and freedom, is an ideal location for scientists from all over the world, while the greater Rhine-Main region is an amazing space to conduct outstanding international research on topics ranging from astrophysics to social cohesion – all under the protection of scientific freedom. As a newly founded science network, we deliberately chose to address the public with our festival, which is aimed not only at arousing interest in science, but also answering questions about the how, what and why of research. We want to strengthen this dialog between research and society and disseminate scientific findings – in a manner that is fun and can be enjoyed by the entire family.”
Apl. Prof. Dr. Zoe Waibler, Vice President of Paul-Ehrlich-Institut (PEI) / Goethe University – Faculty of Biological Sciences: “Science is part of our DNA. We at Paul-Ehrlich-Institut use it daily to ensure the safety, efficacy and availability of vaccines and biomedical drugs. Science drives ahead progress, and impacts our daily lives in many ways – be it through vaccines that protect our health, or through the regulation of blood products whose safety patients can rely on. We want to share our enthusiasm for science and its direct benefits for health with as many people as possible at the Frankfurt Science Festival.”
Prof. Dr. Florian Heider, Leibniz Institute for Financial Research SAFE / Goethe University – Faculty of Economics and Business: “With the Science Festival, we as the Frankfurt Alliance, together with the Hessian Ministry of Higher Education, Research, Science and the Arts and Kassel Foundation, are building a bridge between science, practice and society. It is great to experience this direct exchange and deepen our understanding of the diverse research that is conducted here. As the Leibniz Institute for Financial Market Research SAFE and given that we are located in the financial hub of Frankfurt, we are particularly pleased to be able to show people on site how important financial literacy is for each individual and how the markets work.”
Dr. Katharina Stummeyer, GSI/FAIR: “The Science Festival of Frankfurt Alliance in the heart of the city embodies the power of interdisciplinary collaboration to jointly develop sustainable solutions for the future. GSI/FAIR as a large-scale physics research center contributes to pushing the boundaries of knowledge and enabling technological innovations that have an impact far beyond science. This festival offers a unique opportunity to bring our research closer to the public and to promote a lively exchange between science and society.” (JGU/CP)
Frankfurt Alliance is a regional science network consisting of 16 research institutions from Frankfurt and the surrounding area, who on January 30, 2024, signed a relevant Memorandum of Understanding and presented their concept for the alliance, which is currently being set up. The aim is to deepen existing collaborations, pool the expertise of those involved and further strengthen international competitiveness. In so doing, the alliance seeks to optimize the structural, personnel and political framework conditions for cutting-edge research in the Frankfurt Rhine-Main region, while at the same time contributing to Frankfurt's positioning as an excellent science location and an international metropolis worth living in. The following institutes are part of Frankfurt Alliance:
The Summer Student Program offers an annual insight into research at GSI and FAIR. “Every single person and experience went way above my highest expectation, thank you all!”, says Jacopo Lancione, University of Turin at the good-bye event.
All summer students worked in a research group on their own scientific or technical project, as part of the ongoing research. The topics ranged from atomic physics and biophysics to nuclear and astrophysics. In the focus was the development and testing of technical and experimental components for the FAIR accelerator facility, which is currently being built at GSI, as well as its future experiments.
“Never would I have thought that getting out of my comfort zone would have led to one of my deepest core memories”, says Chiara Masia, University of Pisa.
Many of the international students return to GSI and FAIR in Darmstadt after the Summer Student Program for their master's or doctoral thesis. The Summer Student Program, which is organized in cooperation with the graduate school HGS-HIRe, took place for the 42nd time. In addition to scientific events, a city rally, sports activities offered by GSI company sports and self-organized activities in the region took place. Accompanying lectures provided an overview of the broad research spectrum of GSI and FAIR as well as the scientific results. (LW)
The award recognizes excellent experimental work of Dr. Dickopf, focused on the high-precision determination of the nuclear moment of beryllium-9 and the zero-field-splitting of its hyperfine structure. The achieved accuracy exceeds the one from previous measurements by up to two orders of magnitude, which makes beryllium-9 an excellent reference sample for other nuclear moment measurements.
The SPARC PhD Award has been presented annually since 2018 and comes with a prize money of 300 euros. The award honors the best PhD thesis within the collaboration concerning atomic physics with heavy ions at the research facilities of GSI and FAIR. SPARC stands for Stored Particles Atomic Physics Research Collaboration. Currently, more than 400 members from 26 countries belong to the collaboration. They experiment with the existing atomic physics facilities at GSI and prepare new experiments and setups at the future FAIR accelerator. (CP)
They were welcomed by the management of GSI and FAIR: Research Director Dr. Yvonne Leifels, Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director, and Dr. Katharina Stummeyer, Administrative Managing Director, as well as Dr. Inti Lehmann, head of Research Coordination, and press officer Dr. Ingo Peter. An introductory presentation on the research objectives, campus development and the FAIR construction project was followed by a tour of the FAIR construction site, the test stand for superconducting magnets for the FAIR ring accelerator SIS100 and the large-scale detector HADES.
On the construction site, the group visited the central beamline and transfer building as well as the areas which are part of the FAIR construction phase First Science Plus: the Super Fragment Separator (Super-FRS) and future FAIR experiment pillars NUSTAR and CBM. (CP)
]]>Science network makes its debut at upcoming science festival held on Frankfurt’s central Roßmarkt square, promising amazement, questions, discussions and exchange.
In January 2024, 16 Frankfurt-based research institutions joined forces to set up the “Frankfurt Alliance”, made up of Goethe University Frankfurt and several non-university research institutions. With the aim of visualizing at an event held in the heart of the Main metropolis both the strength and the diversity of research conducted in the science city of Frankfurt and the larger Rhine-Main region, including its importance for society, the alliance invites you to the first “Science Festival”, held on Saturday, September 28, from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. at Roßmarkt in downtown Frankfurt.
The big and colorful family festival will bring science to life in multiple tents as well as on stage. Its diverse program ranges from science slams to debates on current socio-political topics and hands-on activities all the way to short lectures and musical performances. Researchers from different Goethe University faculties as well as the research-intensive institutes of Max Planck Society, Leibniz Association, Fraunhofer Society, Helmholtz Association, Paul-Ehrlich-Institut and the German Cancer Consortium will be providing insights into their research and will be on hand to answer questions and engage in discussion.
The program on stage will kick off with a panel discussion on the topic of (educational) justice, joined by DIPF | Leibniz Institute for Research and Information in Education. The discussion will focus not only on the connection between educational opportunities and social background, but also on social mobility and the important roles played by politics and research in decision-making processes. A comprehensive AI quiz in the form of a prompt battle, a talk and comedy interludes by the two quirky “professors” Dr. KNOW and Dr. HOW are also part of the program. Together with biologists and equipped with a magnifying glass, you can explore Roßmarkt’s nooks and crannies, and discover what exactly is growing between the pavement joints and wall cracks. Wrapping up the festival will be a rap by Coodiny, aka Nikita Kudakov and his live band. Kudakov has been making music since he was a teenager and is now a doctoral candidate at the Max Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics, where he is researching the interaction between rappers and their audience. The stage program will be moderated by Stephan Hübner from hr Info, the festival’s media partner.
Accompanying the program on stage, each of the alliance’s member institutions will have their own pagoda tent, offering insights into respective research activities. To name a few examples: In a joint tent, Max Planck Institute for Heart and Lung Research and Goethe University Frankfurt will be presenting a walk-in model of the human heart, a central research object of the Cardio-Pulmonary Institute (CPI) cluster of excellence, which is dedicated to diseases of the cardiovascular system. The adjacent Goethe University tent will feature colorful flowers in bloom, as well as open studios for experimenting, painting and solving puzzles. In addition, scholars from the humanities, social and natural sciences will be presenting their own favorite topics as part of the series “Research close to my heart”. Visitors to the Senckenberg Society for Nature Research’s tent will be able to travel around the world and evaluate camera traps from Bolivia and South Africa, while the Peace Research Institute Frankfurt (PRIF) will use the festival to collect visitors’ ideas for peace. As part of its “Dive into the cell” activity, the Max Planck Institute for Biophysics is providing VR glasses that enable visitors to experience the building blocks of life from the inside, while two hands-on experiments from GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung show how particle accelerators work.
The festival invites passersby of all ages to not only be curious, but to join in the conversations, ask questions and learn more about science. Catering to visitors’ culinary tastes will be food trucks serving regional specialties, while numerous deckchairs and seats invite passersby to stay and linger. The festival starts at 10 a.m. and ends at 7 p.m. Admission is free. (CP)
The “Industrial Heritage Days” are organized annually by KulturRegion FrankfurtRheinMain gGmbH, an association of more than 50 cities and municipalities, districts and the regional association with the aim of connecting the diverse local and regional culture and promoting inter-municipal cooperation. Together with its members, the non-profit organization presents projects and provides impulses with the “Industrial Heritage Days” on changing topics to bring places of industrial culture to life. GSI and FAIR took part again this year, both as hosts of the kick-off event and with a guided tour for interested citizens.
The event days this year focused on the topic “Full of Energy”. A focus that fits well with GSI/FAIR: The particles that race through the accelerator facilities at close to the speed of light are also full of energy. KulturRegion Managing Director Dr. Jennifer John emphasized at the launch event: “GSI reflects our focus topic perfectly.” The opening event on the GSI/FAIR campus was attended by representatives of the visit points of the “Industrial Heritage Days”, the working group for the Route of Industrial Heritage, and mayors, district administrators and cultural representatives from the partner municipalities. They were welcomed by Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, who picked up the current motto “Full of Energy” in his welcome address: “Not only do we move particles with the highest energies on the campus: All colleagues are actively realizing the integrated FAIR/GSI campus with full energy and spirit.” The guests then had the opportunity to get informed about the current scientific activities at GSI and the progress of the FAIR accelerator center during a tour.
During the “Industrial Heritage Days”, GSI/FAIR was also able to give another 50 interested citizens a comprehensive insight into the research and future plans of the worldwide unique accelerator center. On a guided tour, the guests were given information about the running accelerator facilities and those presently under construction, as well as scientific achievements such as the tumor therapy with heavy ions developed at GSI.
The “Rhine-Main Industrial Heritage Days” once again offered a wide range of events this year, focusing on the region's impressive industrial heritage. In addition to GSI/FAIR, numerous other institutions throughout the Rhine-Main region provided exciting insights into the diversity of industrial culture. (BP)
]]>Two experiments will attract visitors to the GSI and FAIR booth on Ernst-August-Platz: Young and old can try out for themselves how a particle accelerator works and how the structure of matter can be investigated in order to learn more about one of the largest construction projects for basic research. If you can't be there in Hanover, you can still take part: Much of “Highlights der Physik” content will also be available to watch online via live stream. All live streams and videos can be found on the YouTube channel: highlights-physik.de/streams
Professor Harald Lesch will kick off the week-long physics spectacle on September 23 with his lecture “Sun, Moon and Stars” at the Theater am Aegi. The week of events will conclude in the same location with the evening lecture “James Bond in the sights of music” with Professor Metin Tolan and the Hanover Medical Orchestra.
“Highlights der Physik” are organized by the German Physical Society (DPG) and Leibniz University Hannover. In previous years, they have attracted up to 60,000 visitors.
Admission to all events is free. In some cases, free admission tickets are required. Tickets are available at highlights-physik.de/tickets. (LW)
The workshop focussed on two projects funded by Hi-Acts, the innovation platform for accelerator-based technologies and solutions: GSI Biophysics' "Standardised Station for High-energy Heavy Ion Radiation on Electronics" project and GSI Materials Research's "Microprobe 2.0" project. Both initiatives mark significant progress in the field of radiation hardness testing for space electronics.
For space missions to the moon and beyond, the complex radiation environment in space can be a limiting factor for space exploration. The ionizing radiation can affect electronic devices and components. Therefore, mission-critical systems must be tested for radiation hardness before being used in space.
The ground based broad beam heavy ion characterization of electronics is currently done with low energy ions, typically at the accelerators in Louvain (Belgium) and Jyväskylä (Finland). Considering the particle range at these low energy facilities (several tens of µm), some electronic devices undergo complex and invasive sample preparation to expose their most sensitive or critical components to the ion beams. To test the electronics at low energy accelerators, complex and invasive sample preparation is needed to expose the critical components to the ion beams considering the limited particle range of ~100 µm. Whilst in the past electronics was customized for the specific mission, and therefore different sub-components could be tested seperately, nowadays space agencies tend to use commercial components-off-the-shelf (COTS). Testing COTS, which cannot be disassembled, requires heavy ions with range in silicon >1 mm. In Europe, this is only possible at GSI. Therefore, we have a potential wide market request from European space industry to test their modern electronics with the high energy (SIS18, and in the future SIS100) beams at GSI and FAIR, which provide up to U ion beams with energies up to 1 and 10 GeV/u, respectively. These beams are also of interest since Galactic Cosmic Rays (GCR) contain heavy ions at energies above 100 MeV/n.
The Hi-Acts Use Case Initiative project carried out by the Biophysics Department at GSI in 2023 made a significant contribution to the development of a standardized procedure for the assembly, positioning and irradiation of electronic samples. This development represents a significant step towards automation and standardization in the testing of space electronics with high-energy heavy ion beams, leading to standard workflow for external industrial users. Resources will be saved and work will be more efficient, which will benefit the entire space industry.
Compared to broad beams, the existing heavy ion microprobe at GSI’s linear accelerator UNILAC enables the injection of charge carriers into spatially defined locations in integrated circuits for radiation hardness testing of detectors and electronics with heavy ion micro beams. The UNILAC ion beam energies of up to 11 MeV/u provide a penetration range in the materials of up to 100 µm. The microprobe focuses ions from the linear accelerator into a focal spot of about 500 nanometers diameter and positions individual ions across the target. The effect of each individual event at its defined location in the electronic device is registered to compile a map of radiation sensitivity.
Using the heavy ion microprobe, users and developers can determine the localized effects of dense ionizing radiation on electronic devices, such as those on their way to space qualification. The current GSI’s material research project “Microprobe 2.0” will upgrade the hardware and software systems of the current microprobe to a unique and user-friendly single-event effect test system for integrated electronic circuits. The project will facilitate industry access to GSI’s linear accelerator UNILAC to carry out their own high-resolution electronic tests with ion micro beams more efficiently, with remote support from specialists.
During the workshop, GSI presented the results of the recent microelectronics testing campaign performed by ESA and EU projects. Participants received an insight into the European radiation hardness testing landscape as well as the expectations and needs of industrial users from Gerd Datzmann (DINI). One highlight was the presentation by Ruben Garcia Alia (CERN) on best practices in the field of radiation hardness testing. He shared his experiences from the two EU projects RADNEXT and HEARTS, both in cooperation with GSI, and explained the background to the creation of the R2E (Radiation to Electronics) project at CERN.
During the workshop, technical and scientific boundary conditions were discussed in line with the requirements of potential users from industry and research. Approaches were discussed as to how these requirements can be aligned in the future in order to drive innovation and overcome challenges in radiation hardness testing. (BP)
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Although access is via the Wixhausen district, the GSI/FAIR campus is located in the Arheilgen district. GSI/FAIR therefore feel closely connected to both districts and are involved in local life. Accordingly, the 18 square meter stand at the trade show offered plenty of opportunity for exchange and participation.
Visitors were able to participate in an accelerator game to see how particles are accelerated in a linear accelerator such as the UNILAC at GSI/FAIR. A fusion pinball machine invited guests to playfully experience the production of a new element from two smaller ones. Six new chemical elements were successfully produced at the GSI/FAIR facility in a similar way, including Darmstadtium (element 110), which is named after the city of Darmstadt.
The trade show is organized by the Gewerbeverein Arheilgen e.V. around the Goldner Löwe restaurant in the center of Arheilgen. With this event, the association wants to offer the opportunity to make contacts and strengthen the Arheilgen community. (CP)
]]>Zewei Xiong’s research centers on neutrino physics and nuclear astrophysics covering a broad range of subjects related to the evolution and nucleosynthesis in supernovae and neutron-star mergers. His work involves theoretical modelling of the quantum dynamics of neutrinos and hydrodynamical simulations of astrophysical events where neutrino interactions play a significant role.
He is one of a few hundred researchers all over Europe to be honored with an ERC Starting Grant this year. His project “Neutrino flavor Transformations in dense Astrophysical Environments” NeuTrAE is aimed to advance our understanding on lingering puzzles regarding the flavor evolution of neutrinos and their implication in particle and nuclear astrophysics. Neutrinos are characterized by their flavors, which can change during propagation – a phenomenon known as neutrino flavor oscillation.
The oscillations in vacuum and ordinary matter are well understood and confirmed by several experiments. Extreme astrophysical events, such as core-collapse supernovae and the violent merger event of two neutron stars or a neutron star and a black hole, are profuse sources of neutrinos. In those astrophysical environments, the neutrino flux becomes so intense that the flavor interference of neutrinos with each other must be taken into account. This nonlinear effect coupling neutrinos propagating in different directions and with different energies is known as collective neutrino oscillations.
Accounting for the collective neutrino oscillations in simulations of astrophysical environments requires a quantum kinetic transport. It remains a tremendous challenge due to the high dimensionality of the problem and the vastly different scales for flavor and hydrodynamical evolution. The impact of neutrino flavor transitions on those compact objects remains elusive without efficient and sophisticated treatments.
“My thanks go to the European Research Council. I am extremely pleased about this award and the great opportunity it provides for my research goals. I am looking forward to realize NeuTrAE together with my team“, says Zewei Xiong. “With the project NeuTrAE I want to provide a pipeline to study the impact of collective neutrino oscillations in astrophysical environments. NeuTrAE aims to significantly advance our understanding of dynamical evolution of compact astrophysical objects and their nucleosynthesis.”
Zewei Xiong studied Physics at the Shanghai Jiao Tong University and initially worked from 2016 to 2020 as a Teaching Assistant, then as a Research Assistant at the University of Minnesota. There, he received his PhD from the Department of Physics and Astronomy in 2020 and has been working as a postdoctoral researcher in the Theory Department at GSI. (BP)
ERC Starting Grants for talented early career scientists support outstanding researchers, two to seven years after their PhD, showing great promise and an excellent research proposal under the EU's Horizon Europe research and innovation program. The grants, worth an average of 1.5 million euros, will help ambitious scientists launch their own projects, form their teams of postdoctoral researchers and PhD students and pursue their research ideas. GSI and FAIR researchers have been very successful in recent years in receiving ERC grants, both in the areas of Starting and Consolidator Grants as well as Advanced Grants for established researchers and their highly innovative projects.
This two-week Summer School takes place both on the sites of ESA‘s European Space Operations Center (ESOC) and on the GSI and FAIR campus in Darmstadt. The aim is to train students in the fundamentals of heavy ion biophysics for terrestrial and space applications, for example in the areas of detection, monitoring and protection from space radiation. Research into cosmic radiation and its effects on humans, electronics and materials is crucial for future-oriented space travel, ensuring that astronauts and satellites are optimally protected during the exploration of our solar system. Moreover, the research provides valuable insights into the risks of radiation exposure on Earth. The main topics of this year's Summer School include space radiation activities at ESA, space radiation physics and biology, applied physics at GSI/FAIR, particle accelerators, and particle therapy. In a unique combination of lectures and practical workshops, participants can deepen their knowledge of radiation research.
The scientifically outstanding program was opened by Dr. Anna Fogtman¸ Radiation Protection Operations Lead at the European Space Agency, and Professor Marco Durante, Head of the GSI Biophysics Department. It includes lectures by experts such as former astronaut Thomas Reiter and former ESA Director General Johann-Dietrich Wörner, tours of facilities in Darmstadt, an excursion to ESA's European Astronaut Center (EAC) in Cologne, practical training and research opportunities. At the end of the first week, the participants switch between the two locations ESOC and GSI/FAIR-Campus. There they are welcomed in the second week by Dr. Yvonne Leifels, Research Director GSI/FAIR. Dr. Radek Pleskac gives an insight into the FAIR project. At GSI and FAIR, the participants have the opportunity to work in teams on laboratory activities and learn more about the research fields of radiation biology and simulation of cosmic radiation in accelerators.
The young researchers can further develop and expand their own experiment ideas by submitting proposals for ground-based space radiation experiments, for example as part of the IBER program, which deals with the biological effects of radiation. IBER enables research groups to use GSI's accelerator facilities to study the biological effects of cosmic radiation. At the end of the ESA-FAIR Radiation Summer School, participants will take written exams and/or carry out teamwork, which will be evaluated and graded.
The establishment of the Summer School is the result of many years of close cooperation between ESA and FAIR on cosmic ray research and one of several projects within the GSI/FAIR-ESA cooperation agreement. GSI's existing accelerator facility is the only one in Europe capable of producing all ion beams found in the solar system - from the lightest, hydrogen, to the heaviest, uranium. With the future FAIR accelerator center, these possibilities will be significantly expanded: FAIR will enable experiments with an even broader spectrum of particle energies and intensities and will be able to simulate the composition of cosmic rays even more precisely. Its proximity to the ESA Satellite Control Center in Darmstadt also creates optimal conditions for regional cooperation in one of the key research fields of the future. (BP)
Professor Dr. Jens Limpert and Privatdozent Dr. Jan Rothhardt are awarded the EPS-QEOD Prize for Research in Laser Technology and Applications 2024 in recognicion of their groundbreaking research “for the development of compact coherent high-performance extreme ultraviolet (EUV) light sources and material-specific nanoscale EUV imaging”. This prestigious award is presented every two years by the Division of Quantum Electronics and Optics of the European Physical Society (EPS) and recognizes outstanding contributions in the field of laser technology.
The EPS-QEOD Prize is one of the highest awards in laser science and recognizes researchers who have made a significant contribution to science through innovative research and technological breakthroughs. Professor Limpert and Dr. Rothhardt were honored for their groundbreaking work on the development of compact high-power coherent extreme ultraviolet (EUV) light sources and material-specific nanoscale EUV imaging. This award underlines the international recognition of their scientific excellence and innovation.
The award ceremony took place on August 27, 2024 during the 11th Europhoton conference in Vilnius, Lithuania.
In close collaboration, Professor Dr. Jens Limpert and Dr. Jan Rothhardt have developed new understanding and technologies to realize EUV sources with synchrotron-like performance. By using high-power femtosecond fiber laser systems and the concept of coherently combining multiple fiber amplifiers, they have developed highly harmonic sources with high conversion efficiency whose photon flux exceeds the state of the art by several orders of magnitude.
Their work leads to a groundbreaking new technology: a high-resolution, lensless EUV microscope using the ptychography method. This method enables an unprecedented resolution of 16 nanometers and provides quantitative amplitude and phase information in every image pixel. This unlocks unexploited potential in nanoscience and materials science, such as in the development of efficient nanoelectronics, for energy and data storage devices, as well as in biological imaging, with applications ranging from cancer cell detection through to studying the interaction of pathogens, drugs or nanoparticles with biological cells.
The outstanding achievements were made possible by close inter-institutional collaboration between the two researchers. Professor Limpert — member of the of the directorate at the Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Optics and Precision Engineering (IOF) and Professor at the Institute of Applied Physics at the Friedrich Schiller University Jena — and Privatdozent Dr. Rothhardt — Research Group Leader at the Helmholtz Institute Jena, a branch of GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt — combined their expertise in laser technology and imaging techniques to develop this innovative technology.
Their work impressively demonstrates how significant scientific breakthroughs can be achieved through teamwork and cooperation. Professor Limpert emphasized: “The interdisciplinary collaboration has enabled us to create a compact EUV microscope on a laboratory scale and demonstrate it on microorganisms. This not only expands the application possibilities, but also makes the technology more accessible.” “The award is the highlight of this overall achievement and we are delighted to accept the prize on behalf of the team,” concludes Dr. Rothhardt.
The Helmholtz Institute Jena, the Friedrich Schiller University Jena and the Fraunhofer IOF warmly congratulate Professor Dr. Jens Limpert and Dr. Jan Rothhardt on this outstanding award and look forward to the further scientific successes that will result from their pioneering research. (FSJ/CP)
The program included an overview of the current research topics, campus development and technology transfer, and the progress of the FAIR project. During a tour of the FAIR construction site with an on-site visit to the current construction highlights, the guests were able to take a close look at the latest developments. The starting signal for the installation of the FAIR accelerator technology has been given recently and work is progressing steadily.
Dr. Astrid Mannes visited the series test facility (STF) for superconducting magnets, the main supply building, the underground accelerator tunnel SIS100 and the central building for beam guidance and distribution, the buildings for the CBM experiment and the Super FRS experimental facility. During a tour of the GSI facility, the guests were also able to visit the experimental station of the Biophysics Department, where tumor therapy was developed and applied, as well as the HADES experiment. (BP)
]]>TRANSIEVES aims to study so called transient sieves, which constitute a novel technological concept to separate species dissolved or suspended in a liquid. Until now, separation processes have largely been based on spatial exclusion: It depends on whether a component is small enough to pass through a pore or not. The collaboration of researchers from TU Darmstadt and GSI/FAIR want to investigate separation by temporal exclusion, i.e. the permeability of a sieve or pore as a function of time. The decisive factor for selectivity is whether a species can pass through a pore in a certain time. The goal of the TRANSIEVES project is to equip sieves with novel and useful properties, e.g. increased selectivity or lower energy consumption.
The TRANSIEVES lead experiment “Electrically modulatable nanopores” strengthen the collaboration of GSI/FAIR and TU Darmstadt in the field of nanostructured materials. With ion track technology, GSI/FAIR provides a unique method for creating nanopores. As part of their sub-project, the GSI/FAIR research team led by Professor Toimil-Molares plans to synthesize single-pore polymer membranes, which will be produced using the unique single-ion irradiation facility at GSI/FAIR, and to modify them with gold coatings and nanoporous gold to characterize their voltage-controlled transport properties.
Professor María Eugenia Toimil-Molares has many years of expertise in the production of single-pore and multi-pore membranes by means of irradiation with high-energy heavy ions and subsequent chemical etching of the ion tracks, as well as in their functionalization, e.g. by atomic layer deposition. Her research activities also include the fabrication of metal, semi-metal and semiconductor nanowires with controlled dimensions by electrodeposition in the pores of the etched ion track polymer membranes. In addition, her group is researching the fabrication of other porous materials such as three-dimensional nanowire networks, porous gold, and metal-organic framework compounds.
The FOR 5584 project Transient Sieves is funded by the DFG under the project number 509491635. (CP/BP)
TRANSIEVES website at TU Darmstadt
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It began in the first minutes of the Big Bang, when the atomic nuclei of the elements hydrogen, helium and lithium came into being. The universe had to cool down for a further 380,000 years before electrons could be bound to these nuclei and the first elements formed. All other elements in the periodic table originated in stars, except for the heaviest elements, which were artificially synthesized in research centers such as GSI. Stars exploit the property that the fusion of two lighter nuclei to form a heavier nucleus can generate energy, which the star uses to exist in equilibrium for millions to billions of years while also radiating large amounts of energy. At some point, a star has used up its nuclear energy reservoir, then, if it is massive enough, it meets a dramatic fate: it explodes as a supernova, ejecting the elements it has incubated inside into space, where they were used to form life on a small planet around a fairly inconspicuous star.
However, supernovae only produce elements up to the iron-nickel mass range. To make the heavier elements, nature has another trick: by the progressive accumulation of neutrons on seed nuclei, the mass number of the nuclei can be successively increased, whereby this sequence is interrupted by decays in which a neutron transforms into a proton, thus advancing one step in the periodic table. The problem with this trick, however, is that there are actually no more free neutrons after the Big Bang and the star has to produce them on site. This can happen quite peacefully during special periods in the life of stars that are slightly more massive than the sun, or in spectacular events such as the fusion of two neutron stars.
The sun is a fairly common star, but not for us, as we would not exist without it. Today we know a great deal about the sun and have managed to look deep inside the sun using two different methods and test our theoretical ideas about stars, with spectacular success.
The lecture will first discuss the cosmic alchemy of the first almost 14 billion years of the universe. But at the end, Karlheinz Langanke will venture a look ahead to the next billion years and beyond.
Karlheinz Langanke studied physics at the University of Münster, where he received his doctorate in 1980. He then went to the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) as a post-doctoral researcher. From 1987 to 1992 he was a professor in Münster, after which he became a member of the faculty at Caltech. In 1996, he accepted a chair at the University of Aarhus in Denmark. In 2005, he became Professor of Theoretical Physics at the Technical University of Darmstadt and a senior scientist at GSI. There he was also Research Director for several years until his retirement in 2022 and Scientific Managing Director ad interim for two years, in 2015 and 2016. His research focuses on the nuclear processes that take place in stars and stellar explosions. Karlheinz Langanke was awarded the Lise Meitner Prize of the European Physical Society for his scientific work and was elected an honorary member of the society in 2023.
The other lectures of the term also focus on activities at GSI/FAIR, either on science or accelerator topics like the research into superheavy elements or the start of acceleration at the so-called ion sources, or — as is the case with the asteroid discoveries — on activities of employees beyond work. Finally, in December, participants can find out which experiments were carried out at the accelerator facility in 2024 in the Christmas lecture.
The lectures start at 2 p. m., further information about registration, access and the course of the event can be found on the event website at www.gsi.de/wfa
The lecture series “Wissenschaft für Alle” is aimed at all persons interested in current science and research. The lectures report on research and developments at GSI and FAIR, but also on current topics from other fields of science and technology. The aim of the series is to prepare and present the scientific processes in a way that is understandable for laypersons in order to make the research accessible to a broad public. The lectures are held by GSI and FAIR staff members or by external speakers from universities and research institutes. (CP)
FAIR is one of the largest projects and one of the most innovative high-tech facilities for research worldwide. Groundbreaking new discoveries about matter and the universe can be expected from FAIR's cutting-edge research. Scientists from all over the world will conduct a wide range of novel experiments at FAIR, from astrophysics to cancer research.
The buildings for the current realization stage of FAIR are completed and the installation of the technical building equipment is at a very advanced stage. In the coming years, several thousands of high-tech components of the FAIR accelerator and experimental facilities will be installed. The first components now installed are superconducting magnets, each weighing around three tons. A total of 108 of these will be installed. They will be part of the 1.1 km ring accelerator SIS100, which will be able to accelerate ions of all elements to up to 99 per cent of the speed of light. The function of the magnets is to steer the particles in the ring accelerator and keep them on course on the circular path.
“With the high-tech superconducting magnets, we are now starting to install the FAIR accelerator machine. We have been working towards this consistently and with the greatest commitment for years," says Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR. "All of the high-tech components manufactured worldwide and now ready for installation, were previously developed and tested in sophisticated procedures. This success is the result of careful planning and the enormous commitment of everyone involved. I am proud of the outstanding collaboration between our employees, the cooperation partners from research and industry, the many planning experts and supporters and, of course, our shareholders, who have made possible this transition into the next realization phase of FAIR." (GSI)
Currently the international accelerator facility FAIR, one of the largest and most complex building projects for international cutting-edge research worldwide, is being built in Darmstadt. On a site of approximately 20 hectares, unique buildings are being constructed in order to house and operate newly developed high-tech research facilities. This multinational and highly complex mega construction project has entailed the development of integrated construction workflow planning that closely coordinates building, civil and construction engineering, accelerator development and construction, and scientific experiments. At FAIR, matter that usually only exists in the depth of space will be produced in the lab for research. Scientists from all over the world will be able to gain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe from the Big Bang to the present.
Video FAIR construction site in April 2024
Video FAIR construction site 2018-2024 drone laps
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Above all, the enormous dimensions of the baths and the ability to copper plate large components make the system unique. It is able to coat cavities with a diameter of around two and a half meters with homogeneous copper layers. A total of four custom-made bath tanks and two rinsing baths were installed in the galvanic hall in which the new system is housed. Each of these tanks has a diameter of 2.70 meters and a depth of 3.60 meters and can hold up to 19,000 liters of liquid.
With its modern equipment and special design, the new electroplating system operates precisely and optimally meets the high coating requirements. The new baths are specialized in applying copper layers of the highest quality and homogeneity and depositing layer thicknesses from a few micrometers up to 120 micrometers. To ensure uniform, high-gloss coating deposition, air is actively circulated through the bath and special heating and cooling equipment maintains the correct bath temperature during the coating process. Different anodes for the respective electrolyte metals and components to be copper-plated can be attached to the conductor rails in the middle of the baths.
Several weeks of preparation are required before a component is immersed in the electrolytes. First, areas have to be masked, coated with a protective lacquer and the surface prepared. Due to the complexity of the components, the preparatory work is carried out entirely by hand. All surfaces that are not to be copper-plated must be carefully covered with a galvanoresistant coating and multiple layers of lacquer to achieve effective protection against the electrolytes. The actual copper plating takes just one day and follows a defined process sequence through the various treatment baths. First, the component passes through a degreasing bath to remove grease and dirt. Next, an adhesion promoter is applied in a nickel bath to improve copper adhesion. After activating the surface with diluted sulphuric acid, the component is then coated with a layer of pure copper in a copper plating bath. Finally, the protective lacquer must be removed, and the copper surface hand-polished to retain the crystalline surface structure's properties and achieve a beautiful shine.
The new system will enable the coating of the improved acceleration cavities that will be installed as part of the modernization of the existing linear accelerator UNILAC. These improved modules will replace the rear part of the UNILAC in order to achieve the performance parameters required for the FAIR project. The copper plating of a total of 25 individual tanks is planned over the next few years. Following the successful coating of a test tank, which confirmed the functionality of the system, operation of the system will now begin. (JL)
]]>The ELMA researchers, led by Professor Giacomo Contin at University of Trieste and Professor Silvia Masciocchi at Heidelberg University and GSI, will systematically study the MAPS response to selected particles and particle energies. The collaborators will prepare and characterize functional MAPS samples, in planar and bent geometries, and irradiate them at the GSI/FAIR ion beam facilities. The shape and size of the pixel clusters activated by the impinging particles with different charge number and energy, and the analogue signal information as preserved by the detector logic, will be used to study the response, and accurately calibrate the sensors for further use in the different experimental applications.
MAPS realized in CMOS technology have recently established themselves as the best detectors for the reconstruction of particle trajectories and collision vertices at the core of particle and nuclear physics experiments. They provide spatial information with very high position resolution (down to three micrometers, or 3・10-6 meters) and allow to build very light detector systems that barely disturb the traversing particles, but measure them with highest precision. Such detectors are currently in use in the ALICE experiment at CERN and are planned for use both in CBM and in R3B experiments at FAIR. In the ELMA project, their possible use in other fields, such as medical applications and space observation will also be investigated.
The grant will be used to fund postdoctoral positions and student fellowships to work on the proposed research and the fabrication of the needed data-taking setups. The GSI/FAIR laboratories will make the local irradiation beam facilities available to the project and provide scientific and technical support.
Through the project, the two research groups will put together their resources towards a goal that would be otherwise unachievable by each of the parties alone. The further project outcome will be a long-lasting collaboration between the Italian and German groups, allowing for students and scientific personnel exchange, routinary access to the respective facilities, further joint research initiatives and scientific publications. (CP)
Italian Ministry for Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation (MAECI)
]]>Deniz Würsch was welcomed by the management of GSI and FAIR: Research Director Dr. Yvonne Leifels, Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director, and Dr. Katharina Stummeyer, Administrative Managing Director, as well as press officer Dr. Ingo Peter. An introductory presentation on the research objectives, campus development and the FAIR construction project was followed by a tour of the test stand for superconducting magnets for the FAIR ring accelerator SIS100 and the FAIR construction site.
On the construction site, she visited the individual construction phases up close. The program included the first installations in the SIS100 underground accelerator tunnel, the Super Fragment Separator (Super-FRS) the central beamline and transfer building, and the buildings for the FAIR experiment stations.
The activities of GSI/FAIR are of great interest to the district administration. A second informative visit with other representatives of the district administration is planned for later this year. (CP)
]]>For the first time, an international research team, led by GSI/FAIR in Darmstadt, the Institut de recherche sur les lois fondamentales de l'Univers (IRFU) in Saclay, France, and the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg (MPIK) has succeeded in observing a two-photon decay on a so-called bare atomic nucleus from which the entire electron shell has been removed. The measurements on germanium-72 nuclei were carried out as part of the FAIR Phase 0 experimental program at the experimental storage ring ESR at GSI/FAIR. The results have been published in the journal Physical Review Letters.
Nuclear two-photon or double-gamma nuclear decay is an electromagnetic process in which a nucleus in an excited state emits two gamma rays simultaneously. This new type of decay was first discovered in the 1980s at the MPIK, but further investigations were hardly possible due to its rare nature. Studying this process gives insight into fundamental properties of the nucleus, such as the reaction to electromagnetic fields in different states of excitation.
In the recent experiments, this rare phenomenon was studied in a specific isotope of Germanium, with mass number A=72, which was stripped of its entire electron shell. For this purpose, a beam of krypton ions was accelerated to about 70% of the speed of light with the GSI/FAIR accelerator facility and subsequently passed through a beryllium plate with a thickness of one centimeter. In the collision, the required germanium ions are produced in a specific excited state, which has the same spin-parity quantum number 0+ as the ground state.
“In this situation the usually dominating decay by the emission of a single gamma-ray is forbidden due to angular momentum conservation, since the gamma ray must take away an intrinsic spin of one unit,” says the project leader, Dr. habil. Wolfram Korten, scientist at IRFU. “Other competing decay modes, such as the transfer of the energy to an electron of the atomic shell, are also not possible, because we intentionally removed all electrons. Therefore, the double-gamma decay becomes the dominant decay mode.” The scientists utilized this situation to directly measure the partial half-life for the double-gamma emission.
“In a nuclear reaction at relativistic energies the produced ions inevitably have a large velocity spread,” explains Professor Yury Litvinov, who was responsible for the conduction of the experiment at GSI/FAIR. “To force the same ion species to have identical revolution frequencies, we tuned the experimental storage ring ESR at GSI/FAIR into a special ‘isochronous’ mode, such that the differences in velocities are exactly compensated by the lengths of ion trajectories. As a result, we were able to reliably separate the ground and the isomeric states of germanium-72 ions despite their very slight relative mass difference of the order of 10-6. ”
“We tracked each ion in the isomeric state non-destructively and precisely determined the time of its decay. Thus, the half-life for the double-gamma decay of the first excited 0+ state in bare germanium-72 ions was determined to be 23.9(6) milliseconds, which is fifty thousand times longer than in the atomic state and strongly deviates from theoretical expectations,” adds Dr. David Freire Fernández, first author and PhD student at the MPIK at the time of the measurement. “The measured half-life is by at least two orders of magnitude shorter than the shortest lifetime directly measured previously for stored highly-charged ions.”
“The obtained short lifetime was not expected and we are extremely intrigued to find the theoretical explanation for this. Further experiments will be required to harmonize theory and experiment for this rare phenomenon,” concludes Professor Klaus Blaum, Director of the MPIK in Heidelberg. (CP)
The event, which was held for the first time in 2018, has a high international impact. Every two years, it offers research institutions and companies the opportunity to develop new collaborations and networks and to forge interdisciplinary contacts, in lectures and workshops, at roundtable discussions and at information stands. It brings together the top players from science, research and technology.
GSI and FAIR had a state-of-the-art information booth at the conference, measuring around ten square meters, and presented "FAIR – the universe in the laboratory". At the international accelerator center FAIR, extreme forms of matter that usually only exist in neutron stars, supernovae, stars or large gas planets are to be produced and studied in the lab. Scientists from all over the world will use the different areas of GSI and FAIR to conduct unique experiments and to obtain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe. The research center offers forward-looking and exciting prospects, especially for top talents and the next generation of scientists and engineers.
At the GSI/FAIR booth, the around 2000 congress participants from the fields of science, business, society and politics had the opportunity to obtain information about the latest research projects, career opportunities and options for students. This included interactive exhibits providing an insight into the basic acceleration process of chemical elements as well as a presentation of current research work. Scientists from GSI/FAIR and the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM), a branch of GSI, presented the various scientific disciplines and provided fascinating insights into current research topics and issues of relevance to society, for example in the fields of biophysics and nuclear physics as well as medical applications.
Those who were interested in working at an international research institution were also able to find out about the wide range of career, study, job and training opportunities at GSI and FAIR. Various exchange programs and worldwide collaborations of GSI and the international accelerator center FAIR offer forward-looking possibilities. This applies to young academics as well as to outstanding scientists. GSI and FAIR were very satisfied after the fair and drew a very positive balance. In-depth discussions at the booth, a whole series of focused one-on-one meetings and the acquisition of numerous new expert contacts contributed to this. (BP)
The Future Insight e.V. association unites like-minded individuals and organizations in its mission to support the advancement of science and technology for the benefit of humanity, aligned on the three fundamental principles of truth, love, and hope – science, ethics, and inspiration. The non-profit association organizes the bi-annual „Curious – Future Inside Conference“, one of the world’s leading gatherings on science and technology. It covers a broad range of topics and brings together some of the world’s brightest scientists and innovators to solve the challenges of today and enable the dreams of a better tomorrow. The first conference was initiated by the pharmaceutical and chemical company Merck on its 350th anniversary in 2018, and triggered the birth of this global movement.
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These primary power supplies have a total pulse power of 30 Mega-Watt and are directly connected to the medium voltage network (20,000 Volt). The dipole magnets are supplied with currents of up to 13,000 Ampere in an acceleration cycle to final energy at a current increase rate of 29,000 Ampere per second.
The power supplies must maintain the target current with a precision of 0.01 Percent at every point in the ramp, which leads to a resulting resolution of 0.001 Percent of the measuring devices. This requires high-precision current measuring systems, consisting of current transformers for direct currents and ADC (analog digital converters) developed by GSI, as well as powerful control systems in the power supplies.
The cooperation between GSI and Power Conversion Deutschland is of strategic importance to both in the field of magnetic high-current technology and aims to maintain and expand such technology and expertise at the highest level.
Building on the know-how of the former AEG, which built the main power supplies of the SIS18, General Electric (GE) Power Conversion Germany has taken over and expanded the know-how for such extreme requirements. GE was already able to demonstrate its capabilities and achieve all specified requirements as part of the previous upgrade project for the existing SIS18 ring accelerator. As a result, it was convenient to give General Electric Power Conversion Germany in Berlin the job of building the SIS100 main power supplies. In doing so, GSI and the FAIR Project support the development of cutting-edge engineering know-how in German industry and ensure future-proof job opportunities.
Now, this has paid off as part of the development of the world’s first commercial fusion device being built near Boston in the USA. Commonwealth Fusion Systems (CFS) is the world’s leading fusion technology company and is currently building a tokamak fusion device named “SPARC.” A tokamak is a donut-shaped machine that confines fusion plasmas with a strong magnetic field. Tokamaks are best positioned for the fastest path to commercially relevant fusion energy. In 2021, CFS, in collaboration with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, successfully demonstrated a revolutionary 20 tesla HTS magnet, which will be used in “SPARC”. Similar requirements are placed on the power supplies used by the tokamak's numerous magnet systems as they are on the SIS100 main power supplies.
General Electric USA was able to prevail in the competition for the contract to supply the electricity for the fusion experiments by making reference to the expertise already present at General Electric Berlin. Thus, a while ago, Power Conversion Deutschland, Power Conversion USA, and Commonwealth Fusion Systems visited the GSI Holenholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung to learn more about the FAIR Project, present the “SPARC” Project, and exchange information on network device technologies with the Subproject SIS100/SIS18 and the Expert Group Electrical Power Systems (EPS). (BP)
]]>Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. mult. Peter Armbruster
* 25.7.1931 † 26.6.2024
who passed away at the age of 92.
Peter Armbruster created and achieved groundbreaking research in his long and fulfilling life. This applies in particular to his achievements for and at GSI, where he was a leading scientist and a longstanding member of the Scientific Directorate from 1971 to 1996. His main areas of research were nuclear fission, atomic physics and the interaction of heavy ions with matter. As the initiator of the research program for the synthesis and study of superheavy elements at GSI, he and his research team succeeded in discovering the chemical elements 107 - Bohrium, 108 - Hassium, 109 - Meitnerium, 110 - Darmstadtium, 111 - Roentgenium and 112 - Copernicium. These results contributed significantly to GSI's scientific reputation and also to its visibility beyond the scientific community. He was also a co-discoverer of proton radioactivity in 1982. From 1984, he was professor at the Technische Hochschule Darmstadt (now Technische Universität Darmstadt). From 1989 to 1992, he was Director of Research at the European Institute Laue-Langevin in Grenoble (France). Subsequently, back at GSI, he achieved outstanding research with the FRS fragment separator on the production and investigation of neutron-rich isotopes by means of nuclear fission in flight. By establishing numerous research collaborations, he has made a significant contribution to the internationalization of GSI research.
For his scientific achievements he has received many prestigious awards in Germany and abroad, among others the Max Born Prize of the British Institute of Physics and the German Physical Society (1988), the Stern-Gerlach Medal of the German Physical Society (1997), the Glenn T. Seaborg Award for Nuclear Chemistry of the American Chemical Society (1997) and the Lise Meitner Prize of the European Physical Society (2000). He was also awarded the Federal Cross of Merit 1st Class, the Hessian Order of Merit and the Johann Heinrich Merck Medal.
GSI and FAIR bid farewell to its former division head and outstanding scientist Peter Armbruster with the greatest gratitude and respect.
Management, Works Council and Employees of the GSI and FAIR GmbH
]]>The module consists of in total four superconducting radio-frequency cavities and two high-field solenoid lenses, which are also superconducting. For the assembly, the accelerator cavities had to be combined into a complete so-called “accelerator string” in the almost complete absence of interfering particles. For this purpose, the HIM clean room with ISO class 4 (similar to the rooms in use for computer chip production) and a special production line for the insertion and extraction process was used. Afterwards this string was assembled into a complete cryomodule.
In the summer of 2023, the fully equipped module, which weights almost eight tons, was transported from Mainz to Darmstadt to the GSI/FAIR using a special truck. The assembly and integration of the cryomodule followed, as well as the connection to the local cryogenic liquid helium supply. After a successful cool-down procedure, the individual superconducting acceleration cavities were able to go into operation with the newly installed radio-frequency power supply.
In December 2023, the time had come: After five years of development, construction and commissioning, the helium beam from the GSI high charge injector was accelerated for the first time in the HELIAC-Kryomodul 1, recently with argon beam an energy of approx. 13.5 million electron volts in a stable manner and with good beam transmission has been reached. The acceleration gradients required to accelerate heavy ions are up to three times higher and are also available. Furthermore it has been shown that it is possible to vary the beam energy over a wider range with this cryomodule without losing particles. This is a considerable advantage of the particle-dynamics concept developed at the Goethe Universität Frankfurt, which is being applied in practice for the first time here.
The proposed HELIAC, in which up to four such modules are to be used, will in the future accelerate heavy ion beams to up to 10% of the speed of light. The energy required for particle acceleration will be reduced by up to 90% compared to conventional accelerators through the use of superconductivity. The newly developed cryomodules make a significant contribution to saving energy and thus to reducing CO2 emissions.
Once the HELIAC project is approved, funded and implemented, the fully assembled and tested modules will then be available to the scientists to carry out experiments in nuclear and atomic physics, nuclear chemistry and in the materials sciences with continuous wave heavy ion beams of the highest intensity.
The staff of the GSI Linear Accelerator Department and the ACID 1 section of the HIM have in particular contributed to this success, as well as further specialist departments of GSI/FAIR.
The prototype phase of the HELIAC project, reported here, is financially supported and funded by the Helmholtz Association of German Research Centers (HGF), the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and the European Union (European Regional Development Fund). (CP)
]]>The commitment and expertise of Joachim Stroth and Pavel Tlusty have been invaluable to the ongoing success and progress of the HADES project in the last years. The upcoming experiments in their next term will shed new light on the phase diagram of QCD matter, providing deeper insights into the properties and behaviors of strongly interacting particles under extreme conditions.
The HADES detector is a versatile fixed-target collision experiment that operates with ion beams of a few GeV provided by the SIS18 synchrotron, and probes the systems created in such collisions at freeze-out are characterized by the highest baryon chemical potentials and intermediate temperatures. Similar properties of matter are expected to form in merging neutron stars, making low-energy heavy-ion collisions a unique opportunity to study the microscopic and macroscopic properties of such matter. In addition, HADES can operate with proton or secondary pion beams to study the properties of hadronic resonances and provide reference measurements for heavy-ion collisions. Recently, HADES is also set to analyze Au+Au and C+C collisions at kinetic beam energies of 0.8A GeV and below. These measurements will extend the phase diagram of QCD matter to even higher baryon chemical potentials, offering more constraints on the equation of state of dense baryonic matter and potentially leading to the discovery of further phase transitions.
With the leadership and commitment of Joachim Stroth and Pavel Tlusty the HADES collaboration will advance the research objectives further towards FAIR. Over the next years, the construction of the SIS100 accelerator and the CBM experiment will enable the study of heavy-ion collisions in the 2.7 to 4.9 GeV energy range with unprecedented precision. The physics programs of the HADES and CBM experiments will be complementary. (LW)
]]>The team around Dmitry Budker, including also Dr. Danila Barskiy and Dr. James Eills, has been nominated for their work in the field of nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR). NMR is conventionally performed in strong magnetic fields to increase resolution and sensitivity. The “wall” of needing a magnet to do NMR has “fallen”: Professor Budker and his colleagues have advanced zero-field NMR, where measurements are made without a magnetic field. This more accessible kind of NMR opens new opportunities in a broad range of fields: the search for dark matter, the observation of chemical reactions through metal walls, and the monitoring of the efficacy of cancer therapies.
Dmitry Budker was born in Russia in 1963 and studied physics at the Novosibirsk State University, USSR, gaining a diploma with honors. In 1993, he was awarded his doctorate by the University of California at Berkeley, USA. After two years working as a research associate, in 1995, he was appointed an Assistant Professor of Physics at the University of California, becoming an Associate Professor in 2001 and ultimately Full Professor in 2005. From 1995 to 2014, Budker was also a member of the Nuclear Science Division of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), CA, USA. In 2014, Dmitry Budker was appointed Professor of Experimental Atomic Physics at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz. This professorship has been established at the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM). Together with his research team, Dmitry Budker investigates fundamental interactions and symmetries.
Dr. Jan Rothhardt’s field of expertise is extreme UV light. It offers fascinating opportunities for nanoscale microscopy, but was so-far limited to large-scale light sources. So Rothhardt developed a new table-top alternative based on lasers and advanced computational imaging as a compact portable device. This breakthrough allows completely new insights, including nanoscale mapping of the chemical composition of samples, and will impact many fields ranging from energy-efficient electronics to medicine.
Jan Rothhardt studied physics at the Friedrich Schiller University Jena (FSU) and received his PhD with summa cum laude in 2010 with a thesis about high power ultra-short pulse lasers. During his education, he spent time as a Visiting Scientist at Centre d’études lasers intenses et applications (CELIA), Bordeaux, France, and at University of Stellenbosch, South Africa. He continued working at FSU as a Postdoctoral Fellow, as well as at the Commissariat à l’énergie atomique et aux energies alternatives (CEA) in Saclay, France, until 2012, when he changed to the HI Jena. Since 2014 he is Junior Research Group Leader for “Soft X-ray spectroscopy and microscopy”. Following his habilitation, he also became Assistant Professor at FSU im Jahr 2023.
The Falling Walls Science Summit is a leading forum for global science leaders with focus on science breakthroughs. The summit takes place every year in Berlin from 7 – 9 November, the anniversary date of the fall of the Berlin Wall, with this year’s event marking the 35th anniversary Berlin Wall’s falling. The holistic approach of international, interdisciplinary and intersectoral discourse is globally unique and attracts leading researchers, CTOs, science strategists, sciences funders, and media worldwide. The Falling Walls Science Breakthroughs of the Year are presented by world class researchers awarded by a rigorous and distinguished jury in ten categories out of over one thousand nominations from all over the world. (CP)
Timelapse video of the FAIR construction site 2018 until 2024
]]>The Green IT Cube is a particularly energy-efficient data center. The energy required to cool the computers is very low compared to conventional data centers, as the computers are cooled using an innovative air and water method. The energy required for cooling corresponds to less than seven percent of the electrical power used for computing, instead of 30 to 100 percent, as is the case in conventional data centers with air cooling.
The effective cooling technology allows a space-saving placement of the computers in the Green IT Cube. In a cube-shaped building measuring 27 x 30 x 22 cubic meters, a total of 768 computer racks can be arranged closely together on six floors. Three of the six floors are currently equipped with a maximum cooling capacity of four megawatts. In the final stage, the Green IT Cube will be able to reach a cooling power of twelve megawatts. Due to saving energy and space, it is very cost-efficient. In addition, the waste heat of the Green IT Cube’s servers is being used to heat a modern office and canteen building on the GSI/FAIR campus.
For the recertification, the IT experts at GSI/FAIR had to meet some new criteria: For example, retired IT equipment can no longer be scrapped, but must be given to a refurbishing service. Energy for the entire data center must be supplied to 100% from renewable sources. For each individual server, CPU and memory utilization must be recorded and made available. An energy measurement upstream of the transformers was retrofitted to expand the monitoring system. All measurement concepts and an energy management system are provided. Once all these requirements had been met, nothing stood in the way of the Blue Angel at the Green IT Cube.
Scientists use the Green IT Cube to perform simulations and develop detectors for FAIR. They also analyze measurement data recorded in experiments at the accelerator facilities at GSI and, in the future, FAIR, to gain fundamental insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe. To this end, the Green IT Cube will be equipped in the long term with computer systems that meet the scientists' requirements in terms of computing power, storage capacity and access speed.
In addition, the Green IT Cube has been expanded into an IT living lab, called the Digital Open Lab, to carry out research and development projects on the more sustainable operation of data centers, together with industrial partners. Likewise, partners from the scientific environment have the opportunity to use the data center for their research work.
The Blue Angel has been the German government's environmental label for over 45 years. It identifies environmentally friendly products and services. More than 30,000 products and services from over 1,600 companies have been awarded the Blue Angel, but currently only four data centers, one of which is the Green IT Cube. (CP)
Reinhard Kulessa early on supported the development of the new accelerator infrastructure FAIR and promoted the participation of Polish scientists and institutions in this new project, in particular as a co-author of the Super-FRS proposal for FAIR. In 2005, Reinhard Kulessa became the Polish representative in the FAIR International Steering Committee and signed the FAIR Memorandum of Understanding prior to many other participating countries. As such his role in the establishment of FAIR and the Polish participation cannot be understated.
We are grateful for his tireless efforts to promote cooperation between the countries and institutions, and thanks to him scientific contacts with the Jagiellonian University until today are deep and excellent. Those colleagues at GSI and FAIR who knew him personally, value him as remarkable scientist, gentle person and for his interest far-beyond natural sciences. Many of us gained a friend in him and will keep him in warmest memories. Our deepest sympathies go out to his family and friends. (CP)
]]>He was welcomed by the management of GSI and FAIR: Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director, Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director, and Markus Jaeger, Deputy Administrative Managing Director, as well as press spokesman Dr. Ingo Peter. Minister Gremmels was impressed: “It is fascinating to see how cutting-edge research is being carried out here and how the international accelerator center FAIR is taking shape.”
FAIR not only promises pioneering scientific findings, but is also a magnet for highly qualified specialists. Minister Gremmels emphasized the importance of GSI and FAIR for Hessen: “GSI/FAIR are not only international flagships for research, but also make a decisive contribution to strengthening Hessen as a top location for research and innovation.”
FAIR will be able to produce and study extreme states of matter in the laboratory, which otherwise only occur in neutron stars, supernovae, stars or large gas planets. During the tour of the construction site, the guests were able to see the different construction phases up close. The program included the underground accelerator ring tunnel SIS100, the central beamline and transfer building and the buildings for the FAIR experimental sites. They were impressed by the first accelerator components that have already been installed in the tunnel and by the prospects that are opening up as the FAIR project progresses.
On the GSI and FAIR campus, the guests were able to get an idea of the scientific successes. They visited the HADES (High-Acceptance Di-Electron Spectrometer) detector, which is used to study high-energy nuclear-nuclear collisions and enables a better understanding of the properties of hot, highly compressed nuclear matter, such as that produced in the universe when neutron stars collide. They also visited the PHELIX (Petawatt High-Energy Laser for Ion Experiments) laser facility, which is one of the most powerful lasers in the world. One potential application of PHELIX is to optimize the conditions for a more stable interaction between laser and plasma, as required for the realization of inertial confinement fusion.
Most of the vaccines approved for human use either live attenuated or inactivated viruses (e.g. influenza); newer approaches are based on subcellular components of the infectious agents or on the genetic information encoding for these antigens, such as vector or mRNA vaccines. To develop new vaccines, scientists need methods that inactivate the virus while causing as little damage to its structure as possible — in particular the viral envelope that is the key to the immune response. In past years, the inactivation of viruses for vaccine development has been carried out with conventional gamma radiation. However, the use of high doses of gamma rays inevitably leads to damage of surface structures, which can impair the ability to induce an adaptive immune response. This is where the new GSI and HZI project comes in.
The aim was to irradiate influenza viruses with high-energy heavy ions. Energetic ions are able to inactivate the virus by inducing breaks in the viral RNA with only a few passages in the envelope, at the same time minimizing membrane damage and thus protecting the surface structures. In the experiment at the GSI/FAIR accelerator facilities, an influenza virus was irradiated with the iron isotope Fe-56, which was accelerated at 1 GeV/n at the SIS18 synchrotron. Based on the resulting viruses, HZI produced a flu vaccine inactivated with heavy ions and examined it for its ability to promote the formation of virus-binding and neutralizing antibodies after vaccination.
The researchers found that immunization of mice with the inactivated virus resulted in the stimulation of strong, antigen-specific cellular and humoral immune responses. These promising results suggest that heavy ion beams could be an innovative and effective method for inactivating viruses and developing vaccines that are more effective.
The project was partly funded by the Helmholtz-Förderung aus dem Innovationspool des Forschungsbereichs Materie and was conducted as part of the FAIR Phase 0 experimental period by the GSI Biophysics Department headed by Professor Marco Durante and HZI researchers from the department Vaccinology and Applied Microbiology led by Professor Carlos A. Guzmán. Professor Durante was very pleased about the pioneering results: “It is a very innovative approach and an excellent example of the good and fruitful cooperation within the Helmholtz Association. The findings of this research could form the basis for future vaccine developments and help us to be better prepared for future pandemics.” (BP)
]]>Researchers at European XFEL in Schenefeld near Hamburg have taken a closer look at the formation of the first crystallisation of nuclei in supercooled liquids. They found: The formation starts much later than previously assumed. The findings could help to better understand the creation of ice in clouds in the future and to describe some processes inside the Earth more precisely. Scientists from GSI/FAIR were involved in the experiments, whose results have now been published in the journal Physical Review Letters.
Every child knows that water freezes into ice when it gets icy cold. For water, this normally happens below zero degrees Celsius, the melting temperature of water. This is a fixed point on the Celsius temperature scale that we use.
However, the transition from the liquid to the solid phase is a very complex process and is difficult to study experimentally at the atomic level. One reason for this is that crystals are formed randomly: You don't know exactly when and where it will happen. Furthermore, a liquid can remain in a metastable state for a long time: It remains liquid even though it should actually freeze and become solid. This makes it extraordinarily difficult to pinpoint the right moment for a crystal to form and watch its growth.
However, these effects are highly relevant in nature. For example, they play a decisive role in the formation of ice in clouds or in processes inside Earth.
Using the intense X-ray flashes of the European XFEL's X-ray free-electron laser, an international team of researchers at the European XFEL in Schenefeld near Hamburg has now succeeded in precisely measuring the nucleation of supercooled liquids. The experiments took place in a vacuum so that the X-ray light does not interact with the molecules in the air, which would interfere with the experiments. Because of its complexity, however, water is one of the most difficult liquids to model. For that reason, the researchers used instead argon and krypton in liquid form in their experiments. In fact, supercooled noble-gas liquids are the only systems for which reliable theoretical predictions can be presently made.
The researchers explicitly investigated the so-called crystal nucleation rate J(T). This is a measure of the probability that a crystal will form in a certain volume within a certain time. The rate at which this happens is an important parameter, for example in order to be able to mathematically describe real processes in models – in weather forecasting, for example, or in climate models.
Since it is so difficult to measure real crystal formation, simulations are often used. However, these are associated with major uncertainties. For example, the nucleation rates simulated for water can deviate by several orders of magnitude from those measured experimentally, which makes modelling inaccurate.
The X-ray laser of European XFEL is ideal for investigations of this kind: with the help of intense X-ray flashes, researchers can investigate the very rapid changes in the development of crystallisation.
The team choose the MID instrument (MID = Materials Imaging and Dynamics) for their experiments. They bombarded the liquid jets with X-ray pulses that had an energy of 9.7 kiloelectronvolts (keV). Each X-ray pulse lasted less than 25 femtoseconds – one femtosecond corresponds to one quadrillionth of a second. To illustrate: light travels less than a millimetre in this time.
The experimenters directed the intense X-ray light onto the liquid jet, which was only 3.5 micrometres thin, focusing it on a surface with a diameter of less than one micrometre. In total, the team recorded several million diffraction images in order to have sufficient statistics and to determine the rate of crystal formation with sufficient accuracy.
According to their results, the crystal nucleation rates are much smaller than those predicted on the basis of simulations and the classical theory. „The study promises to significantly expand our understanding of crystallisation,“ says Johannes Möller from MID instrument of European XFEL. „The results show that the widely used classical theory of the formation of crystals from the liquid phase deviates significantly from reality.“
„We expect that our approach will allow testing various extensions of the classical theory for predicting crystallisation for the first time,” adds Robert Grisenti from GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, the lead author of the study. “Our findings will help theorists to refine their models in the future.” (CP)
Physicist Anna Alicke was awarded for her thesis “Development of fast track finding algorithms for densely packed straw tube trackers and its application to Ξ hyperon reconstruction for the PANDA experiment". In the course of her thesis, she developed two new tracking algorithms and combined these primary and secondary trackers to achieve the highest efficiency, which was tested on reactions with multiple secondary vertices. But the algorithm can also be used for other densely packed straw tube trackers.
The PANDA Collaboration has awarded the PhD Prize once per year since 2013 in order to honor the best dissertation written in connection with the PANDA Experiment.
The PANDA Collaboration awards the PhD Prize to specifically honor students’ contributions to the PANDA project. Candidates for the PhD Prize are nominated by their doctoral advisors. In addition to being directly related to the PANDA Experiment, the nominees’ doctoral degrees must have received a rating of “very good” or better. Up to three candidates are shortlisted for the award and can present their dissertations at the PANDA Collaboration meeting. The winner is chosen by a committee that is appointed for this task by the PANDA Collaboration. (LW)
For astronauts on long-term missions, both space radiation and microgravity are a potential threat to their health and performance, as both conditions can lead to changes in the brain’s neuronal networks and to cognitive impairments similar to those occurring in patients with depression and other neuropsychological disorders. To investigate the changes in the brain under microgravity and space radiation, researchers at GSI/FAIR’s Biophysics Department are using brain organoids, testing them under simulated space conditions. These organoids are produced from human stem cells and, although they do not represent a fully developed brain, they can mimic the architecture and specific function of the brain in parts and are therefore a valuable research model.
“The mission serves to gain initial knowledge after a short time in real microgravity and some changes in the gene expression of the brain organoids are already expected. We have also gained valuable experience with regard to the cultivation, procedure and logistics underlying such an experiment,” says Dr. Schroeder. The complex organoids survived the transport to Sweden, the rocket flight and the subsequent recovery with flying colors and are currently being examined for cellular changes.
The infrastructure necessary for success was developed in cooperation with the Department of Gravitational Biology under PD Dr. Ruth Hemmersbach and Dr. Christian Liemersdorf and the engineers Sebastian Feles and Ilse Holbeck from the DLR Institute of Aerospace Medicine. In the future, the brain organoids are expected be used in a long-term experiment on the International Space Station (ISS) to gain further insights into how the brain changes under real space conditions. In collaboration with Professor Dr. Sherif El Sheikh from the Technical University of Cologne, new substances are also being tested to protect the brain's neuronal network. These findings may not only help future astronauts, but also patients suffering from depression or other neuropsychological disorders. (CP)
]]>Bare protons and neutrons have charges of +1 and 0, respectively. However, in most theoretical models of the atomic nucleus, empirically determined effective nucleon charges have to be used instead to calculate electromagnetic transition probabilities. The reason: Due to computational limitations, often only a limited number of particles can be considered, rather than explicitly treating for each of them the influence of all the other protons and neutrons in the nucleus of interest.
Already nearly fifty years ago, these effective charges were predicted to depend on the isospin, i.e., the relative number of protons and neutrons in the nucleus. The present work presents the first clear evidence for such a dependence based on new experimental information for the two semi-magic cadmium nuclei 98Cd and 130Cd. These nuclei span the entire N = 50-82 major neutron shell, reaching from N≈Z to the very neutron-rich side of the nuclear chart, and feature excited states of exceptionally pure structure. They therefore offer the cleanest laboratory experimentally accessible for such a study.
The experiment was conducted at the Radioactive Isotope Beam Factory (RIBF) of the RIKEN Nishina Center in Japan. The neutron-rich cadmium nuclei were produced by projectile fission of uranium nuclei on a beryllium target and identified by the BigRIPS separator. The gamma rays emitted following the decay of isomeric states were measured in the EURICA detector setup. EURICA consisted of European high-resolution Ge detectors, which at that time were lent to RIBF and currently are used in DESPEC experiments during FAIR Phase 0.
The result of this experiment, namely the empirical parametrization of the isospin dependence of the effective charges, will significantly improve the reliability of theoretical predictions towards the heavy neutron-rich region of the nuclear chart in which experimental information is scarce. (CP)
Zbigniew Majka was a renowned scientist, a leading figure in nuclear physics. He was a full professor at the Faculty of Physics, Astronomy and Applied Computer Science at Jagiellonian University in Krakow, Poland.
He started his engagement for FAIR already many years before FAIR was initiated officially, playing a major role in the conception of the facility. In particular, he was among the founders of the CBM collaboration, in which he led the Jagiellonian University team since 2002 and remained a supporter of the collaboration.
From 2007 on Zbigniew Majka was a member of the management of the FAIR project and spent some years at GSI as member of the FAIR Joint Core Team. He contributed significantly to the preparatory phase for the FAIR project and served as Director of Research within the FAIR Joint Core Team from 2008 until the foundation of the FAIR GmbH in 2010.
Thanks to his engagement, Poland signed the FAIR Convention in 2010, signing up for more than 2% shares in the endeavor. Zbigniew Majka was subsequently identified as a representative of the Polish shareholder Jagiellonian University in FAIR. He served as a delegate to the FAIR Council from 2010 up to 2023, making him the longest-serving of all delegates to the FAIR Council. In this position, he vigorously promoted FAIR in Poland and Poland in FAIR, to the benefit of Poland, FAIR and the international science as a whole.
Zbigniew Majka also chaired the National Consortium FEMTOPHYSICS in Poland, whose aim is to organize the Polish participation in the FAIR research program.
He will certainly be missed by all friends of FAIR and GSI. Our deepest sympathy goes to his family and friends. (CP)
]]>“Based on the great successes of GSI, FAIR is one of the most ambitious research projects in the world and will enable thousands of scientists to conduct cutting-edge research for decades to come. I am looking forward to taking on a responsible role in this unique project. In particular, I would like to contribute my professional experience in the administrative management of publicly funded large-scale projects,” says Dr. Katharina Stummeyer.
Dr. Katharina Stummeyer studied biochemistry at the Leibniz University Hannover and graduated with a PhD from the Institute of Cellular Chemistry at Hannover Medical School. She gained extensive experience in national and international science management. Her professional career began as a researcher in structural biology at the Hannover Medical School.
In 2009, she moved to Cologne as an expert at the project management agency of the Gesellschaft für Anlagen- und Reaktorsicherheit (GRS). She was initially responsible for initiating and managing national and international research projects as part of federal project funding. Since 2013, she has been head of the GRS project management agency. In this position, Dr. Stummeyer was responsible for the technical and administrative implementation of federal research and innovation funding programs. Another focus of her work was project support and controlling for the funding body of publicly funded large-scale projects.
Dr Katharina Stummeyer has contributed her expertise to various national and international expert committees on topics such as the promotion of young talent, gender equality and nuclear safety. She has extensive experience in the management of international research collaborations, chaired the management boards of multilateral research projects, and has supported and advised various federal ministries on international cooperation. (IP/BP)
]]>The aim of the event was to highlight the remarkable journey of partnership between India and Germany and at the same time showcase the progress of FAIR, the international accelerator center for research with antiprotons and ions, which is currently being built at GSI. India has been among the initiators and leaders of the FAIR project, and is the third largest shareholder of the new laboratory.
The participants were welcomed by Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI/FAIR, Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of GSI/FAIR, Dr. Jens Brandenburg, Parliamentary State Secretary at the BMBF, Erik Kurzweil, Federal Foreign Office, and His Excellency Ambassador Parvathaneni Harish, Embassy of India in Berlin. With the support of the BMBF, the event was able to showcase the remarkable achievements and the rich diversity of the Indo-German cooperation in several fields. Various excursions and working groups offered the opportunity for intensive scientific exchange, culminating in a very lively interlink session in which the participants of the various working groups exchanged their different elaborations and conclusions. In a poster exhibition, participants learned about joint Indo-German projects and new opportunities for cooperation. A tour of the GSI/FAIR facility provided an insight into research on the campus and into the potential of the future facilities under construction. Finally, in a “Policy Talk”, the conclusions of the discussions were presented by Paolo Giubellino and the representatives of the working groups and commented by State Secretary Jens Brandenburg and Ambassador Parvathaneni Harish, with contributions from many of the participants.
“It is an honor to host this anniversary event at GSI/FAIR,” said Giubellino. “India is a fundamental partner in our field of science, and a leading member of the FAIR project. Indian universities and research laboratories play a major role worldwide in nuclear physics, and the strong collaboration of both theoretical and experimental physicists from India and Germany has laid the foundations for our current research programs. We look forward to many more years of cooperation. On a personal note, I have collaborated with Indian scientists in my own research work for over 30 years, and this collaboration has been always very satisfactory, and the basis of my own results. ”
“FAIR is a unique testimony to the joint Indo-German efforts to push the technical boundaries, especially in the field of accelerator technology for scientific research, where the collaboration of institutions and industrial companies from India and Germany is a very important success factor which will continue based on the well-developed relationships,” added Blaurock. “Participants are invited to witness first-hand the innovative solutions to technical challenges and the joint effort shaping the common future.” (CP)
Under the scientific leadership of Prof. Specht, from 1992 to 1999, a rich scientific harvest was obtained at the previously commissioned GSI accelerator facilities UNILAC/SIS/ESR, with numerous discoveries and new technological developments.
Professor Specht also played an eminent role in the establishment of tumor therapy with carbon ion beams, based on close cooperation between GSI and the University Radiology Clinic and the German Cancer Research Center in Heidelberg. Following successful pilot studies at GSI with approx. 450 patient irradiations, GSI also participated in the construction of the first ion beam clinic with carbon ions in Europe, the Heidelberg Ion Beam Therapy Center HIT.
It was also during his term of office that the discussion about the long-term future of the GSI was initiated, which eventually led to the proposal for the international FAIR Center.
With Professor Specht, nuclear and particle physics has not only lost a strong scientific leader, but also an internationally renowned researcher and university teacher. He made outstanding contributions to many fields of nuclear science and played a leading role in the heavy-ion program at CERN. Last but not least, he was mentor for numerous talented researchers in building their own scientific careers.
GSI looks back on his term of office with gratitude and respect and will keep him in honorable memory. (JL)
]]>Fusion processes operating in massive stars produce nuclei up to iron and nickel. Beyond them, most of the stable heavy nuclei, such as lead and gold, are produced via slow or rapid neutron capture processes. For the production of the rest of them, which are neutron-deficient, a variety of nucleosynthesis processes have been suggested. However, it has remained a challenge to explain the large abundances of 92,94Mo, 96,98Ru and 92Nb in the (early) solar system.
The νr-process allows for the simultaneous production of all those nuclei because neutrinos catalyze a series of capture reactions. This is how the process works: The νr-process operates in neutron-rich outflows in astrophysical explosions that initially, when the temperatures are high, consist of neutrons and nuclei located around iron and nickel. As the temperature of the material decreases, heavier nuclei are produced from lighter nuclei by a sequence of neutron captures and weak interaction processes. However, different to the rapid neutron capture process, in which the weak reactions are beta-decays, for the νr-process they are neutrino absorption reactions. Once the free neutrons are exhausted, further neutrino absorption reactions convert neutrons bound in nuclei into protons pushing the produced nuclei towards and even beyond the beta-stability line. The energies of the neutrinos are large enough to excite nuclei to states that decay by the emission of neutrons, protons and alpha particles. The emitted particles are captured by the heavy nuclei. This triggers a series of capture reactions catalyzed by neutrinos that determine the final abundances of elements produced by the νr-process. In this way, neutrinos can produce neutron-deficient nuclei which are otherwise inaccessible. "Our finding opens a new possibility to explain the origin of p-nuclei via neutrino absorption reactions on nuclei," says Zewei Xiong, scientist at GSI/FAIR Nuclear Astrophysics and Structure Department and the corresponding author of the publication.
Having determined the series of reactions that drive the νr-process, the type of stellar explosion where it occurs remains to be identified. In their publication, the authors proposed that the νr-process operates in material that is ejected in an environment with strong magnetic fields, such as in magneto-rotational supernovae, collapsars, or magnetars. This suggestion has triggered astrophysicists to search for the suitable conditions, and indeed a first publication has already reported that magnetically driven ejecta reach the necessary conditions.
The νr-process requires the knowledge of neutrino reactions and neutron-capture reactions on nuclei located at both sides of the beta-stability line. Measuring the relevant reactions will become possible with the unique storage ring capabilities at the GSI/FAIR facility. (LW)
Original publication: Production of p Nuclei from r-Process Seeds: The νr Process
Zewei Xiong, Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo, Oliver Just, and Andre Sieverding
Phys. Rev. Lett. 132, 192701 – Published 9 May 2024 https://journals.aps.org/prl/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevLett.132.192701
Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Hans Geissel
* 13.5.1950 † 29.4.2024
who passed away at the age of 73.
Hans Geissel was an enthusiastic scientist and gifted experimental physicist, a continuous source of new research ideas, involved in many groundbreaking discoveries in the field of exotic nuclei and other areas of research,awarded numerous scientific prizes and honors, professor at the Justus-Liebig-University Giessen and honorary doctor of Chalmers University in Gothenburg. He was a supervisor and mentor to several generations of young researchers and - in a pioneering role for GSI - an important forward thinker and innovator of the scientific program at the international research facility FAIR. He worked on numerous research projects until the very end of his life.
GSI and FAIR have lost an outstanding scientist and esteemed colleague and we bid farewell to Hans Geissel with great gratitude and deep respect.
Our deepest sympathy goes to his family. (JL)
]]>“Imagine a small number of three-meter-long devices could enable a one-kilometer particle accelerator ring, say the FAIR accelerator SIS100, to deliver 50 per-cent more intense heavy-ion beams. Sounds tempting?” asks Dr. Adrian Oeftiger from GSI/FAIR’s research department Accelerator Physics, who is first author of the publication. Intensity marks the parameter that defines the number of particles that can be accelerated by the synchrotron in order to then collide with a material sample for the experiments. More particles mean more collisions and consequently more scientific data and more results.
To fully exploit the research potential of GSI and FAIR’s facilities, they aim to produce ion beams of worldwide unique intensity. The maximum number of ions per bunch is limited by the electromagnetic fields they generate, known as “space charge”. Space charge counteracts the focusing provided by the magnets which confine the beam within the vacuum inside the beam pipes. At the space charge limit, a maximal ion intensity is reached before beam losses start to occur due to harmful resonances. In order to produce beams of highest intensities for the GSI/FAIR experiments as well as for accelerator facilities elsewhere, accelerator physicists devise strategies to mitigate the impact of space charge.
A new and promising path is followed with the development of pulsed linear electron lenses at GSI/FAIR. These devices generate an intense electron pulse of several hundred kilowatts and guide it such that the electrons overlap with the ion bunches circulating in the accelerator ring. Since electrons are negatively charged in contrast to the positively charged ions, their electromagnetic fields can be arranged so that they compensate for each other aiming to reduce the space charge of the ions. Correspondingly, beam losses from harmful resonances affect the beam only at much higher intensity. Key to success turns out to be providing electron pulses of matching pulse length compared to the passing heavy-ion bunches while, at the same time, avoiding to create additional resonances through the electron beam’s localized space charge field.
“Our now published study demonstrates that only a few such symmetrically arranged devices strongly increase the space charge limit of the accelerator rings. In other words, upgrading the GSI/FAIR accelerators with pulsed linear electron lenses promises to deliver ion beams to the experiments with up to 50 per-cent higher beam intensity compared to the baseline scenario,” explains Oeftiger.
Two key factors made the now published comprehensive simulation study on pulsed electron lenses possible: First, the resonance behavior of the ion beam needs to be simulated accurately in order to determine the space charge limit. This requires detailed measurements and knowledge of the parameters of the accelerator magnets under operational conditions, which is for example – as the only synchrotron worldwide – available for each main magnet in the FAIR accelerator SIS100. Second, such simulations must be both fast and highly accurate, which could be realized by a developed high-performance simulation model using the computing capacities of the GSI/FAIR data center Green IT Cube.
Oeftiger is confident: “All in all, we conclude that pulsed electron lenses offer a new and promising upgrade option for the GSI/FAIR synchrotrons to provide even higher beam intensities to future experiments.” (CP)
State Secretary Pirscher was impressed: “It was an extremely interesting meeting with great scientists who are carrying out cutting-edge research at GSI’s accelerator facilities. Moreover, I am very pleased to see that the construction of the international accelerator centre FAIR is progressing well. It is becoming increasingly clear that FAIR will go from a construction project to become a research infrastructure with the potential to make discoveries of global importance. One of the largest research projects in the world is currently being conducted here. I am confident that the star power of this facility will attract the best young scientists to come to the region.”
State Secretary Pirscher was given an extensive tour, allowing her to see the research facilities and the FAIR construction site for herself and talk to the scientists.
The tour included the medical treatment unit of the biophysics department, the HADES experiment and the PHELIX laser experiment. During a visit to the FAIR construction site, the State Secretary was shown the current construction progress of FAIR and the first technical installations.
At the international accelerator center FAIR, extreme forms of matter that usually only exist in neutron stars, supernovae, stars or large gas planets are to be produced and studied in the lab. FAIR will thus investigate “the universe in the laboratory”. FAIR's future research activities will build on the successful research carried out at GSI. Scientists from all over the world will use the different areas of GSI and FAIR to conduct unique experiments and obtain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe.
At the medical radiation unit where, in 1997, cancer patients were successfully treated with ion beams for the first time in Europe, future research will focus on technical and radiobiological advancements in ion beam therapy and on space research. This will include assessments of radiation exposure during long-term space missions in collaboration with the European Space Agency (ESA).
The HADES detector (High Acceptance Di-Electron Spectrometer) is used to study high-energy nuclear collisions. HADES will allow scientists to understand the properties of hot, highly compressed nuclear matter as it is produced in the universe, for example, when neutron stars collide.
The PHELIX (Petawatt High-Energy Laser for Ion Experiments) laser facility is one of the most powerful lasers in the world. It can deliver extremely short laser pulses of up to 1 kilojoule of energy or up to half a petawatt of power. Among other things, PHELIX could in future define the conditions for improving the stability of laser-plasma interactions, as required for inertial confinement fusion. (CP)
]]>Following a welcome by the organizing Public Relations department and the head of the Human Resources Management, Tobias Gottschalk, the girls first went on an accompanied discovery tour to some stations on campus. They took a look at the Main Control Room of the accelerator facility, visited the treatment site for tumor therapy with carbon ions and marveled at the large detector setup HADES. The program also included a walk to the viewing platform of the large construction site for the future FAIR accelerator.
Afterwards, the girls learned more about individual work areas on campus in small groups. These included science activities in materials research, atomic physics, physics of superheavy elements and biophysics, as well as numerous accelerator and infrastructure facilities such as ion sources, linear accelerator, beam diagnostics, electronics, engineering, workshops, target laboratory, cryogenics, technology transfer, facility management and IT. In a special FAIR construction offer, some of the girls were also able to get a glimpse of construction activity on the large-scale site, getting up close and personal with excavators, cranes and lots and lots of concrete.
“We were delighted to see enormous demand and lively participation in our attractive offers again this year. A big thank you goes to our supervisors. They put a lot of work and passion into preparing the activities. Many groups have built or produced small items to take home,” explains organizer Carola Pomplun, herself a physicist, who works in the GSI/FAIR press and public relations department. “Coming into personal contact with colleagues on site, seeing the work ‘live’ and being able to ask and answer questions directly, gives the girls a deep insight into the various professional fields. They learn about the opportunities for internships, apprenticeships, dual study programs or even bachelor’s, master’s or doctoral theses at GSI/FAIR.”
Girls’Day is a day of action all over Germany. On this day, businesses, universities, and other institutions all over Germany open their doors to schoolgirls from grade 5 and above. The participants learn about courses of study and training in professions in the areas of IT, natural sciences, and technology — areas in which women have rarely been employed in the past. GSI and — since its foundation — also FAIR have been participating in the annual event since the early days of Girls'Day. (CP)
Due to its short wavelengths, the XUV spectral range (extreme ultraviolet radiation) has gained substantial importance for both the production and imaging of the smallest structures in the nanometer range. In recent years, a series of breakthroughs in the generation and application of spatially coherent XUV radiation have been achieved in Jena. With its capability of interference with high contrast, this offers a fundamental advantage over spatially incoherent radiation, and fulfills the basic requirement for many modern measurement and imaging methods. In addition, XUV radiation has a significantly greater penetration depth and sensitivity to the composition of the sample compared to electrons, making this spectral range even more attractive.
Based on previous work on the generation and application of spatially coherent XUV radiation, the research group aims to develop additional imaging modalities with enormous application potential, including biology and materials science, and is also set to open up the spectral range of soft X-ray radiation. For example, correlated XUV imaging, i.e. a combination of high-resolution XUV microscopy with the widely used and complementary fluorescence microscopy, is to be realized for biological and medical questions. There, XUV microscopy providing structural information will be complemented by functional fluorescence microscopy.
The new research group brings together experts and know-how from physics, biology and materials science in a synergetic way. It is furthermore supported by regional high-tech companies, which form the industrial advisory board, thus promoting the transfer of knowledge and technology and contributing to networking between Thuringian research institutions and Thuringian companies. (BP)
Professor Dr. Dr. h.c. Rudolf Bock
* 21.5.1927 † 9.4.2024
who passed away at the age of 96 after a rich and fulfilling life.
Prof. Bock was one of the founding fathers of GSI in 1969. Until his retirement in 1995, he was a member of the Scientific Directorate of GSI and in this function played a decisive role in shaping the scientific profile of GSI. As GSI division head, he pursued the research focus Heavy Ion Reactions" at intermediate and relativistic energies with experiments at the GSI accelerators, at the Berkeley Bevalac and at CERN. In the 1980s, he was one of the initiators and pioneers of the heavy ion program at ultra-relativistic energies at CERN. In addition to his commitment to basic research in nuclear physics, Prof. Bock initiated and shaped the application-oriented GSI research program on inertial confinement fusion and plasma physics at high densities. As part of his scientific activities, Prof. Bock established numerous new research collaborations with institutes in Germany and abroad and contributed significantly to the internationalization of GSI research. As a war veteran himself, the idea of international understanding and peacekeeping was an important concern for him. Prof. Bock has received numerous awards at home and abroad for his scientific achievements and services to the promotion of international cooperation.
In his long and successful life as a researcher, Prof. Bock laid the foundations for the scientific work and careers of numerous subsequent researchers.
He was regularly present at GSI until his late years and took great interest in current research topics and developments on campus. His advice and foresight will be missed in the future.
With deep gratitude and respect, GSI says farewell to its founding father Rudolf Bock. Our deepest sympathy is extended to his family. (JL)
Slides from the lecture given by Prof. Dr. Hans J. Specht (University of Heidelberg) in 2017 on the occasion of Rudolf Bock's 90th birthday:
What is the mass of a neutrino at rest? A team led by the department of Klaus Blaum, Director at the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg, with the participation of Christoph Düllmann's working group at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU), the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt, and the Helmholtz Institute Mainz has now made an important contribution to the “weighing” of neutrinos as part of the international ECHo collaboration. Using the Pentratrap ion trap, the researchers have achieved an extremely precise measurement of the change in mass of the holmium-163 ion when its nucleus captures an electron and becomes dysprosium-163. From this, the researchers were able to determine this so-called Q value 50 times more accurately than before. With the help of a more precise Q-value, possible systematic errors in the determination of the neutrino mass can be uncovered.
Holmium-163 is an artificial isotope that can be produced by irradiation natural erbium-162 with neutrons, which leads to erbium-163, which in turn decays into holmium-163. The chemical isolation of the produced holmium-163 was carried out at JGU, where the sample tailored to fit the requirements of the Pentatrap experiment in Heidelberg was also produced. Pentatrap consists of five so-called Penning traps. In these traps, electrically charged atoms can be trapped for long times in a combination of a static electric and magnetic field. These ions perform an intricate “circular dance”, which allows their mass to be determined with extreme precision. “With an Airbus A-380 with a maximum load, you could use this sensitivity to determine whether a single drop of water has landed on it,” says Christoph Schweiger, PhD student in Klaus Blaum's department at the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics, illustrating the capabilities of these super scales. (CP)
As part of the FAIR Phase 0 experimental period on the GSI and FAIR campus, TRON, in collaboration with the GSI Biophysics Department headed by Professor Marco Durante, used the accelerator facilities to combine particle therapy and immunotherapy as the mRNA-based cancer vaccine. The experiment has entered uncharted territory with this combination. The aim of the current proof-of-concept experiment at GSI/FAIR was to directly compare the efficacy of carbon ion radiotherapy (CIRT) and conventional X-ray radiotherapy, each combined with an mRNA-based vaccine specific for a mouse tumor model.
It is already known from preclinical studies by TRON that the mRNA-based vaccines achieve effective results in combination with conventional X-ray radiotherapy. The question now was which effects are caused by carbon ion radiotherapy in combination with immunotherapy and which potential carbon ion radiotherapy has for tumor growth inhibition. The two GSI/FAIR researchers Professor Claudia Fournier and Dr. Alexander Helm explain: “The combination of this powerful systemic drug with densely ionizing, local heavy ion radiation could be a powerful tool in the fight against cancer.”
TRON's and GSI/FAIR’s research is still a glance into the future. “The findings have given a first orientation that heavy ion radiotherapy might benefit from combined immunotherapy, using mRNA cancer vaccines, and could be instructive for the translation of radio immunotherapy combinations using heavy ions into the clinic,” explain TRON scientists Dr. Fulvia Vascotto and Dr. Nadja Salomon. The study examined a colorectal adenocarcinoma, a type of tumor that occurs in the intestine and is one with the highest incidence in Western countries.
As the study shows, mRNA-based vaccines significantly potentiate tumor growth inhibition induced by radiotherapy. Cell growth is significantly reduced for carbon ion compared to X-ray radiotherapy. Although both carbon ion therapy and X-ray therapy alone inhibit tumor growth, they only marginally prime specific immune responses against the tumor itself.
It is known that<s> </s>the immune system plays an important role in preventing and curing cancer<s>.</s> Usually, the immune system recognizes degenerated cells and can “sort them out". At the same time, it is equipped with highly complex control mechanisms to avoid overreactions. This is exactly what cancer cells can sometimes use to their advantage and to down-regulate immune surveillance. They disappear from the radar, so to speak, they camouflage so skillfully that the endogenous defenses do not recognize the enemy or are too weak to attack it. Individualized mRNA vaccine educates and reactivates the immune system in its fight against cancer and support in situ anti-tumor immune responses.
TRON and GSI/FAIR showed now evidence that carbon ion therapy is superior to X-ray therapy regarding cell death induction and tumor immune-modulation in murine tumor cell lines. This increases immunogenicity, i.e. the ability of the immune system to recognize the tumor.
In conclusion, the study has provided for the first time a comparative result for carbon ion and X-ray therapy in combination with mRNA vaccines: the vaccines show similar overall therapeutic efficacy in combination with both ion beams and X-rays, but the physical radiation dose is lower for carbon ions than X-rays. Even if the path to a possible clinical application is still long and many steps still need to be taken: The authors conclude that the combination of carbon ion radiotherapy and mRNA-based vaccine is a promising strategy for treatment of radioresistant tumors. (BP)
The approach pursued at TRON leads to a stimulation of the immune system via systemic vaccination with messenger RNA (mRNA). With the vaccination - the fragile mRNA is packed in a protective lipid envelope - the tumor-diseased organism receives valuable information. The vaccine up-taken by antigen presenting cells in the spleen activates these cells while they produce specific portion of the tumor associated antigens. On the consequence the immune system starts an education and reactivation program which allows T cells to attack the mutated cancer cells. The cancer vaccine is based on similar technologies as mRNA-based vaccines used against Covid-19, while injected intramuscularly.
The tumor therapy with heavy ions developed at GSI provides high precision in the administration of the dose: the ions develop their damaging effect at the end of their trajectory at a certain depth, which depends on the ion velocity. The administration of the heavy ions is sophisticatedly controlled with the release of a low dose in the healthy tissue while it reaches a sharped increase in the tumor mass. This causes irreparable damage to the genetic material of the cancer cells without causing additional stress to the healthy tissue.
The article covers a wide range of very different aspects, the understanding of which outlines the major challenges of current physics. These span from the unsolved mystery behind dark energy, which determines the dynamics of our universe today, to the question of whether it is possible to construct machines that function like a human brain.
FAIR, with its unique, wide-ranging research capabilities, is the only research facility to have its own chapter (“FAIR - Exploring the universe in the laboratory”), in which Langanke discusses what contributions FAIR, with its unrivaled combination of beam energy and intensity, as well as precision and instrumentation, can and will make in the future to further understanding our world.
The chapter highlights the studies of matter at extreme densities, focusing on the salient question of whether there is also a critical point in the phase diagram of the strong interaction. Langanke describes the contributions FAIR will make to the synthesis of elements in stellar processes through the first production and studies of very short-lived heavy nuclei. With its unique combination of storage rings, FAIR will open up access to the atomic physics of ultra-strong electric fields in the future. Finally, the annihilation of protons and antiprotons promises new insights and tests of the fundamental theory of the strong interaction.
“In summary, FAIR brings the ’Universe into the Laboratory’ and with its widespread fundamental and applied research opportunities will deepen the understanding of our universe and the objects therein,“ Langanke writes in his contribution. (CP)
For his project HITHOR — “Highly Ionized Trapped 229-Thorium: A New Paradigm Towards a Nuclear Clock” — Professor Thomas Stöhlker receives a million-euro grant. In this way, the European Research Council supports Stöhlker’s pioneering work on precision spectroscopy of highly charged ions in storage rings and traps with the aim of advancing the development of a nuclear clock based on highly-charged 229-thorium ions. The award underlines the outstanding quality of scientific research at GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung and the accelerator facility FAIR that is currently under construction. The application was submitted jointly by GSI and the Helmholtz Institute Jena, a GSI branch, under the direction of Thomas Stöhlker, and entitles the applicant to a maximum of 2.5 million euros in funding over a period of five years.
“I am extremely pleased about this great opportunity and would like to thank the European Research Council,” says Thomas Stöhlker. “HITHOR will be realized at GSI's ion storage ring and trapping installations, as this is the only accelerator facility in the world where highly ionized 229-thorium can be synthesized, decelerated, trapped and cooled and studied by means of precision spectroscopy. The ERC Advanced Grant will enable my team and me to bring together the exceptional expertise of scientists from different disciplines at GSI/FAIR and Helmholtz Institute Jena to perform these novel experiments.”
The Scientific Managing Director of GSI/FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, says: “Congratulations on this fantastic achievement. I am delighted to see Thomas Stöhlker and his team recognized for their innovative projects and commitment to tackling important challenges in modern physics that could revolutionize applications requiring accurate time measurements. The grant demonstrates the exceptional quality of our scientists and research facilities at GSI/FAIR. We all look forward to ground-breaking results from these unique experiments at our storage rings.”
Currently, there are intense research activities in many laboratories worldwide related to the “thorium clock” since such a “nuclear clock” opens new doors to fundamental physics such as e.g. testing time-variations of natural constants and exploring the enigma of dark matter and may, in the long run, even enable the establishment of a new time standard. The unique selling point of the project “HITHOR” is a novel access to the “thorium clock” with the focus on highly-ionized 229-thorium, an elementary quantum-system, which consists only of the Thorium nucleus and one or few electrons. Using highly-ionized 229-thorium, the realization of a clock based on nuclear transitions promises fascinating insights.
According to the European Research Council (ERC), the funding is amongst the EU’s most prestigious and competitive, providing leading senior researchers with the opportunity to pursue ambitious, curiosity-driven projects that could lead to major scientific breakthroughs. The new grants, worth in total nearly €652 million, are part of the EU’s Horizon Europe program. (LW)
]]>The consortium of Dr. Maarten Boonekamp (spokesperson, Institute of Research into the Fundamental Laws of the Universe, CEA, Paris-Saclay), Prof. Dr. Jens Erler (Institute for Nuclear Physics, JGU Mainz), and Prof. Dr. Frank Maas (Institute for Nuclear Physics, JGU Mainz, GSI/FAIR and Helmholtz Institute Mainz) has been awarded in April 2024 an ERC Advanced Grant for the project “Zeptometry”. This project aims to combine new precision measurements at the highest LHC-energies at the European Organization for Nuclear Research CERN with challenging new precision measurements at very low energies with the upcoming MESA accelerator in Mainz in connection with the theory interpretation of the experimental results. The funding will be dedicated to the study of interactions between the Z boson and the fermions (the quarks and leptons constituting ordinary matter), to which end the upcoming experiment P2 at the Mainz electron accelerator MESA will be crucial.
The theory of particle physics, the Standard Model (SM), successfully describes the basic constituents of matter and the forces that act between them. However, the astronomy of the universe at very large scales shows that the SM explains only about 15% of the total mass in the Universe. The present day understanding of particle physics at the smallest scales of nature must be extended by new, yet unknown forces and particles beyond the SM. This is where the project “Zeptometry” comes into play.
In the absence of direct observation of new particles at colliders like the LHC at CERN in Geneva, it becomes increasingly important to determine the parameters of the SM with the highest possible precision, since new particles and forces would change their values and the energy dependence through quantum effects. The existence of many of the most recently discovered SM particles was known long before their direct observation, from quantum corrections to precision measurements at high energies: prominent examples include the W and Z bosons, the top quark, the tau neutrino and, most recently, the Higgs boson.
The project “Zeptometry” will combine data from the LHC, the very high energy accelerator operating at CERN, with the low-energy data from P2 at MESA in an innovative and interdisciplinary approach. “This ERC advanced grant emphasizes the impact of the extremely challenging measurements of the P2-experiment at the new high intensity electron accelerator MESA on the campus of JGU Mainz. The combination with the LHC data will probe the existence of new particles down to microscopic length scales of a zeptometer (10-21 m)”, explains Prof. Maas. “Dedicated theoretical developments will also be performed in Mainz, allowing an optimal interpretation of the results. The combination of results from extreme energy ranges, from distinct research areas, and otherwise independent experimental and theoretical communities is new and innovative. It will help to evaluate the options for future collider projects.”
ERC Advanced Grants are awarded to outstanding researchers to enable them to work on projects considered to be highly speculative due to their innovative approach, but which, because of this, can open up access to new approaches in the corresponding research field. Only researchers who have already made significant breakthroughs and have been successfully working for at least ten years at the highest levels of international research are eligible for the grant. The only criteria considered in awarding ERC funding are the academic excellence of the researcher in question and the nature of their research project. An ERC grant thus also represents an important acknowledgement of the recipient's achievements.
Prof. Dr. Maarten Boonekamp, Particle Physics division of the Institute of Research into the Fundamental Laws of the Universe (IRFU), leads the team which studies the properties of W and Z bosons with the ATLAS detector at the LHC. He is an expert in the phenomenology of the Standard Model and in the calibration of the calorimeters and charged particle detectors composing the ATLAS experiment. He was a visiting scientist of the Helmholtz Institut Mainz, a GSI branch, and of the PRISMA+ Custer of Excellence from 1 September 2021 to 31 August 2023. He is also a member of the P2-experiment collaboration.
Prof. Dr. Frank Maas is the originator and the spokesperson of the P2-experiment, currently under construction at the MESA accelerator on the campus of JGU Mainz. Since 2007, he is leading scientist at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung Darmstadt and full professor at JGU, where he is a principal investigator at the PRISMA+ Cluster of Excellence in Mainz. He acted for 10 years as the founding director of the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM). As the project leader of the P2 experiment at MESA he spearheaded the preparatory research and development for the P2-concept and detectors in the framework of the PRISMA+ Cluster of Excellence.
Prof. Dr. Jens Erler is a world expert in the phenomenology and theoretical interpretation of precision experiments. He is editor of the corresponding chapter on weak interactions in the Particle Data Group (PDG). Coming from the leading university UNAM in Mexico, he was appointed a PRISMA professorship in “Precision Calculations for Low-Energy Experiments” in January 2021, after several years of collaboration with colleagues in Mainz. He works mainly on the theoretical basis for the interpretation of P2 experimental results.
The P2 experiment is funded in the framework of the German “large infrastructure” funds (Großgeräte). Additional development work for P2 has been funded by DFG and by the Helmholtz-Association in the framework of the “Helmholtz Excellence Network”. The additional funding from “Zeptometry” will support the construction of the backward-scattering detector enhancing substantially the accuracy of the measurements.
Publications:
Becker, D., et al., The P2 experiment: A future high-precision measurement of the weak mixing angle at low momentum transfer. Eur. Phys. J. A 54, 208 (2018).
DOI: 10.1140/epja/i2018-12611-6
link.springer.com/article/10.1140/epja/i2018-12611-6
Berger, N., Denig, A., Maas, F., & Sfienti, C., Laboratory Portrait: The MESA Experimental Program: A Laboratory for Precision Physics with Electron Scattering at Low Energy. Nuclear Physics News, 31(3), 5–10 (2021).
DOI: 10.1080/10619127.2021.1954434
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10619127.2021.1954434
Related links:
irfu.cea.fr/en/ – IRFU at Saclay
www.prisma.uni-mainz.de – PRISMA+ Cluster of Excellence at JGU
www.gsi.de – GSI Helmholtz Center for Heavy Ion Research
www.hi-mainz.de – Helmholtz Institute Mainz
Contact:
Prof. Dr. Frank Maas
PRISMA+ Cluster of Excellence/GSI/Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM)
Institute for Nuclear Physics
Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz
55099 Mainz, Germany
Email: maas@him.uni-mainz.de
www.kernphysik.uni-mainz.de/univ-prof-dr-frank-maas/
Prof. Dr. Jens Erler
PRISMA+ Cluster of Excellence
Institute for Nuclear Physics
Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz
55099 Mainz, Germany
Email: erler@uni-mainz.de
Dr Vikas Singhal works at the Variable Energy Cyclotron Centre (VECC), Kolkata, India, and submitted his PhD thesis at the Homi Bhabha National Institute in Mumbai. In his thesis "Development and implementation of first level event selection process on heterogeneous systems for high energy heavy ion collision experiments" he adresses the development of a realistic time-based simulation framework for the Muon Chamber System (MuCh) of the CBM experiment. Another focus is on the development of a trigger algorithm for MuCh, and the evaluation of its performance in various heterogeneous computing platforms including CPU, GPU and hybrid platform. At the award ceremony, the CBM collaboration emphasized “the high relevance of this work in CBM computing and its direct implications in the final CBM setup”.
Dr Marcel Bajdel is employed at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung and completed his thesis at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt. His thesis "Development of the Detector Control System and Instrumentation for the Silicon Tracking System (STS) in the Compressed Baryonic Matter Experiment" is about the development of a modular detector control system (DCS) and the implementation of the containerized EPICS based control system framework, which allows for remote operation and monitoring. It is also crucial for operation of lab setups, as well as the Silicon Tracking System (STS) in the mCBM at the ring accelerator SIS18. The development of a general strategy for ambient parameters monitoring inside the STS is also an important topic of the thesis. The CBM collaboration emphasized at the award ceremony “the high relevance of this work for the control of the CBM detectors and its direct implications in the final CBM operation”.
The CBM Dissertation Prize Committee, formed by Anand Dubey, Ilya Selyuzhenkov, Hanna Zbroszczyk and Alberica Toia (Chair), decided on the works submitted. CBM spokesperson is Norbert Hermann, Chairman of the CBM Collaboration Committee Nu Xu.
(BP)
]]>Seine frühe Leidenschaft für die Physik führte Eckart Grosse zum Physikstudium in Bonn und Heidelberg. In der Gruppe von Peter von Brentano am Max-Planck-Institut für Kernphysik erwarb er 1966 sein Diplom mit Messungen von Protonenreaktionen an leichten Kernen und promovierte 1968, ebenfalls unter von Brentano, mit Messungen zur Kernstruktur von 207Pb mittels resonanter inelastischer Protonenstreuung. Es folgten Arbeiten zu isobaren Analogresonanzen und zur Coulombanregung. Danach ging er für zwei Jahre an das Lawrence Berkeley Laboratorium (USA) und befasste sich mit Gammaspektroskopie und dem „back-bending“ Phänomen in der Gruppe von Frank S. Stephens.
Im Jahr 1976 trat Eckart Grosse eine Stelle an der Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung (GSI) an, wo er am Schwerionenlinearbeschleuniger UNILAC Experimente zu kollektiven Kernanregungen durchführte. Weiter Experimente zum Photonennachweis an Beschleunigern am CERN und GANIL (Caen, Frankreich), die die Grundlage seiner Habilitation 1984 bildeten, zeigten seine Faszination für Phänomene mit astrophysikalischem Bezug, insbesondere die im Labor untersuchbare kurzzeitige Bildung heißer und verdichteter Kernmaterie.
Mit dem neuen Schwerionensynchroton SIS18 war in Darmstadt in den 1990er Jahren die Tür zu höheren Strahlenergien und neuen Forschungsthemen geöffnet, die von Eckart Grosse aktiv mitgestaltet wurden. Parallel zum Aufbau des Kaonen-Spektrometers KaoS bei GSI und dem Betrieb des Spektrometers DISTO am Laboratoire National SATURNE II in Saclay, Frankreich formierte er die entsprechenden Kollaborationen und gestaltete durch interessante und vielbeachtete Experimente die sich bildenden Communities der relativistischen Schwerionen- und Hadronenphysik einschließlich der damit verbundenen Theoriegruppen.
Im Jahr 1996 übernahm Eckart Grosse die Leitung des Instituts für Kern- und Hadronenphysik am Forschungszentrum Rossendorf (FZR), dem heutigen Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR). Gleichzeitig wurde er an der Technischen Universität Dresden auf den Lehrstuhl für Kern-, Hadronen- und Strahlungsphysik am Institut für Kern- und Teilchenphysik berufen.
Besonders am Herzen lag ihm die Rossendorfer Strahlungsquelle ELBE, die 2001 in Betrieb genommen wurde. Er erkannte frühzeitig das Potenzial dieses 40 MeV supraleitenden Elektronenbeschleunigers und prägte viele Aspekte des vielfältigen wissenschaftlichen Programms, das dort bis heute verfolgt wird. Neben den klassischen kernphysikalischen Experimentieraufbauten zur Kernresonanzfluoreszenz und einer eigenen Neutronen-Flugzeit-Beamline an ELBE wurden Brücken zu anderen Disziplinen gebaut. So wurde mittels eines Freie-Elektronen-Lasers die ELBE auch zur Infrarot-Strahlungsquelle, und es wurden Experimente in Biophysik und Medizin entwickelt.
Eckart Grosse trieb die multidisziplinäre Ausrichtung sowie die starke wissenschaftliche Vernetzung nicht nur der Rossendorfer Institute miteinander, sondern auch mit anderen Instituten und Hochschulen in Dresden als fruchtbare Bereicherung für das gesamte Forschungszentrum voran. Dies zeigt sich bis heute im Aufblühen des gemeinsamen Forschungszentrums Oncoray. Er schuf und hielt enge Kontakte zur GSI. Unter seiner Leitung baute das FZR u.a. die Drahtkammern für das Dileptonenspektrometer-Experiment HADES und entwickelte schnelle Flugzeitdetektoren für FAIR-Experimente, die am ELBE-Elektronenstrahl getestet wurden. Mit dem PET-Detektor BASTEI leistete er bedeutende Beiträge zur tumorkonformen Bestrahlung in der Schwerionentherapie. Zum Ende seiner Karriere 2007 holte er die „Nuclear Physics in Astrophysics“ Konferenz nach Dresden.
Nach seinem Ruhestand 2007 blieb Eckart Grosse dem HZDR aktiv verbunden, unter anderem durch die Betreuung von Doktoranden an der TU Dresden und die Mitarbeit in europäischen Projekten. In diesen Jahren konzentrierte er sich, befreit von den Verpflichtungen eines Institutsdirektors, wieder auf die Kernstruktur, insbesondere den Einfluss der Triaxialität auf elektromagnetische Stärkefunktionen, photonukleare Reaktionen und Neutroneneinfang. Bis zuletzt publizierte er auf diesem Feld und besuchte noch 2023 die DPG-Frühjahrstagung in Dresden.
Professor Eckart Grosse bleibt uns als vielseitiger Kernphysiker und engagierter Institutsleiter in Erinnerung. Sein Beitrag zur Physik und seine Leidenschaft für die Erforschung der Materie werden uns noch lange begleiten.
Daniel Bemmerer (HZDR), Arnd Junghans (HZDR), Burkhard Kämpfer (HZDR), Peter Senger (GSI), Andreas Wagner (HZDR)
]]>In the framework of the ALICE Masterclass, the students were able to gain an insight into the scientific work and data analysis . Under the expert guidance of the scientists on site, they analyzed the ALICE experiment data taken in proton-proton collisions as well as collisions of lead nuclei. On a tour of the GSI/FAIR campus, they were taught about accelerator and detector components and took a look at the FAIR construction site from the viewpoint. To conclude the day of research, they discussed their results with other participants in a joint video conference with other research institutions.
ALICE is one of the four large-scale experiments at the LHC collider at the CERN research center in Geneva and deals in particular with heavy-ion collisions of lead atomic nuclei. When lead atomic nuclei collide with unimaginable impact in the LHC, conditions are created similar to the first moments of the universe. During the collisions, a so-called quark-gluon plasma is created for a very short time - a state of matter that existed in the universe shortly after the Big Bang. This plasma transforms back into normal matter within fractions of a second. The particles produced in the process provide information about the properties of the quark-gluon plasma. Thus, the measurements can peer into the birth of the cosmos and reveal information about the basic building blocks of matter and their interactions.
The relationship between GSI and ALICE is traditionally very close: The two large ALICE detector systems Time Projection Chamber (TPC) and Transition Radiation Detector (TRD) were designed and built with significant contributions of GSI’s ALICE department and Detector Laboratory. Today scientists from both departments focus on the TPC, which is the centerpiece for track reconstruction in the central ALICE barrel setup and is also indispensable for particle identification. Scientist from GSI's IT department contribute strongly to the new data acquisition and analysis software O2, and the GSI computer center is an integral part of the computer network for data analysis of the ALICE experiment.
The Masterclasses are organized by the IPPOG (International Particle Physics Outreach Group), of which GSI is an associate member. Each year, more than 13,000 students from over 60 countries take part in the events of about 225 universities or research centers for a day to unlock the mysteries of particle physics. All events in Germany are held in collaboration with the Netzwerk Teilchenwelt, of which GSI/FAIR is a member. The goal of the nationwide network for communicating particle physics to young people and teachers is to make particle physics accessible to a broader public. (CP)
Whether in listening to music or pushing a swing in the playground, we are all familiar with resonances and how they amplify an effect – a sound or a movement, for example. However, in high-intensity circular particle accelerators, resonances can be an inconvenience, causing particles to fly off their course and resulting in beam loss. Predicting how resonances and non-linear phenomena affect particle beams requires some very complex dynamics to be disentangled.
For the first time, scientists at the Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS) at the CERN research center in collaboration with scientists at GSI/FAIR in Darmstadt, have been able to experimentally prove the existence of a particular resonance structure. While it had previously been theorised and appeared in simulations, this structure is very difficult to study experimentally as it affects particles in a four dimensional space. Space refers to “phase space” – the space in which all possible states of a system are represented.
The researchers have now published their findings in “Nature Physics”. These latest results will help to improve the beam quality for low-energy and high-brightness beams for the LHC injectors at CERN and the SIS18/SIS100 facility at GSI, as well as for high-energy beams with large luminosity, such as the LHC and future high-energy colliders.
“With these resonances, what happens is that particles don’t follow exactly the path we want and then fly away and get lost,” says Dr. Giuliano Franchetti, a scientist at GSI and one of the paper’s authors. “This causes beam degradation and makes it difficult to reach the required beam parameters.”
The idea to look for the cause of this emerged in 2002, when scientists at GSI and CERN realized that particle losses increased as accelerators pushed for higher beam intensity. “The collaboration came from the need to understand what was limiting these machines so that we could deliver the beam performance and intensity needed for the future,” says Hannes Bartosik, a scientist at CERN and another of the paper’s authors.
Over many years, theories and simulations were developed to find out how resonances affected particle motion in high-intensity beams. “It required an enormous simulation effort by large accelerator teams to understand the effect of the resonances on beam stability,” says Frank Schmidt at CERN, also one of the paper’s authors. The simulations showed that resonance structures induced by coupling in two degrees of freedom are one of the main causes of beam degradation.
It took a long time to devise how to look for these resonance structures experimentally. This is because they are four dimensional and require the beam to be measured in both the horizontal and the vertical planes to see if they exist. “In accelerator physics, the thinking is often in only one plane,” adds Franchetti. To measure how resonances affect particle motion, the scientists used beam position monitors around the SPS. Over approximately 3000 beam passages, the monitors measured whether the particles in the beam were centered or more to one side, in both the horizontal and vertical planes. “What makes our recent finding so special is that it shows how individual particles behave in a coupled resonance,” continues Bartosik. “We can demonstrate that the experimental findings agree with what had been predicted based on theory and simulation.”
While the existence of the coupled resonance structures has now been observed experimentally, much more remains to be done to reduce their detrimental effect. “We’re developing a theory to describe how particles move in the presence of these resonances,” continues Franchetti. “With this study, coupled with all the previous ones, we hope we will get clues on how to avoid or minimize the effects of these resonances for current and future accelerators.” (CERN/BP)
Scientific publication „Observation of fixed lines induced by a nonlinear resonance in the CERN Super Proton Synchrotron“ in the journal Nature Physics
]]>Professor Claudia Fournier heads the research field "Immune system and tissue radiobiology" at GSI and teaches as an honorary professor at Darmstadt University. The radiation biologist is one of the most recognized radiation researchers in Germany. She has been a member of the SSK since 2010. The Commission of Radiation Protection consists of 18 volunteer experts in the field of radiation protection and is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year as an advisory body to the federal government.
Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, is delighted about the appointment and stressed: “We are very proud of this recognition of the expertise of Professor Claudia Fournier, which once more demonstrates the excellence of out scientists. The most important factor for the success of a scientific center is its human capital. And we are so proud of the outstanding quality of ours."
From 2002 to 2023, Professor Claudia Fournier was a member of the board of the German Radiation Research Socienty (DeGBS). She is also member of the board of the interdisciplinary Competence Network for Radiation Research (KVSF), which was founded in 2007 on the initiative of the Federal Ministry for the Environment and the Federal Ministry of Education and Research, as well as a member of the German delegation to the annual UNSCEAR meeting. UNSCEAR is the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation. (BP)
]]>The Young Scientist Award was presented to Dr. Ali Mollaebrahimi from the Justus Liebig University in Giessen this year for his findings in the field of nuclear structure using modern time-of-flight mass spectrometers at the FRS Ion Catcher and the TITAN experiment at TRIUMF in Vancouver (Canada).
The Young Scientist Award is presented annually by GENCO to outstanding young researchers working in the field of experimental or theoretical nuclear physics or chemistry. The winners are selected by an international jury. The prize is endowed with 1,000 euros.
At the end of the annual meeting, the vice presidency changed hands from Wolfram Korten (CEA Saclay, France) to Zsolt Podolyak (Univ. Surrey, UK), who had also taken over the chair of the NUSTAR collaboration's Board of Representatives the day before.
Furthermore, several new members of the FAIR-GENCO community received the “FAIR-GENCO Membership Award”:
In order to fully exploit the precision that is possible with heavy ion therapy, patients must be fixed with millimeter precision. However, tumors in the abdomen and chest are constantly in motion due to breathing and the heartbeat. Liver, lung or bowel cancer could therefore not be treated precisely with the heavy ion beam for a long time. However, it is precisely these tumors that could benefit greatly from heavy ion therapy.
New methods studied and developed at GSI, such as multiphase optimization and residual tracking, are now on the verge of a breakthrough. These techniques divide the movement of the tumor during breathing into phases in which the position of the tumor is determined. With the help of 4D CT imaging, in which the patient is x-rayed layer by layer, the position and movement of the tumor can be determined for planning the radiation treatment. This allows the radiation to be planned in such a way that it delivers the desired radiation dose to the tumor despite the expected movement. The multiphase optimization developed at GSI achieves a very high dose accuracy for model patients who always breathe in the same way.
The difficulty for clinical application: The respiratory movement assumed during radiation planning never corresponds exactly to the patient's actual breathing during radiation, which sometimes takes place several days after imaging in 4D CT. For example, an accelerated breathing rate or shallower inhalation must be taken into account in order to fully exploit the high precision of heavy ion therapy. The new irradiation technology developed at GSI combines so-called residual tracking with multiphase optimization. This allows the beam to additionally follow the tumor's movements to the right, left, up and down, thus compensating for deviations in tumor movement. Comparative studies have shown that tumors with a combination of these methods are hit very precisely from a clinical point of view. Experiments with plastic phantoms will soon take place at the Centro Nazionale di Adroterapia Oncologica (CNAO) in Italy. The method has already been integrated into the radiation system there and will then be used for patients for the first time.
FLASH irradiation, which is also being researched at GSI by the groups led by Ulrich Weber and Walter Tinganelli in the Biophysics Department, is another promising development in which the radiation dose is delivered to the tumor in an extremely short time. This enables the treatment of various types of cancer, as tumors virtually do not move during the 100 milliseconds of irradiation. However, this method requires state-of-the-art imaging technology to ensure that the tumor is hit precisely during the flash irradiation. This technique is being tested in an ongoing study at GSI and MIT in Marburg. Further cooperation with industry partner Varian and the Technische Hochschule Mittelhessen is paving the way for clinical application.
While clinical trials with the new methods are underway, some pragmatic solutions are already benefiting patients. Several methods that circumvent the problem are now in routine clinical use. One proven method for treating tumors in motion is "gating". The radiation is synchronized to the correct time in the breathing movement and irradiated in the seconds when the patient pauses between exhaling and inhaling. The patient's breathing phase can be recognized either by measuring the respiratory flow through a tube, by a belt that measures the pressure of the upper body during inhalation, or by camera tracking of markings on the patient's body. Another method is to suppress the patient's breathing to minimize the movement of the tumor. Patients can hold their breath and be supplied with oxygen if necessary. In some cases, the patient's lungs are also flooded with oxygen-enriched air, which replaces breathing and can therefore eliminate movement.
These methods are already being used at the Heidelberg and Marburg Ion Beam Therapy Center to treat pancreatic cancer, liver cancer, recurrent rectal cancer, lung cancer and lymphomas, for example.
Imaging, i.e. the visibility of the tumor during radiotherapy, is a key factor in achieving a good result. Innovation in image-guided particle therapy is a hallmark at GSI. The Biophysics Department has got two ERC grants on this topic. The Advanced grant BARB to Marco Durante started in 2021 to investigate the use of radioactive ion beams for simultaneous treatment and beam visualization by PET. Professor Christian Graeff was awarded a Consolidator grant in 2023 to open up new treatment options for pancreatic and lung cancer. For the first time, mixed ion beams will enable simultaneous treatment and image guidance. Carbon ions deliver the dose to the target, while helium ions, accelerated simultaneously to the same speed, traverse the patient and indicate the location of the tumor and the radiation distance.
These developments promise major steps forward in radiotherapy for cancer and offer new hope for patients with tumors in the upper body. (LW)
The appointment of Thomas Nilsson as a member of the class for physics of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences is an outstanding recognition of his significant contributions to physics research and his dedicated work at internationally leading research institutions such as GSI and FAIR. Thomas Nilsson has made significant contributions to nuclear research, often with connections to astrophysics and thus to the understanding of element formation in stars through his research on exotic nuclei.
GSI and FAIR warmly congratulate Thomas Nilsson on this prestigious appointment and look forward to continuing to benefit from his valuable contribution to the scientific community. The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, emphasizes: "I am very pleased about the election of Thomas Nilsson as a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. He is an outstanding scientist who not only makes important contributions to physics with his projects and his commitment, but also plays a decisive role in advancing the FAIR project as vice chair of the Joint Scientific Council FAIR/GSI. His appointment not only represents an outstanding distinction for him, but also recognizes the excellent quality of the experiments designed at the FAIR accelerator center. We are proud to have him as an outstanding personality in the FAIR community."
Thomas Nilsson's research focuses on the fundamental interactions in subatomic systems, especially in nuclei with a large excess of neutrons or protons, resulting in exotic structures and properties. His experiments are carried out at facilities that provide beams of exotic nuclei, including GSI and CERN-ISOLDE in Switzerland. He has also been instrumental in the development of such facilities and the associated instrumentation, particularly at the FAIR research center.
In addition to Thomas Nilsson, the following outstanding personalities have also been elected for the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, from whose ranks Nobel Prize Committee members are also appointed: Love Dalén, Professor in Evolutionary Genomics at the department of Zoology, Stockholm University, Marie Carlén, Professor at the department of Neuroscience, Karolinska Institutet, Hanna Johannesson, holder of the Bergianus professorship and Professor at the department of Ecology, Environment and Plant Sciences, Stockholm University, Eva Malmström Jonsson, Professor in Coating Technology at the division of Coating Technology, KTH Royal Institute of Technology. (LW)
]]>The workshop brought together experts working in the field of proton induced interactions, and explored possibilities for exciting physics at the SIS100 accelerator at FAIR. The overarching aim was to identify synergies among the various theoretical and experimental endeavors that leverage complementary techniques and methodologies with the aspiration to nurture a thriving, collaborative community. The topics addressed at the meeting included: open- and hidden-charm production in elementary reactions, charm content of the proton, emergent hadron mass and QCD trace anomaly studies, gravitational form factors and gluonic mass radius of the proton, hyperon production, spectroscopy and structure, hyperon-baryon interactions via femtoscopy and partial-wave analysis, hadronic production mechanisms as reference for nuclear modification factors, search and line-shape measurements of exotic forms of baryonic-like matter. (CP)
The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, and the Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Jörg Blaurock, met with high-ranking scientists and representatives of the Indian government; of particular importance was a meeting with the distinguished state secretary from the Indian Ministry of Science and Technology, Professor Abhay Karandika. The common goal of the discussions was to further strengthen India's commitment and participation in the FAIR project.
At the same time, a delegation of technical experts from GSI/FAIR’s accelerator division visited the partner country. The delegation met on site with an Indian manufacturer of vacuum components to inspect production for FAIR and to continue joint innovative developments for FAIR.
During the visit, the FAIR management was invited to celebrate the 107th founding day of the prestigious Bose Research Institute. It also marked the 165th birthday of the visionary founder and a prominent personality of modern science in India, Acharya Jagadish Chandra Bose. The Bose Institute in Kolkata, a leading public research institute in India and one of the oldest in the country, represents the Republic of India as a Shareholder in the FAIR Council.
The celebrations began with a flower ceremony at the memorial for Acharya Jagadish Chandra Bose on the Rajabazar campus by Professor Uday Bandyopadhyay, Director of the Bose Institute, who was accompanied by Professor Paolo Giubellino and Jörg Blaurock. The guests visited the traditional lecture hall on campus as well as the historic Jagadish Chandra Bose Museum on campus. A highlight was the 84th Acharya Jagadish Chandra Bose Memorial Lecture: Professor Paolo Giubellino gave an inspiring ceremonial talk on the topic of "India and Big Science: A success path for the 21st century".
Highlighting India’s key role in 'mega science,' Professor Giubellino emphasized the importance of the nation’s wide-ranging scientific endeavors. He underlined how such ‘mega science’ engagements are taking shape globally, in areas ranging from multi-messenger astronomy to solutions to the energy crisis. He also stressed the role of facilities such as the Bose Institute and the international FAIR accelerator center, currently under construction in Darmstadt, as talent factories that open up outstanding opportunities for training the next generation.
Jörg Blaurock presented the current status of the FAIR project at this event. He informed about the upcoming installation phase for the SIS100 ring accelerator, emphasizing the crucial importance of the timely arrival of components, including contributions from India. A number of key components of the accelerator will be developed and manufactured in India. For example, Indian companies will develop and deliver ultra-stable power converters, coaxial cables for the power supply of the magnets, beamstoppers, ultra-high vacuum chambers and superconducting magnets for the FAIR accelerator system.
At the event, the Bose Institute, GSI/FAIR and M/s Siechem Technologies Pvt Ltd signed an agreement for the development and fabrication of power cables and IT and diagnostic cables. A symbolic act during the expert group's visit to the vacuum component manufacturer was also the planting of a tree, which stands as a symbol of the sustainable partnership between GSI/FAIR and India. The visit to India thus not only leaves a lasting impression in terms of the shared history of GSI/FAIR and the Bose Institute, but also paves the way for a promising future of bilateral cooperation in the field of science and technology and in the further development of FAIR. (BP)
India is one of the founding countries of FAIR. Indian researchers are involved in both the experiments and the accelerators, and design and realize components in Indian scientific and industrial institutions. Indian scientists are decisive in sharpening the overall scientific program of FAIR and in designing the accelerator complex. They are involved in the construction of detectors for the research pillars NUSTAR (Nuclear Structure, Astrophysics and Reactions) and CBM (Compressed Baryonic Matter). Another important area is the construction of high-tech equipment for FAIR’s ring accelerator, such as vacuum chambers, radiation-resistant cables and high-tech current transformers.
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The President of the Max Planck Society has appointed Prof Dr Almudena Arcones from the GSI Helmholzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung and the Technische Universität (TU) Darmstadt as a Max Planck Fellow at the Max-Planck-Institut für Kernphysik (MPIK) in Heidelberg. Within the framework of the Max Planck Fellowship, she will lead the theoretical research group "Theoretical nuclear astrophysics and the origin of heavy elements in the universe" starting 1 March 2024, working closely with the experimental department of Professor Klaus Blaum.
One main area of Almudena Arcones' work is nucleosynthesis, the production of atomic nuclei - especially heavy ones: "I want to understand the origin and history of heavy elements in the universe. In my work, I combine astrophysical simulations for extreme high energy events, such as supernova explosions and neutron star mergers, with nucleosynthesis calculations involving the most neutron-rich nuclei." In collaboration with Prof Blaum's group, the key role of nuclear physics input for the synthesis of heavy elements will be further investigated in order to understand the extreme conditions in supernovae and neutron star mergers. "These explosive events are also sources of cosmic rays and neutrinos," emphasises Almudena Arcones and is therefore looking forward to exciting synergies with all groups at the MPIK.
Almudena Arcones studied physics at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid and obtained her Master's degree as an Erasmus student of the TU München with a thesis on neutrino physics in supernovae at the MPI für Astrophysik in Garching. In 2007, she obtained her doctorate at the TU München for her dissertation on nucleosynthesis in supernovae within the framework of an IMPRS scholarship at the MPI for Astrophysics. After postdoctoral periods at the GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research and as a Feodor Lynen Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Basel, she became the leader of a Helmholtz Young Investigator Group at the GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research in 2012, combined with a junior professorship at TU Darmstadt. There, she was appointed Professor of Theoretical Astrophysics in 2016. She works in the GSI Theory Department, is a Fellow of the American Physical Society and in 2016 successfully applied for the ERC Starting Grant "EUROPIUM" for research on the origin of heavy elements.
The Max Planck Fellowship Program promotes collaboration between outstanding university lecturers and scientists from the Max Planck Society. The appointment as a Max Planck Fellow is limited to five years and is linked to the leadership of a small working group at a Max Planck Institute. (MPIK/BP)
Group of Almudena Arcobes at the TU Darmstadt
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An innovative computer model of a human lung is helping scientists simulate, for the first time, how a burst of radiation interacts with the organ on a cell-by-cell level. This research, carried out at the University of Surrey and the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, Darmstadt, could lead to more targeted treatments for cancer and reduce the damage caused by radiotherapy.
Dr Roman Bauer, Senior Lecturer at the University of Surrey, said: “Doctors could one day use our model to choose the right length and strength of radiotherapy – tailored to their patient. This is exciting enough – but others could use our technique to study other organs. This could unlock all kinds of medical knowledge and could be great news for doctors and future patients.”
Nowadays, more than half of cancer patients receive radiotherapy – but too high a dose can injure their lungs. This can lead to conditions like pneumonitis and fibrosis. To study these injuries, researchers at GSI and the University of Surrey used artificial intelligence to develop a new model of part of a human lung – cell by cell.
Professor Dr Marco Durante, head of the Biophysics Department at GSI said: “For the first time, BioDynaMo makes interactive models of entire human organs achievable. This will allow us to model individual patients’ lungs in a way that’s just not possible with the very general statistical methods we currently use. What’s more – it will allow us to study the way fibrosis and other conditions is actually caused, and how they develop over time.”
The research is published in the journal Communications Medicine. (BP/UoS)
The setup now realized at the STF corresponds to a continuous section of the SIS100 arc, consisting of two dipole modules and a one quadrupole module. Other important and technically sophisticated cryogenic components of the local cryogenics, such as the bypass lines and the end boxes that terminate each arc, are also part of the setup.
Cryogenics plays a crucial role in the FAIR project. Superconducting magnets are used in the SIS100 ring accelerator to guide the extremely fast particles and at the same time create an extremely low residual gas pressure (vacuum) in the beam tube. Superconductivity can only be achieved with the aid of highly developed cryogenic technology. It must maintain the required ultra-low temperature along the magnet chains in the entire ring system of the SIS100, which is needed for operation.
All modules include technologically highly advanced, cutting-edge components. In particular, the electrical current used to generate the beam-guiding magnetic fields is conducted in special superconducting cables. To cool these cables and the so-called cold magnetic masses, liquid helium is transported via a hydraulic system and distributed in parallel cooling circuits. Only near the operating temperature of -269 degrees Celsius the electrical resistance in the cables collapses and superconductivity is established. Therefore, a key question to be investigated in the string test is whether the cooling in the parallel circuits is sufficient to maintain superconductivity in every operating state. Similar balancing is required in the parallel cooling circuits as in a conventional heating system. The hydraulic resistance must be set so that a sufficient mass flow is guaranteed in each of the parallel cooling circuits without the pressure in the overall system decreasing too much.
Each individual unit was tested extensively by the manufacturers and approved by the SIS100/SIS18 sub-project at GSI/FAIR. Only the interconnection areas of the large superconducting modules established with the assembly of the string test could not be tested in advance. These interconnection areas are exposed to high forces and stresses. Particularly at the required test pressure of 28 bar, high lateral forces are exerted on the process lines, which must be absorbed by suitable supporting structures. The length contraction of the cold masses of the single modules also has an effect in the connecting areas and must be adequately taken into account in the design in order to prevent damage to the components.
During the assembly of the string test, the various work steps were carried out and documented for the first time. The processes that will also be crucial for installation in the SIS100 tunnel include, for example, welding the process lines, closing the cryogenic vacuum system and soldering the superconducting cables. Each of these work steps was documented on the basis of the string test setup in the form of work instructions, test plans and test protocols for the subsequent tunnel assembly. The assembly was carried out in collaboration with engineers experienced in accelerator assembly from the Institute of Nuclear Physics at the Polish Academy of Sciences (IFJ PAN) in Krakow.
The string test setup has led to numerous important findings with regard to the assembly capability of the units and their design. The findings are used for final design optimization. Even in the first thermal cycle (test run with regular temperature changes, heating and cooling), it was possible to supply all magnets with power as intended in the SIS100 in the future. Even when operating at full power (maximum ramp rate and electrical current), stable operation of the superconducting magnets was observed without quenching (sudden, undesired transition of a superconductor to the normal conducting state).
Other key design requirements and cooling concepts were also demonstrated for the first time in a larger vacuum area. The chamber walls of the ultra-high vacuum system, cooled to -263 °C, functioned as planned as a "super pump" and were able to generate a pressure of <10-12 mbar by freezing out the residual gas particles.
The string will be analyzed in detail over the next few months in many thermal cycles. The so-called cross-talk between the individual circuits of the main magnets also plays an important role. The interaction of the circuits via their electromagnetic fields must be sufficiently small so that the precise course of the currents in the acceleration process is not disturbed. Even with the planned rapid current changes (ramp rate of up to 29,000 amperes/second) and electrical currents of up to 13,000 amperes, the precision of the currents must not deviate from the target value by more than 0.01 per cent at any time.
The available results suggest that the SIS100 can be set up as planned. The expert committee MAC (Machine Advisory Committee), responsible for advising on the technical design and operation of the FAIR facility, has classified the completion of the string test as an important step forward in the project. (BP)
]]>The guests were welcomed by Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Markus Jaeger, deputy of the Administrative Management of GSI and FAIR, and Prof. Karlheinz Langanke, former Research Director. During their visit, the guests gained an impression of the scientific successes and the current status of the FAIR project.
The program included a bus tour to the FAIR construction site. There, the guests saw the central crossing structure, the impressive size of the SIS100 particle accelerator and the buildings for the FAIR experiments. Furthermore, they had the opportunity to inspect the ongoing work on the 20-hectare construction site directly on site.
The tour then took the Science Committee through the research and accelerator facility on the GSI campus, including the ESR storage ring, the tumor therapy facility, the Green IT Cube and the main control room. The visitors were able to experience the ongoing experimental operations at first hand.
FAIR and GSI are an integral part of Darmstadt's scientific landscape. By creating highly qualified jobs and supporting the economy, e.g. as part of the AI Innovation Lab Hesse, GSI and FAIR contribute to the attractiveness of Darmstadt. FAIR and GSI also play an important role in the training of young researchers in close cooperation with TU Darmstadt and Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences. (LW)
]]>Since the turn of the century, six new chemical elements have been discovered and subsequently added to the periodic table of elements, the very icon of chemistry. These new elements have high atomic numbers up to 118 and are significantly heavier than uranium, the element with the highest atomic number (92) found in larger quantities on Earth. This raises questions such as how many more of these superheavy species are waiting to be discovered, where – if at all – is a fundamental limit in the creation of these elements, and what are the characteristics of the so-called island of enhanced stability. In a recent review, experts in theoretical and experimental chemistry and physics of the heaviest elements and their nuclei summarize the major challenges and offer a fresh view on new superheavy elements and the limit of the periodic table. One of them is Professor Christoph Düllmann from the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, and the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM). In its February issue, the world's leading high-impact journal Nature Reviews Physics presents the topic as its cover story.
Already in the first half of the last century, researchers realized that the mass of atomic nuclei is smaller than the total mass of their proton and neutron constituents. This difference in mass is responsible for the binding energy of the nuclei. Certain numbers of neutrons and protons lead to stronger binding and are referred to as “magic”. In fact, scientists observed early on that protons and neutrons move in individual shells that are similar to electronic shells, with nuclei of the metal lead being the heaviest with completely filled shells containing 82 protons and 126 neutrons – a doubly-magic nucleus. Early theoretical predictions suggested that the extra stability from the next “magic” numbers, far from nuclei known at that time, might lead to lifetimes comparable to the age of the Earth. This led to the notion of a so-called island of stability of superheavy nuclei separated from uranium and its neighbors by a sea of instability.
There are numerous graphical representations of the island of stability, depicting it as a distant island. Many decades have passed since this image emerged, so it is time to take a fresh look at the stability of superheavy nuclei and see where the journey to the limits of mass and charge might lead us. In their recent paper titled "The quest for superheavy elements and the limit of the periodic table", the authors describe the current state of knowledge and the most important challenges in the field of these superheavies. They also present key considerations for future development.
Elements up to oganesson (element 118) have been produced in experiments, named, and included in the periodic table of elements in accelerator facilities around the world, such as at GSI in Darmstadt and in future at FAIR, the international accelerator center being built at GSI. These new elements are highly unstable, with the heaviest ones disintegrating within seconds at most. A more detailed analysis reveals that their lifetimes increase towards the magic neutron number 184. In the case of copernicium (element 112), for example, which was discovered at GSI, the lifetime increases from less than a thousandth of a second to 30 seconds. However, the neutron number 184 is still a long way from being reached, so the 30 seconds are only one step on the way. Since the theoretical description is still prone to large uncertainties, there is no consensus on where the longest lifetimes will occur and how long they will be. However, there is a general agreement that truly stable superheavy nuclei are no longer to be expected.
This leads to a revision of the superheavy landscape in two important ways. On the one hand, we have indeed arrived at the shores of the region of enhanced stability and have thus confirmed experimentally the concept of an island of enhanced stability. On the other hand, we do not yet know how large this region is – to stay with the picture. How long will the maximum lifetimes be, with the height of the mountains on the island typically representing the stability, and where will the longest lifetimes occur? The Nature Reviews Physics paper discusses various aspects of relevant nuclear and electronic structure theory, including the synthesis and detection of superheavy nuclei and atoms in the laboratory or in astrophysical events, their structure and stability, and the location of the current and anticipated superheavy elements in the periodic table.
The detailed investigation of the superheavy elements remains an important pillar of the research program at GSI Darmstadt, supported by infrastructure and expertise at HIM and Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, forming a unique setting for such studies. Over the past decade, several breakthrough results were obtained, including detailed studies of their production, which led to the confirmation of element 117 and the discovery of the comparatively long-lived isotope lawrencium-266, of their nuclear structure by a variety of experimental techniques, of the structure of their atomic shells as well as their chemical properties, where flerovium (element 114) represents the heaviest element for which chemical data exist. Calculations on production in the cosmos, especially during the merging of two neutron stars, as observed experimentally for the first time in 2017, round off the research portfolio. In the future, the investigation of superheavy elements could be even more efficient thanks to the new linear accelerator HELIAC, for which the first module was recently assembled at HIM and then successfully tested in Darmstadt, so that further, even more exotic and therefore presumably longer-lived nuclei will also be experimentally achievable. An overview of the element discoveries and first chemical studies at GSI can be found in the article “Five decades of GSI superheavy element discoveries and chemical investigation,” published in May 2022. (BP/JGU)
On the occasion of the construction of the new FCC and on behalf of the Federal Ministry of Education and Research and the State of Hesse, GSI launched a single-phase, invited and anonymous art-in-architecture competition. The aim was to sharpen the profile of FAIR/GSI through independent artistic designs and to make it visible to the outside world. The artwork was supposed to create an identity for the campus and have a strong signal effect. Six artists submitted their designs, which were assessed and evaluated by a jury of experts. The winner was the design “Entschleunigtes Teilchen — the FCC meteor” by Atelier Thomas Stricker. Stricker's design impressed with its use of copper and its symbolic representation of the connecting axis between research and the cosmos.
Ongoing construction
The proposed site for the artwork is strategically placed at a central location in front of the entrance to the visitors‘ gallery, allowing the object to develop a striking and widely visible signal effect. The artwork will be installed in parallel with the ongoing construction of the FCC, which resumed in January after a temporary pause. The scaffolding on the west side of the Main Control Room has been completed, and the metalwork on the windows and doors of the building envelope, as well as the painting in the technical centers, is underway. In addition, the basic installation of the technical building equipment is scheduled to begin in early March. The contract for the facade work has already been awarded, and the commissioning of other finishing trades is planned to take place successively over the next few weeks. (JL)
16 institutions from the greater Frankfurt/Rhine-Main region joined forces in the Römer to form a new science network. The future cooperation within the Frankfurt Alliance was sealed with a Memorandum of Understanding. Markus Jaeger, Deputy of the Administrative Managing Directorate of GSI and FAIR, signed the agreement on behalf of GSI.
The Frankfurt/Rhine-Main science region is characterized by a high density of research institutions that are already interconnected in many ways, based on common research interests and numerous cooperation agreements. To meet the major challenges of the 21st century and work together on new solutions, however, requires closer cooperation: That is why, as an initial step, 16 institutions have now joined forces and set up the Frankfurt Alliance, which is comprised of institutes from the four major scientific organizations in the Frankfurt/Rhine-Main metropolitan region, one federal institution, as well as Goethe University Frankfurt. The idea behind the network and its joint framework conditions is to create synergies and counteract the increasing segregation of work processes and research topics.
By simplifying the conditions for joint research, reducing existing obstacles in the respective administrations by means of overarching regulations, establishing joint structures and infrastructures, and vigorously representing the interests of Frankfurt's excellent scientists in the political arena, the Frankfurt Alliance provides the framework not only for joint research, but also the transformation of scientific structures. In addition, joint activities are expected to result in closer integration between the institutions. The vision is to further develop the Frankfurt/Rhine-Main region as a leading research hub in Europe and to further increase its international standing and attractiveness for top-level research.
Frankfurt Alliance’s first joint public event will be a science festival, to be held in downtown Frankfurt on September 28, at which the participating institutions will present themselves to the public.
Bettina Stark-Watzinger, Federal Minister of Education and Research: “I congratulate all parties involved as well as the Frankfurt/Rhine-Main region for having established the Frankfurt Alliance. In today's world, which presents us not only with great challenges but also opportunities, it is more important than ever to bundle excellence and intensify cooperation. The new science network created here holds enormous potential, and I wish it the utmost success.”
Timon Gremmels, Hessian Minister for Higher Education, Research, Science and the Arts: “Science and research are essential to mastering the transformation processes of our time and at the same time securing our democracy – something which will be all the more successful by joining forces. The Frankfurt Alliance will make the outstanding research and transfer work in Frankfurt and the Rhine-Main region even more effective and visible – whether with regard to internationalization, research infrastructures or personnel recruitment. The latter is particularly important, especially in view of increasing competition for the best scientific minds. That is why the Hessian Ministry of Higher Education, Research, Science and the Arts Culture is supporting the Frankfurt Alliance both this year and next with a total of more than €500.000.”
Mike Josef, Lord Mayor of the City of Frankfurt: “The new science network is a great initiative that many people have been waiting for. Frankfurt is an excellent science and research location – two areas with which the city must be even more closely associated. This initiative is an important step in this direction. Better networking among our science and research institutions, including at an administrative level, increases the attractiveness of the entire region, enabling us to better recruit and retain skilled workers.”
Dr. Bastian Bergerhoff, Frankfurt City Treasurer: “An extremely strong alliance has come together here, which will boost Frankfurt as a science location and promote cooperation in the region. Science is, after all, also a driving force for the economy, culture and urban society, and creates material and immaterial prosperity – which is why it plays such an important role in terms of location, too. There is great potential here, which can be leveraged even better together.”
Prof. Dr. Enrico Schleiff, President of Goethe University Frankfurt: “The Memorandum of Understanding is an important step on the path to even closer networking between the scientific institutions in Frankfurt. Together, we have the unique potential to work on the important issues of the future and enter into a productive dialog with the public. I am already looking forward to September’s science festival, and am convinced that its exciting program will bring together many interested people from the Frankfurt/Rhine-Main region and beyond and convey just how great an impact science in Frankfurt has on the economy, society and the shaping of political opinions.” (CP)
Members of the Frankfurt Alliance are:
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Quantum electrodynamics (QED), the quantum field theory that describes the interaction between light and matter, is one of the important cornerstones of the Standard Model. QED is generally considered as the best tested quantum field theory. However, recent precision measurements of the gyromagnetic factor of the muon and the fine structure of positronium show significant disagreements with theoretical predictions, stressing the need for new complementary tests.
At present, most stringent tests of QED are based on extremely precise studies performed in the domain of relatively low electromagnetic field strengths and light atoms and ions, where perturbation methods can be efficiently implemented in the QED calculations. In the regime of extreme fields of heavy ions, the QED calculations enter a qualitatively different non-perturbative regime (with respect to the nuclear charge), making accurate theoretical predictions challenging. Experiments in this domain are equally challenging and thus QED tests in strong fields currently lack the high precision reached for light atoms. New tests are required, in particular in the regime of extreme fields of heavy ions, where QED effects are greatly enhanced due to the extremely strong electromagnetic field of the heavy nucleus, reaching several orders of magnitude higher than the most intense laser fields available nowadays.
GSI/FAIR is at present the unique place worldwide where the heaviest ions in any desired charge-state can be produced with subsequent acceleration and stripping, followed by cooling and storage in the dedicated storage ring ESR. The international research team used the ESR to perform a new stringent test based on precision x-ray spectroscopy of helium-like uranium (with two bound electrons), the simplest and heaviest many-electron atomic system, and compared its transition energy to the energy of similar transitions in lithium-like (three electrons) and beryllium-like uranium ions (four electrons).
For the measurement, dedicated Bragg crystal spectrometers have been constructed and mounted at the gas-jet interaction chamber of the ESR. Differently from past experiments, a new calibration method based on a combination of moving and stationary energy references is implemented. This new method (along with other improvements) provided a gain in accuracy of almost one order of magnitude on the absolute transition energy. The obtained accuracy of 37 parts per million allows, for the first time for high-Z helium-like ions, to test high-order QED effects and sets a new important benchmark for QED in the strong field domain. In addition, such an accuracy enables the discrimination between different theoretical models and approximations developed throughout the last decades. Moreover, by comparing the transition energies for the different uranium ions, one-electron and many-electron QED contributions could be clearly disentangled for the first time in such a high-field regime.(CP)
Participants benefited in particular from trainer Ian Tracey's many years of experience in supporting entrepreneurs in research- and technology-intensive environments of how they can develop their potential and build successful businesses, and how these can be used to reach society. Viola Hay, with a wealth of experience in European programs and funding opportunities, also offered valuable insights and possible strategies on how to access Horizon Europe funding and identify potential consortium partners.
The workshop offered an in-depth exploration of the entrepreneurial process with sessions such as “How to write a business plan, how to start a business?”. These sessions highlighted the complex process of starting a business, technology commercialization, team building, go-to-market strategies and different business models through interactive games and team exercises.
Participants also had the opportunity to exchange ideas with international experts and other entrepreneurs in a dedicated “Career Session” and learn from inspiring success stories on how to develop a strong research profile and build a professional network.
A central focus of the public „Start-up Afternoon“ was the protection of valuable ideas e.g. from imitators. The discussion underlined the importance of protecting ideas in science and covered aspects such as inventions, patenting, know-how, open source, and their further development and commercialization.
Here, experienced technology transfer speakers such as Dr. Matthias Götz, Dr. Timo Smit and Madeleine Mussgnug from Innovectis, the Gesellschaft für Innovations-Dienstleistungen mbH of Goethe University Frankfurt, gave the participants informative insights into the entire process of entrepreneurship.
In a personal experience report by the founder Justin Port of “Betterdrinx”, a technical start-up of Goethe University, and in an open dialog, many insights into the path from the idea via the foundation to the growth of a technical start-up were conveyed.
At the end of the HEPTrepreneurs Training School 2023, participants, trainers and organizers looked back on an intensive training with a lot of instructive content and inspiring and motivating discussions – characterized by the passion for science and the creation of sustainable added value for society through it. (CP)
Gottfried Münzenberg had a major influence on various areas of modern nuclear physics and leaves behind a significant scientific legacy. His diversified research work ranged from the study of exotic, very light nuclei to super-heavy nuclei, touching on both fundamental physical questions and practical applications. He laid important foundations for the extension of the GSI facilities, shaped the scientific program at the Super-FRS, contributed to the design of the new apparatus and initiated the founding of the NUSTAR collaboration at FAIR.
During his time at GSI, he made decisive contributions to the discovery of superheavy elements and played a leading role in the design and construction of the SHIP velocity filter at Justus Liebig University in Giessen. He was head of the SHIP experiment group for the synthesis of the new chemical elements bohrium, hassium and meitnerium and, as a member of the discovery team, was closely involved in the synthesis of the elements darmstadtium, roentgenium and copernicium. Münzenberg was also co-discoverer of the double magic nuclei tin-100 and nickel-78 as well as the proton halo in boron-8. Furthermore, his scientific commitment led to the discovery of over 220 new isotopes and more than 350 new mass measurements of various isotopes.
Gottfried Münzenberg gained worldwide international reputation as Professor of Experimental Physics at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz and head of the Nuclear Structure and Nuclear Chemistry departments at GSI. He initiated and fostered numerous international collaborations and was passionately committed to the promotion of young scientists.
For his outstanding scientific achievements, Gottfried Münzenberg has received many high-ranking awards and honors, including the Röntgen Prize of the Justus Liebig University in Giessen, the Physics Prize of the German Physical Society, the Otto Hahn Prize of the City of Frankfurt, the Gold Medal of the Comenius University in Bratislava, the SUNAMCO Medal of the IUPAP, the Lise Meitner Prize of the European Physical Society and the Medal of Honor of the Hellenic Nuclear Physics Society.
GSI and FAIR will always remember Gottfried Münzenberg as an outstanding scientist, a valued source of inspiration, and above all as a great person full of warmth and with an incomparable sense of witty humor. His colleagues and friends will keep his wisdom, kindness and friendship in lasting memory. The management of GSI/FAIR extends its deepest condolences to his family.
]]>The HELIAC is a novel superconducting linear accelerator built jointly by HIM and GSI/FAIR. HELIAC is intended to deliver intense continuous-wave ion beams for cutting-edge research ranging from superheavy elements to materials science for decades to come. The performance depends critically on the quality of the transition and the elaborate beam matching from the normal-conducting injector to the super-conducting part of the machine.
Within the scope of his thesis work, Simon Lauber made vital and forward-looking contributions, which are of immense importance for the realization of the entire HELIAC project. In order to provide for proper phase-space matching, the complete six-dimensional phase space needs to be explicitly known. Recently, sufficient experimental data from a novel bunch-shape measurement device have been collected to reconstruct the longitudinal beam characteristics with an algorithm newly developed by Lauber. To measure the transverse phase space to be adapted to the acceptance of the superconducting part, Lauber designed, built and commissioned a complex beam collimation system. This collimation system enabled pinpoint measurements of the HELIAC acceptance.
Together with the method for reconstructing the longitudinal phase space, this is a crucial tool for tuning and optimizing the entire HELIAC. On the basis of a complex simulation code developed by Simon Lauber, essential beam dynamics studies were performed for the construction of a high-performance interdigital H-type drift tube structure for the acceleration of heavy ions in cw mode. The alternating phase focusing (APF) structure used for this purpose allows an accelerator setup without any additional focusing lenses, and thus the design of a very compact and efficient accelerator structure.
The annual FAIR-GSI PhD Award honors an excellent PhD thesis completed during the previous year. Eligible for nominations are dissertations that were supported by GSI in the context of GSI's strategic partnerships with the universities of Darmstadt, Frankfurt, Giessen, Heidelberg, Jena, and Mainz, or through the research and development program. In the framework of the Helmholtz Graduate School for Hadron and Ion Research (HGS-HIRe), more than 300 PhD students currently perform research for their PhD theses on topics closely related to GSI and FAIR. GSI has a long-standing partnership with the award sponsor, Pfeiffer Vacuum GmbH. Pfeiffer Vacuum is a leading global provider of vacuum solutions. In addition to turbopumps, the product portfolio includes backing pumps, leak detectors, measuring and analysis devices, vacuum components and vacuum chambers. Solutions from Pfeiffer Vacuum have been successfully used in GSI's facilities for decades. (CP)
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]]>Focusing on the physics at the existing GSI and the future FAIR accelerator facility, other lectures will deal with the reactions at the FAIR experiment for compressed nuclear matter CBM and the irradiation of tumors using short and intense beam pulses, known as FLASH. Two further lectures will shed light on cosmic processes such as supernovae and neutron star mergers as sites for the synthesis of elements in the universe. A contribution concluding the half-year will highlight the importance of high accuracy and precision for gaining new scientific insights.
The lectures start at 2 p. m., further information about registration, access and the course of the event can be found on the event website at www.gsi.de/wfa (German)
The lecture series “Wissenschaft für Alle” is aimed at all persons interested in current science and research. The lectures report on research and developments at GSI and FAIR, but also on current topics from other fields of science and technology. The aim of the series is to prepare and present the scientific processes in a way that is understandable for laypersons in order to make the research accessible to a broad public. The lectures are held by GSI and FAIR staff members or by external speakers from universities and research institutes. (CP)
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GSI and FAIR are among the largest manufacturers of superconducting accelerator magnet systems in Europe. This made it necessary for GSI to build up outstanding expertise in the field of superconducting systems during the preparatory project phase. Today, GSI is in contact with all relevant European suppliers. There is great potential for European research laboratories and European industry to apply new innovative concepts for greater sustainability and energy efficiency to accelerators and thus qualify them for future use in energy systems in public and private facilities.
At the workshop, there was a lively exchange on the demand for further improvement of key parameters and performance. Studies and developments to increase the energy efficiency of large accelerator facilities and for energy systems in the public sector were presented. A key topic were synergies in the development of future superconducting technology with regard to its application in particle accelerators and energy systems. The I.FAST program ("Innovation Fostering in Accelerator Science and Technology"), where GSI/FAIR is involved in several work packages, provided the framework and motivation for the workshop. I.FAST is an EU-funded program that aims to advance new developments in the field of accelerator-based research infrastructures and promote innovative technologies. GSI's contributions to the project include the development of new superconducting cables and approaches for the sustainability and energy efficiency of particle accelerator facilities.
European energy supply systems as a whole are undergoing major change, which requires the development and application of new technologies. Superconductivity can play a key role, particularly with regard to the conversion of energy systems. At present, energy transported in liquid, solid or gaseous form are predominantly used to supply a large proportion of the energy required by our society, and these are mainly transported in pipe systems and tanker trucks. A planned switch from chemical to electrical energy sources would require enormous amounts of energy to be transported by cable (i.e. the existing electrical grid infrastructure) in the future. However, high line losses and restrictions are to be expected, which could potentially be avoided with transportation in superconducting energy cables. Current developments at GSI/FAIR, at CERN and other future particle accelerator technologies are providing significant impetus in this regard and can therefore be used for the benefit of society. In particular, major advances in the mass production of high-temperature superconductor materials and price reductions will enable large-scale applications in the future.
The topic of sustainability is a key issue for GSI and FAIR. Thus it is of particular interest to highlight approaches for reducing the energy consumption of large-scale plants in the medium term. For example, replacing copper coils, which result in higher energy losses due to energy dissipation, with superconducting coils can decrease the energy consumption of beam guidance systems.
The question of how cooperation between accelerator centers and industry can be intensified in the future was also of particular importance at the workshop. There was a consensus that the development of high-tech products requires long-term cooperation and the early involvement of industry. In order to optimize this, suitable adjustments to the legal framework conditions are useful. A working group of the I.FAST program is dealing with precisely these questions. The result should be a guideline for the early and long-term involvement of industry in the development of accelerator centers. (BP)
]]>The new building of the Helmholtz Institute Jena, a branch of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt, was constructed within almost 2,5 years in the immediate vicinity of the existing institute building on the campus of the Friedrich Schiller University (FSU) Jena. Several floors provide additional offices, seminar and laboratory areas, which are necessary for the increased number of employees as well as for the amount of laboratory and research equipment. The new building designed by "Osterwold°Schmidt EXP!ANDER Architekten" adds around 550 square meters of usable space. Offices and a seminar room are available on the two top floors, while the two lower floors mostly house research laboratories in addition to building technology and supply services. The four-storey, cube-shaped building is connected to the already existing target laboratory in the basement of the adjacent building.
The Thuringian Ministry of Infrastructure had announced an architectural competition for the new research building. The winner was a regional office: The jury voted unanimously for the design by "Osterwold°Schmidt EXP!ANDER Architekten" office in Weimar, which had submitted the plans jointly with Impuls Landschaftsarchitektur Jena. Groundbreaking for the new building, which was constructed on a hillside location on a state-owned plot of land within the university site below the Landgrafen, took place in October 2019. The ceremonial opening after the successful joint implementation with the "Osterwold°Schmidt EXP!ANDER Architekten" was in November 2022. The €8.9 million construction cost of the research building was fully financed by state funds from the Thuringian Ministry of Infrastructure and Agriculture
With the architecturally outstanding, additional institute building, it was possible to further improve the infrastructural conditions for the cutting-edge research that will take place at the Helmholtz Institute Jena in the future and has been conducted since the institute was founded in 2009. The research profile of the Helmholtz Institute Jena is characterized by physics at the interface between conventional accelerator technology and the rapidly developing field of laser-based particle acceleration. The institute offers outstanding research in the areas of the coupling of intense photon fields and the supporting development of adequate instrumentation. In addition, the Helmholtz Institute Jena will further expand and strengthen the close connection between the university and the research facility GSI with the international accelerator center FAIR, currently being built at GSI in Darmstadt. (BP)
About the Helmholtz Institute Jena
About Osterwold°Schmidt EXP!ANDER Architekten
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An international research team has taken a decisive step toward a new generation of atomic clocks. At the European XFEL X-ray laser, the researchers have created a much more precise pulse generator based on the element scandium, which enables an accuracy of one second in 300 billion years – that is about a thousand times more precise than the current standard atomic clock based on caesium. The team, which includes scientists from the Helmholtz Institute Jena, a branch of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, presented its success in the journal Nature.
Atomic clocks are currently the world’s most accurate timekeepers. These clocks have used electrons in the atomic shell of chemical elements, such as caesium, as a pulse generator in order to define the time. These electrons can be raised to a higher energy level with microwaves of a known frequency. In the process, they absorb the microwave radiation. An atomic clock shines microwaves at caesium atoms and regulates the frequency of the radiation such that the absorption of the microwaves is maximised; experts call this a resonance. The quartz oscillator that generates the microwaves can be kept so stable with the help of resonance that caesium clocks will be accurate to within one second within 300 million years.
Crucial to the accuracy of an atomic clock is the width of the resonance used. Current caesium atomic clocks already use a very narrow resonance; strontium atomic clocks achieve a higher accuracy with only one second in 15 billion years. Further improvement is practically impossible to achieve with this method of electron excitation. Therefore, teams around the world have been working for several years on the concept of a “nuclear” clock, which uses transitions in the atomic nucleus as the pulse generator rather than in the atomic shell. Nuclear resonances are much more acute than the resonances of electrons in the atomic shell, but also much harder to excite.
At the European XFEL the team could now excite a promising transition in the nucleus of the element scandium, which is readily available as a high-purity metal foil or as the compound scandium dioxide This resonance requires X-rays with an energy of 12.4 kiloelectronvolts (keV, which is about 10,000 times the energy of visible light) and has a width of only 1.4 femtoelectronvolts (feV). This is 1.4 quadrillionths of an electronvolt, which is only about one tenth of a trillionth of the excitation energy (10-19). This makes an accuracy of 1:10,000,000,000,000 possible. “This corresponds to one second in 300 billion years,” says DESY researcher Ralf Röhlsberger, who works at the Helmholtz Institute Jena, the GSI outstation on the campus of the Friedrich Schiller University Jena. Additional partner institutes of the HI-Jena are the Helmholtz centers DESY and Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR).
Atomic clocks have numerous applications that benefit from improved accuracy, such as precise positioning using satellite navigation. “The scientific potential of the scandium resonance was identified more than 30 years ago,” reports the experiment’s project leader, Yuri Shvyd’ko of Argonne National Laboratory in the United States. “Until now, however, no X-ray source was available that shone brightly enough within the narrow 1.4 feV line of scandium,” says Anders Madsen, leading scientist at the MID experiment station at the European XFEL, where the experiment took place. “That only changed with X-ray lasers like the European XFEL.” In the groundbreaking experiment, the team irradiated a 0.025-millimetre-thick scandium foil with X-ray laser light and was able to detect a characteristic afterglow emitted by the excited atomic nuclei, which is clear evidence of scandium’s extremely narrow resonance line.
Also important for the construction of atomic clocks is the exact knowledge of the resonance energy – in other words, the energy of the X-ray laser radiation at which the resonance occurs. Sophisticated extreme noise suppression and high-resolution crystal optics allowed the value of the scandium resonance energy in the experiments to be determined to within five digits of the decimal point at 12.38959 keV, which is 250 times more accurate than before. “The precise determination of the transition energy marks a significant progress,” emphasizes the head of the data analysis, Jörg Evers of the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg. “The exact knowledge of this energy is of enormous importance for the realization of an atomic clock based on scandium.” The researchers are now exploring further steps toward realising such an atomic nuclear clock.
“The breakthrough in resonant excitation of scandium and the precise measurement of its energy opens new avenues not only for nuclear clocks, but also for ultrahigh-precision spectroscopy and precision measurement of fundamental physical effects,” Shvyd'ko explains. Olga Kocharovskaya of Texas A&M University in the U.S., initiator and leader of the project funded by the National Science Foundation, adds: “For example, such a high accuracy could allow gravitational time dilation to be probed at sub-millimetre distances. This would allow studies of relativistic effects on length scales that were inaccessible so far.”
The work involved researchers from Argonne National Laboratory in the U.S., the Helmholtz Institute Jena, Friedrich Schiller University Jena, Texas A&M University in the U.S., the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg, the Polish synchrotron radiation source SOLARIS in Kraków, the European XFEL, and DESY. (DESY/BP)
News publication of the Deutsche Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY
Scientific publication: Resonant X-ray excitation of the nuclear clock isomer 45Sc; Yuri Shvyd’ko, Ralf Röhlsberger, Olga Kocharovskaya, et al.; „Nature“, 2023
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Two of Europe's leading centers for the study and application of heavy particles in oncology will partner in the “CROSS” project to investigate for the first time in living organisms whether the sequence of carbon ions followed by photons is more effective in treating radioresistant tumors than the reverse order of irradiation. The study is part of a long-standing collaboration in which the National Center for Oncological Hadron Therapy CNAO in Pavia and the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt are involved in several other joint research projects.
CNAO has received a grant of 385,600 euros from the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation (MAECI) as part of a call for proposals aimed at facilitating access for Italian researchers to certain cutting-edge scientific infrastructures in Germany that are not available in Italy. Thanks to the grant, a group of CNAO scientists will have access to the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt, a world-leading center for radiobiological research, providing an accelerator facility also able to perform in vivo experiments. The CNAO scientists will be supervised and supported by the team of Professor Marco Durante, Director of GSI’s Biophysics Department and one of the leading international experts in radiobiology and medical physics.
The research project, the MAECI grant was awarded for, is called “CROSS” (Combination of X-Ray and Carbon-iOns for radioresiStant tumorS) and aims to investigate whether mixed-beam radiotherapy with carbon ions followed by photons is more effective than the reverse sequence (photons followed by carbon ions) in a mouse model of osteosarcoma, a radioresistant tumor.
“There are different clinical experiences with the treatment of radioresistant tumors with mixed beams,” explains Amelia Barcellini, principal investigator of the study, radiotherapist at CNAO and PhD student at the University of Pavia in the Experimental Medicine program. “In this type of neoplasia (i.e. new formation of body tissue), an early boost with carbon ions before photon treatment is preferred in clinical practice in order to take advantage of the radiobiological benefits of the particles and thus increase the sensitivity of the tumor to the second part of radiotherapy with photons. However, the current preclinical data are not sufficient to prove that this sequence is the better one. CROSS will evaluate for the first time in an in vivo experiment the difference between the two sequences (carbon ions + X-rays versus X-rays + carbon ions) in terms of tumor response, immunogenicity, hypoxia and toxicity”.
“Our hypothesis is that the use of carbon ions at the beginning of treatment is the most effective strategy,” says Angelica Facoetti, Head of Experimental Radiobiology at CNAO. “In vitro evidence suggests that by stimulating the anti-tumor activity of the immune system, causing irreparable DNA damage to neoplastic cells and promoting cellular re-oxygenation, carbon ions could 'pave the way' and optimize the effect of subsequent X-ray irradiation.”
“The collaboration with CNAO is strategic for the GSI’s Biophysics Department and a win-win situation. We have the best possible research infrastructure, while CNAO is an advanced clinical center for carbon ion treatment,” stresses Professor Marco Durante. “In the project CROSS we try to answer a simple question: when patients are treated with conventional X-rays fractionated course and a boost of carbon ions, is it better to apply the boost before or after X-rays? Even if the boost is sometimes given at the end, we have reasons to believe that starting with carbon can be preferable, as it may trigger a strong re-oxygenation. The experiment will run already in the February 2024 block of FAIR-phase-0 and we expect exciting results with a strong translational potential in the CNAO clinic. By working together, we can achieve outstanding results that have an international impact and benefit society in Europe and the whole world in the fight against cancer.”
CNAO and GSI have been actively collaborating in the field of scientific research since the center was founded in Pavia. Both are participating in the HITRIplus (Heavy Ion Therapy Research Integration Plus) project, which is funded by the European Union's Horizon 2020 program and whose coordinator is CNAO. The FOOT experiment (FragmentatiOn Of Target) is one of the many other collaborations in which the two partners are involved. It aims to analyze how protons and carbon ions break up nuclei in the human body to damage and kill cancer cells.
Thanks to the CROSS project and the grant received, CNAO and GSI have established a new preclinical research consortium that will enable multidisciplinary collaboration between radiobiology, biophysics and medicine in the treatment of tumors with heavy ions. This will enable important progress to be made in the field of radiation therapy with mixed beams. (CNAO/BP)
CNAO, National Center for Oncological Hadron Therapy
Project HITRIPlus: Heavy Ion Therapy Research Integration
FOOT Experiment FragmentatiOn Of Target
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Structured around the three main sessions “General AI”, “AI for Cybersecurity and Cybersecurity for AI” and “Diagnostics and Preventative Maintenance and Assistants” and featuring a dedicated poster session with 30 submissions, the symposium provided a platform for researchers and industry experts to showcase their innovative projects. This poster session created extensive opportunities for networking and in-depth discussions among participants.
Throughout the event, GSI/FAIR experts actively participated in knowledge sharing. Dr. Lennart Volz of GSI’s Biophysics research department delivered a talk on “AI in Radiotherapy”, highlighting the transformative potential of AI in modern cancer treatment. Additionally, several GSI/FAIR representatives presented insightful posters, shedding light on their contributions to the field of “General AI” and “Diagnostics and Preventative Maintenance and Assistants”.
The impact of AISTAR 2023 extended beyond the physical attendees, with over 200 on-site participants and an additional 400 online registrants. The received positive feedback attested to the event's resounding success. AISTAR 2023 was an inspiring two-day journey that highlighted the central role of partnerships and collaborations in advancing AI-driven global solutions. It brought together diverse communities, including scientists, space experts, and AI professionals, fostering valuable insights and discussions.
Artificial Intelligence Symposium on Theory, Application and Research is a two-day event featuring technical talks, networking opportunities and exciting project poster spaces in the fields of Research, Methods and Algorithms and AI Application. The Symposium brings together AI experts and enthusiasts from industry and academia to explore, connect, network and exchange ideas. After a successful first edition in 2021, with more than 1000 participants, AI STAR took place again in 2023, in a hybrid mode, tackling new topics with the intention of bridging the AI community to bolster innovation.
The Symposium is designed to identify concrete technological solutions addressing current and future needs in organizations, connect the communities and enable interactions to lay the foundations for further collaborations and inspire and enable the public to learn about AI research and applications from experts. (CP)
Following a short introductory lecture, the students learned about topics such as tumor therapy with carbon ions developed at GSI, the production of superheavy elements, materials research, and atomic physics at the ESR experimental storage ring. Infrastructure facilities such as the main control room, the target laboratory and the test stands and storage facilities for the magnets of the future FAIR facility were also part of the program, as was an outlook onto the FAIR mega construction site from the viewpoint.
The “Saturday Morning Physics” event series was organized by the Faculty of Physics at TU Darmstadt for the 25th time. It takes place annually and aims to encourage young people's interest in physics. At the events, pupils learn more about physics research at the university. Those who take part in the events receive the “Saturday Morning Physics” diploma. GSI and FAIR have been sponsors and supporters of the series since its start. During the coronavirus pandemic, the series switched to an online format, but returned to a hybrid format of on-site and online participation this year. (CP)
ErasmusDays 2023 brought together an impressive array of participants, including students, researchers, and representatives from esteemed institutions such as Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences, Darmstadt University of Technology, Unite! - Network of Universities of Innovation, Technology, and Engineering, and European Universities of Technology (EUT+). The primary objective of this gathering was to foster stronger collaboration, co-innovation, and knowledge exchange within the realm of science and technology. The event was inaugurated with the welcome speech by Professor Paolo Giubellino the Scientific Managing Director of FAIR and GSI.
"In the spirit of ErasmusDays, we are not merely connecting students, researchers, and institutions; we are forging bridges of knowledge, understanding, and international cooperation that leads to a brighter, more interconnected world. The power of education and mobility surpasses borders and enriches us all. Let's embrace this transformative journey together," said Professor Paolo Giubellino.
The event was witnessed by the presence of inspirational speakers who shared their wisdom and experiences, leaving an indelible mark on all attendees. The speakers included including five Erasmus+ alumni, five mentors and two coordinators of large European University Networks. Additionally, the day offered exclusive tours of the FAIR Construction Site and the GSI campus, granting an exclusive behind-the-scenes look at the knowledge driving high-end research and innovation at FAIR and GSI.
One of the highlights of #ErasmusDays 2023 was a thought-provoking discussion on the issue of sustainability in mobility. This conversation featured a diverse range of perspectives, including those of Erasmus+ students, FAIR/GSI mentors, Darmstadt University of Applied Science professors, and representatives from student organizations within the Erasmus Student Network (ESN). The multifaceted discussion underscored the pressing importance of sustainable mobility in today's world. The participants in the panel unanimously agreed that more attention to this topic has to be given on all levels. Mere awareness campaigns will not be helpful in the long run.
Sincere thanks went out to all the participants and attendees who contributed to making this event a resounding success. There was also an appeal to continue working together, fueled by the knowledge and inspiration gathered at #ErasmusDays to build a brighter and more sustainable future through education and mobility. (BP)
For inquiries, please contact: Dr. Pradeep Ghosh (International Cooperations), via Pradeep.Ghosh(at)fair-center.eu oder International-cooperations(at)fair-center.eu
]]>Sommerfeldt was honored for his thesis, titled “All-Order Calculations of Delbrück Scattering” and the extraordinary achievement of solving the longstanding discrepancy between experiment and theory for the case of Delbrück scattering, a strong field QED effect related to the elastic scattering of hard x- and g-rays by virtual electron-positron pairs in the strong Coulomb field of heavy nuclei. His work has just been published in Physical Review Letters (Phys. Rev. Lett. 131, 061601) and has attracted a lot of attention, e.g. in the article “Physics — Quantum Deflection Unraveled” of the APS.
The SPARC PhD Award has been presented annually and comes with a prize money of 300 euros. The award honors the best PhD thesis within the collaboration concerning atomic physics with heavy ions at the research facilities of GSI and FAIR. SPARC stands for Stored Particles Atomic Physics Research Collaboration. Currently, more than 400 members from 26 countries belong to the collaboration. They experiment with the existing atomic physics facilities at GSI and prepare new experiments and setups at the future FAIR accelerator. (CP)
The Polish Academy of Arts and Sciences (PAU) is the oldest academy of sciences in Poland. Active since 1872 and developing its activities on the international forum, today this association brings together more than three hundred scientists and researchers. It has its headquarters in Krakow. Membership in the PAU is considered an expression of the highest recognition for preeminent scholarly accomplishments.
“I am very honored and delighted to be accepted as a member of the Polish Academy of Arts and Sciences. The joint work will further deepen our already strong connections with Poland," said Professor Peter Braun-Munzinger. Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, said: “I am very pleased that Professor Peter Braun-Munzinger, one of the most prominent scientists in our Institution, is receiving this recognition. Poland is one of the founding members of FAIR, they have many institutions of excellence with which we have a very fruitful partnership. The choice of Professor Braun-Munzinger will further advance our collaboration on the scientific program of the future FAIR accelerator center."
The nuclear physicist Peter Braun-Munzinger, whose work focuses primarily on ultrarelativistic heavy-ion collisions and the resulting quark-gluon plasma, was head of the ALICE department at GSI, in the period from 1996 to 2011 and also held a chair at TU Darmstadt. From the very earliest days of the project, GSI has played a leading role in the construction of ALICE — one of the largest experiments at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research — and in shaping the associated scientific program of research. The prime purpose of ALICE is to investigate the quark-gluon plasma, a state of matter that existed in the first few fractions of a second after the Big Bang.
Professor Braun-Munzinger studied physics at Heidelberg University, where he was awarded a doctorate summa cum laude. As a doctoral candidate, he held a scholarship of the Studienstiftung des Deutschen Volkes, following which he worked as a postdoctoral researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg. In 1976, he joined the State University of New York at Stony Brook, where he became a full professor in 1982. After his return to Germany, he served as project manager for the time projection chamber of the ALICE experiment at CERN from 1998 until 2010. He was also chair of the collaboration board of ALICE from 2011 to 2016 and Helmholtz professor at GSI from 2011 to 2014. He has held an honorary chair at Heidelberg University since 2014.
In the periods from 1984 to 1987 and 2000 to 2002, Professor Braun-Munzinger was an editor of Physical Review Letters. Published by the American Physical Society, this is one of the world’s oldest and most renowned academic journals in the field of physics. Peter Braun-Munzinger’s scientific work has attracted numerous awards. In 1994, for example, he was made a fellow of the American Physical Society, and in 2011 a member of the Academia Europaea. In 2014, he was awarded the Lise Meitner Prize, in 2019 he has been awarded the Stern Gerlach Medal. (BP)
]]>The ERC grants are funding and acknowledgement in equal measure: They will support outstanding scientists and scholars at the career stage where they may still be consolidating their own independent research teams to pursue their most promising scientific ideas. They each provide a maximum of two million euros in funding over a period of five years.
Professor Christian Graeff is deputy head of the Biophysics Department, head of the Medical Physics group at GSI Biophysics and professor at the Department of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology (ETIT) at TU Darmstadt. His teaching is within the framework of the Master's program in Medical Technology, which provides knowledge and skills in engineering and human medicine. His research has focused on innovative applications of ion beams (for example, research on the treatment of cardiac arrhythmias with the use of carbon ions) and the development of methods for irradiating moving targets with scanned ion beams. He also made important scientific progress in the field of developing new therapy control systems for raster scanning.
In his new project entitled “Portal Range Monitoring in Mixed Ion Beam Surgery” (PROMISE), Christian Graeff aims to further develop the process of tumor therapy with charged particles. “Half of the approximately four million annual cancer cases in Europe receive radiotherapy. While many cancer patients have benefitted from technical improvements in recent years, widespread diseases, such as pancreatic and lung cancer, still have dismally low cure rates. Carbon ion radiotherapy (CIRT) offers unprecedented precision in delivering tumor dose, and can be the much needed game changer for these patients. However, CIRT is still vulnerable to uncertainties in patient positioning, anatomy changes and organ motion,” explained Christian Graeff. Novel strategies for image guidance and beam range assessment are crucial to unlock the full potential of CIRT for the best possible patient care.
This is where the new ERC funded project comes in. The idea is to employ a combined beam for both medical treatment and imaging purposes during treatment. PROMISE, for the first time, will produce mixed ion beams that enable concurrent treatment and image guidance. Carbon ions deliver the dose to the target while Helium ions, simultaneously accelerated to the same velocity, traverse the patient and monitor tumour location and beam range. PROMISE could realize an imaging, that provides real-time information on the target anatomy as seen by the treatment beam. Coupled with innovative detectors, AI-based image recognition, and online dose reconstruction, this technique could enable to drastically reduce safety margins, and achieve the full potential of CIRT.
The GSI accelerators are uniquely suited to develop the first mixed beam of Carbon and Helium, along with strategies for their cost-effective translation to existing and future clinical CIRT centers. The method will be validated experimentally on the GSI campus. “The mixed beam image guidance of PROMISE can lead to a paradigm shift in Carbon ion radiotherapy and could therefore also enable better treatment,” summarized Christian Graeff.
After studying medical engineering at the Hamburg University of Technology, Christian Graeff received his doctorate with a study on computed tomography-assisted diagnostics of osteoporosis. He worked as postdoc in the Medical Physics group of the Biophysics Department at GSI, before taking over as head of this group in 2012. For his scientific achievements, Christian Graeff was awarded the Günther von Pannewitz Prize of the German Society of Radiation Oncology (DEGRO) and the Behnken-Berger Prize for young scientists.
Professor Christian Graeff said: “I would like to thank the European Research Council for giving me this great opportunity through the ERC Consolidator Grant. I am looking forward to fulfilling PROMISE together with my team and the renowned experts of the GSI accelerator department“. The head of GSI’s Biophysics, Professor Marco Durante, said: „I am delighted that Christian Graeff has been honored and funded for his fantastic idea. This is the second ERC in a few years to the Biophysics Department, a clear sign that our research activity is cutting edge and successful. Both ERC grants are introducing revolutionary concepts in particle therapy, and both exploits the unique opportunities provided by the GSI/FAIR accelerator facility. Once again, we show how our success in biomedical research is possible thanks to the extraordinary infrastructures of the GSI/FAIR facility”. Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, said: “I am extremely pleased for Professor Graeff, who is tackling important challenges in medical physics with this innovative project and his commitment. The grant also underlines the outstanding research perspectives at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum and the international accelerator center FAIR. This is due to the uniqueness of our facilities but even more to the exceptional quality of our human capital in experiments and accelerators. In the future, we will be able to further expand the prospects of such groundbreaking research and enable pioneering achievements”. Professor Maria Leptin, President of the European Research Council, said: „The new Consolidator Grant winners represent some of the best of European research. It is disappointing that we cannot support every deserving project simply due to budget constraints“. (BP)
Press release of the European Research Council
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The memorial colloquium on November 20, 2023 once again honored the important scientific legacy of Professor Gerhard Kraft, the biophysicist and pioneer of modern heavy ion therapy. The initiator and decisive innovator of tumor therapy with ion beams established the biophysical research department at GSI in the early 10980s, which he headed from 1981 to 2008. For his exceptional merits, especially in cancer research and particle therapy, this world-renowned researcher received numerous high-ranking national and international awards and honors. He passed away on March 18, 2023. The memorial event was organized by the GSI Biophysics Department, the Department that he founded and was previous director, and was attended by many colleagues all over the world and by Professor Kraft’s family. His wife, Wilma Kraft-Weyrather, worked for many years with the husband at GSI and has largely contributed to the success of the therapy project.
The special colloquium was opened by the GSI/FAIR Scientific Managing Director, Professor Paolo Giubellino, and the current Director of the Biophysics Department and successor of Gerhard Kraft, Professor Marco Durante. “Gerhard Kraft – said Durante – was a pioneer and a visionary. His work has contributed to save many lives and to make the name GSI famous worldwide”. Professor Paolo Giubellino emphasized: “Gerhard Kraft was an outstanding scientist who was highly renowned nationally and internationally and played a decisive role in shaping the scientific reputation of GSI and FAIR. His research is of high relevance for society".
Professor Jürgen Debus from the University of Heidelberg delivered the memorial lecture. Subsequently, colleagues and fellow researchers had the opportunity to share their memories of Professor Gerhard Kraft through short talks. The speakers emphasized his importance as an outstanding person and professional.
After the lunch break, the event continued with the presentation of the Christoph Schmelzer Prize, which is awarded annually by the Association for the Promotion of Heavy Ion Tumor Therapy. This would have been in line with Professor Kraft's wishes, as he dedicated himself tirelessly to the education of young scientists and mentored significantly more than a hundred final theses. The awarding of the Schmelzer Prize was an important issue for him every year. The last public talk of Professor Kraft was indeed given at the 2022 Schmelzer Prize ceremony.
Following a welcome address by Dr. Hartmut Eickhoff, chairman of the board of the association, Professor Marco Durante gave the word of greeting on the occasion of the 25th Christoph Schmelzer Prize. As an internationally recognized expert in the fields of radiation biology and medical physics, he had recently dedicated the Henry Kaplan Prize, awarded to him, to Professor Gerhard Kraft. The Kaplan award is considered the top radiation research award.
With the Christoph Schmelzer Prize, the Association for the Promotion of Tumor Therapy with heavy ions, honors outstanding master's and doctoral theses in the field of tumor therapy with ion beams. Dr. Jonathan Berthold's receives the prize for his thesis entitled "Evaluation of a detector system for prompt gamma radiation for treatment monitoring in clinical proton therapy". In his thesis, he deals with the use of gamma radiation, which is generated by the interaction of proton beams with the irradiated tissue, to verify the spatial distribution of the dose.
For his dissertation entitled "Ultra-fast treatment delivery to enhance the potential of proton therapy", Dr Vivek Maradia focused on accelerator optimization, which enabled a significant increase in beam intensity. This allows a substantial reduction in irradiation time, which is particularly relevant for the improved treatment of moving tumours.
Luisa Schweins receives the prize for her Master's thesis entitled "Implementation and Evaluation of Monte Carlo Simulations for Carbon-Ion Radiotherapy Monitoring". She worked on the simulation of a new type of detector system for monitoring radiation application and validated these simulations using experimental studies.
The prize money for the dissertations is 1500 Euro each, for master's theses 750 Euro. The award is named after Professor Christoph Schmelzer, the co-founder and first Scientific Managing Director of GSI. The promotion of young scientists in the field of tumor therapy with ion beams has been continuing for many years, and the award was presented for the 25th time. The topics of the award-winning theses are of fundamental importance for the further development of ion beam therapy and often find their way into clinical application. (BP)
The Association for the Promotion of Tumor Therapy supports research activities in the field of tumor therapy with heavy ions with the aim of improving the treatment of tumors and making it available to general patient care. At the accelerator facility at GSI, more than 400 patients with tumors in the head and neck area were treated with ion beams as part of a pilot project from 1997 to 2008. The cure rates of this method are sometimes over 90 percent and the side effects are very low. The success of the pilot project led to the establishment of clinical ion beam therapy centers in Heidelberg and Marburg, where patients are now regularly treated with heavy ions.
Association for the Promotion of Tumor Therapy with Heavy Ions e.V.
Technical University of Dresden
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Quark-gluon plasma is a state of matter made of free quarks (particles that make up hadrons such as the proton and the neutron) and gluons (carriers of the strong interaction, which hold the quarks together inside the hadrons). In all but the most extreme conditions, quarks cannot exist individually and are bound inside hadrons. In heavy-ion collisions however, hundreds of protons and neutrons collide, forming a system with such density and temperature that a tiny fireball of quark-gluon plasma forms, the hottest substance known to exist. Inside this fireball quarks and gluons can move around freely for a split-second, until the plasma expands and cools down, turning back into hadrons.
Studies of quark-gluon plasma in this heavy-ion run focus on rare processes such as the production of heavy quarks, quarkonium states, real and virtual photons and heavy nuclear states. The increased number of collisions is expected to allow measurement of the temperature of the plasma using thermal radiation in the form of photons and electron-positron pairs. Hydrodynamic properties of the near-perfect liquid state of matter will thus be measured in greater detail and “tomography” using particles such as the charm or beauty quarks that are produced in the initial phase of the collision, pass through the plasma and are detected afterwards. All these measurements will be far more precise than before. Data taking for the run is complete and a total integrated luminosity of 2.16 per nanobarn could be reached.
For the purpose of performing these studies with the LHC’s improved lead-ion beam, significant upgrades have been implemented in ALICE’s collision detection and analysis. ALICE is now using an entirely new mode of data processing storing all collisions without selection, resulting in up to 100 times more collisions being recorded per second. In addition, its track reconstruction efficiency and precision have increased due to the installation of new subsystems and upgrades of existing ones.
GSI/FAIR has taken part in the development of new measurement instruments, in particular in the design and construction of the ALICE Time Projection Chamber (TPC), and in the ALICE scientific program from the very beginning. Also, GSI/FAIR contributed significantly to the development of the new readout chambers. A substantial part of the chambers was built in collaboration between the ALICE research department and the detector laboratory at GSI/FAIR. Staff from both departments also assisted in the insertion of the chambers on site at CERN.
The ALICE upgrade work at GSI/FAIR, completed in budget and in time, is crucial to fully exploit the collision rate of 50 kHz provided by the LHC. It was – in addition to the GSI/FAIR base funding – also financially supported by the Helmholtz Association together with other upgrades of LHC experiments.
Likewise, the IT department of GSI/FAIR made key contributions to the new software systems. The GSI/FAIR computer center remains an integral part of the computer network for data analysis of the ALICE experiment. The expertise from the upgrades is also relevant for the future operation of FAIR. For example, continuous data streams will also be read out at the Compressed Baryonic Matter (CBM) experiment. (CP)
The chemical element Darmstadtium celebrates its birthday on November 9. It was produced for the first time on this date in 1994 at the GSI accelerator facilities. The researchers shot atomic nuclei of nickel (atomic number 28) onto a foil of lead (atomic number 82). The fusion of the two nuclei produced element 110, which bears its name Darmstadtium — in honor of the city of Darmstadt — in all the world's periodic tables.
In addition to research into the production of superheavy elements, GSI/FAIR also provided information about the mega construction project FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research), which is currently being built next to the GSI premises in international cooperation. At FAIR, matter that usually only exists in the depth of space will be produced in the lab for research. Scientists from all over the world will be able to gain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe from the Big Bang to the present. (CP)
Research into superheavy elements
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The paper of Jonas Sommerfeldt of the Technical University of Braunschweig and his colleagues Vladimir. A. Yerokhin, Thomas Stöhlker, and Andrey Surzhykov is about improved calculations of a quantum phenomenon called Delbrück scattering resolve a long-standing discrepancy between theory and experiment. (BP)
Complete synopsis of Physics Magazine
Scientific publication J. Sommerfeldt, V. A. Yerokhin, Th. Stöhlker, and A. Surzhykov. All-Order Coulomb Corrections to Delbrück Scattering above the Pair-Production Threshold. Phys. Rev. Lett. 131, 061601 (2023)
]]>The #InnoDay23 showcased almost 70 start-ups, which presented their latest innovations and business models. The event also provided a platform for meetings between technology startups, sciencepreneurs, scientists and investors, business and politics. Lectures and panels, a pitch corner and the HIGHEST xchange area added to the program, offering impulse lectures and discussions on topics such as energy trends and new technologies for the climate change. In addition, various dialogue formats were available for exchange and networking in the startup ecosystem.
GSI and FAIR used their booth to illustrate how the technologies of both research institutions can result in cooperation opportunities for start-ups and business models. A special highlight was the accelerator model – a replica of GSI and FAIR that gave visitors a tangible understanding of the technology of accelerator facilities.
Visitors also had the opportunity to learn more about GSI/FAIR's technology transfer cooperation opportunities. One of the decisive key projects, especially for start-ups and applied research and development partners, is the living laboratory “Digital Open Lab” in the high-performance data center “Green IT Cube” of GSI and FAIR. Likewise, the new tech-up network “TuNe” of GSI/FAIR was presented at the event for the first time. People interested in founding a company and those supporting it can register to actively network with GSI and FAIR in the field of entrepreneurship.
The conversations at the booth focused mainly on young start-up enthusiasts. The concepts of technology transfer and opportunities for collaboration were discussed in depth. The large number of start-up presentations made it possible to explore further potential for future collaborations.
Young startup enthusiasts in particular attended the event in large numbers, many of them looking for job opportunities in the thriving startup scene of Darmstadt, Hesse’s startup capital. This highlights the importance of events like Start-up & Innovation Day, which not only promote the founding of new companies but also create job opportunities in the region. (CP)
The Green IT Cube is an environmentally friendly high-performance data center with a special cooling system. The generated heat is dissipated through water cooling on the racks’ back doors and supplies an adjacent canteen and office building with heat. The company NDC-Garbe, the cooperation partner for the Cube concept, represented by Managing Director Peter Pohlschröder, was also available on the day of the event to answer visitors' questions.
By dispensing with complex cooling of the high-volume room air and instead using an innovative water cooling system, the energy required for cooling is reduced to about one tenth compared to conventional data centers (PUE≈1.07). With half the floor height, the computer cabinets can be arranged much more densely, as in a high-bay warehouse, which reduces investment costs. For its special environmental friendliness, the Green IT Cube received, among other awards, the Blue Angel, the Federal German Government's eco label.
In the framework of the visit, participants were also able to take part in a virtual reality experience: The company DC Smarter allowed to test its DC Vision® solution. By combining a digital twin with augmented reality, the software optimizes key data center tasks such as remote hands services, documentation management and visual inspections.
The implementation of the DC Vision® solution is part of the living lab Digital Open Lab of GSI/FAIR. In the future, among the research and development projects to be carried out via the Digital Open Lab will be those on the more sustainable operation of data centers, together with industrial partners. Likewise, partners from the scientific environment have the opportunity to use the data center for their research work.
Data centers are unfamiliar places to most people, so the question “Where does the Internet live?” is a valid one. The TdoRZ was the culmination of the awareness campaign of the same name initiated by the German Datacenter Association (GDA), the representative body of the data center industry in Germany. The association actively invited all data center operators in Germany to join the initiative and open their doors on September 29.
Twenty data center operators in 16 German cities across the country opened their doors. Guided tours gave interested parties the opportunity to find out what goes on in data centers and what central importance they have for modern life. (CP)
During an introductory presentation, the guests were given a comprehensive overview of the ongoing research activities at GSI and FAIR, as well as the current status of the construction of the international FAIR project. During a guided tour, they had the opportunity to visit several research facilities on the GSI campus. Among them were the experimental storage ring ESR, which was explained by Dr. Markus Steck, the therapy unit for tumor treatment with heavy ions as well as the large-scale experiment R3B. The energy-efficient supercomputing center Green IT Cube, which Helmut Kreiser informed about, and the test stand for superconducting accelerator magnets, where high-tech components for FAIR are tested, as Dr. Claus Schroeder explained in detail, were visited as well.
A view from the FAIR viewing platform gave the guests an overview of the construction progress on the FAIR construction site. Afterwards, they had the opportunity to take a tour of the construction site and to get a closer look at the individual construction sections. The program included the underground accelerator ring tunnel SIS100, the central beamline and transfer building, and the buildings for the experimental sites. (JL)
]]>The interactions between electrons, ions, and photons within the material ejected from a neutron-star merger determine the light that we can see through telescopes. These processes and the emitted light can be modelled with computer simulations of radiative transfer. Researchers have recently produced, for the first time, a three-dimensional simulation that self-consistently follows the neutron-star merger, neutron-capture nucleosynthesis, energy deposited by radioactive decay, and radiative transfer with tens of millions of atomic transitions of heavy elements.
Being a 3D model, the observed light can be predicted for any viewing direction. When viewed nearly perpendicular to the orbital plane of the two neutron stars (as observational evidence indicates for the kilonova AT2017gfo) the model predicts a sequence of spectral distributions that look remarkably similar to what has been observed for AT2017gfo. “Research in this area will help us to understand the origins of elements heavier than iron (such as platinum and gold) that were mainly produced by the rapid neutron capture process in neutron star mergers,” says Shingles.
About half of the elements heavier than iron are produced in an environment of extreme temperatures and neutron densities, as achieved when two neutron stars merge with each other. When they eventually spiral in toward each other and coalesce, the resulting explosion leads to the ejection of matter with the appropriate conditions to produce unstable neutron-rich heavy nuclei by a sequence of neutron captures and beta-decays. These nuclei decay to stability, liberating energy that powers an explosive ‘kilonova’ transient, a bright emission of light that rapidly fades in about a week.
The 3D simulation combines together several areas of physics, including the behavior of matter at high densities, the properties of unstable heavy nuclei, and atom-light interactions of heavy elements. Further challenges remain, such as accounting for the rate at which the spectral distribution changes, and the description of material ejected at late times. Future progress in this area will increase the precision with which we can predict and understand features in the spectra and will further our understanding of the conditions in which heavy elements were synthesized. A fundamental ingredient for these models is high quality atomic and nuclear experimental data as will be provided by the FAIR facility. (LW)
Located near Geneva airport, the LHCb experiment is one of the four big experiments at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC). Dedicated to study so-called b-quarks, LHCb uses a set of successive detectors to study the traces of the particles thrown forward from the collision point. One of these detectors is the outer tracker, that was replaced during Long Shutdown 2 by a new setup based on scintillating fibers, the SciFi. The latter comes with a more refined granularity, allowing for a higher spatial resolution of the tracked particles.
After a decade of detecting particles, the outer tracker was still in good shape and working perfectly. After discussing the spare detector module at a conference with colleagues from the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, the LHCb collaboration decided to donate it to the PANDA (antiProton ANihilation at DArmstadt) experiment, which will be hosted by FAIR – the Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research – currently under construction at GSI.
At PANDA, the outer tracker will partly go back to resume its initial function of tracing the smallest building blocks of matter. With the aid of the FAIR accelerators, antiproton beams will be generated and stored, then collided with fixed targets (e.g. hydrogen) inside the PANDA detector setup. As this will happen at lower energies, the outer tracker will fit in perfectly to detect the light hadrons produced by the collisions. Hadron spectroscopy is where the physics goals of LHCb and PANDA overlap, and the two will be able to collect complementary data that can later be analyzed and compared. The tracker will also be used by students and young researchers in R&D projects, and in addition, in outreach activities for schools and the general public.
Transporting the tracker was no easy feat: In its transport frame, it is seven meters long, 3.5 meters wide and 5.5 meters high. It also weighs 24 tons. In 2018, when the disassembly started, the whole outer tracker was unmounted, placed in its transport frame – a specially designed handling cage – and removed from the LHCb cavern. Subsequently, it was moved to a storage hall within CERN, and more recently to near Sergy, France for the release procedures and finally back to near LHCb in Meyrin, Switzerland, where it was prepared for shipping. Hoisted up by cranes onto a truck, the detector began its journey from CERN to GSI/FAIR. Near Colmar, France, it was loaded on a ship for a multi-day journey up the Rhine river. At Gernsheim, Germany, another truck waited for the tracker and brought it safely to GSI/FAIR in Darmstadt where it will start its second life.
The close cooperation in the logistics and technical aspects by several colleagues at CERN and GSI/FAIR made the donation possible, in particular the relentless efforts of Niels Tuning (LHCb, Nikhef/CERN) and Anastasios Belias (PANDA, GSI/FAIR) with their vision for a second life of the formidable outer tracker. The donation was kindly agreed upon by the LHCb groups who meticulously built and operated the outer tracker, namely,
“Think about sending samples from, say, CERN to GSI,” explains Jörgen Larsson, Vice Chair of RI.Logistica, who recently visited GSI/FAIR with a delegation to take a look at the FAIR construction site. “How should they be transported, insured and declared at customs? Imagine if scientific infrastructures had a customs tariff code that automatically flagged our imports duty-free. This is the kind of change research infrastructures can achieve together if we speak with one voice.”
For the GSI/FAIR logistics team, the membership in RI.Logistica means access to powerful network partners like the World Customs Organisation as well as preferred, common rates on insurance and customs brokerage and shared best practice on everything from warehousing to warranty.
Currently, GSI/FAIR are working with RI.Logistica on a “health check” of the processes, looking together for ways of addressing the immediate challenges the FAIR mega-project presents and anticipating those of the future. (CP)
The experiment was conducted at the Radioactive Ion Beam Factory (RIBF) at the RIKEN research center in Japan. The 28O nuclei were produced in collisions of accelerated ions of the radioactive fluorine isotope 29F with a hydrogen target, in which a proton was shot out of the fluorine. Subsequently, the decay of the 28O into 24O and four neutrons had to be measured. Thanks to the utilization of the NeuLAND neutron detector setup, four neutrons could be observed in coincidence with the charged remnant nucleus for the first time.
“NeuLAND is being developed at GSI/FAIR and built with the participation of German university groups for the R3B experiment at the FAIR facility. For the current experiment, we flew the detector to RIKEN in Japan and recommissioned it on site,” explains Professor Thomas Aumann, who heads the Research department Nuclear Reactions at GSI/FAIR and holds a professorship for experimental nuclear physics with exotic ion beams at TU Darmstadt. “The realization required an extraordinary effort, in which the Darmstadt groups at GSI/FAIR and the TU Darmstadt made a central contribution.”
The most stable oxygen isotope is composed of eight protons and eight neutrons, while 28O has eight protons and 20 neutrons. Understanding the properties of such extremely neutron-rich nuclei is of great importance for the further development and for tests of modern nuclear theories. These, in turn, form the basis for predicting and understanding properties of neutron-rich nuclei and neutron-rich nuclear matter, which play a major role in our universe, for example in the synthesis of the heavy elements. They are for example produced in collisions of neutron stars, which have recently been detected by multi-messenger astronomy using the measurement of gravitational waves.
“The result impressively highlights the relevance and contribution of the detector setups developed for FAIR, such as in this case the NeuLAND detector, which was essential to conduct the experiment,” says Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR. “Together with our Japanese colleagues, with whom we have a long-standing successful collaboration, and in an international team of top researchers, we were able to achieve this outstanding result, of which all involved can be very proud.”
The participation of German universities in the development and construction of the R3B NeuLAND detector was substantially supported through the BMBF's collaborative research program. The experiment was funded by the DFG through the collaborative research center SFB 1245 “Atomic nuclei: From Fundamental Interactions to Structure and Stars” at the TU Darmstadt. (CP)
In line with the interdisciplinary character of biological radiation research, the program of the meeting reflected the broad scientific spectrum covered by the activities of the DeGBS members. Topics of the sessions were the basic mechanisms of radiation action of different radiation qualities, the signaling impact of radiation on intra- and extracellular communication, systemic and extra-cellular factors affecting radiation responses, and physics and radiobiology of innovative approaches for radiotherapy. A special topic presentation highlighted the scientific challenges of modern radiation-protection research in the context of the current knowledge in the field.
Each of the four scientific sessions started with an introduction by a keynote lecture. Renowned national and international experts were invited to open the respective sessions with keynote lectures. These were s followed by the presentation of five proffered papers, and a poster session. The program of the meeting started with a Young Investigators' (jDeGBS) session, which aims at exchanging information and experiences that are of particular importance for the students and young research fellows. This was chaired by Dr. Alexander Helm from GSI Biophysics and Dr. Johann Matschke from Essen University Hospital.
At the conference, DeGBS also commemorated its honorary member Professor Gerhard Kraft, founder of the Biophysics Department at GSI and father of heavy ion therapy in Europe, who passed away in March 2023. The obituary of the Biophysics department says: “He was one of the strongest ‘motors’ of radiation research in Germany during the last decades. We are grateful to him for his important ideas and impulses, and will preserve his memory as an outstanding scientist and mentor.”
The Ulrich Hagen Award and the Dieter Frankenberg Young Investigator Award were also presented during the annual meeting. The Ulrich Hagen Prize of the DeGBS has been awarded since 2004 to researchers for outstanding contributions to radiation research in Germany, usually in honor of a lifetime achievement. This year, the prize went to Professor Horst Zitzelsberger, Helmholtz Munich. The Dieter Frankenberg Young Investigator Award recognizes outstanding achievements by young researchers in the field of biological radiation research. The prize was awarded to Dr. Johanna Mirsch, Faculty of Biology/TU Darmstadt.
The annual meeting of the German Society for Biological Radiation Research was organized for the third time by members of the GSI Department of Biophysics, headed by Professor Marco Durante. After the founding event in 1996 in Gießen, it is the 24th meeting of the DeGBS. (BP)
“GSI and FAIR have world-leading accelerator facilities in operation and, with the construction of FAIR, a new international flagship project in the pipeline. After eleven years of working with electron beams, it is therefore a fascinating task for me to return to the world of hadron accelerators, of which there are very few large facilities worldwide,” Aßmann comments his start. “It is my goal to serve the planned user experiments with the existing accelerators in the best possible way, to make the present facilities fit for the future step by step, and, last but not least, to successfully commission the entire GSI/FAIR accelerator complex with the GSI accelerator team. Bringing these tasks together involves various challenges but also new opportunities that I, as head of the business area, will be happy to tackle with the departments and their heads.”
In his work, Aßmann aims to preserve and cultivate what has been tried and tested, while integrating new and innovative approaches. He plans to foster a strengthened collaboration with regional universities to advance accelerator physics and technology and to solve challenges at GSI/FAIR. Examples include the use of advanced methods such as artificial intelligence in accelerator theory and operation, new optimization methods for particle beams, and the development of innovative accelerator structures or instrumentation. Aßmann also plans to collaborate closely on these and other topics within the Helmholtz Association and with other German, European and international partners. “With the observation of neutron star collisions in gravitational wave detectors, which is only now possible, and with innovative approaches in tumor therapy, research with ion accelerators is gaining additional momentum and new potential for discovery, both in basic research and its applications. That's where I'd like to be involved as a scientist.” (CP)
Ralph Aßmann has obtained his doctorate in physics from the Ludwig-Maximilians-University in Munich. His PhD research was performed at the Max Planck Institute for Physics in Munich and at CERN in the ALEPH experiment on the mass of the Z boson, spin polarized particle beams and precise energy calibration. He then spent almost four years as research associate and staff at Stanford University and SLAC, where he worked on operation, modelling and design of the colliders.
For the next 15 years he worked at CERN in leading roles on the LEP and LHC colliders. He was an LHC machine coordinator in run I of the LHC operation, that led to the discovery of the Higgs boson in 2012. In this role he helped to commission and to optimize the world-leading proton and heavy ion beams of the LHC.
In Summer 2012 he moved as Leading Scientist for Accelerator R&D to DESY, where he researched new, compact accelerators. He was awarded an ERC synergy grant together with three colleagues in 2014. Until a replacement has been identified, Dr. Assmann is the founding coordinator of the EuPRAXIA ESFRI project, a 569 M€ project on building the world-wide first user facility based on plasma-based accelerators that is supported by more than 50 institutes.
He has been the Chair of the Accelerator Group in the European Physical Society from 2020 - 2023, the proposer and initial coordinating PI of the 30 M€ Helmholtz ATHENA project, the leader of several European funding grants and coordinator of the European Network for Novel Accelerators.
Each year, the Summer Student Program offers a glimpse into research at an accelerator laboratory. "The experience at GSI is an unmissable opportunity to meet different perspectives on physics from different cultures, which means for us to deeply understand what our goals and expectations are," says Benedetto Spadavecchia from the University of Turin.
All summer students worked on their own small scientific or technical project from ongoing research in a research group. The topics ranged from atomic physics and materials science to nuclear physics and astrophysics. Developments and tests of technical and experimental components for the FAIR accelerator facility, which is currently being built at GSI, and its future experiments were the main focus. “For me, it was the first time being in such a large facility and also the first summer program abroad, “ says Raluca-Andreea Miron from the University of Bucharest. “I enjoyed working on my project and meeting remarkable researchers here at GSI, who inspired me to continue to be curious about science. I am glad to share these two months in Germany with amazing people from all over the world, who have become my friends. The summer student program at GSI is an outstanding experience for every student in STEM.”
Many of the international students come back to Darmstadt after the Summer Student Program for a master or doctoral thesis at GSI and FAIR. Already for the 41st time the Summer Student Program took place, which is organized in cooperation with the graduate school HGS-HIRe. In addition to scientific events, the program included a pedestrian rally, sports activities and self-organized ventures in the region. Accompanying lectures presented the broad research spectrum of GSI and FAIR and the scientific results achieved. (LW)
During their visit, the Polish students also had the opportunity to visit several major research institutions in the region, including the Heidelberg Institute of Technology and the Helmholtz Institute Mainz. The program, arranged by the FAIR-International Cooperations Unit and the Faculty of Physics, Astronomy and Applied Computer Science at the Jagiellonian University, introduced the students to a wide range of scientific disciplines and technological advances. In addition, the guests were able to attend lectures of the International Summer Student Program at GSI/FAIR and gain insights into ongoing research activities and cutting-edge projects in various laboratories and departments on the GSI/FAIR campus.
During a discussion with the Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Jörg Blaurock, the students had the opportunity to exchange ideas and report on their experiences. This exchange of ideas was very valuable for the students and left a lasting impression on their academic pursuits. “As you embark on this journey of exploration, remember that knowledge unlocks endless possibilities. Your visit to GSI and FAIR opens minds to science and technology wonders. Embrace challenges, dream big, and seek answers to the universe's mysteries. Your passion will shape scientific research's future, leaving a profound impact on the world. So, go forth with determination, for the pursuit of knowledge knows no boundaries. Together, let's make a difference“, said Jörg Blaurock.
“Witnessing the students of our Jagiellonian University's Physics Scientific Club engage in this enriching study tour in Germany to GSI and FAIR facility fills me with great pride. Such experiences are not just journeys; they are vital passages that nurture curiosity, broaden intellect, and inspire a lifelong pursuit of knowledge. I am thankful for all the support and insights provided at the facilities in GSI/FAIR though International Cooperations Unit of FAIR/GSI”, said Piotr Salabura, Professor at Jagiellonian University.
The students also gave an extremely positive feedback, PhD student Ania emphasized: “I think it is a common misconception for young people that getting involved with an international research group is achievable only if one is very experienced, has huge knowledge, and that even then it is extremely hard. This is not true for GSI. What people here are showing us is that motivation, curiosity and a passion to learn can easily make one’s dream come true. From the variety of disciplines and experiments, one can find the most suitable and pursue a dream career.”
Poland is one of FAIR's major shareholders and is shaping FAIR's progress in various areas of development and production: For example, Poland contributes profoundly to the HADES detector. Polish know-how has been also pivotal for the development of the electronics for CBM's silicon tracking detector and for the straw tube tracker of PANDA's Forward Detector, as well as for the cryogenic systems in the large accelerator ring SIS100 and in the Super Fragment Separator.
The partnership with Jagiellonian University Krakow lasts since end of the 70’es and is also a link to inspire young minds. During the “FAIR Days” 2021 FAIR/GSI and Jagiellonian University signed a new cooperation agreement (“Memorandum of Understanding”) and an agreement on student and staff mobility within the framework of the GET_INvolved program to further deepen their cooperation. (BP)
The Jagiellonian University (JU) was founded on 12 May 1364 by the Polish king Casimir the Great. It is the oldest higher education institution in Poland and one of the oldest in Europe. Jagiellonian University was nominated by the Minister of Science and Higher Education for international shareholder in FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research in Europe) GmbH. The Jagiellonian University has been coordinating and managing Polish participation in the FAIR program since 2010. The Jagiellonian University – Faculty of Physics, Astronomy and Applied Computer Science – is working on several large projects related to the design of FAIR’s scientific equipment.
The GET_INvolved Programme provides international students and early-stage researchers from partner institutions with opportunities to perform internships, traineeships and early-stage research experience to get involved in the international FAIR accelerator project while receiving scientific and technical training.
For more information on the GET_INvolved Programme, interested persons can contact the respective coordinators: Dr. Pradeep Ghosh (GSI and FAIR) and Professor Dr. Piotr Salabura (Jagiellonian University)
The publication from Andrey Bondarev, a postdoc researcher at Helmholtz Institute Jena, an outstation of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, James Gillanders a postdoc researcher in Rome, and their colleagues is about new insights into heavy elements production in neutron star mergers. (BP)
Dr. Lennart Volz studied physics at the Ruprecht Karls University of Heidelberg. For his master's thesis at the University of Heidelberg on the feasibility of using ion beams for the imaging of patients, he received the Christoph Schmelzer Award 2017. During his Masters, Dr. Lennart Volz also worked as a research associate at Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, in Boston. Until 2021 he was a postdoctoral researcher at the German Cancer Research Center DKFZ, Department of Biomedical Physics in Radiation Oncology, since then he is a postdoctoral researcher at the GSI Biophysics Department, his focus is on Medical Physics. Between 2021 and 2023 he also held a position as visiting researcher at the University College London in the Particle and Advanced Radiotherapy (PART) group.
In his dissertation, which received several honors and was supervised by Professor Joao Seco, Heidelberg, Dr. Lennart Volz focused on an improvement and on new methods of particle imaging for tumor therapy with ions. Treatment with ion beams is a highly effective and at the same time very sparing therapy method, but range uncertainty limits its applications. In current clinical practice, a major cause of range uncertainties resides in the conversion of the treatment planning x-ray CT to the patient specific relative stopping power (RSP) map. By measuring the energy loss of particles after traversing the patient, particle imaging enables a more direct reconstruction of the RSP, that is crucial for accurate treatment planning. By measuring the energy loss of particles after traversing the patient, particle imaging enables a more direct reconstruction of the RSP. In his thesis, Dr. Lennart Volz investigated different aspects towards the clinical implementation of particle imaging: First, he developed a theoretical description of the spatial resolution for different particle radiography algorithms in order to explain observed limitations and demonstrated a novel filtering technique for imaging with helium ions that can differentiate secondary particles from the relevant primary particles. With the new filtering method, he demonstrated experimental helium ion CTs with both high spatial resolution and high RSP accuracy. First results from an experimental comparison between particle and x-ray CT modalities for RSP prediction were presented.
Furthermore, Dr. Lennart Volz explored a novel technique for intra-treatment helium ion imaging based on a mixed helium/carbon beam with that relative range changes in the millimeter regime were observable. Finally, novel particle imaging detector designs were investigated. With the results of his dissertation, Dr. Lennart Volz was able to highlight the potential of particle imaging, and in particular helium ion imaging, for image guidance in particle therapy.
The Otto Haxel Prize was endowed by the entrepreneur and physicist Professor Dr. Hans-Joachim Langmann in memory of his doctoral supervisor. The nuclear physicist Professor Dr. Otto Haxel was scientific director of the Nuclear Research Center Karlsruhe from 1970 to 1975. The Otto Haxel Award for Physics has been awarded since 2017 in cooperation with the German Physical Society for the three best PhD theses in physics at the universities of Göttingen and Heidelberg and at KIT, Otto Haxel's three places of work. (BP)
]]>Light atoms, such as hydrogen or helium, play a special role in physics. They have only few electrons, which means their spectra can be calculated using our fundamental theories to exceptional precision. For this purpose, the precise knowledge of their properties, such as their mass, is essential. The atomic mass of helium-4 measured in the current experiment can for example be used to determine the mass of the electron, an important fundamental constant. Measurements in this mass range performed by different research groups have been inconsistent in the past. The current Penning-trap-based precision measurement significantly boosts the reliability of our tabulated fundamental constants.
Penning traps, in which individual charged particles can be confined for long periods of time using electric and magnetic fields, have proven to be precision scales for ions. The trapped particle performs a characteristic circular motion in the trap that depends on its mass — heavy particles oscillate more slowly than light ones. If two different, single ions are measured one after the other in the same trap, the ratio of their masses can be determined exactly.
To perform the helium measurement, the scientists used the so-called LIONTRAP (Light-Ion Trap), located at the University of Mainz and developed and built within a collaboration of the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics and GSI. In the 3.8 Tesla strong magnetic field of LIONTRAP, the stored helium nuclei moved on circular paths with a radius of about ten micrometers. Carbon ions, which were also trapped, served as a mass comparison.
As a result, the researchers obtained the mass of the helium nucleus to 4,001 506 179 651(48) atomic units, with the number in parentheses indicating the uncertainty of the last digits. This result has an accuracy 1.3 times greater than the current literature value but deviates from it by 6.6 standard deviations. Additional measurements of, for example, helium-3 systems are planned for the future to resolve the inconsistencies with measurements from other research groups.
In the future, precision mass measurements with Penning traps will also be employed at the FAIR facility currently under construction at GSI. With aid of the HITRAP ion trap setup, which is part of FAIR’s APPA experiment pillar, it is planned to determine the binding energies of electrons in heavy ions with different charge states to test quantum electrodynamics. Further trap experiments in the NUSTAR pillar want to measure nuclear binding energies to test nuclear models for the synthesis of chemical elements in our universe. (CP)
The visit was part of a summer meeting of the SPD Parliamentary Group in Wiesbaden, which also included information tours to various companies and top sites in the region. On the GSI and FAIR campus, the political visitors gained insights into the scientific successes and current status of the FAIR project, one of the largest construction projects for cutting-edge research worldwide and at the same time a strong pillar of the German and European research landscape in global competition. They got a compact overview of science, structural and technical progress, and the development at the site in the heart of the Rhine-Main region.
The program also offered a tour of the GSI campus and an overview of the FAIR construction site. The guests visited the linear accelerator UNILAC, which Dr. Hartmut Vormann explained, the experiment HADES, which was developed in international research cooperation, and the therapy unit for tumor treatment with heavy ions. From the viewing platform, the guests were given an overview of the entire FAIR construction site. They were able to take a direct look at the work in progress on the 20-hectare area.
The FAIR project is rated by experts as a top international science project for decades, offering world class opportunities and outstanding potential for groundbreaking discoveries. FAIR makes value contributions to society on many levels, whether as a driver of innovation, provider of highly qualified jobs and in education of young scientists and engineers or in the development of new medical applications. (BP)
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Professor Volker Koch and Professor Nu Xu are both from the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory. Volker Koch holds the professorship for theoretical heavy-ion physics and has been the laboratory’s nuclear physics division head. Nu Xu is professor for experimental heavy-ion physics and the former spokesman of STAR, a flagship experiment at the Relativistic Heavy-Ion Collider (RHIC) at the Brookhaven National Laboratory. Professor Takaharu Otsuka held the chair of theoretical nuclear physics at the University of Tokyo until his retirement. Taka Otsuka and Nu Xu are both recipients of Humboldt Research Awards, while Volker Koch is currently an EMMI Visiting Professor.
GSI and FAIR took the unique opportunity to discuss with these colleagues in an interview the motivation why they have chosen GSI for their long-term stay, and what personally fascinates them from the many science options at FAIR. Despite very different perspectives and different scientific expectations with regard to the FAIR research pillars, the three scientists have one thing in common: the anticipation of outstanding research prospects and decisive advances in knowledge in a unique world leading research infrastructure at FAIR. The whole interview can be read here:
You all three are world-leading scientists and come from prestigious institutions. Why did you choose GSI for your research stays?
Volker Koch: The Rhein-Main-Neckar region is the center of gravity in nuclear science, in particular in my field of interest, which focuses on the properties of the strong force at the high-density and high-energy frontiers as it can be explored in heavy-ion collisions. There is for example the HADES experiment, which has taken exciting data in their latest runs within the FAIR Phase-0 program, which we try to understand now. It is of great advantage to have many experts on campus and at the neighboring universities with whom we can look at these data from very different angles. In fact, I have missed such a stimulating scientific atmosphere during the pandemic and I every much enjoy the daily discussion taking place here. Of course, we also discuss the future opportunities, in particular the CBM experiment at FAIR, which we hope will answer some of the fundamental questions in our field of research.
Nu Xu: Indeed, the phase diagram of Quantum Chromodynamics, which describes the properties of the strong force as function of temperature and density, has still several open fundamental questions. I was much involved in the preparation and in the execution of experiments of the STAR collaboration where we have tried to explore whether this phase diagram exhibits a critical point like it is familiar to us from the phase diagram of water. Unfortunately, the STAR experiment left a gap in the data, which is needed to answer this question. The place from which we expect the answer is the CBM experiment at FAIR. To prepare this unique and scientifically extremely important experiment I am here.
Takaharu Otsuka: My scientific interest is somewhat different from that of my colleagues as I try to develop models, which describe the many facets of nuclear structure. Here the frontier are exotic unstable nuclei, which for example have a large number of extra neutrons compared to their stable counterparts. These nuclei and their properties are, however, crucial if we want to develop a general model, which describes the many phenomena the nuclear many-body system exhibits. For example, we have learnt in recent years that nuclear magic numbers, which are a cornerstone of nuclear structure whose explanation was awarded a Nobel Prize, are different in exotic from those in stable nuclei. We could recently show that among others the tensor force plays a crucial role in these exotic nuclei. In my career, I have benefitted very much from close contact to experimentalists, which some years ago were my colleagues at RIKEN. Now I think that in the future the NUSTAR experiments at FAIR will have the leading role in understanding many aspects of the structure of exotic nuclei beyond the present reach. In particular, I am interested in the physics, which determines the limit of existence in very neutron-rich nuclei where FAIR opens completely new perspectives. Therefore, I am happy to intensify my collaboration with my theory and experiment colleagues in Darmstadt. I hope that both sides will benefit from these activities.
Professor Xu, you mentioned the STAR experiment at RHIC, which is one example that there are also other facilities worldwide which explore the science which will be in the focus at FAIR. Professor Otsuka, you referred to the Japanese flagship facility RIKEN. Perhaps you can elaborate where you see the advantages of FAIR and perhaps its uniqueness?
NX: The Brookhaven activities are finished leaving important questions unanswered. In my view, CBM is in the position to answer them. Actually, if there were other facilities, which were better advanced than CBM, I would have joined these activities. But there is none. If FAIR can deliver SIS100 beams the CBM collaboration will be ready for data taking. And the CBM experiment has the high-rate capabilities to decide whether a critical point exists in the QCD phase diagram or not.
VK: Indeed, to answer this fundamental science question statistics is the name of the game and CBM has the capability to deliver the required rate of data. This allows actually much more than to prove the existence of the critical point. For example, one can also explore the symmetry energy at densities twice or even three-times the value of saturation density, as it exists inside of heavy nuclei like lead. Such high densities are of crucial importance in many astrophysical environments, like core-collapse supernovae or neutron star mergers. The CBM data will also provide very valuable constraints for the nuclear Equation of State, which governs the structure of neutron stars, which are the most compact objects which one can study directly in the Universe. In fact, there are so many upcoming activities in astrophysics opening the era of multi-messenger exploration of the Universe, which all are intimately related to science, which will be, often for the first time, explored at FAIR. During my stay in Darmstadt, my colleagues and I have developed several new ideas how this complementarity can be optimally explored. I am really looking forward that FAIR will be switched on and the CBM and NUSTAR experiments start. This will be a new game in town, as we say in California.
TO: The FAIR facility offers significantly higher bombarding energies than the other facilities. This allows to explore mass regions in the nuclear chart which are not easily accessible with other accelerators, making the global activities complementary in many aspects. This opens exciting perspectives for my research interest. It is very exciting that FAIR will soon deliver for example first data on the very neutron-rich nuclei, which build the third peak in the astrophysical r-process, which is often referred to as the "gold peak". We have predicted the half-lives for the nuclei in the gold peak and it will be nice to see whether we have been right. Let me stress another important point. Also many activities at FAIR, although unique on the global level, are very complimentary. Take the symmetry energy, which my colleagues Volker Koch and Nu Xu want to study at very high densities. It is also relevant for astrophysical applications to know it at densities at and below saturation. This behavior can be studied with the R3B experiment within the NUSTAR collaboration.
Your home countries have very strong activities in heavy-ion and nuclear structure science. Which role does FAIR play for these communities?
VK: The US Nuclear Physics community is currently preparing its Longe Range Plan, which also addresses the future opportunities of the research on high-density nuclear matter, that is the behavior of the QCD phase diagram at high densities as it will be explored at FAIR. I am not personally involved in the writing team, but I know that the intellectual interest of my theory colleagues in this field is tremendous. Personally, I am also convinced that there will be a growing American participation in CBM.
NX: I share the view of my colleague Volker Koch concerning the interest in the US. But I like to add, that also in my mother country China there is a very large interest in the CBM physics, carried by six institutions including many postdoctoral and graduate students. The Chinese colleagues have been involved in the STAR experiment at RHIC and bring their expertise now to CBM. To underline the Chinese interest, components of the time-of-flight detector system for CBM have been built in China. They are tested and ready to be employed at FAIR. We need a SIS100 beam.
TO: There is an existing strong interaction between the Japanese and GSI activities in nuclear structure, but also in other FAIR research fields like atomic or biophysics. Some FAIR detectors developed by the NUSTAR collaboration have already been tested and used in experiments at RIKEN. But the exchange is in both directions. One interesting research field at FAIR will be hypernuclei, which is regular nuclei to which a lambda particle, which carries a strange quark, is added. Japan has a long history in hypernuclear research. But now we bring activities to FAIR based on a Memorandum of Understanding signed by RIKEN and GSI/FAIR where we jointly open research on neutron-rich hypernuclei. FAIR provides the SIS100 accelerator and the Super FRS, the equipment to produce such really exotic nuclei, and RIKEN develops and builds a novel detector which allows to study these hypernuclei. RIKEN has in fact very positive experience with such collaborative efforts abroad, for example, with a dedicated hadron physics program at Brookhaven. I am sure that also the RIKEN-FAIR project will be a success.
What is the scientific highlight you personally wish to see delivered by FAIR?
NX: With its high-rate capability and the other available observables, CBM will answer the question whether a critical point exists in the QCD phase diagram, or not. CBM will also constrain the nuclear equation of state to a level that it has a very strong impact on the understanding of astrophysical objects like neutron stars or supernovae. I would like to add that while the high-energy programs at CERN focus on the properties of the quark-gluon plasma – the form of matter as it exists in the very early phase of the Universe, here we concentrate on the properties of matter at high densities. If CERN is the high-energy frontier, FAIR is the high-density frontier. Both programs are complementary to each other and are both necessary for understanding the QCD phase diagram.
VK: The critical point and the equation of state are certainly also on the top of my list. But CBM can do more, perhaps answer questions which we do not even think about now. For example, recent lattice QCD calculations predict that the interaction between two Omega baryons is attractive. CBM with its very high event rate is likely the only experiment, which can check this prediction.
TO: In general, I expect from the NUSTAR experiments at FAIR decisive progress in our general understanding of the nucleus as a many-body system, already from phase 0 experiments and then more once FAIR is operational. It would be quite exciting to understand the boundaries of nuclear existence as a function of neutron excess but also in the regime of superheavy nuclei, derived from nucleons as the fundamental building blocks and the strong and Coulomb forces acting between them. But I personally would also like to explore whether hypernuclei might be a tool to probe the emergence of nuclear shapes. There are some hints, which have recently emerged that nuclei might have a wider spectrum of geometric shapes than usually assumed.
Thank you very much for this discussion. We wish you a successful stay in Darmstadt and many fruitful returns to GSI and later to FAIR. (GSI)
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The award recognizes Professor Durante's outstanding achievements in the field of radiation research. Since 1987, the IARR, the umbrella organization of the world radiation research societies, has presented the prestigious Henry S. Kaplan Distinguished Scientist Award every four years to an outstanding scientist to recognize their achievements in the field of radiation research. Nominations are done by individuals or national societies. Professor Durante was jointly nominated by the German and Italian radiation research societies.
Professor Durante is an internationally recognized expert in the fields of radiation biology and medical physics, especially for therapy with heavy ions and radioprotection in space. He made important scientific progress in the field of biodosimetry of charged particles, optimization of particle therapy, and shielding of heavy ions in space. Professor Durante's expertise is in high demand internationally. Currently, he is president of the Particle Therapy Co-Operative Group (PTCOG), a worldwide organization of scientists and professionals interested in proton, light ion and heavy charged particle radiotherapy. He was elected by the PTCOG Steering Committee, to which each clinical particle therapy center in the world sends representatives.
"I wish to dedicate this award to Professor Gerhard Kraft, who passed away this year and has been the founder of the biophysics department at GSI and the father of heavy ion therapy in Europe. It is a great honor for me to receive this award. The Henry Kaplan Prize is an enormous motivation and also a recognition of the topics that have moved me for many years and are important for me. Continuously developing the benefits of radiation research and making even better use of its potential is a major goal, for example for an even more effective cancer therapy or for the safe exploration of space. This drives me personally, but also our joint research in biophysics at GSI and in the future at the FAIR facility," emphasized Professor Marco Durante.
Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, is delighted about the award and stressed: “We are extremely proud of this prestigious award, which recognizes the exceptional standing of Prof Durante but also the world-class quality of the GSI and FAIR program in radiation biology and therapy.”
Professor Durante studied physics and got his PhD at the University Federico II in Italy. His post doc positions took him to the NASA Johnson Space Center in Texas and to the National Institute of Radiological Sciences in Japan. During his studies, he specialized in charged particle therapy, cosmic radiation, radiation cytogenetics and radiation biophysics. He has received numerous awards for his research, including the Galileo Galilei prize from the European Federation of Organizations for Medical Physics, the Warren Sinclair award of the US National Council of Radiation Protection (NCRP), the IBA Europhysics Prize of the European Physical Society (EPS), the Bacq & Alexander award of the European Radiation Research Society (ERRS) and the Failla Award of the Radiation Research Society. Additionally, he has been awarded an ERC Advanced Grant of the European Union for the continuation of his research activities. The ERC grant is used to continue the studies at GSI. (BP)
]]>The initiative is a catalyst and promotes global collaboration and innovation across sectors and the scientific community at large. Supporting the campaign underscores GSI and FAIR's commitment to transparency, collaboration, innovation, sustainability and efficiency. Therefore, participation is not just a signature, it’s a commitment to improving science and society through openness and collaboration. The open nature of software allows for global scrutiny and contributions, resulting in better, efficient and sustainable development. Dissemination even prior to possible monetization is a core principle, aiming for positive impact rather than quick profits. The essence: if the public pays for it, the public should benefit from it.
GSI's and FAIR's strategic decision to use open source software and hardware is important because free and open standards allow to explore diverse technological solutions that fit best and encourage competition. In addition, open source software and hardware serve as a catalyst in attracting highly skilled individuals such as engineers, scientists and developers. It is a good tool to foster seamless collaboration and provides a platform for participants to collectively build on each other's work, leading to continuous improvement. Finally, this creates an environment that encourages collaboration and learning. This commitment to nurturing talent transforms GSI and FAIR into a hub for research and development.
The open nature of the software allows for scrutiny and contributions from innumerable minds globally. This collaborative approach often results in more refined, efficient and sustainable software development. Open software reflects GSI's and FAIR's commitment to excellence and meets the high-performance computing and security demands crucial for important infrastructures, physics experiments, in particular in the accelerator control domain. (BP)
At present, the radioisotope thorium-229 is considered to be the only candidate for use in a nuclear clock. A nuclear clock of this kind would be considerably more accurate than the current atomic clocks. The timekeeper in this case would be the rate of oscillations in the nucleus of thorium-229, induced by laser light excitations. An international team of researchers with participation of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung has now developed a new method to determine the excitation energy with significantly more precision. This represents an important step in the development of a functional nuclear clock.
The nucleus of the radioisotope thorium-229 features an isomer with an exceptionally low excitation energy that enables direct laser manipulation of the nuclear state. It is for this reason that it is among the leading candidates for use in next-generation optical clocks. The last decade has been characterized by a number of experimental breakthroughs, such as the first direct and clear proof of the existence of the nuclear isomer, its characterization using laser spectroscopy, the measurement of its excitation energy, and X-ray pumping. However, there was still a lack of observation of radiative decay and of the precise determination of the light frequency for the development of the optical clock. Using a novel approach in which the isomer is populated with ionic beams at the ISOLDE facility at CERN, researchers have now been able for the first time to observe the elusive radiative decay of the isomer and substantially decrease the uncertainty of its energy and decay constant with the help of spectroscopic techniques.
The corresponding experiments were undertaken by an international team headed by researchers from KU Leuven. German members of the team came from Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU), LMU Munich, the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM) and the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt. The researchers have recently published their results in Nature.
The first proposal for an optical clock based on the excitation of a nuclear state to serve as an ultra-stable metrological instrument and quantum sensor was made long ago, but most recently caused a stir in the scientific world due to the direct detection of the thorium-229 isomer. The underlying idea is quite simple: Instead of measuring time based on the frequency of light needed to invoke electronic transitions in an atom, which is the method employed to date, the frequency of the light used to excite the atomic nucleus itself is employed for this purpose. The clear advantage would be that the atomic nucleus is a more compact structure compared with atomic shells and has small electromagnetic moments. It is thus less susceptible to external interference factors, meaning that the resultant clock will be of unparalleled accuracy. In addition, it is expected that the radiative transition of the isomer in the thorium-229 nucleus will be in the ultraviolet range of the electromagnetic spectrum, meaning that optical control should be possible using appropriately designed UV lasers. This, on the other hand, will only become possible when the corresponding nuclear transition has been observed using optical methods and analyzed in more detail.
The technique used to date was to populate the appropriate nuclear isomer with the help of the alpha decay of uranium-233. So far, the decay to the ground state did not lead to the emission of the characteristic light from the nucleus. In the experiments at CERN, the nuclear isomer was populated by means of the beta decay of actinium-229, which was previously implanted in crystals of calcium fluoride and magnesium fluoride at kinetic energy of 30 kiloelectron volts (keV). The researchers used vacuum ultraviolet spectroscopy to analyze the photon spectrum emitted by the crystals under favorable radioluminescence conditions and were finally able to identify the spectral line at a wavelength of 148 nanometers. "We have finally succeeded in observing a clear signature for the radiative decay of the thorium-229 nuclear isomer in our experiments. As a result, we have managed to measure its excitation energy with an accuracy improved by a factor of seven than previous results. And on the basis of our measurements, we have even been able to estimate the half-life of the radiative transition, which we put at about 10 minutes," said Dr. Mustapha Laatiaoui, junior research group leader at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, who was involved in the recent investigations.
The reported results represent important steps towards the development of a nuclear clock. On the one hand, the decreased level of uncertainty in terms of the excitation energy constitutes a reduction of the potential search range and is a crucial preliminary parameter for the development of a suitable vacuum-ultraviolet laser control system. On the other hand, the observation of radiative decay in large-bandgap crystals shows that the creation of a solid-state nuclear clock with far greater stability than that of contemporary atomic clocks is feasible.
The practical realization of a clock that uses nuclear transition as a timekeeper would have an exciting range of potential applications – in applied and fundamental physics, geodesy and seismology through to trials to determine whether fundamental constants exhibit any time variations. (LW)
Original publication:
S. Kraemer et al., Observation of the radiative decay of the 229Th nuclear clock isomer, Nature 617, 24. Mai 2023,
DOI: 10.1038/s41586-023-05894-z
During an introduction the guests were informed about the scientific activities at GSI and FAIR and the construction of the international FAIR project. They had a guided tour to the research facilities on the GSI and FAIR campus. They visited the therapy unit for tumor treatment with heavy ions, explained by Professor Christian Graeff, the HADES experiment, explained by Professor Tetyana Galatyuk, and the test stand for superconducting accelerator magnets, where high-tech components for FAIR are tested, explained by Dr. Holger Kollmus.
During a bus tour of the FAIR construction site and a walk-through of individual construction sections, the guests got a close-up view of the construction progress. The program included the cryogenics buildings, the underground accelerator ring tunnel SIS100, the central hub for the facility’s beam line and beam distribution (transfer building) and the buildings for experimental caves. (BP)
]]>Aided by numerous illustrations, the lecture gives an overview of the history of the settlement Wixhausen from the Bronze Age to the 20th century. The main focus is on the period of the foundation of the village and the first mention, the time of the incorporation into Darmstadt as well as the relations with GSI/FAIR, which have lasted for more than 50 years.
Peter Engels, who comes from Haan in the Rhineland, studied history, Latin and musicology at the University of Cologne, where he passed the state examination in 1987 and received his doctorate in 1990 with a thesis on the history of the Crusades and the Christian reception of Islam in the Middle Ages. After completing his legal clerkship at the State Archives in Münster and at the School of Archives in Marburg, he has been head of the City Archives in Darmstadt since 1993. He is also a member of the Historical Commission for Hesse and has been chairman of the Historical Association for Hesse since 2002, in which capacity he is also responsible for the Stadtlexikon Darmstadt Online, which has been available since the beginning of 2016. He is the author of numerous publications and organizer of many exhibitions on the history of the city of Darmstadt and the state of Hesse.
The additional lectures will focus on beams in various fields of application, for example in the further development of tumor therapy with ion beams in moving organs. Another lecture will shed light on the possibilities of using X-rays generated in the laboratory to gain insights into objects in space. Finally, the last lecture for the year 2023 will deal with the particles that are present in our environment and permanently impact on our bodies.
The lectures start at 2 p. m., further information about registration, access and the course of the event can be found on the event website at www.gsi.de/wfa
The lecture series “Wissenschaft für Alle” is aimed at all persons interested in current science and research. The lectures report on research and developments at GSI and FAIR, but also on current topics from other fields of science and technology. The aim of the series is to prepare and present the scientific processes in a way that is understandable for laypersons in order to make the research accessible to a broad public. The lectures are held by GSI and FAIR staff members or by external speakers from universities and research institutes. (CP)
A plan has already been drawn up so that the installations can be carried out precisely and accurately, step by step. Numerous different aspects, such as delivery windows and the type of magnets, must be exactly coordinated and logistically mastered so that the accelerator components fit together precisely in the shell like a gigantic puzzle.
The start of the SIS100 installation will be in the straight of the western sector 4. From there, the installation will continue clockwise toward the sector 3 arc. While the straight line in sector 4 is dominated by high-frequency acceleration systems, the arc consists largely of superconducting magnet modules. Due to the supply situation of the quadrupole modules required for beam focusing, the superconducting dipole pairs are first set up in the arc and interconnected. They guide the beam onto the hexagonal "circular path" of the SIS100.
The installation begins in the straight section with the positioning of the superconducting bypass lines, which were manufactured as a Polish Inkind contribution. The bypass lines transport the liquid helium required for magnet cooling and the superconducting main bus bar system passing the room temperature components of the straight sections. The bypass lines are first moved to a parking position, from which they are then moved and connected to the quadrupole modules after delivery is complete. Gaps are left in the first assembly cycle for the quadrupole modules to be integrated in the second cycle.
Since the tunnel is still in settlement motion, the later integration of the quadrupole modules also leaves freedom of movement for fine adjustment. The extraction straight in sector 5 will initially be kept open for equipping the high-energy beam transport system, including heavy magnet systems. The expansion of the SIS100 tunnel with the technical building equipment, double floors and routes is in full swing. In the second half of 2023, cable pulling work will be carried out with a focus on sector 4.
On the home stretch until the end of the year, extensive work still needs to be completed in preparation for assembly. For example, various smaller subassemblies for closing the UHV (ultra-high vacuum) system have to be procured, pre-integration work completed and comprehensive documentation prepared for each subassembly. Then the installation itself can begin, another crucial milestone and a sign of the steady progress being made in the construction of FAIR.
In parallel, science is also taking major steps towards future research at FAIR. The FAIR experimental program is currently being defined more and more precisely, for example during research stays of high-ranking scientists on site at GSI and FAIR or in the collaborations of the large experiment pillars. Already today, "FAIR-Phase 0" offers outstanding experimental opportunities. In the future, the FAIR accelerator facility will deliver high-energy ion beams of highest intensities. In combination with the Super-Fragment-Separator, storage rings and cutting-edge instrumentation, it will provide worldwide outstanding research opportunities. (BP)
]]>New nuclear physics data provide a better understanding of the properties of neutron stars. High-precision measurements of nuclear masses reveal germanium-64 as a waiting-point nucleus in nucleosynthesis via fast proton capture and form the basis for modelling X-ray bursts on neutron stars as part of binary systems. The experiments were conducted by an international team, including researchers from Max-Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg (MPIK) and GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung by employing the Heavy Ion Research Facility of the Institute of Modern Physics (IMP) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Lanzhou, China.
Neutron stars are some of the most bizarre objects known to astronomers. While measuring only about ten to twelve kilometers in diameter, they are one of the densest objects in the universe, with masses considerably larger than the solar mass. Additionally, they are extremely hot and can display the strongest magnetic fields known. The physics of these extreme objects are of great interest to scientists worldwide.
About five percent of all known neutron stars occur in binary systems, where the neutron star is gravitationally bound to another, often less evolved star. In such systems X-ray bursts can frequently be observed.
Type-I X-ray bursts are thermonuclear explosions on a surface of a neutron star. The fuel is hydrogen and helium rich matter which is steadily accreted for hours up to days from a companion giant star. Once the ignition temperature and density are reached, a thermonuclear runaway is triggered, resulting in a bright X-ray burst of about ten to 100 seconds. The burst is powered by a sequence of nuclear reactions termed rapid proton capture nucleosynthesis process (rp-process).
The rp-process consists of a sequence of proton captures and beta decays, emitting high energy photons. So-called Waiting Point (WP) nuclei in this process play a decisive role in setting the matter flow and thereby the X-ray flux produced by the neutron star burst. These are the nuclei where the fast proton capture reactions cannot energetically proceed further and the process stalls until a much slower β+ decay enables a bypass. A sequential capture of two protons, however, can in some cases allow the process to bridge the waiting point. The reaction probabilities depend on the proton separation energies, which can directly be derived from the masses of the involved nuclei. Therefore, a precise knowledge of the masses of the involved nuclei is crucial to understand the microphysics behind the X-ray bursts.
Dedicated sensitivity studies have indicated that the yet unknown masses for nuclei around the WP nucleus 64Ge (Z = 32) are presently a major source of uncertainty in modelling the rp-process nucleosynthesis. A group of scientists have now measured with unprecedented resolution all the remaining masses needed to constrain the flow through 64Ge and thereby gained surprising insights.
The nuclei of interest, namely 63Ge, 64,65As, and 66,67Se, are extremely neutron-deficient and have very short half-lives spreading from 54(4) millseconds for 66Se to 153.6(1.1) milliseconds for 63Ge. Such short-lived nuclides can only be produced at a specialized radioactive ion beam facility and require ultra-fast and — due to small production quantities — also ultra-sensitive and efficient measurement techniques. It is emphasized that the production rate of the 64As nuclei was lower than one ion per day.
The present experiment was conducted at the Heavy Ion Research Facility in Lanzhou (HIRFL) in operation at the Institute of Modern Physics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
A novel method for efficient detection of short-lived nuclei was employed for the first time in the CSRe. Following the idea originally proposed for the Collector Ring of FAIR, the scientists developed an efficient way to compensate the uncertainties in the revolution time of the ions in the CSRe storage ring of the HIRFL facility caused by their velocity spread.
“We helped set up the detection methodology and are deeply involved in the physical interpretation of the data,” states Professor Klaus Blaum, director of the division on stored and cooled ions at the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics (MPIK) in Heidelberg. “The ability to measure masses of such short-lived species with vanishingly small production rates demonstrated here is a major achievement,” describes Professor Yuri Litvinov, head of the ASTRUm Group at GSI in Darmstadt, the impact of the new results. “Before this we could not measure the masses of short-lived nuclei to this accuracy or in some cases were not able to determine them at all.”
With this novel method the masses of the nuclei 64As and 66Se were measured for the first time, and the masses of 63Ge, 65As and 67Se could be significantly improved. The scientists simulated an X-ray burst with these newly achieved masses, resulting in a larger peak luminosity of the burst than previously assumed. This means that, in order to match the brightness acquired by telescopes, these astronomical objects need to be more remote than expected. In the case of the well-known X-ray binary GS 1826-24, it shall be placed about 1300 lightyears further away from our solar system than previously thought. Additionally, the new results impact the heating and cooling rates of the neutron star as well as update bounds on its density.
All the relevant masses needed to model the rp-process flow through 64Ge are now measured. The next step will be to accurately determine the masses around the next two critical WP nuclei 68Se and 72Kr. “We are confident this newly developed method to accurately determine masses of such short-lived nuclei will help us to understand these fascinating astronomical objects and the underlying physics even better,” summarizes Klaus Blaum the findings. (MPIK/CP)
Press release of the Max-Planck-Institut for Nuclear Physics, Heidelberg
Publication in the scientific journal "Nature"
Group 'ASTRUm - Astrophyics with Stored Highy Charged Radionucleides' of Professor Yuri Litvinov
]]>Bikash Sinha was one of the key players and leaders in India's successful partnership with FAIR. He not only pioneered India's entry as a shareholder in FAIR but played a leading role in the conception of the FAIR scientific program. Furthermore he was India's representative in the FAIR Council, FAIR's highest supervisory body, from its beginning in 2010 to 2021. It is largely thanks to his dedication that some 25 scientific institutions and 15 industrial partners in India are now involved in the FAIR project.
Prior to the establishment of FAIR, Bikash Sinha already had many years of successful collaborations with GSI. GSI is happy and proud for having been at the beginning of his great project of Indian international collaboration in the field of relativistic heavy ion physics.
Bikash Sinha was a world-renowned scientist and one of the outstanding personalities in science management in India. He was the director of the Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics and Variable Energy Cyclotron Centre, among others. He received numerous awards for his scientific work, including the prestigious Padma Shri and Padma Bhushan awards given by the Government of India.
FAIR and GSI will have enduring memories of Bikash Sinha as an outstanding scientist, science policy maker, but most of all as a great person and a great friend. To his colleagues and friends Bikash Sinha with his attractive personality was always a source of positive energy and inspiration. The management of GSI/FAIR expresses its deepest condolences to his family and friends. (IP)
]]>The novel heavy ion therapy was pioneered in joint research of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum, the Clinic of Radiology and the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) in Heidelberg, and the Rossendorf Research Center FZR (today’s Helmholtzzentrum Dresden-Rossendorf, HZDR). Individual radiation treatment with heavy ions had initially been conducted as early as December 1997. This had been preceded by four years of technical development of the therapy unit at the heavy-ion accelerator of GSI, which included a radiation facility for patients, and by 20 years of fundamental research in radiation biology and physics. Initiator and the crucial pioneer of this tumor therapy was Professor Gerhard Kraft. He established GSI’s biophysical research department already in the early 1980s and was its head from 1981 to 2008.
Worldwide innovations were the extremely target-conform irradiation with the raster scanning method, the biological irradiation planning and the visualization of the beam in the patient with a special recording device, the PET camera (Positron emission tomography).
In the period until 2008, GSI used carbon ion beams to treat more than 440 patients for tumors of the head and neck with great success. Today, special clinics in Heidelberg (Heidelberg Ion-Beam Therapy Center — HIT), Marburg (Marburger Ionenstrahl-Therapiezentrum — MIT) and Shanghai (SPHIC) offer customized versions of the treatment that was first used at GSI in Darmstadt 25 years ago. GSI played a major role in the development of these three facilities. In the meantime, the three-dimensional scanning technology has become standard in all new particle therapy facilities. The three centers, HIT, MIT and SPHIC, have treated more than 10,000 patients to date.
Today, Professor Marco Durante is the head of GSI biophysics. He is a renowned expert in the field of particle therapy and current president of the Particle Therapy Co-Operative Group (PTCOG), a worldwide organization of scientists and professionals interested in proton, light ion and heavy charged particle radiotherapy. He was elected by the PTCOG Steering Committee, to which each clinical particle therapy center in the world sends representatives.
Professor Durante and his team are working with great international attention on constantly improving the method through new technologies and treatment procedures and to make it even more powerful. For example, FLASH irradiation - the application of an ultra-high radiation dose in a very short time - is currently the focus of much attention worldwide and is advanced with great expertise at GSI. Other research questions include the treatment of moving tumors on internal organs and possible combinations of heavy ion and immunotherapy.
The international accelerator center FAIR currently being built at GSI will expand the research possibilities for next-generation particle therapy even further, for example by using beams with high intensities or radioactive ions for online PET imaging. Tumor therapy with heavy ions thus still provides broad potential for further scientific findings, so that it can be used even more effectively for the benefit of many patients in the future.
How significant the development and research of tumor therapy with heavy ions is for medicine is confirmed 25 years after the start in Darmstadt by current clinical studies on carbon ion radiotherapy conducted at the HIT in Heidelberg. To date, research at the HIT has produced clinical evidence of the safety and efficacy of carbon ion beam therapy in several areas: depending on the type of tumor, they show good tolerability of the therapy, combined with an effective fight against the treated tumor.
The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, emphasizes the great benefit for society: "The ion beam therapy developed at GSI is an outstanding example of how society and people can benefit from basic research through successful technology transfer. Together with strong partners, we are working hard to further develop new technologies and methods to ensure that our scientific breakthroughs continue to benefit society in the future, in medicine and other areas such as materials research or computer technology." (BP)
Treatment with ion beams is a very precise and highly effective, yet extremely gentle, therapeutic process. The major advantage of this method is that the ion beams, which have previously been brought to very high speeds in the accelerator facility of GSI, develop their strongest effect in the tumor itself, while sparing the healthy tissue that surrounds it. Because the range of the heavy-ion beam can be controlled with millimeter precision, particles are stopped inside the tumor and can release their energy there in a concentrated burst.
The raster-scan method, which was also developed at GSI and was used in heavy-ion therapy for the first time, enables the carbon beam to cover the tumor very precisely. The radiation dose can be applied to the malignant tumor tissue point by point in three dimensions. In order to control the effect, the beam is left at each point until the intended dose is reached. Despite the large number of up to 50000 individual beam spots, the irradiation of a field takes only a few minutes. This process makes it possible to irradiate very precisely tumors with complex shapes.
Ion-beam radiotherapy in the fight against cancer
Association for the promotion of tumor therapy with heavy ions
]]>As partners of “The hessian AICon”, GSI and FAIR underscored their commitment to advancing practical AI applications across various fields. GSI and FAIR already collaborate with hessian.AI through the “Digital Open Lab” at the Green IT Cube on the GSI/FAIR campus. At the GSI and FAIR exhibition booth, the Technology Transfer and Information Technology (IT) departments showcased the offers to private and public partners: the provision of infrastructure and IT expertise for collaborative development projects and jointly operated high-performance computing systems and projects. Furthermore, the accelerator physics department gave insights into practical applications of AI, both in the research and development of large accelerator facilities as well as their operation in the control room.
The Green IT Cube is an innovation center focusing on energy-efficient and sustainable information technology (IT). It provides a state-of-the-art computing infrastructure and serves as an environment for the development, testing, and upscaling of energy-efficient high-performance computing solutions. The Digital Open Lab at the Green IT Cube provides researchers, companies, and start-ups with an ideal framework to collaboratively addressing current research questions in close connection to cutting-edge research.
Moreover, the Green IT Cube has been chosen recently as the location for the initial phase of the “KI-Innovationslabor” (AI Innovation Lab) supported by the State of Hesse. This initiative aims to invest ten million euros into building a unique center for AI research, development, and application. The innovation lab will offer a cutting-edge AI-supercomputer infrastructure and extensive AI expertise, fostering collaborations among researchers, industry, and start-ups. It will provide a platform for developing, training, testing, and evaluating AI systems and applications. As such, the innovation lab will facilitate product innovations in various fields such as medicine, materials science, pharmaceuticals, and industrial sectors.
The conference “The hessian AICon” aimed to foster collaboration, knowledge exchange, and innovation within the AI community. It served as a platform for industry leaders, researchers, and AI enthusiasts to connect, discuss cutting-edge advancements, and explore the transformative potential of AI technologies. (BP)
For one day, GSI and FAIR opened their doors to guests, which also included numerous representatives from politics and research. Thousands of interested visitors, including many families, took the opportunity to take a look behind the scenes of one of the leading international physics research facilities. The demand was extraordinarily high: Within one week, all tickets for guided tours on the campus and the FAIR construction site as well as the stay on the "Science Square" were fully booked. The GSI and FAIR management was very pleased about the interest of visitors of all ages in the work of GSI and FAIR. The day showed that research consists of high quality science and fascinating technology, but also lives on dedicated employees.
For the Open House with the motto “Seeing. Experiencing. Understanding”, the employees at GSI and FAIR had prepared the research operation in a special way so that visitors could gain an understanding of as many topics as possible. More than 400 volunteers were on hand during the Open House. They made sure the guests had an interesting and informative day, tirelessly answered their questions, and helped during the tours.
During five guided tours and at almost 20 stations, the guests were able to gain exciting insights into the research with ion beams. This included accelerator facilities, where during research operations ions can race at around 270,000 kilometers per second, or the experiments with detectors as big as houses, which can detect several hundred reaction products simultaneously. Other tours focused on the 20-hectare construction site for the world’s outstanding particle accelerator facility FAIR and the unique high-tech developments for this great future project.
The “Science Square” was all about enjoying the international atmosphere of GSI and FAIR with diverse catering and entertainment, including science shows by the "Physikanten" and "Team Scientastic," magic, ice cream made of nitrogen, tabletop fiddling and hands-on experiments. The "Market of Possibilities" offered, among other things, the opportunity to talk directly with researchers about topics such as technology transfer or space travel. The guests also got information about the wide variety of job opportunities at GSI and FAIR.
The Open House at GSI and FAIR was also part of the nationwide program for the Science Year 2023. The campaign is proclaimed annually with a changing topic by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research, 2023 titled “Our Universe”. This year’s topic fits particularly well with the future accelerator center FAIR, which has the motto “The Universe in the Laboratory”. At FAIR, matter that usually only exists in the depth of space will be produced and explored in the laboratory. Scientists from all over the world will be able to gain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe from the Big Bang to the present. (BP)
Prof. Dr. Kristina Sinemus, Hessian Minister for Digital Strategy and Innovation: "In addition to your concrete research successes, I am particularly pleased to see how strongly the Hessian research landscape continues to network together with GSI and FAIR and exploits important synergies to further advance the successful digital transformation in Hessen. The AI Innovation Lab of the Hessian Center for Artificial Intelligence hessian.AI at the Green IT Cube of GSI, which opened in March, or the new Digital Innovation Hub EDITH are two examples that make our successful cooperation tangible."
Prof. Dr. Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR: „It is important for us to inform the public about our work and our concept for the future and to strengthen the interest for scientific and technical topics, especially among the interested young people. With the Open House we succeeded in raising excitement and curiosity for science. We are glad that so many young people came – our potential scientists for tomorrow.”
Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR: „The Open House attracted a lot of visitors, highlighting the fascination that cutting edge has for the people. We were able to give the interested public an insight into the current FAIR construction activities and show what progress is being made continuously on the 20-hectare construction site. The international FAIR project guarantees a promising further development of the location Darmstadt and offers innovative perspectives for research and technology.”
]]>The Summer School is held both at ESA´s European Space Operations Center ESOC and on the GSI/FAIR campus in Darmstadt. The aim is to train students in basic heavy ion biophysics for space applications, e.g. space radiation detection, monitoring and protection. Exploring cosmic radiation and their effects on humans, electronics and materials is a decisive contribution to the future of human spaceflight, so that astronauts and satellites in space are provided with the best protection during the exploration of our solar system. Furthermore, it also contributes to detailed knowledge about the risks of radiation exposure on Earth.
The Summer School’s top-class scientific program, opened by Wim Sillekens, ESA Directorate of Human and Robotic Exploration programs, and Professor Marco Durante, Head of the GSI Department of Biophysics, includes lectures from experts such as former astronaut Thomas Reiter and former ESA Director General Johann-Dietrich Wörner, visits to facilities in Darmstadt and practical training and research opportunities at GSI/FAIR. Participants switch between the two locations ESOC and GSI/FAIR campus. In the second week, they are welcomed at GSI/FAIR by Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR. Dr. Radek Pleskac gives an insight into the FAIR project. At GSI and FAIR, the participants have the opportunity to work in teams on laboratory activities and to learn more about the research fields of radiation biology and simulation of cosmic radiation in accelerators.
The young researchers have the possibility to continue developing and building on their own experiment ideas via formulation and submission of a ground-based space radiation experiment proposal for example in the context of the investigations into biological effects of radiation (IBER program). IBER enables groups of researchers to use the GSI accelerator facilities to study the biological effects of cosmic radiation. At the end of the ESA-FAIR Radiation Summer School, participants will take written exams or carry out team work, which will be evaluated and rated by the lecturers.
The establishment of the Summer School is a result of the close cooperation between ESA and FAIR for many years on cosmic radiation research and one of more common topics in the GSI/FAIR-ESA cooperation agreement. The existing GSI accelerator facility is the only one in Europe that can generate all of the ion beams occurring in our solar system, which range from hydrogen, the lightest one, to uranium, the heaviest. At the future FAIR accelerator center, the possibilities will be significantly expanded: FAIR will allow experiments with an even wider range of particle energies and intensities and will be able to simulate the composition of the cosmic radiation even more accurately. The neighborhood of ESA’s Space Operations Center in Darmstadt also creates ideal conditions for local cooperation in one of the decisive research fields of the future. (BP)
The exhibition at Atelierhaus LEW1 on Rosenhöhe is open from Friday, July 28, to Sunday, July 30, 2023, from 11:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. (LW)
]]>It's a match! The Universe in the Lab meets the Universe on Tour. The GSI and FAIR experiments bring the Universe into the laboratory by recreating some of the essential processes which define the evolution of our Universe in the lab in controlled conditions with the help of particle accelerators. This research will be part of the planetarium show, where visitors will travel to the depths of space and take a tour of the Universe. In a companion tent, guests can also visit an exhibition on the topic of "light" and find out what it reveals about the universe and what role gravitational waves play. Various stations provide information about, among other things, the importance of light for astronomy – from radio waves to the light of the stars visible to us to gamma radiation – and take a look at the nurseries of stars and planets.
Opening hours of the mobile planetarium in Hofheim:
July 26 – 28: 9:00 a.m. – 10:00 p.m. I July 29: 10:00 a.m. – 10:00 p.m. I July 30: 10:00a.m. – 6:00 p.m.
Lectures in the mobile planetarium (starting at 8:00 p.m.):
In total, the roadshow "Universe on Tour" tours 15 large and small cities from May to September 2023 to get citizens excited about research in space. The tour is part of the “Science Year 2023 - Our Universe”, a joint initiative of the BMBF and Wissenschaft im Dialog (WiD). The Stiftung Planetarium Berlin and the Astronomische Gesellschaft (AG) are responsible for the implementation and content of "Universe on Tour."
Citizen science project Night Light Stage
Interested guests can take part in the Citizen Science project Night Light Stage by documenting the light pollution in their surroundings and providing the collected data for research. On July 29, 2023, at 8:00 p.m., the "Light Walk" will start at the planetarium tent. No registration is necessary here. The project leaders will be available for interviews. (LW)
All stops of the roadshow "Universe on Tour":
scienceyear.com/2023/universe-on-tour
The parliamentarians learned about the scientific activities at GSI/FAIR and the progress of the future accelerator center FAIR, currently under construction at GSI. After an introduction on the status of the FAIR project, campus development, research successes and recent experiments, the guests had a guided tour to the existing research facilities on the GSI and FAIR campus. They visited the linear accelerator UNILAC, explained by Dr. Udo Weinrich, the supercomputing center Green IT Cube, explained by Dr. Helmut Kreiser, the large-scale experiment R3B, explained by Dr. Kathrin Göbel, and the test stand for superconducting accelerator magnets, where high-tech components for FAIR are tested, explained by Dr. Holger Kollmus.
During a tour of the construction site, accompanied by Dr. Harald Hagelskamp, the head of the FAIR construction site, the guests took a look at the construction progress. The program included the cryogenics buildings, the underground accelerator ring tunnel SIS100, the central hub for the facility’s beam line and distribution (transfer building) and the buildings for experimental caves. (BP)
]]>A transformation to the Green Economy will hardly succeed without increasingly energy-efficient large-scale data centers. New concepts and technologies are needed to meet society’s enormous hunger for data and the growing demand of the scientific community, in a sustainable way. To meet these needs, GSI/FAIR expanded one floor at their supercomputing center Green IT Cube earlier this year, turning it into an IT living lab: the Digital Open Lab. For this purpose, GSI received project funding from the REACT-EU program. In the future, among the research and development projects to be carried out via the Digital Open Lab will be those on the more sustainable operation of data centers, together with industrial partners. Likewise, partners from the scientific environment have the opportunity to use the data center for their research work.
Inspired by a large number of industrial visits and inquiries, the Technology Transfer department of GSI/FAIR initiated the implementation of the living laboratory. Previously, there was no development and test platform under real conditions in Germany, neither for researchers nor for companies. This requirement gave rise to the idea of a digital living lab.
The Digital Open Lab aims to explore and test digital innovations for energy-efficient high-performance computing and ultra-fast data processing, in particular using liquid cooling media, preparing them for industrial application. For this purpose, the Digital Open Lab offers a basic infrastructure where changing application scenarios can be set up according to the requirements of the industrial partners. However, these must allow the realistic simulation of an industrial application scenario, both in terms of the size of the demonstrator (a large number of servers and other components) and in terms of the connections and options for different operating modes (e.g. duration of operation under high loads).
The Digital Open Lab provides the necessary resources for this task. Technologies can be tested in collaboration with industry in dimensions, technical environments and operating scenarios that come much closer to industrial use than the conventional development environment in the laboratory.
The necessary cluster networks with scientists contributing content-wise as well as companies with attractive application scenarios are currently being established. Suitable, efficient and sustainable transfer structures are to be derived from this.
This will make it possible to:
The Green IT Cube is an environmentally friendly high-performance data center with a special cooling system. The generated heat is dissipated through heat exchangers mounted on the back of the racks and cooled with a liquid medium. This reduces the energy required for cooling to about one-tenth compared to conventional data centers. Furthermore, the data center does not require any complex cooling of the high-volume room air. With half the floor height, the computer cabinets can be arranged much more densely, as in a high-bay warehouse, which reduces investment costs. In addition to the electrical power required to supply the computer components, the Green IT Cube data center requires less than ten percent of energy consumption for cooling and all other operations (PUE<1.1).
Professor Volker Lindenstruth and Professor Horst Stöcker are the inventors of this environmentally friendly data center technology. They developed a visionary overall concept of a highly optimized cooling structure for the most energy-efficient large-scale data centers. Construction of the Green IT Cube took place from mid-December 2014 to December 2015, with commissioning taking place in January 2016. The technology has been successfully in operation since then, undergoing continuous improvements.
The high-performance Green IT Cube concept has repeatedly won national and international awards for innovation and environmental friendliness; most recently, it was awarded the Federal Environment Agency's Blue Angel eco-label. Even before the actual completion of the floor, the Digital Open Lab was awarded the Datacenter Strategy Award 2022 in the field of innovation. This was in recognition of GSI/FAIR's strategy to use the Green IT Cube as a living laboratory for developing new ideas and innovations in collaboration with startups, companies and research institutes. (CP)
The GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt operates a world unique accelerator facility for ions. Some of the best-known results are the discovery of six new chemical elements and the development of a new type of cancer therapy. The new international accelerator center FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research), one of the largest research projects worldwide, is currently under construction at GSI. At FAIR, matter that usually only exists in the depth of space will be produced in a lab for research. Scientists from all over the world will use the facility for experiments to gain new insights about the building blocks of matter and the evolution of the universe, from the Big Bang to the present. They will also develop new applications in medicine and technology.
NDC-GARBE (ndc-garbe.com) is a German data center developer. The international team combines decades of experience in European real estate developments with a profound knowledge of data center technologies and a deep understanding of the market. The focus is on projects in markets with the highest demand in Germany and neighboring European countries. Whether based on modular and cost-optimized standard solutions or a data center according to customer-specific requirements, NDC-GARBE assures a smooth process and on-time completion throughout all project phases.
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Professor Karlheinz Langanke works in the field of theoretical nuclear astrophysics, in particular on the theoretical calculation of nuclear reactions in supernovae and in stellar element synthesis. Born in 1951, he studied physics at the University of Münster, where he also obtained his doctorate and habilitation. As a postdoc he went to the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), where Nobel laureate Willy Fowler inspired his interest in nuclear astrophysics. From 1987 to 1992 he held a professorship at the University of Münster, and in 1992 he joined the faculty at Caltech as a senior research associate. In 1996, he accepted a chair at Aarhus University in Denmark. Since 2005, he has held a joint professorship at the Technical University of Darmstadt and at GSI, where he also served as Research Director and, for two years in 2015/16, as Scientific Managing Director.
The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino emphasizes: "I am truly delighted about the election of Professor Karlheinz Langanke as Honorary Member of EPS. He is a towering figure in our field of science and has played a key role in shaping the scientific program of GSI and FAIR. He is an outstanding scientist who addresses important challenges in nuclear physics with his projects and commitment. With the admission to this prestigious circle of EPS honorary members, his scientific work and his international standing are justly honored. At the same time, the award demonstrates the scientific strength at GSI and FAIR. Karlheinz Langanke’s seminal contributions to the microscopic description of nuclear processes in astrophysical environments has a profound impact on our modern understanding of stellar evolution, supernovae dynamics and nucleosynthesis. Karlheinz initiated and built up world-leading activities in nuclear astrophysics in Darmstadt, which in the future will constitute the backbone of research at our new facility FAIR, from which we expect fundamental new insights into the origin of the elements in the Universe and of the astrophysical objects which produce them. The work of Prof Langanke is therefore creating an important and long lasting legacy.”
Professor Karlheinz Langanke's scientific work has evolved during his scientific career on many topics in nuclear astrophysics ranging from hydrostatic burning phases in stars to understanding the dynamics and associated nucleosynthesis of explosive events such as supernovae. Arguably his most important research is concerned with the electron capture on nuclei which is the dominating process working against the gravitational collapse in the core of a massive star leading to a supernova explosion. He developed the strategy and techniques to describe this process at the extreme density and temperature conditions occurring in the collapsing star. His results are now incorporated in modern supernova simulations with important consequences for the dynamics of the collapse. Furthermore, Langanke also developed the research field of neutrino-nucleus reactions for astrophysical applications in nucleosynthesis and neutrino detection on Earth. He also realized the important role that fission yields play in r-process nucleosynthesis and together with GSI experimentalists developed the first set of fission yields for r-process nuclei.
For his scientific work, Professor Karlheinz Langanke was awarded, among others, the 2012 Lise Meitner Prize of the European Physical Society and the 2015 Benjamin Lee Professorship Award of the Asian Pacific Center for Theoretical Physics. He was elected member of the Academia Europaea and appointed honorary member of the Hellenic Nuclear Physics Society. Karlheinz Langanke has been called to numerous international advisory committees at leading laboratories worldwide.
He is the author of numerous major scientific publications and review articles. In addition he represented the field of nuclear astrophysics at many major conferences and regularly lectures in schools on all continents, sharing his enthusiasm for Nuclear Astrophysics with the next generation of researchers. (BP)
The science manager and physicist Dr. Ulrich Breuer has been joint Administrative Director of GSI and FAIR since 2020 and previously worked as Administrative Director at the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR). He studied physics and received his doctorate at the Rheinisch-Westfälische Technische Hochschule (RWTH) Aachen. His professional career began in 1991 at the Forschungszentrum Jülich. There he first worked as assistant to the Chairman of the Board of Directors and then in leading positions for many years. In 2005, he changed to the Hahn-Meitner-Institut Berlin as Administrative Director, where he accompanied the merger with the Berliner Elektronenspeicherring-Gesellschaft für Synchrotronstrahlung (BESSY) and the foundation of the Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin. He operated as its Administrative Director from 2009 to 2011. From 2012 to 2017, he worked as Vice President Economics and Finance of the Karlsruher Institut für Technologie (KIT). Subsequently he held the position of the Administrative Director at the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf.
Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Director of GSI and FAIR, and Jörg Blaurock, Technical Director of GSI and FAIR, expressed their gratitude to Dr. Ulrich Breuer for his great commitment and for his highly competent work. GSI and FAIR have developed very successfully during Dr. Ulrich Breuer’s term of office. His guiding principle as Administrative Managing Director was a solid financial and personnel planning as well as the effective support of science with tailored infrastructural, administrative and commercial processes. During his term of office, he succeeded in creating the administrative framework that has further advanced the GSI/FAIR campus as well as the FAIR Phase 0 research program and the FAIR construction project in a targeted manner.
His time included, for example, the start of construction for the FAIR Control Center and the opening of the AI Innovation Lab at the High Performance Computing Center Green IT Cube of GSI and FAIR. Dr. Ulrich Breuer led the administration of GSI and FAIR through the challenging developments during the Corona pandemic and the war in Ukraine, always keeping in mind the special requirements of the internationally oriented research institution. (BP)
]]>The participants had the opportunity to attend talks from Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, about the FAIR project and from Dr. Danyal Winters, work package leader “SIS100 laser cooling pilot facility”, on the state of the art in laser cooling. Scientific posters from theory, simulation, experiment and engineering showed a true cross-section of accelerator science at GSI and FAIR, from student projects to the work of seasoned accelerator experts. The FAIR exhibition stand showed the accelerator science community the progress made towards first science at FAIR and the future goals for groundbreaking heavy ion and antiproton research.
The head of FAIR’s international office, Dr. Pradeep Ghosh, was on hand to present the GET_Involved programme to the IPAC participants. Industry delegates learned how to become suppliers to FAIR, and FAIR/GSI’s technical and procurement experts scouted for innovative companies with the unique competences needed to realize FAIR. Furthermore, technology transfer offers and research and development projects around the digital open lab, heavy ion therapy and Helmholtz technology brokerage were presented.
The GSI and FAIR delegates not only presented their own research, but worked shifts in the IPAC exhibition to present FAIR on the world stage in Venice. The Industry liaison officers representing Denmark, Sweden, Estonia, Spain, Italy and Switzerland followed the FAIR presentations to support in finding partners in their respective countries. Many established and new partners in industry took the time to attend the dedicated industry reception at the FAIR/GSI booth. In 2024, the science community will gather for the next IPAC in Nashville, Tennessee. (BP)
Artificial Intelligence, Cybersecurity, High Performance Computing and Advanced Digital Tools: The fields in which companies and the public sector in Hesse need to take action in the digital transformation are diverse and complex. EDITH now offers the best possible support. The mission of the Digital Innovation Hub is to support small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), startups and municipalities in southern Hesse, including the Frankfurt/Rhine-Main metropolitan region, in implementing their digitization projects, closing the digital gap in Hesse and to make the region one of the smartest as well as most sustainable in all of Europe. On June 12, at the Digisustain 2023 conference in Frankfurt am Main, EDITH presented EDITH presented its new offering and answered the questions of the expert audience.
Dr. Arjan Vink, head of the staff department Third-Party Funding and project manager for EDITH at GSI/FAIR: "We are very pleased to be able to share our knowledge on high-performance computing and project funding with small and medium-sized companies and municipalities in Hesse together with the EDITH consortium partners and in an international environment. In addition, we would like to further advance sustainable computing in particular through consulting and via research and development projects in our Green IT Cube data center." (CP)
Press release of the House of Digital Transformation (German)
]]>In a group of detectors carried by “Juice”, a charge sensitive amplifier readout chip from GSI/FAIR is used. The so-called PADI-X ASIC was developed within the CBM experiment. CBM (Compressed Baryonic Matter) is one of the central research pillars of the international accelerator center FAIR, which is currently being built at GSI. The chip was developed in both GSI scientific-technical department Experimental Electronics and Detector Lab, in collaboration with senior scientist Dr. Mircea Ciobanu (Institute of Space Science, Romania and University of Heidelberg).
At the launch of Juice from the European Spaceport in French Guiana, Carole Mundell, ESA's Director of Science, emphasized: “Today, we have sent a suite of ground-breaking science instruments on a journey to Jupiter’s moons that will give us an exquisite close-up view that would have been unimaginable to previous generations. The treasure trove of data that ESA Juice will provide will enable the science community worldwide to dig in and uncover the mysteries of the jovian system, explore the nature and habitability of oceans on other worlds and answer questions yet unasked by future generations of scientists.”
The Scientific Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, is delighted about the participation in this very exciting space mission: “The European Space Agency ESA has been working closely with GSI/FAIR for many years to jointly advance the various aspects of space research. For example, cosmic ray research is a crucial contribution to ensure that astronauts and satellites in space have the best performance when exploring our solar system. In addition, artificial hibernation, another research field with strong GSI expertise, could become a promising key technology for the future of spaceflight. ESA and FAIR have since a few years a joint summer school dedicated to radiation effects in space. I am very pleased that a high-tech application developed for the future FAIR accelerator center will now continue this successful series and be part of the Jupiter exploration.”
On its way to the biggest planet in our solar system, the "Juice" probe has ten instruments on board, primarily to analyze Jupiter's large moons. Water is presumed to be present there under a thick layer of ice, and thus a prerequisite for life. The instruments come from European partners and the U.S. space agency Nasa and enable numerous investigations, such as laser or radar measurements, by which data can also be collected under the ice layer.
The PreAmplifier-DIscriminator chip (PADI) is an application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) that was originally designed as a general-purpose chip for GSI/FAIR. It is used as front-end electronics for reading out the timing resistive plate chambers in the time-of-flight (TOF) wall of the CBM experiment for FAIR. Thus, originally developed for high-energy physics experiments carried out at ground facilities, it turned out that PADI is also suitable for space experiments, and PADI-X was selected and qualified as front-end electronics for one sensor on the “Juice” mission, the PEP/JDC instrument. PEP (Particle Environment Package) is a particle spectrometer for measuring neutral and charged particles in the Jupiter system.
The PEP instrument consists of a total of two units with six different sensors; the scientific goals of the instrument are to study Jupiter's moons Ganymede, Callisto, Europa and Io, as well as Jupiter's magnetosphere.
Before the “Juice” probe can take up its mission at Jupiter, however, it still has a long way to go. During its eight-year journey to Jupiter, it must fly once around Venus and three times around Earth to gain speed. After its arrival in 2031, the scientists will be able to take a close look at Jupiter's moons, among other things, and begin their analyses - with the help of high-tech from GSI/FAIR developments. (BP)
More about ESA's JUICE mission
]]>Dark matter is one of the greatest scientific mysteries of the universe: From astronomical observations, one knows that it accounts for about 26 percent of the total energy content of the universe and is thus about five times more abundant than normal matter. Until now, however, this mysterious substance has eluded direct detection because it interacts only extremely weak with the normal matter surrounding us.
In order to shed more light on this dark part of the universe, the CNRS has founded the DMLab together with DESY, GSI, and the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology. The aim is to strengthen collaboration between the two countries and foster the potential for discovery. “We want to bring together the partly complementary expertise and different infrastructures of the German and French sides in order to sustainably advance topics of common interest and thus also gain greater visibility internationally,” says DESY researcher Thomas Schörner, German director of the DMLab. The IRL will also support funding applications of the IRL teams to the French and German national funding agencies.
The DMLab's scientific topics include a wide variety of aspects of the search for dark matter: direct searches for dark matter particles, the development of innovative detector and accelerator technologies, and the theoretical study of dark matter. The activities also include astroparticle physics with its multi-messenger approach that includes research on gravitational waves, and scientific computing with topics such as artificial intelligence and large-data management.
Joint DMLab projects in which GSI is participating concentrate on the development of new accelerator concepts on the basis of laser driven particle acceleration, novel detectors and theoretical models.
The DMLab will initially be established for five years. Organizationally, it is a facility of the French IN2P3 (Institut National de Physique Nucleaire et de Physique des Particules) in the CNRS, which is opening another location in Germany. Ten of the existing IN2P3 sites distributed throughout France are involved in DMLab. The laboratory will enable French scientists to spend longer research stays of at least one year in Germany. With the help of the funding also pledged by DESY, GSI, and KIT, a lively exchange in both directions is expected, which will have a productive impact on all projects at DMLab.
More than thirtyfive years ago, the bilateral collaboration between IN2P3 and GSI started the mutual exchange of scientists to conduct joint research projects. The Dark Matter Lab is a unique opportunity to further deepen the collaboration between CNRS–IN2P3 and the Helmholtz research centers. (CP)
Dr. Francesca Luoni studied at the Engineering Technical University of Milan (Politecnico di Milano). She wrote her Master’s Thesis in Milan and at the German Aerospace Center DLR. After graduating as a nuclear engineer, she started her PhD research at the Technical University of Darmstadt and at the Department of Biophysics at GSI. Currently, she is working as a postdoctoral researcher at the GSI Biophysics Department, Space Radiation Physics research. Her focus is on radiation shielding during space missions. She is also a spokesperson for the GSI-ESA-NASA nuclear cross-section databases resulting from the ESA project ROSSINI3 and part of the team organizing the "ESA-FAIR Radiation Summer School" held annually in Darmstadt at GSI/FAIR and ESA.
In her awarded PhD thesis, mentored by Professor Marco Durante, head of GSI Biophysics, Dr. Francesca Luoni focused on the physics of the interaction of space radiation with materials that are candidates for passive shielding during long-term space missions. Passive shielding is currently considered the most promising radiation protection strategy. This approach consists of adding shielding material to the walls of the spacecraft and the planetary bases.
In her thesis, Dr. Francesca Luoni presented results obtained in the accelerator-based experimental campaigns with ion beams as they occur in space and different shielding materials: among other findings, this showed that lithium-based hydrides stabilized with paraffin were proved to combine the promising dose attenuation properties of the pure hydrides and the mechanical and chemical stability of the paraffin, resulting in good candidate shielding materials for space missions. Subsequently, the experimental data were compared with the simulation results of the most commonly used Monte Carlo codes. The simulations showed significant and systematic differences. Therefore, the last part of the work focused on the presentation of the two nuclear cross-section databases with total reaction cross-sections and fragment production cross-sections, that were generated within Francesca Luoni’s work. The databases were made open access to provide the research communities interested in such data, with the possibility to access them and plot them alongside the parametrizations.
The association “Freunde der Technische Universität zu Darmstadt e.V.” awards 13 prizes each year for outstanding scientific achievements - one prize for each TU department. Since 1987, the organization honored young scientists annually. The 13 departments select the best PhD thesis of the current year and report this to the association. The excellent PhD theses are awarded with 2,500 euros each, plus a one-year free membership in the association “Freunde der der Technische Universität”. (BP)
Vereinigung von Freunden der Technischen Universität zu Darmstadt e.V
]]>Seeing. Experiencing. Understanding: The Open House offers an adventure trip into science and leads right into the heart of the cutting-edge research activities at GSI and FAIR with numerous information and entertainment offers. Scientists, engineers and technicians explain their work and give insights into the fascinating world of research. There is a wide range of opportunities for the guests. Thanks to the ticket system, visitors can conveniently plan their stay in advance and organize it individually.
On the date, the guests can explore the campus with guided tours. There are several tours to choose from, also in English and offerings with barrier-free access and without age restriction. All of them give a good overview of research facilities, technology departments, accelerators and experiments. The visitors can see, for example, the accelerator facilities, where during research operations ions can race at around 270,000 kilometers per second, or the experiments with detectors as tall as houses, which can detect several hundred reaction products simultaneously. Other bookable tours focus on the 20-hectare construction site for the world’s outstanding particle accelerator facility FAIR and the unique high-tech developments for this great future project.
The “Science Square” near the future FAIR control center, is all about enjoying the international atmosphere of GSI and FAIR with a diverse catering offer and entertainment program. There, as well, the focus is on science: There will be hands-on experiments and opportunities to talk directly with researchers about topics such as technology transfer or space travel. Persons interested in working at one of the most exciting international research facilities can get information about the wide variety of job opportunities at GSI and FAIR.
The Open House at GSI and FAIR is also part of the nationwide program for the Science Year 2023. The campaign is proclaimed annually with a changing theme by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research, 2023 titled “Our Universe”. This year’s topic fits particularly well with the future accelerator center FAIR, which has the motto “The Universe in the Laboratory”. At FAIR, matter that usually only exists in the depth of space will be produced and explored in the laboratory. Scientists from all over the world will be able to gain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe from the Big Bang to the present. In addition, the event coincides with the celebrations of the 850th anniversary of the city district Wixhausen, closely connected to GSI/FAIR as a neighboring district.
The GSI and FAIR managing directors Professor Paolo Giubellino, Dr. Ulrich Breuer and Jörg Blaurock look forward to the Open House with great anticipation: “All of us working at GSI and FAIR are very excited to welcome the visitors and want to spark enthusiasm and curiosity for science with the Open House. It is important for us to inform the public about our work and our concept for the future, to inspire people and to strengthen the interest for scientific and technical topics, also among the interested young people. Science needs many bright minds using their talent for research. We also want to show the possibilities of international collaboration and how society can benefit from modern research. That's why we strongly hope to welcome numerous guests on July 15.” (BP)
Tickets: Individual “Open House” tickets free of charge must be purchased in advance.
Booking portal: free ticket booking at www.gsi.de/en/tagderoffenentuer (starting 1 June 2023)
Booking options: a) guided campus tours or construction site tours at fixed starting times (duration approx. 75 min.) with stay at the “Science Square” b) stay at the “Science Square” without guided tours (duration unlimited)
Maximum number: up to six tickets per person can be booked
Admission: The ticket entitles you to admission from 10 a.m., please arrive at the entrance at least 30 min. before the starting time of your booked tour
Language: Guided tours are also offered in English at certain times.
Age restrictions: All ages are welcome at the “Science Square”; age restriction for the guided tours can be found on the ticketing website.
Accessibility: Accessibility is provided in the "Science Square"; restrictions on guided tours can be found on the ticketing website.
Gastronomy: A gastronomic offer is available on a self-pay basis
]]>The France@FAIR event, which emphasized the significance of global collaboration in research and innovation, was effectively organized by the FAIR Management and the Ministère de l'Enseignement supérieur et de la Recherche (MESR), France. The event brought together 15 leading companies in the big science industry in France, enabling them to explore the potential opportunities available at FAIR.
During the France@FAIR event, participants were able to take a tour of the civil construction site and gain firsthand insights into the project's progress. They also received a presentation on the research focus and project status by the Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, and Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Drector of FAIR and GSI. This helped them to better understand the technological needs and challenges that the project aims to address. These experiences provided a valuable opportunity for the companies to engage with the project team and gain a deeper understanding of how they can contribute to the project's success. The companies were also presenting their competencies, experience and capabilities to the experts at FAIR. The insights and current opportunities in Research and Innovation between France and Germany were also shared, including research projects and Technology Transfer opportunities for sustainable development and cooperation.
The satellite event, aimed to understand the current requirements of the FAIR mega science project and how French companies can GET_INvolved with FAIR, was attended by 15 French companies. The satellite event was warmly opened by Consul General adjoint (Frankfurt) Thomas Buffin and attended by passionate scientists and members of the GSI/FAIR team. The Industry Partnership Officer, Arnauld Leservot, and the support of the Embassy of France in Germany and the Management of FAIR made the event possible.
“I was pleased to present the key importance of the French-German cooperation on Research and Innovation on behalf of the Embassy of France in Germany in this frame. I was very delighted to get to know and discuss lengthy with the passionate scientists and GSI/FAIR team on this important international project and its future prospects. I was very impressed by the site and the facilities under construction,” said Axelle Cheney-Grünberger, Senior International Policy and Innovation Expert from the Embassy of France in Germany.
"We are extremely delighted to see such a strong interest and participation from industry partners in the France@FAIR event. Collaborating with industry is crucial to the success of big science projects like FAIR, and we value the insights and contributions of these companies towards achieving our research and innovation goals. I look forward to have them actively engaged in the FAIR project in one form or the other", said Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of FAIR and GSI.
The France@FAIR event was a great success, highlighting the importance of international cooperation in research and innovation. Special thanks go to Axelle Cheney-Grünberger, Science Allemagne, for sharing her insights and current opportunities. Additionally, the following companies participated in the event and were able to gain valuable information about research projects and Technology Transfer opportunities: ALSYMEX, Technetics Group, Bertin Technologies, OMEGA PHYSICS, Thales Science, Chart Industries, Inc., Sigmaphi Accelerator Technologies, Air Liquide, ROBATEL industries, Framatome, Nexans, NUVIA VINCI, Cegelec CEM (VINCI Energies), and ISP System. The event provided an excellent opportunity for these companies to learn more about the FAIR science project and explore possibilities for sustainable development and cooperation. (BP)
For queries, it is possible to get in touch with Arnauld Leservot (arnault.leservot@recherche.gouv.fr), Industrial Partnership Officer for Research Infrastructures at French Ministry of Research and Innovation, Dr. Sonia Utermann (S.Utermann@gsi.de), In-Kind and Procurement, Dr. Pradeep Ghosh (Pradeep.Ghosh@fair-center.eu; International-cooperations@fair-center.eu), International Cooperations
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The project is well focused and deliberately restricted to three enabling technologies, which require the most urgent efforts and timely attention by the community: laser amplification at both high-energy and high-repetition-rate, the transport of high-energy laser beams over long distances, and the resilience of optical coating for large optics. To reach the goals, the major activity within THRILL will be organized around producing several prototypes demonstrating a high level of technical readiness. THRILL will address not yet explored technical bottlenecks — such as transport over long distances of large-aperture laser beams via relay imaging using all-reflective optics — and aims at proposing concrete steps to increase the performances and effectiveness of the industrial community through the co-development of advanced technologies up to prototyping in operational environments.
Advancing the technical readiness of these topics is strategically aligned with the long-term plans and evolution of the European ESFRI landmarks FAIR, ELI and Eu-XFEL, and of the French research infrastructure APOLLON, bringing them to the next level of development and strengthening their leading position. The project is also offering an outstanding opportunity to train a qualified work force for research institutions and industry. The structure of THRILL promotes synergetic work, fast transfer to industry and integrated research activities at the European level. Access to the research institutions will be granted as in-kind contribution.
GSI is well-suited for the coordinator role due to its long-standing experience in the conception, development and operation of mid-scale laser systems. GSI’s high-performance laser system PHELIX (Petawatt High-Energy Laser for Ion Experiments) has been one of the first lasers operated in combination with an accelerator research facility worldwide. PHELIX can deliver laser pulses with energies of up to 1,000 joules and laser pulses with a power of up to half a petawatt. “At PHELIX, scientists from around the world have the unique opportunity to conduct experiments that combine laser beams and ion beams produced in the existing accelerator facility. This makes it possible to study extreme states of matter, such as those that occur in stars or inside large planets,” explains Professor Vincent Bagnoud, head of the research department Plasma Physics/PHELIX at GSI/FAIR.
THRILL is funded by the EU’s HORIZON EUROPE program under the grant agreement 101095207. Participating institutions, apart from GSI/FAIR, are Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf, European X-Ray Free-Electron Laser Facility and Forschungsverbund Berlin in Germany, as well as Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique and Amplitude Systems in France, the ELI ERIC, Laserlab-Europe AISBL in Belgium and the University of Rochester in the USA. (CP)
Digitization requires data centers and competent personnel to operate them. But this is precisely where the challenges lie: On the one hand, the requirements and complexity of IT systems increase; on the other hand, it is becoming more and more difficult to find well-trained data center technicians and engineers. This is where DC Vision comes in. The software centralizes all information about the various components in the data center. For each individual rack, a digital twin is created which exactly replicates reality. If changes have to be made to a rack, AR glasses provide data center engineers with a variety of additional information about the rack they are currently working. This greatly simplifies remote services in particular, as all work steps can be clearly defined. The probability of errors drops precipitously. In addition, technicians can access other sources as needed, updating or adding data to the digital twin as appropriate.
Dr. Helmut Kreiser, head of the Green IT Cube from the IT department of GSI/FAIR, sees a lot of potential in the technology: “Our data center has multiple levels, and we’re currently running 128 racks per level. Documentation management takes up a lot of time here, but is crucial to ensure the security of the infrastructure. We’re pleased to be able to utilize the concept of the digital twin with DC Vision, which reduces this effort and provides considerable added value.” In the future, there are plans to use sensors more intensively in the data center and integrate them into the digital twin concept, as Dr. Kreiser explains: “Our goal is to enable visual inspections with AR glasses that provide us with all relevant information at a glance. Having all this data in view, we could directly identify errors and even anticipate potential interruptions.”
For DC Smarter, the Green IT Cube represents the ideal environment to demonstrate the software to interested companies or organizations. Jörg Hesselink, CEO DC Smarter, is enthusiastic about the cooperation: “We are delighted to be the first partner to move into the Digital Open Lab at the Green IT Cube. For us, this is the ideal combination of research environment and real data center infrastructure. Here we can both comprehensively present our software to prospects and also receive valuable suggestions for additional functionalities.”
DC Vision is based on an existing Data Center Infrastructure Management System (DCIM). The digital twin is created on the basis of existing information. Jörg Hesselink knows from experience: “Only 50 percent of all companies regularly update the required information. The user-friendly interface of our software simplifies asset management and prevents media disruptions, thus ensuring the secure and reliable operation of the infrastructure over the long term.” (DC Smarter/CP)
Following a welcome by the organizing Public Relations department and the head of the Human Resources Management, Tobias Gottschalk, the girls first went on an accompanied discovery tour to some stations on campus. They took a look at the experimental storage ring ESR, visited the treatment site for tumor therapy with carbon ions and marveled at the large detector setup HADES. The program also included a walk to the viewing platform of the large construction site for the future FAIR accelerator.
Afterwards, the girls learned more about individual work areas on campus in small groups. These included science activities in materials research, atomic physics and at the ALICE experiment, as well as numerous infrastructure facilities such as electronics departments, workshops, target laboratory, detector laboratory, cryogenics, construction, facility management and IT. In a special FAIR construction offer, some of the girls were also able to get a glimpse of construction activity on the large-scale site, getting up close and personal with excavators, cranes and lots and lots of concrete. In biophysics, even a small group took part in Girls'Day in English.
“We were very happy about the enormous popularity and the lively participation. For us as the organizing department and, of course, for our colleagues in the scientific and technical departments, this is a confirmation of the attractiveness of our offer,” explains organizer Carola Pomplun, who is a physicist herself and works in the Public Relations department at GSI and FAIR. “Many groups built or made something small on campus that could be taken home. To get into personal contact with our colleagues on site, to see the work ‘live’ and to ask and answer questions directly, allows the participants a deep insight into the different fields of work.”
“Besides the possibility of working at GSI and FAIR as a student, there is also the option to do your bachelor's, master's or doctoral theses with us. In addition we offer a variety of apprenticeships as well as dual study programs,” says Tobias Gottschalk. “If the girls liked it here, I’d like to invite them to apply for those, or for a voluntary or compulsory internship as well.”
Girls’Day is a day of action all over Germany. On this day, businesses, universities, and other institutions all over Germany open their doors to schoolgirls from grade 5 and above. The participants learn about courses of study and training in professions in the areas of IT, natural sciences, and technology — areas in which women have rarely been employed in the past. GSI and — since its foundation — also FAIR have been participating in the annual event since the early days of Girls'Day. (CP)
The students gained insight into innovative methods for tumor therapy using ion beams via introductions to particle therapy and a review of the carbon therapy pilot project that took place at GSI, where over 440 people were treated on campus from 1997 to 2008. During a tour of the research facilities, they visited the former treatment site and received information about the current state of research.
During a subsequent hands-on exercise, they had the opportunity to create treatment plans for therapy using the professional software MatRad, developed by Deutsches Krebsforschungszentrum in Heidelberg, and got to know more about the benefits of different methods. In a final video conference in English with participants from other research institutions in Germany, Georgia and Slovenia, they exchanged their experiences.
The PTMCs have been set up by GSI/FAIR and are organized internationally by coordinator Yiota Foka. Since its first pilot at GSI/FAIR, six PTMCs sessions have been organized per year reaching about 1500 each year in 2021 and 2022, in online mode. In 2023, nine sessions of PTMC took place mostly in-person or in hybrid mode, in 35 institutes from 20 countries. Further yearly events at GSI/FAIR and others around the world are planned for the future.
Each year, more than 13,000 students from 60 countries take part in all IPPOG Masterclass events of about 225 universities or research centers for a day to unlock the mysteries of particle physics. The events in Germany are held in collaboration with the Netzwerk Teilchenwelt, of which GSI/FAIR is a member. The goal of the nationwide network for communicating particle physics to young people and teachers is to make particle physics accessible to a broader public. In addition, the new PTMC demonstrates benefits of fundamental research for society and the role of particle physics for tumor therapy. (CP)
]]>The workshop is a part of the preparations of implementation of the new experiments. The call for research proposals took place last year, submission, evaluation and selection as well. The goal of the current IBPER workshop was to discuss the experiment proposals of the research groups and to plan the future experiments during the next beam time at GSI/FAIR. Numerous scientists from Germany, Belgium, the Czech Republic, England, France and Italy participated in the workshop and shared information about the experiments, which deal with nanocomposites, moon dust and cold shields, among other topics.
The meeting was opened by Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, and ESA Campaign Manager Dr. Anna Fogtmann. An overview of IBPER and IBER activities at GSI was given by the head of GSI’s Biophysics Department, Professor Marco Durante. During a guided tour, the guests got an insight into the GSI and FAIR research facilities before research plans were discussed.
The GSI accelerator facility is the only one in Europe that can generate all of the ion beams that occur in our solar system, which range from the lightest one, hydrogen, to the heaviest, uranium. The research opportunities will be expanded even further by the international accelerator facility FAIR. Even higher energies will be available for cosmic radiation simulation, enabling groundbreaking new insights. Using these pioneering research opportunities of GSI/FAIR, participants in the new IBPER program will be able to advance their selected research projects to expand knowledge of the biological and physical effects of cosmic radiation.
With space missions to the Moon and beyond, the complex space radiation environment can be a limiting factor of human and robotic space exploration. Ionizing radiation impacts living organisms and also interacts with matter, affecting electronic devices, and disrupting satellite operations. This creates the need for investigations into the effects of interactions of ionizing radiation with biological tissues, physical matter, and hardware, to better assess the risk of adverse effects of space radiation leading to designing countermeasures and mitigation strategies for spaceflight.
The results, generated by the ESA-GSI-collaboration will provide future-oriented information not only for space travel but also for life on earth. For example, data from the experiments can provide more detailed insights into radiation risks on earth. They can also help to optimize radiation protection measures and can improve radiation therapies for treating cancer. (BP)
Jörg Blaurock Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR (remotely), and Dr. Pradeep Ghosh, International Cooperations of GSI and FAIR, welcomed the Indian guests. The visit focused on informing about the status of the FAIR Project, current and planned research activities at GSI as well as the high-tech developments for FAIR, especially the Indian activities in this regard. During his visit, the ambassador had the opportunity to visit the construction site with a guided tour and see a few chosen sections in campus.
During their visit, the delegation also met with Indian students, researchers, and employees of Indian origin who are currently working at the research center GSI and FAIR. The Ambassador was impressed with their contributions to the project and their dedication to scientific research.
The visit was a success and helped to strengthen the long standing partnership between India and Germany in the field of scientific research and technology. India's investment in the FAIR project demonstrates its commitment to fostering global collaborations and advancing scientific research.
The Ambassador's visit highlights India's growing presence in the global scientific community and its efforts to encourage its citizens to pursue careers in research and development. It also underscores the importance of international collaboration in advancing scientific research and promoting innovation. The Ambassador also pressed for even more brain circulation between Germany and India using mobility opportunities for students, researchers and engineers through the GET_INvolved Programme. Overall, the Ambassador's visit was a significant step forward in strengthening India's role in the global scientific community and advancing scientific research and technological innovation. (BP)
India is one of the founding countries of FAIR, and holds 3,5 percent of the current FAIR GmbH shares. Indian Researchers, under the guidance of the Department of Science and Technology (DST) and the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE), Government of India, have been working both in experiments and accelerators, designing and realizing components in Indian scientific institutions and industries. Indian scientists have been essential in shaping the overall scientific program of FAIR and in the conception of the accelerator complex. They are engaged in building detectors for the NUSTAR (Nuclear Structure, Astrophysics and Reactions) and, CBM (Compressed Baryonic Matter) scientific pillars. Another area of major participation is building high-tech equipment to be used at the heart of the FAIR accelerator such as Vacuum chambers, radiation-hard cables and high-tech power convertors.
For inquiries, please contact: Dr. Pradeep Ghosh, E-Mail Pradeep.Ghosh@fair-center.eu or International@gsi.de.
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The EDC were opened by Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, with an introduction to the science of GSI/FAIR. With twenty presentations and many discussion opportunities, the ECD provided a colorful bouquet of topics and a broad forum around the subject. The ECD are always accompanied by an industrial exhibition, where this time ten companies from the field of cryogenics presented their portfolios. For FAIR/GSI and the in-kind partners, this was an opportunity to talk to potential suppliers on site.
Naturally, one of the focusses of the meeting this time was the international FAIR accelerator, which is currently being built in Darmstadt. Numerous presentations reported on the cryogenic infrastructure and cryogenic systems of the future FAIR ring accelerator SIS100 and the fragment separator Super-FRS as well as on the FAIR construction site planning. A highlight was the on-site visit to the FAIR cryogenics facility on the construction site, which is well advanced in its installation.
The FAIR cryogenic plant is one of the largest possible cryogenics plants that can still be built from one unit. In order to guide the particles along their paths, strong magnetic fields are required, which can most efficiently be achieved through the phenomenon of superconductivity. To achieve this, the magnets must be cooled to a temperature of four kelvin (- 269°C). For that purpose, the cryogenic system delivers a maximum flow rate of over 21,000 liters of liquid helium per hour, for a total helium storage of nine tons, with a maximum cooling capacity of 14 kilowatts at four kelvin. (CP)
]]>Radiation therapy, manufacturing radiopharmaceuticals, developing and certifying drugs and designing energy-efficient semiconductors and new high-performance materials – these are just some of the different areas that are of great economic relevance. They are also areas in which accelerator-based technologies offer enormous advantages to research and development, in manufacturing and for quality control. However, at present the potential of such technologies is not being fully tapped outside the field of science. The Helmholtz Innovation Platform HI-ACTS, with the participation of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, is stepping up to change this.
HI-ACTS will be jointly operated by GSI together with project coordinator DESY, Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR), Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin (HZB) and Helmholtz-Zentrum Hereon. Accelerator technologies operated by the Helmholtz Association will be made available to industrial users in the form of a cost-effective full-service infrastructure. This means that existing research infrastructures, such as DESY's synchrotron radiation source PETRA III and its successor PETRA IV, will be easier to use when studying industrial questions.
At GSI and the international accelerator center FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research), which is currently under construction, a position will be created for this purpose, which will further develop and professionalize relationships with relevant industrial partners. Partners can, for example, use experiment time at the accelerator, as is already established in a collaboration between the European Space Agency ESA and the Biophysics research department for radiation hardness testing of electronic components to be used in space, or in the production of nanostructures in materials research. The computing capacities of GSI/FAIR's particularly energy-efficient high-performance computing center Green IT Cube can also be employed by external partners.
“To network with relevant partners for transfer, GSI has established a proactive innovation ecosystem and sees the HI-ACTS innovation platform as an ideal partner for further expanding and professionalizing the areas of infrastructure use and services around its accelerator facilities,” says Dr. Tobias Engert, head of Technology Transfer at GSI/FAIR.
“Accelerator technology has great innovation potential that needs to be exploited for a wide range of societal challenges,” adds Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR. “The new HI-ACTS platform will provide a single point of contact for industrial partners, establish administrative procedures and offer the best possible support for researchers.”
In addition to making better use of the existing accelerators in the research centres themselves, HI-ACTS aims to establish the technology of compact accelerators so that these devices can easily be used on site, for example when developing drugs, or as powerful instruments for cancer therapy.
The platform will set up Technology Labs, specifically drawing on the competencies of the scientific partners for relevant technological developments, such as compact accelerators or cyclotron solutions for radionuclide production. From the very beginning, HI-ACTS will be designed in collaboration with industrial companies, ensuring that the needs of companies working in fields such as medical technology, high-performance semiconductors, (radio‑)pharmaceuticals and radiotheranostic materials can be specifically addressed.
HI-ACTS is one of two projects that are currently receiving funding within the framework of the Helmholtz Association’s “Innovation Platforms” funding scheme. The common factor between all the applications is that they specifically address challenges for which the research centres within the Helmholtz Association can develop sustainable solutions relevant to society at large.
Implementation of the platform will start as of now and will run for a period of three years, with a total volume of just under 13 million euros. Current plans envisage HI-ACTS operating beyond this period in the long term. (DESY/CP)
Leading international scientists, partly from GSI and FAIR, spent five days in Aschaffenburg discussing the latest experimental and theoretical results in the field of quark-gluon plasma (QGP). The QGP, a state of the early universe in its first microseconds after the Big Bang, is produced in the laboratory in large accelerators such as the Large Hadron Collider at CERN and will also be studied with collisions of nuclei at the FAIR accelerator facility under construction in Darmstadt. The event was organized by scientists from GSI Darmstadt and the University of Münster, together with colleagues from Bielefeld, Darmstadt, Frankfurt, Gießen and Heidelberg.
After the last conference was held online due to the covid pandemic, the lively discussions around talks in parallel and plenary sessions in Aschaffenburg were much appreciated by the participants. The conference was preceded by a student day with presentations for early-career scientists held at GSI/FAIR in Darmstadt, which included a guided tour of the FAIR construction site.
A series of public events gave people in Aschaffenburg and the surrounding area an insight into nuclear and particle physics and their essential role in understanding our Universe. A public evening lecture by Prof. Luciano Rezzolla from Goethe University Frankfurt rounded off the program. The next edition of the conference will take place in the fall of 2024 in Japan.
]]>Artificial intelligence, quantum technologies, advanced computing, deep space missions... Projects for new advanced space applications are flourishing. To carry them out, it is essential to use highly advanced radiation-resistant electronic devices and to acquire decisive knowledge of shielding properties and radiobiology for astronauts going to the Moon and beyond. Capable of mimicking the effects of space highly penetrating radiation, very high energy (VHE) ion beams have become extremely attractive for qualifying advanced electronics for use in space and shielding and radiobiology testing. However, there are such European facilities aimed specifically for space applications.
Funded under the Horizon Europe programme, HEARTS (High-Energy Accelerators for Radiation Testing and Shielding) will aim at developing and establishing a European infrastructure for research and industrial access to high-energy heavy ion facilities for the fields of radiation effects in electronics, shielding and radiobiology. For this purpose, it will provide upgrade two VHE ion facilities and provide access to space industries and academia on a routinely basis.
HEARTS will be instrumental to ensure an autonomous European access to space. By making such facilities available in Europe, European companies will be less dependable on critical facilities available elsewhere. By the end of the project in 2026, the HEARTS is expected to bring Europe to be in a position to easily accommodate the current demand for VHE ions and to meet the increasing demand that is foreseen by the end of the decade.
The project is coordinated by CERN, together with GSI as main high-energy ion accelerator infrastructures. HEARTS also includes the University of Padova as an academic partner, as well as Thales Alenia Space and Airbus Defence and Space as industrial participants, all of whom have extensive experience in the field of radiation effects and a strong interest in VHE ion testing.
On the GSI part, the HEARTS project is advanced by the Biophysics Department headed by Professor Marco Durante. The expertise available here in the field of space radiation physics and biology is receiving wide international recognition. As part of the HEARTS work packages, GSI biophysics will make significant preparations for the use of the new FAIR ring accelerator SIS100 for shielding testing. For the HEARTS program, it will be essential the realization of the biophysics test station at SIS100, foreseen in the CBM experimental cave, which will allow a world-record in cosmic ray simulations using 10 GeV/n Fe-ions. The only other facility, Brookhaven National Laboratory in US funded by NASA, offers a cosmic ray simulator with cutoff at 1 GeV/n.
Another work package with strong GSI participation focuses on defining and calibrating the beam delivery sensors for both material shielding and microelectronics. (CERN/BP)
Since the 1960s, earthquakes have been predicted by measuring radon gas, which leaks from microcracks in the bedrock due to movements in the Earth's crust. “But is has become increasingly clear that the radon level measured in the air or soil can be influenced by temperature fluctuations and air humidity, so instead we’re measuring the values in the groundwater,” says Dr. Ayse Ataç Nyberg, professor at KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden, who is leading the project.
GSI plays a key role in the project in terms of realizing the sensing and analytics. Building on particle and radiation detectors, signal processing electronics and data processing systems used for nuclear physics experiments at GSI facilities, the participating GSI research group is developing the sensor units for artEmis. In addition to radon detectors, the units will include sensors for temperature, pressure, conductivity and other physical parameters. By using artificial intelligence (AI) methods, which also result from basic research at GSI, the sensor units can be operated autonomously. GSI scientist Dr. Jürgen Gerl, who is responsible for the sensor units in the artEmis project with his team, confirms, “We are pleased to make an important contribution to the practical realization of an early warning system for earthquakes by applying detection systems and methods from our basic research.”
As a first step, measurements will be carried out on fault lines in Greece, Italy and Switzerland. Through research stations in these countries, the team has access to groundwater sources where sensor units can be placed. Hundreds of such units, distributed across the earthquake-prone areas, each form a network. Advanced analysis of the network data is performed using machine learning and AI. The goal here is to clearly link changes in local radon concentration to seismic activity and rule out other causes (false alarms). (LW)
Gerhard Kraft was born in Heidelberg on October 29, 1941. He studied physics in Heidelberg and Cologne, where he also received his doctorate, and initially worked in the fields of atomic and nuclear physics. This was followed by research stays in Strasbourg and Berkeley in the USA, where he became acquainted with the ion beam therapy activities there. In 1973 he joined GSI in the research department of atomic physics. From 1981, he headed the new GSI biophysics department as founding director. He also held honorary professorships at the University of Kassel and the Technical University of Darmstadt as well as a Helmholtz professorship of the Helmholtz Association.
Professor Gerhard Kraft's main field of activity was heavy ion therapy and his work is inseparably linked with the initiative to establish heavy ion therapy in Germany and Europe. His vision was to develop an extremely precise irradiation method in which the advantages of the ion beam - its precision and high biological effect - could be fully exploited. Thanks to his initiative, his foresight and persuasiveness, this undertaking succeeded. The method for cancer therapy with ion beams, which he initiated, was advanced at GSI in Darmstadt from basic research in physics and radiobiology to clinical application. Cancer cells are effectively destroyed while healthy tissue is spared.
In joint research by the GSI Helmholtzzentrum and its partners – the Radiological Clinic of the University of Heidelberg, the German Cancer Research Center Heidelberg (DKFZ) and the Research Center Dresden-Rossendorf (now HZDR) – the novel tumor therapy was developed and realized in a pilot project. The first patient irradiation in 1997 was preceded by four years of technical construction of the therapy unit and 20 years of basic research in radiation biology and physics. The construction of the treatment unit at GSI was primarily a joint effort of the biophysics, materials research, experiment electronics, information technology and accelerator departments.
Professor Gerhard Kraft struggled with tireless commitment and perseverance to set up this pilot project. Years later, he still recalled the teamwork in the pilot project with high appreciation: "At that time, most people hardly thought it possible to make the outstanding biological-medical properties of ion beams technically usable for therapy. This was only possible through the interaction of many disciplines such as nuclear and atomic physics, radiation biology and medicine, accelerator physics, computer science and many more."
From 1997 to 2008, more than 440 patients with tumors in the head and neck region were treated with ion beams at GSI with great success. The promising findings went directly into the construction of the Heidelberg Ion Beam Therapy Center HIT. Subsequently, Professor Gerhard Kraft dedicated himself to the further dissemination of heavy ion therapy and, for example, accompanied the construction of similar therapy facilities in Marburg and Shanghai, advising major corporations such as Rhön-Klinikum AG and Siemens AG. He also co-authored the proposals for the ion beam therapies in Pavia (CNAO) and in Wiener Neustadt (MedAustron).
The renowned scientist has shaped the research of the biological effects of ion beams nationally and internationally with his work. He was involved in many initiatives to develop ion therapy in Europe and was a founding member of the ion therapy initiative "European Network for Research in Light Ion Hadrontherapy" (ENLIGHT) at CERN. In addition, he was always an extremely experienced advisor in the Association for the Promotion of Tumor Therapy with Heavy Ions. His initiative also led to the establishment of a professorship in radiation biophysics at the Technical University of Darmstadt, which significantly strengthened radiation research in Germany. Together with the Biophysics Department of GSI, the Darmstadt site could thus be developed into one of the leading centers of radiation research.
Even after his retirement, he continued to work intensively in research, focusing in particular on research into the therapeutic effects of radon. As a patient with a severe chronic disease, he was convinced of its positive effects after many radon cures. Together with his colleagues and students, he also conducted fundamental research on the transport and accumulation of radon in organisms, thus advancing the field of radiation protection on radon, a topic that is becoming increasingly important. Here, again, his unerring instinct for important technologies and research topics has been evident.
He has received numerous awards for his work, including the Erwin Schrödinger Prize of the Helmholtz Association in 1999 and the Federal Cross of Merit 1st Class in 2008. He was also awarded the prestigious Bacq and Alexander Prize by the European Radiation Research Society ERRS in 2006, as well as the Otto Hahn Prize of the City of Frankfurt and the Ulrich Hagen Prize of the German Society for Biological Radiation Research.
Professor Gerhard Kraft created an exemplary interdisciplinary research culture in his department, which always had a balanced proportion of male and female researchers and is still very successful today. He also dedicated himself tirelessly to the education of young scientists and mentored significantly more than a hundred final theses.
With his pioneering research for the benefit of society, Professor Kraft's work has left traces that are even visible in the daily lives of the people of Darmstadt. For example, the so-called Bragg curve, the base of the tumor therapy with heavy ions, is eternalized in the glass windows of the Protestant church in Darmstadt-Wixhausen district; it shows the dose distribution of heavy ion therapy.
The death of Professor Gerhard Kraft means the loss of a leading figure for the sciences. GSI and FAIR will always remember Professor Gerhard Kraft with great honor. Our deepest compassion goes out to his family. (BP)
]]>The artist wants to create an immersive interactive installation generating a poetic reinterpretation.“The opportunity to work and research at FAIR/GSI will allow me to delve into the hidden poetry of physics, the links that beat inside atoms and verses,” says Violeta López López.
GSI wants to promote interdisciplinary exchange and creativity together with Kultur einer Digitalstadt and the artist. The aim is to create new perspectives and inspire innovation in science and art. Through the artistic approach, complex scientific concepts can be communicated to a wider audience. During expert discussions, in the Open Lab and at the Final View, the research project of the residency can be experienced by all participants and the public.
The "Artist-in-Science-Residence" is supported by Kulturfonds Frankfurt Rhein-Main, Dr. Hans-Riegel-Stiftung Bonn, Wissenschaftsstadt Darmstadt and Digitalstadt. (KG/BP)
The Management of GSI and FAIR is very glad about the commitment of the Federal Ministry of Research and the Hessian Ministry of Science and the Arts to provide about the additional funding for FAIR and thus to secure "First Science" at FAIR as the host state. Despite the difficult global economic and geopolitical conditions, this represents a significant step forward for the FAIR project and for the excellent research that can be conducted at FAIR. FAIR's 'First Science' stage, for example, can provide completely new insights into the structure and behavior of matter and open up new possibilities for tumor therapy with high-intensity charged particles for the benefit of society. The scientific review evaluated FAIR's scientific program as compelling and world-leading in many aspects.
The international partners have also acknowledged the additional costs and want to make further commitments in a timely manner. Therefore, the current decisions are an outstanding signal for the site and its employees. But they are also an outstanding signal for science in Germany and Europe.
Press release of the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (in German)
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Hessen's Digital Minister Prof. Dr. Kristina Sinemus today inaugurated the AI Innovation Lab at the Green IT Cube of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt. Funded with approximately 10 million euros, the project serves as a focal point for companies, startups and academia with the central goal of providing access to an AI supercomputing infrastructure.
In the lab, AI systems and applications can be developed, trained, tested and evaluated. Users from research and application not only receive assistance in the design and implementation of AI projects and access to the infrastructure, but also support in the adaptation of alternative hardware architectures and can perform computationally intensive AI tasks. This enables companies to accelerate processes, make workflows more efficient, and develop leap innovations. Industries that benefit from computing infrastructure include finance, biotechnology, pharmaceuticals, and mobility and logistics. “Sustainable and state-of-the-art AI computing infrastructure is a prerequisite for the long-term economic success of companies. With the AI Innovation Lab, we are creating a center that is unique in Germany, which will increase start-up dynamics in Hessen, boost the state's innovative capacity and provide a competitive edge,” Hessen's Minister of Digital Strategy and Innovation Prof. Dr. Kristina Sinemus emphasized.
“Many Hessian start-ups use AI for their innovative business models — from agricultural technology to finance and environmental technologies. This is precisely why the AI Innovation Lab at the Green IT Cube plays a key role in the transfer from science to business. At the same time, we are strengthening Hessen as a start-up location for sustainable business ideas. We we need them to contribute to the economic transformation in Hessen: We want to facilitate the transformation to a climate-neutral economy and make Hessen the leading location for green start-ups,” said Hessen's Minister of Economics Tarek Al-Wazir, pointing out that one-third of start-ups in Hessen are already green start-ups.
To house the hardware of the future innovation lab in hessian.AI, TU Darmstadt has signed a framework agreement with GSI Helmholtzzentrum to use the water-cooled Green IT Cube, one of the most sustainable computing infrastructures in the world in terms of energy use. In its entirety, the AI Innovation Lab will be among the top 300 AI supercomputers in the world. With its 38 compute nodes and 304 GPUs (graphics cards) and half a petabyte of storage space, it provides an excellent infrastructure for research and development. The computers have a weight of about six tons. Several kilometers of cables were installed.
“The move of the AI Innovation Center into the Green IT Cube bridges the gap between cutting-edge research and application, because low energy consumption is a key prerequisite for the sustainable use of AI and the operation of high-performance data centers,” explained Angela Dorn, Hessen's Minister of Higher Education, Research, Science and the Arts. “The Ministry of Science has therefore provided 5.5 million euros from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) for the expansion of the Green IT Cube into a research and transfer center for water cooling of mainframe computers.”
Prof. Dr. Tanja Brühl, President of TU Darmstadt: “As a future-oriented building block of the strong AI ecosystem in Hessen, the AI Innovation Lab creates excellent framework conditions to transfer the excellent AI research in width and depth at TU Darmstadt and all universities involved in hessian.AI into applications. With the help of robust, secure and efficient AI systems, we want to develop solutions for global challenges in exchange with our partners in business and society. I am pleased that we can continue to realize this goal in hessian.AI thanks to the great support of the Hessian state government.”
Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Mira Mezini, Co-Director of hessian.AI: “The AI Innovation Lab of hessian.AI, the Hessian Center for Artificial Intelligence, opens up new opportunities for Hessian companies, startups and academia in dealing with AI as a key technology. Access to large compute infrastructures and the offer of individual services from a single source in close connection to hessian.AI's cutting-edge research are necessary prerequisites for raising the potential for new AI innovations in Hessen and thus promoting AI sovereignty. It's great that with the help of the Hessian state government, we can further advance cutting-edge AI research and application in Hessen.”
“High-performance computing and the use of artificial intelligence play a major role in modern science and are rapidly gaining importance. Our sustainable data center Green IT Cube offers optimal conditions to further advance the development of AI and to link it to our research. The funding we have received as part of the REACT-EU program has allowed the expansion of spare capacities for use by external project partners and allows the development of important synergies like the one we are proud to inaugurate today,” says Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR.
Dr. Ulrich Breuer, Administrative Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, adds, “With our living Digital Open Lab, we provide an environment for the development, testing and upscaling of energy-efficient high-performance computing up to the scale of industrial demonstrators. In the framework of cooperations with scientific institutions and companies, in particular startups, we offer a platform to contribute to green computing and the development of AI-based technologies. We are pleased to welcome hessian.AI as a partner to our campus.”
Prof. Dr. rer. nat. Johannes Kabisch, Chief Scientific Officer of Proteineer GmbH: “Proteineer GmbH uses AI on a large scale, for example to find new proteins for the production of mRNA therapeutics in huge data sets for our customers. The GPUs and computational nodes in the AI Innovation Lab will help us to significantly improve and accelerate these developments.”
Michael Wilczynska, Managing Director WIANCO OTT Robotics: “The further developments of the disruptive Cognitive AI solution EMMA include AI modules based on neural networks, which require a high level of computing power to train the models, for example to classify so-called wood defects in production batches and to automatically control the resulting evaluation in terms of the process. In addition to an outstanding AI computing infrastructure, the AI Innovation Lab also delivers a holistic range of development-supporting components that make the business location even more attractive and significantly increase its performance.”
“Machine learning and computationally intensive algorithms are the core of our products and research activities. The GPU cluster in the Green IT Cube provides the necessary computing capacity regionally to further expand our competitive advantage,” said Dr.-Ing. Stéphane Foulard, CEO of Compredict GmbH.
Dr. Andreas Knirsch, Head of Software, Wingcopter GmbH: “The computational infrastructure of the AI Innovation Lab could help us enormously to train and test our AI to the extent necessary for autonomous, but at the same time safe and reliable flights. The initiative strengthens our region and keeps know-how as well as experts in the country on a key future topic.”
“Given the ever-increasing complexity of DeepLearning models, the requirements for humans and machines to use the systems are also increasing. The AI Innovation Lab addresses both areas and creates a very good starting point for startups from the Rhine-Main region and beyond,” said Erik Kaiser, CEO of summetix GmbH.
“Hessen has the potential to become the Silicon Valley of Europe, and we as the state government are investing in the future technology of AI in order to make Hessen future-proof in both the cities and the state. We are convinced that AI can only develop its potential if people have confidence in the development and use of AI. This applies to existing measures such as the Hessian Center for Artificial Intelligence hessian.AI or the Center for Responsible Digitalization ZEVEDI, as well as to our ‘AI Quality & Testing Hub’, which is unique in Germany. And with our funded Center for Applied Quantum Computing, Hessen is already preparing for the use of the next generation of supercomputers,” Sinemus concluded.
Dr. Daria Kostyleva received the Young Scientist Award for the discovery of several new isotopes beyond the proton drip line, the study of the three-proton decay of the potassium isotope 31K, and for her recent contributions to future medical imaging and possibly oncological therapies using radioactive beams as a member of the BARB collaboration (Biomedical Applications of Radioactive ion Beams).
The Young Scientist Award is bestowed annually by GENCO to outstanding young researchers working in the field of experimental or theoretical nuclear physics or chemistry. The winners are selected by an international jury. The award is endowed with 1,000 euros and is handed over during the NUSTAR annual meeting.
Additionally, the GENCO community honored with a Membership Award:
The delegation of the FAIR/GSI Management visited Prague and Řež to participate in the “FAIR Days Czech Republic”. The event started with an inauguration of the FAIR Seminar at the Czech Technical University (CTU) in Prague to students and faculty members of the university campus. Scientific Managing Director of GSI/FAIR Professor Paolo Giubellino and Technical Managing Director of GSI/FAIR Jörg Blaurock talked about the scientific content, potential discoveries, new technologies and technical challenges that await us in the construction and operation of this substantial international laboratory. Dr. Pradeep Ghosh, International Cooperations FAIR/GSI, presented the GET_INvolved Programme, enabling the participation of CTU students and researchers in internships and research within FAIR/GSI.
The Scientific Managing Director Professor Paolo Giubellino and other senior scientists participated in the FAIR-CZ Scientific Advisory Committee and reviewed the progress made by the researchers at the Nuclear Physics Institute of the Czech Academy of Sciences. The NPI CAS coordinates the cooperation with FAIR on behalf of the Czech Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports. In parallel to the Scientific Advisory Committee meeting in Prague, the Technical Managing Director Jörg Blaurock, together with Jiri Janosec, Industry Liasion Officer - Czech Republic, and Dr. Pradeep Ghosh visited the Research Center Řež and company Vakuum Praha to meet the stakeholders and informed themselves about the competencies and capabilities available.
At the final session of the two FAIR Days, the joint management of FAIR presented the Project progress and contribution of the Czech Republic to the FAIR project. After that, the representatives from three institutions in the Czech Republic and FAIR/GSI signed three GET_INvolved Programme partnership agreements focused on facilitating the mobility of students, researchers and scientific/technical staff between the two countries. The Nuclear Physics Institute of CAS, represented by the director Ing. Dr. Ondřej Svoboda and by the head of the FAIR-CZ project, Dr. Andrej Kugler, the Czech Technical University in Prague, represented by rector Prof. Dr. Vojtěch Petráček, the Palacký University in Olomouc, represented by Ass. Prof. Dr. Vít Procházka. Prof. Paolo Giubellino and Jörg Blaurock signed on behalf of FAIR and GSI. The agreements focus on joint research projects, dedicated internships as part of the University curricula, and joint training programs. It also encourages collaboration between scientists and researchers from both countries in experiments at FAIR/GSI, fostering opportunities for students and researchers to gain valuable experience, advance their careers, and drive innovation and discovery in both countries. The signing ceremony was also attended by the vice president of the Czech Academy of Sciences, Dr. Ing. Ilona Müllerová.
Speaking at the ceremony, the representative of the Czech Republic at FAIR Council, Dr Andrej Kugler from NPI of CAS, said: "These agreements are a major step forward in strengthening the ties between our two countries and promoting collaboration in the fields of education, research and innovation. We are committed to working together to provide opportunities for students and researchers to gain valuable experience and advance their careers."
Professor Vojtěch Petráček, Rector of CTU in Prague, stated: "The Czech Republic has an excellent reputation in particle physics in the world, and the scientists and students of CTU in Prague also have their share in it. We participate in research in practically all major scientific projects around the world, and we are happy to be part of the ambitious FAIR project practically from the beginning."
The Scientific Managing Director of FAIR/GSI, Professor Paolo Giubellino, expressed his excitement about the agreements, stating, “Signing of these partnership agreements is yet another milestone in our long-standing partnership with the Czech Republic. FAIR/GSI is a Talent Factory and we look forward to working together to support the next generation of scientists and researchers and to continue to drive innovation.”
The Technical Managing Director of FAIR/GSI, Jörg Blaurock, stated, “The signing of these agreements is a positive step towards increasing collaboration between the Czech Republic and the International research facility FAIR/GSI in the field of education, research and innovation. It will open up new opportunities for students and researchers to gain valuable experience, advance their careers, and help drive innovation and capacity building in both countries." (BP)
The GET_INvolved Programme at FAIR/GSI currently has a four partner-funded program for the Czech Republic: Nuclear Physics Institute at the Czech Academy of Science, Charles University, Czech Technical University in Prague and Palacký University in Olomouc. More information on the opportunities will soon be made available on the website.
Czech Republic as Aspirant Partner of FAIR
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In the framework of the ALICE Masterclass, the students were able to gain an insight into the scientific work and data analysis . Under the expert guidance of the scientists on site, they analyzed the ALICE experiment data taken in proton-proton collisions as well as collisions of lead nuclei. To conclude the day of research, they discussed their results with other participants in a joint video link to other research institutions. A virtual visit to the ALICE measurement setup at CERN, as well as an on-site visit to the linear accelerator UNILAC and the large experiment HADES on the GSI/FAIR campus was also part of the day's program.
“I was excited by the unique opportunity to work with real measurement data from ALICE, and in such an impressive environment as GSI,” says Masterclass participant Nico Moch, who traveled from North Rhine-Westphalia especially for the event. “It was a fascinating insight into the beginnings of our universe for me.”
ALICE is one of the four large-scale experiments at the LHC collider at the CERN research center in Geneva and deals in particular with heavy ion collisions of lead atomic nuclei. When lead atomic nuclei collide with unimaginable impact in the LHC, conditions are created similar to the first moments of the universe. During the collisions, a so-called quark-gluon plasma is created for a very short time - a state of matter that existed in the universe shortly after the Big Bang. This plasma transforms back into normal matter within fractions of a second. The particles produced in the process provide information about the properties of the quark-gluon plasma. Thus, the measurements can peer into the birth of the cosmos and reveal information about the basic building blocks of matter and their interactions.
The relationship between GSI and ALICE is traditionally very close: The two large ALICE detector systems Time Projection Chamber (TPC) and Transition Radiation Detector (TRD) were designed and built with significant contributions of GSI’s ALICE department and Detector Laboratory. Today scientists from both departments focus on the TPC, which is the centerpiece for track reconstruction in the central ALICE barrel setup and is also indispensable for particle identification. Scientist from GSI's IT department contribute strongly to the new data acquisition and analysis software O2, and the GSI computer center is an integral part of the computer network for data analysis of the ALICE experiment.
The Masterclasses are organized by the IPPOG (International Particle Physics Outreach Group), of which GSI is an associate member. Each year, more than 13,000 students from 60 countries take part in the events of about 225 universities or research centers for a day to unlock the mysteries of particle physics. All events in Germany are held in collaboration with the Netzwerk Teilchenwelt, of which GSI/FAIR is a member. The goal of the nationwide network for communicating particle physics to young people and teachers is to make particle physics accessible to a broader public. (CP)
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The work packages, which originally were targeted on the cooperation of Russian and European research facilities, have been reorganized and focused on European projects, and the cooperation with Russian institutes was stopped. Key aspect of the agenda of the Annual Meeting was the discussion of the adapted working packages with focus on heavy-ion physics at FAIR, neutron physics, synchrotrons, lepton-collider, high-power laser, detector development and programs to support Ukrainian institutes and scientists.
FAIR/GSI participates in this EU project through the development of detector systems, read-out electronics and software for the CBM experiment, and by the development of Monolythic Active Pixel Sensors. Moreover, the organization of a detector school for students is in preparation. EURIZON will be financed until the beginning of 2024 (i.e. mid of 2024 including the prolongation of WP9) via the HORIZON 2020 Research and Innovation Programme of the European Union. (CP)
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Kilonovae are giant explosions occurring when two neutron stars orbit each other and finally collide. The occurring extreme physical conditions are responsible for creating heavy elements, e. g. the atoms in gold jewelry and the iodine in our bodies. Furthermore, kilonovae produce light, which allows for the observation of the explosions with telescopes even at cosmic distances.
But there is still a great deal we do not know about this violent phenomenon. When a kilonova was detected at 140 million light-years away in 2017, it was the first time scientists could gather detailed data. Scientists around the world are still interpreting the data from this colossal explosion, including Albert Sneppen and Professor Darach Watson from the University of Copenhagen, as well as Privatdozent Andreas Bauswein and Dr. Oliver Just of GSI’s Theory research department.
One of the open questions concerns the geometrical shape of the kilonova, i.e. the propagation velocity of the explosion in different directions. This problem has been addressed by the international research team led by Sneppen and Watson. The researchers have analyzed the velocity of the explosion in different directions: along the line of sight — that is, the velocity of the material moving towards our Earth — and perpendicular to it.
Along the line of sight, the researchers take advantage of the Doppler effect known from approaching fire trucks. Just as the pitch of the siren changes at high speed, the properties of the light from the kilonova explosion, or more precisely from the so-called spectral lines, can be used to determine the velocity. The velocity perpendicular to the line of sight results from the size of the emitting area, which can be derived from the brightness and color of the kilonova.
The spherical shape is a mystery
The analysis surprises: The explosion spreads equally fast in all directions. The kilonova from 2017 is shaped like a sphere. “You have two super-compact stars that orbit each other 100 times a second before collapsing. Our intuition, and most previous models, say that, due to the enormous angular momentum in the system, the explosion cloud created by the collision must have a rather asymmetrical shape,” says Albert Sneppen, PhD student at the Niels Bohr Institute and first author of the study published in the journal Nature. How the kilonova can be spherical is a real mystery.
The GSI team in particular contributed simulations of the explosion to test different scenarios and theoretical interpretations to the publication. The researchers were able to show that, even under somewhat speculative assumptions, there is no mechanism that will necessarily lead to a spherical explosion, although some simulations fit the observation quite well. “Therefore, one possibility could also be that it is pure coincidence. In any case, the observation is exciting because it helps to better understand models of the kilonova explosion and thus the details of element synthesis in these events,” says Oliver Just. Andreas Bauswein adds: “With further measurements of neutron star mergers, we will certainly be able to better assess this result. We expect that with new observatories now available, many additional kilonovae will be discovered in the coming years.”
A New Cosmic Ruler
The shape of the explosion is also interesting for an entirely different reason: “Among astrophysicists there is a great deal of discussion about how fast the Universe is expanding. The speed tells us, among other things, how old the Universe is. And the two most commonly used methods that exist to measure it disagree by about a billion years. Here we may have a third method that can complement and be tested against the other measurements,” says Albert Sneppen.
The so-called “cosmic distance ladder” is the method used today to measure how fast the Universe is growing. This is done simply by calculating the distance between different objects in the universe, which act as rungs on the ladder. “If they are bright and mostly spherical, we can use kilonovae as a new way to measure the distance independently – a new kind of cosmic ruler,” says Darach Watson and continues: “Knowing what the shape is, is crucial here, because if you have an object that is not spherical, it emits differently, depending on your sight angle. A spherical explosion provides much greater precision in the measurement.”
The study is a first result of the newly founded HEAVYMETAL collaboration, which was recently awarded an ERC Synergy grant. (CP)
The Science Years are an initiative of Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung (BMBF) and Wissenschaft im Dialog (WiD). This year's topic Universe fits particularly well with the future accelerator center FAIR, which is currently being built in international cooperation at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung and has the motto "The Universe in the Laboratory". At FAIR, matter that usually only exists in the depth of space will be produced in a lab for research. Scientists from all over the world will be able to gain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe from the Big Bang to the present. (BP)
GSI/FAIR activities during the Science Year 2023 (constantly updated)
]]>The “mirrors” exist for only a fragment of time but could help to reduce the size of ultra-high power lasers, which currently occupy buildings the size of aircraft hangars, to university basement sizes. (CP)
Professor Karl-Heinz Kampert from the University of Wuppertal gave account of Hans Gutbrod’s pioneering work at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory where he built, together with Arthur Poskanzer and Hans-Georg Ritter, the GSI-LBL 4π detector “Plastic Ball”. They discovered the collective behavior of nuclear matter ("flow"), which remains one of the most important observables in heavy-ion physics today.
Hans Gutbrod and the Plastic Ball continued their investigations at the CERN accelerator SPS, where he was the spokesperson for the groundbreaking SPS heavy-ion experiments WA80/93/98. Thomas Peitzmann, then a postdoctoral researcher and now a distinguished professor at Utrecht University, shed light on this period in a talk entitled “A Universal Light Experience”.
Together with Jürgen Schuhkraft and others, Hans Gutbrod also laid the foundations for the LHC experiment ALICE. The early “ALICE years” were conveyed by Professor Paolo Giubellino, Jürgen Schuhkraft’s successor as ALICE spokesperson and today’s Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR. He made it clear that without Hans Gutbrod’s contribution ALICE would not look the way it does today. In particular, his influence on India's contribution to ALICE cannot be overstated, as emphasized in a video commentary by Professor Subhasis Chattopadhyay of the VECC Kolkata.
Hans Gutbrod was appointed director of the shortly before founded SUBATECH in Nantes in 1995, where he also served as spokesperson for ALICE-FRANCE, while being deputy- spokesperson of ALICE and project leader of the Dimuon Spectrometer of ALICE. In a short video presentation, Professor Pol-Bernard Gossiaux of Subatech, made clear that Hans Gutbrod was a driving force in the development of the institute.
When Hans Gutbrod decided to return to GSI in March 2001 to work on the “Future project of GSI”, he made significant contributions to the design of the FAIR project as leader of the Joint Core Team. This very productive time was recounted in a richly varied and pictorial way by the former scientific director of GSI Professor Horst Stöcker in talk entitled “FAIR in Europe — from the roots to today — 50 good years with Hans — in 50 minutes”.
All lectures were very much enjoyed by the participants of the symposium. At the end, Hans Gutbrod himself gave a short speech thanking all colleagues who accompanied him on his way. He also thanked the technical staff of GSI, LBL,CERN and Subatech for their efforts in the realization of the experiments and especially Professor Rudolf Bock, who was his PhD supervisor and his constant mentor. (CP)
]]>In the ESA video, Dr. Dr. Jennifer Ngo-Anh, responsible at ESA for the successfully running ESA-FAIR cooperation on cosmic radiation research, and Dr. Anggraeini Puspitasari, who works as a post-doc in GSI biophysics, are among the speakers. ESA has been conducting high-level space radiation research at the GSI particle accelerator in Darmstadt for years. At the future accelerator center FAIR, even higher energies will be available for the simulation of cosmic rays, enabling groundbreaking new insights. Decisive indications for the possible benefit of artificial hibernation for radiation resistance were recently published by an international research team led by the GSI Biophysics Department in “Scientific Reports", a journal of the Nature Publishing Group. The publication received much attention from the scientific community and the international media. (BP)
ESA video „Hibernation. We research. You benefit.“
Scientific publication in in „Scientific Reports“
Press release "Safety in space: Synthetic hibernation could provide protection from cosmic radiation"
]]>In 2023, "Kultur eines Digitalstadt e.V." is again inviting applications for three Artist-in-Science residencies for artists from all disciplines. The six-week studio residency at Rosenhöhe in Darmstadt is linked to the collaboration with a renowned Darmstadt research institute: the Hessian Center for Artificial Intelligence (hessian.AI), the GSI Helmholtz Center for Heavy Ion Research and the European Space Operations Center (ESOC).
GSI would like to promote interdisciplinary exchange and creativity together with the artist. The aim is to create new perspectives and inspire innovations in science and art. Through the artistic approach, complex scientific concepts can be conveyed to a broader audience. During expert discussions, in the open studio and at the final view, the research project of the residency can be experienced by all those involved and the public.
The residency of the artist in cooperation with GSI will take place from mid-June to early August 2023. Freelance artists from all disciplines can apply until February 23rd, 2023, and propose a project that can be carried out in cooperation with GSI. (KG/BP)
Project "Artist-in-Science Residence" and tender information
]]>Dr. Arjan Vink, Head of the staff unit Grant Office and Project Manager for EDIH at GSI/FAIR: „We are very pleased, together with the EDITH consortium partners and in an international environment, to share our knowledge of high-performance computing and project funding with small and medium-sized companies and municipalities in Hesse. In addition, we aim to, in particular, advance sustainable computing through consulting and via research and development projects in our Green IT Cube data center.” (CP)
GSI/FAIR have been collaborating with a consortium of Georgian research institutions in the fields of education, research and knowledge transfer for more than 20 years. They participate, for example, in the mutual academic exchange of students and in various scientific projects. Within the framework of the MoU, joint educational and scientific cooperation has been consolidated in the fields of particle physics, hadron therapy, biomedicine, applied research and supercomputing, among others. In the training of young scientists, the successful exchange program is to be continued and expanded with workshops, summer schools and block lectures. Expertise and advice will be provided for the construction of a Georgian Hadron Therapy Center at the Kutaisi International University. The parties will also work together to develop and strengthen existing SMART Labs under the existing Georgian-German Science Bridge (GGSB).
The signing took place during a visit to GSI and FAIR. Minister Chkhenkeli was accompanied by Professor Alexander Tevzadze, the Rector of Kutaisi International University, General Consule Giorgi Tabatadze, as well as Ana Sarishvili of the Georgian Ministry of Education and Science. The delegation, led by Site Manager Dr. Harald Hagelskamp, inspected the progress on the FAIR construction site on a bus tour and walked through the SIS100 tunnel construction as well as the future experimental site for Compressed Baryonic Matter (CBM).
Following the signing of the contract, further discussions on the scientific content was conducted with Professor Thomas Stöhlker, Deputy Research Director of GSI and FAIR, as well as Professor Marco Durante, head of the Biophysics department. The visit was supported by Dr. Pradeep Ghosh, head of the staff unit International Cooperations, Dr. Irakli Keshelashvili from the Detector Lab as well as Berit Paflik of the PR department. (CP)
]]>One of the applications that comes with the advent of high-intensity lasers is the generation of bursts of hard x-rays, gamma rays and particle beams, obtained from the interaction of ultrashort light pulses with matter. Scientists have quickly recognized that such sources exhibit new properties that make them very attractive compared to other more traditional and established particle sources. In this rapidly evolving field, a definite challenge lies in the precise understanding of the underlying processes that explain the coupling of the laser to secondary beams of particles and radiation. Gaining such understanding is complex since the interaction of the laser with matter takes place on ultrashort time scales, typically femtoseconds (10-15 seconds), and in tiny volumes in the micrometer range, which makes it challenging to observe.
Dr. Johannes Hornung received his doctoral degree from the University of Jena for his experimental work done with the PHELIX laser at GSI/FAIR under the co-supervision of Professor Matt Zepf and Professor Vincent Bagnoud. In his thesis he focused on the interaction of high-intensity laser pulses with solid targets, a regime of interaction in reach of the most powerful laser system worldwide. In particular, Johannes Hornung used a non-invasive method, namely the spectroscopy of the light reflected off the target, to gain new insights on the laser-matter interaction and showed that quantitative information on the dynamics of such processes can be extracted from the collected data.
In a typical experiment, the ultrashort laser pulse is focused down to a few micrometers in a vacuum chamber onto a micrometer-thin foil. A particle burst emerges from this interaction. At the beginning of the interaction, the foil is quickly heated by the laser into a thin plasma slab that reflects a portion of the laser light, like a mirror. However, the plasma either expands into the vacuum or is being pushed by the radiation pressure of the laser in the opposite direction, or a combination of both happens sequentially. Under such conditions, the light reflected by the expanding or recessing plasma is Doppler shifted, carrying precious information of the exact interaction dynamics. The doctoral thesis of Johannes Hornung reports on the experimental study done at the PHELIX laser regarding this effect and proposes an improved model for the description of the laser-matter interaction. The model is backed by numerical simulations performed by Johannes Hornung using the resources of GSI/FAIR’s computing center Green IT cube.
The annual FAIR-GSI PhD Award honors an excellent PhD thesis completed during the previous year. Eligible for nominations are dissertations that were supported by GSI in the context of its strategic partnerships with the universities of Darmstadt, Frankfurt, Giessen, Heidelberg, Jena, and Mainz, or through the research and development program. In the framework of the Graduate School HGS-HIRe (Helmholtz Graduate School for Hadron and Ion Research), more than 300 PhD students currently perform research for their PhD theses on topics closely related to GSI and FAIR. GSI has a long-standing partnership with the award sponsor, Pfeiffer Vacuum GmbH, which offers vacuum technology and pumps. Vacuum solutions from Pfeiffer Vacuum have been successfully used in GSI's facilities for decades. (CP)
]]>During an introduction, the guests learned about the GSI research facilities and the construction of the international accelerator center FAIR. After an overview of the entire FAIR construction area from the viewing platform, the guests saw the progress on the FAIR construction site during a bus tour, guided by Dr. Hartmut Reich, Head of machine assembly.
The program included the underground accelerator ring tunnel SIS100, the central hub for the facility’s beamline and distribution (transfer building) and the buildings for the experimental caves CBM and NUSTAR. Another stop was the cryogenics building. Following the shell construction and the technical building services, the cryogenics is the first technical facility to be brought into the FAIR buildings. (BP)
]]>Until now, there was no efficient way to freely adjust the wavelength, i.e. the colour, of high-power lasers, as a research team from DESY, the Helmholtz Institute Jena and the GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research reports in the journal “Nature Photonics”.
More information is provided here, the original publication is available here.
]]>At GSI/FAIR, the scientists are working on constantly improving particle therapy through new technologies and treatment procedures for the benefit of society. The new FLASH method is a highly promising approach. During the FAIR Phase 0 experimental period the scientists succeeded in performing a carbon ion FLASH experiment on the GSI/FAIR campus for the first time. In addition, GSI/FAIR joins forces in an international cooperation with participants from industry and science to advance medical-technical developments in the field of FLASH therapy. The goal is to pave the way to clinical application.
The cover story in “Nature Reviews Clinical Oncology” refers to a recent research paper by Professor Marco Durante, Head of GSI’s Biophysics, and Dr. Marie-Catherine Vozenin and Professor Jean Bourhis, Lausanne University Hospital and University of Lausanne, which is entitled “Towards clinical translation of FLASH radiotherapy”. The authors describe the worldwide status of this highly innovative treatment method and evaluate possible perspectives for FLASH radiotherapy.
In their conclusion, they summarize: “At present, FLASH radiotherapy has largely sparked the imagination and interest of radiation scientists and oncologists. The advantages of ultra-short treatments at high doses of radiation go beyond the potential widening of the therapeutic window, because short treatment times could also improve the comfort of the patient and the workflow of clinical centers, even if imaging time will remain a limiting factor for accelerating such workflows”. They also provide an overview: “In translational and clinical research, studies on the dose and fraction dependence, tissue specificity, combined treatments and, of course, phase I trials are the highest priority. The future of FLASH radiotherapy will strongly depend on the results of these experiments and the answers to some key questions, including those we have discussed herein”.
The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, said: „GSI and FAIR are leading research centers in the research and development of FLASH therapy. I am very glad to see the current research placed so prominently in one of the most impactful scientific media for oncology showing the overall importance of this topic. This demonstrates once again how strongly our basic research boosts the development of new technologies and methods of high societal impact. Together with strong partners, we are working hard to ensure that our scientific breakthroughs will serve society.” (BP)
Nature Reviews Clinical Oncology
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The FAIR construction site in Darmstadt is one of the largest research construction projects in the world. The progress is documented with drone footage. The "Longterm Dronelapse 2018-2021" has now been awarded first place in the category “Hyperlapse” at the Brazilian film festival "NO AR Drone Film Fest". 55 films from around the world were submitted to this dedicated drone film festival, of which twelve received an award. On their website, NO AR Brazil notes “to showcase and award artists who are resorting drones to create breath-taking imagery and innovative visual languages.” To reveal the dimensions of the construction progress, the filmmakers use a special film technique: With the help of GPS support, they superimpose the regularly created drone videos so that the buildings grow in front of the eyes of the viewers. (LW)
In December 2021, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) launched into space on an Ariane rocket from Europe's Kourou Spaceport in French Guiana. JWST is the largest observatory ever sent into space and is an international collaboration of the U.S., European and Canadian space agencies NASA, ESA and CSA. JWST can look further into the past than ever before, observe the first galaxies, and will enable the expansion of knowledge about the birth of stars and planets and about planets outside our own solar system.
The technology of the satellite itself is unique and a masterpiece of engineering. For example, the observatory — which is the size of a tennis court — had to be folded up for launch on the Ariane 5 rocket and then unfolded again fully automatically in space. On July 12, 2022, the first scientific images were published, which caused excitement not only in the astronomical community. The talk will give an overview of the fascinating history of JWST: From the idea to construction and testing to launch, commissioning and the first scientific results.
Dr. Silvia Scheithauer studied physics at the University of Potsdam and received her PhD in engineering from the University of Bremen. Since 2006, she has been working at the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy in Heidelberg in the field of instrument construction as a systems engineer and project manager, including at the JWST.
While the lecture on the JWST is about expanding our knowledge frontiers and venturing into still unknown areas of space, the other lectures will deal with overcoming other frontiers: For example, new methods for visualizing radiation, the development of even more accurate time measurement using quantum technology, or the investigation of the synthesis of matter with the help of heavy ion collisions at the HADES detector of GSI and FAIR will be discussed. In addition to a look at the benefits of fundamental research in nuclear and particle physics for society, talks will also take a look at the complete crossing of physical boundaries, on the one hand fictitiously in Hollywood film productions, and on the other hand in the illumination of the very real sinking of the passenger ship “Titanic” by Professor Metin Tolan, the President of the Georg August University of Göttingen.
The lectures start at 2 p. m., further information about registration, access and the course of the event can be found on the event website at www.gsi.de/wfa (German)
The lecture series “Wissenschaft für Alle” is aimed at all persons interested in current science and research. The lectures report on research and developments at GSI and FAIR, but also on current topics from other fields of science and technology. The aim of the series is to prepare and present the scientific processes in a way that is understandable for laypersons in order to make the research accessible to a broad public. The lectures are held by GSI and FAIR staff members or by external speakers from universities and research institutes.
FAIR's high energy density physics collaboration (HED@FAIR) spokesperson, Dr. Kurt Schoenberg of Los Alamos National Laboratory, notes, "demonstrating fusion ignition is a significant milestone in the search for alternative clean and carbon-free energies and enables the international public and private fusion research communities to begin optimizing inertial fusion energy as a viable economic concept, knowing that we still have a long and challenging road ahead of us." FAIR conducts research relevant to inertial fusion within its HED@FAIR Collaboration. It looks forward to collaborating with the global IFE effort by increasing research on energy transport, laser-plasma instabilities, and fast ignition to help make IFE a reality. (LW)
A combined process of CNC milling and thick-film electroplating was developed to produce the spirals, which allows the exact reproduction of a free geometry while at the same time integrating the cooling sufficiently. The design frequencies of the cavities were achieved on instantly with deviations of only 8 and 6 per mil. This was enabled by verifying the design of the 36 MHz spirals with two prototypes made of plastic using 3D printing. The experience gained in this project will also benefit the new Alvarez accelerator currently under construction. After passing the factory acceptance test (FAT), both cavities will now be fully equipped and prepared for the upcoming high-performance tests. (CP)
Hannah Elfner teaches and conducts research in a joint permanent professorship of Goethe University and GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, where she is involved in the “Elements” cluster project, among other things. She is coordinating the theory departments at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum, where she previously headed a Helmholtz Young Investigator Group for several years.(BP)
More information on the appointment is available here.
]]>The research project, with the participation of GSI scientists Annika Hinrichs, Claudia Fournier, Gerhard Kraft and Andreas Maier, was conducted as part of the "GREWIS-alpha" consortium funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research. GREWIS, a German acronym, stands for “the genetic risks and anti-inflammatory effect of ionizing radiation.” The word “alpha” stands for the densely ionizing alpha particles that are emitted when radon and its daughter nuclei decay. The radiation biologist Professor Claudia Fournier from the Biophysics Department of GSI is the overall coordinator of this joint project, in which GSI is cooperating with TU Darmstadt, Goethe University Frankfurt, and the Friedrich-Alexander University of Erlangen-Nuremberg.
“GREWIS-alpha” is intended to more and more refine questions concerning radon and provide new insights into very different aspects, for example regarding the physical and biological effects, but also regarding the damage after radon exposure and possible ways to better control and minimize radiation risks. Here, the current publication provides important insights.
The short-living progeny of the naturally occurring radioactive noble gas radon attach to other particles or droplets forming larger aerosol particles, adhere to the lungs when inhaled, and deposit their decay energy there, damaging sensitive lung tissue. Radon itself is directly inhaled. These progeny are considered responsible for more than 95% of the total effective dose and are, together with radon, classified as carcinogenic for lung cancer. Consequently, filtration of the progeny could significantly reduce the dose to the lungs. In the recent study, the researchers investigated the filtering properties of FFP2 masks and of surgical masks (II R) for radon and its decay products.
For the study, the masks were attached to a measurement device, which enabled determination of the different size fractions of radon progeny, ranging from very small decay products (so-called unattached progeny) to medium-sized decay products (so-called clustered progeny). In parallel, it measured the radon activity concentration during experiments. By comparing background measurements without mask and experiments with masks, the percentage of retained small decay products was determined for FFP2 (98.8 %) and II R masks (98.4 %). For medium-sized decay products, the retained fraction was 85.2 % for FFP2 and 79.5 % for II R masks. Radon was not filtered.
The results provide solid guidance that facemasks are effective in filtering radon progeny and will significantly reduce the concentration of radon progeny in the respiratory system, whereas radon is not filtered. Nevertheless, filtering can lead to lower doses to the lungs during radon exposure and thus to a reduced risk for lung cancer.
Besides general, natural occurring exposure of the public, this is also important for occupational exposure, for example in radon galleries or radon baths. The radioactive element radon is used in the form of baths or inhalations in these healing caves and baths to treat many patients, and it has met with success. The pain-relieving effects of low-dose radon therapies for patients suffering from painful chronic inflammatory illnesses have been known for centuries. These therapies are used for diseases of the locomotor system such as rheumatism and arthrosis, as well as diseases of the respiratory system and the skin, including neurodermatitis and psoriasis.
In these treatment facilities, enhanced levels of radon and progeny can be measured. This makes efficient ventilation necessary, but as the current findings show, the wearing of facial masks may also be an easy and cost-efficient method for dose reduction in the staff. Additionally, it can also reduce the exposure to airborne particles in general. (BP)
Publication in "International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health“
About GREWIS alpha
]]>Research on superheavy elements has been one of the strong pillars of the research program since GSI was founded in 1969. Six new elements and many new isotopes were discovered and their nuclear and atomic structure was studied. Chemical studies allowed comparing their behavior to that of their lighter homologs in the periodic table and with theoretical predictions. An outlook on new developments for the next years completes the article. (CP)
GSI researcher Dr. Hans-Jürgen Wollersheim was honored with an adjunct professorship for the years 2022 and 2023 at the University of Delhi. He had completed his habilitation in 1993 and was teaching nuclear physics, detector physics, accelerator physics and nuclear astrophysics. In 1994, he was the representative of C4 professor at the Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich. In 2004, he arranged a Memorandum of Understanding between the Inter University Accelerator Centre in New Delhi and GSI to intensify the collaboration between both laboratories. Several experiments in the field of nuclear structure and nuclear reaction were successfully performed with different Indo-German teams. From 2000 to 2009 he was manager of the international RISING project at GSI and later till 2013 manager of the PreSPEC project. As in-kind coordinator FAIR@GSI he was the FAIR liaison person for the collaboration between BMBF (Germany) and DST (India). His achievements in teaching and research were honored also by the nomination for a visiting professorship at IIT Ropar (2016-2018). (LW)
The huge cooling facility will supply liquid helium to two key FAIR building blocks, the FAIR ring accelerator SIS100 and also the Super Fragment Separator (Super-FRS). In the future, ions — charged atoms — will whiz around the curves of the SIS100 ring accelerator at up to 99% the speed of light, then collide with samples of materials to produce nuclear reactions. The Super-FRS is a giant sorting machine for newly produced, exotic atomic nuclei which can tell us about states in stars and other stellar events. With these and other large-scale devices, scientists at FAIR hope to bring the universe into the laboratory.
In order to guide the particles along their paths, strong magnetic fields are required in both cases, which can only be achieved through the phenomenon of superconductivity: Extreme cryogenic temperatures can cause the electrical resistance in some materials to nearly disappear, allowing high electrical currents to flow in the electromagnets. To achieve this, the magnets must be cooled to a temperature of four kelvin (- 269°C). For that purpose, the cryogenic system delivers a maximum flow rate of over 21,000 liters of liquid helium per hour, for a total helium storage of nine tons, with a maximum cooling capacity of 14 kilowatts at four kelvin.
“The delivery of the coldbox to the FAIR construction site is a milestone and a sign of the steady progress being made in the construction of FAIR. The coldbox is the heart of the cryogenic facility, the first high-tech system to be installed in the newly constructed FAIR buildings on the construction site. This will bring us a big step closer to our goal of accelerating particles to almost the speed of light. Linde Engineering is an important partner in this process,” says Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of FAIR and GSI.
“The FAIR cryogenic plant is one of the largest possible refrigeration plants that can still be built from one unit. For even higher cooling loads, several plants would have to be used in parallel,” explains Dr. Holger Kollmus, who as head of the Cryogenics Department at GSI/FAIR is responsible for the construction of the plant. “A special feature of the plant is the possibility to change the cooling capacity dynamically. Comparable plants, which are mainly used for the production of liquid helium, permanently run at full load. Since the required cooling capacity for the accelerator fluctuates depending on the operating condition, the plant is designed to adjust its pressures and mass flows accordingly to save energy and coolant. Efficient response to changing loads places high demands on the design and construction of the unit.”
As a contract partner, Linde Engineering is responsible for the production and installation of the helium cooling facility on site. Two large buildings are available at FAIR to house the plant components and now the coldbox. Several large pieces of equipment, such as compressors, have already been delivered and integrated into the plant in the past weeks. The coldbox, the largest and central component of the system, was manufactured by Linde Engineering at its Schalchen plant. From there, the unit was driven by transporter to Passau, brought to Aschaffenburg by ship and reloaded onto the final heavy goods transport to GSI/FAIR. Mechanical completion of the entire plant is scheduled for mid-2023. (CP)
]]>Following a short introductory lecture, in short video feeds the students learned about the facilities and the research at GSI and got an insight into the construction of components and buildings of the future facility FAIR. The guided video tour took them to the linear accelerator UNILAC, the main control room and the heavy ion synchrotron SIS18. They learned how to produce new elements at the SHIP experiment, how to treat tumors with carbon ions, and how the large experiment HADES can be used to unravel the mystery of mass. The program also included a virtual visit to the test facility for superconducting FAIR magnets and to the viewpoint of the FAIR construction site. A drone flight over the construction field rounded off the event. Afterwards they had the opportunity to ask questions via a live chat, which was actively used by the participants.
The “Saturday Morning Physics” event series is organized by the Physics Faculty of the TU Darmstadt. It takes place annually and aims to encourage young people's interest in physics. In the events, students learn more about physics research at the university. Those who participate in all events receive the “Saturday-Morning-Physics” diploma. GSI and later FAIR have been among the sponsors and supporters of the series since its beginning. (CP)
Internationally outstanding postdocs are given the opportunity to establish their own research group at Helmholtz. An independent, multidisciplinary and international panel of reviewers has selected ten young research groups for funding this year. One of them will be headed by Peter Micke at the Helmholtz Institute Jena in partnership with Friedrich Schiller University Jena. With his group, he will build a new laser laboratory and connect it to the HITRAP facility at GSI. There, he will operate a sophisticated ion trap in which the ambient conditions are close to those of interstellar space. With the help of the GSI accelerators, heavy highly charged ions will be produced, then decelerated with HITRAP and finally trapped in an ion trap. Modern laser systems will then cool the ions close to absolute zero, allowing Peter Micke's group to precisely measure their hyperfine structure using so-called quantum logic spectroscopy. The special feature: this normally tiny energy splitting due to the alignment of the nuclear spin in the magnetic field of the electrons bound to the atomic nucleus is in the optical range for heavy highly charged ions. It can thus be measured with high precision using lasers. Moreover, heavy highly charged ions have in their atomic shell the strongest electromagnetic fields accessible in the laboratory. This provides an extraordinary opportunity to test fundamental laws of nature such as quantum electrodynamics under such extreme conditions, to better understand nuclear physics models, and even to search for previously unknown physics.
"I congratulate Peter Micke and am delighted that his proposal was selected," says Prof. Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI/FAIR. "A Helmholtz Young Investigator Group leadership not only offers ideal opportunities for a scientific career, but also paves the way for new research approaches, such as quantum logic spectroscopy. This confirms that research opportunities at GSI/FAIR are outstanding and attract talented scientists."
Peter Micke earned his doctorate at Leibniz Universität Hannover with an experiment he set up at the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB) in Braunschweig in collaboration with the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg. In this experiment, he and his colleagues were able to demonstrate quantum logic spectroscopy on highly charged ions for the first time. Peter Micke then spent another year as a postdoc at this experiment. He then moved to CERN as a Senior Research Fellow, working for the international BASE collaboration, which focuses on the study of matter-antimatter asymmetry through measurements of fundamental properties of the proton and antiproton. Since spring 2022, he has been working in Mainz, where the BASE collaboration operates one of its ion traps. Peter Micke will start the new Helmholtz Young Investigator Group within the next 11 months. (LW)
On the occasion of the successful commissioning and to agree on important aspects of further collaboration, a delegation of GSI/FAIR, consisting of the Scientific Managing Director Professor Paolo Giubellino and the Technical Managing Director Jörg Blaurock as well as staff members of the SIS100/SIS18 subproject, visited the facility in Salerno. Also on site were representatives of the management of the Italian National Nuclear Physics Institute (INFN, Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare), where the test facility is assigned. The visit also included a meeting with the management of the University of Salerno, which, among other things, provides laboratory space and technical support for the development of the equipment.
The quadrupole modules for the FAIR ring accelerator are extremely complex. Key components are the superconducting quadrupole units. Each module contains two quadrupole units as well as other, technically highly sophisticated components. These include, for example, the thin-walled magnetic chambers cooled with liquid helium, the cryogenic ion catchers and the cryogenic beam position monitors. The value chain, i.e., the manufacturing stages of SIS100 quadrupole module production, thus includes numerous suppliers and locations. After production, the superconducting quadrupole units are sent to Bilfinger Noell in Würzburg, where they are integrated to superconducting quadrupole modules.
The integration of the quadrupole modules generates a complex system consisting of parallel hydraulic circuits for liquid and gaseous helium and a vacuum system whose walls have temperatures between four and ten Kelvin. Extreme demands are also made, for example on the positional fidelity of the components when cooling from room temperature to the 4.5 Kelvin operating temperature of the magnets. Although the cold mass is built on a carrier consisting of two separate support structures, their position in the cold state may only deviate from the nominal value by a maximum of 0.1 millimeters. The properties of each integrated module must therefore be examined and confirmed in a separate cold test.
The cold testing of 81 of the 83 SIS100 quadrupole modules was made possible on the basis of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research and the Italian Ministry of Education, Universities and Research. The Salerno site offered ideal conditions for this. A cryogenic test facility for testing FAIR-SIS300 magnets had already been built within the campus of the University of Salerno.
Building on these good prerequisites, the local INFN team led by Dr. Umberto Gambardella has now developed, procured and built all the additional equipment necessary for testing the SIS100 quadrupole modules. In addition to the actual cryogenic system, measurement systems for the electrical circuits of the magnets and systems for monitoring superconductivity (quench detection) also had to be developed and built.
In the course of this year, the THOR cryogenic test facility was cold run and commissioned for the first time. For this purpose, the first SIS100 quadrupole module (FoS, First of Series) was brought to Salerno and assembled at the test facility. The Italian team had previously been trained at GSI to test the modules, and a continuous exchange of information has been set between the GSI and INFN groups.
The Italian scientific community and GSI/FAIR are closely linked in many areas. The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino says: Our collaboration with Italy is of great importance. Italian researchers are represented in many fields and collaborations at GSI and FAIR and are making excellent contributions. Italy and INFN in particular have a very strong scientific and technological participation in FAIR, contributing to both the accelerators and the experiments. We hope this involvement will eventually become a full membership. I am delighted about this further deepening at the test facility THOR and the enhancement of our successful cooperation.” (BP)
]]>In the contract, Focused Energy commits to invest more than 100,000 Euros for the expansion of the PHELIX laser system at GSI. The researchers will use the funding to upgrade the laser so that the setup provides non-coherent nanosecond laser pulses. Those can be employed to create conditions for a more stable laser-plasma interaction, as laser-plasma instabilities are currently identified as one of the challenges on the path to inertial fusion energy.
“The collaboration represents an opportunity for us to use our unique PHELIX facility to precisely delineate the fundamentals of this promising form of energy generation,” Giubellino explains. “We encourage the advancement of research and development of application-related technologies also by commercial partners, which enables the exploitation of synergies and can contribute important impulses. This is an excellent example of how the FAIR broad scientific program, in this case the APPA plasma physics program, can provide fundamental science measurements of substantial societal impact.”
GSI and FAIR have a long-standing connection with Markus Roth, who is also a professor of laser and plasma physics at the Technical University of Darmstadt. Roth was previously a postdoc and member of research staff at GSI and has a long history of experiments conducted at GSI’s plasma physics. With the start-up Focused Energy, Roth and his colleagues now want to develop and commercialize fusion power plants and other laser-driven radiation sources, for example for non-destructive testing or for the detection of hidden substances. (CP)
The opening address was given by Prof. Dr. Dr. Gerhard Kraft, the founder and former head of biophysics department at GSI. Dr. Hartmut Eickhoff, chairman of the board of the association, welcomed the participants. The keynote speech was given by the physicist and former Christoph Schmelzer Prize awardee Prof. Dr. Katia Parodi from the Ludwig-Maximilian-University Munich on the topic “New prospects in precision image-guided radiation therapy “.
In her PhD thesis entitled „Estimating the effects on the dose distribution through the Bragg Peak degradation of lung tissue in proton therapy of thoracic tumors“ award winner Dr. Veronika Flatten has investigated the influence of density inhomogeneities in lung tissue on the accuracy of the dose distribution. In her work, she has shown that the relevant information about density inhomogeneities can be extracted from routine diagnostic computed tomography images. Their influence can thus be taken into account in radiation planning without additional measurements on the patient.
For his work with the dissertation topic “Development and experimental validation of adaptive conformal particle therapy”, Dr. Timo Steinsberger has developed methods to compensate the movement of the tumor during irradiation; for this purpose, he has extended existing concepts for regular movement. Instead of assuming respiratory movements with always the same amplitude and frequency, he allows for more realistic, irregular tumor movements in radiation planning and has implemented the corresponding compensation algorithms in the radiation control system.
The master’s thesis of Christopher Cortes Garcia, entitled “Investigation of RF-signals for the slow extraction at HIT’s medical synchrotron” deals with improvements in the time structure of the ion beam extracted by the accelerator. Through a combination of theoretical and experimental work, he was able to establish a method that allows a significant reduction in the irradiation time while improving the irradiation accuracy.
The prize money for the dissertations is 1500 Euro each, for master's theses 750 euros. The award is named after Professor Christoph Schmelzer, co-founder and first Scientific Managing Director of GSI. The promotion of young scientists in the field of tumor therapy with ion beams has meanwhile been continuing for many years, and the award was presented for the 24th time. The topics of the award-winning theses are of fundamental importance for the further development of ion beam therapy and often find their way into clinical application. (BP)
The Association for the Promotion of Tumor Therapy supports research activities in the field of tumor therapy with heavy ions with the aim of improving the treatment of tumors and making it available to general patient care. At the accelerator facility at GSI, more than 400 patients with tumors in the head and neck area were treated with ion beams as part of a pilot project from 1997 to 2008. The cure rates of this method are sometimes over 90 percent and the side effects are very low. The success of the pilot project led to the establishment of clinical ion beam therapy centers in Heidelberg and Marburg, where patients are now regularly treated with heavy ions.
Association for the Promotion of Tumor Therapy with Heavy Ions
Technical University Darmstadt
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GSI and FAIR employees can get a copy at the foyer or at the reception in Borsigstraße. If you want to order the DIN-A2-sized calendar from FAIR and GSI, please contact kalender(at)gsi.de (Data Protection) directly via e-mail and receive the calendar by post. Please include the following information: your name, your address and the number of calendars you wish to order. We kindly ask for your understanding that because of the limited quantity a maximum of three calendars can be sent per request (while stocks last). (CP)
]]>Warsaw University of Technology is one of the leading institutes of technology in Poland and one of the largest in Central Europe. There are 19 faculties covering almost all fields of science and technology. Faculty of Physics and Faculty of Electronics and Information Technology have a long-standing collaboration with GSI in Darmstadt, which is now upgrading to FAIR. It is also strongly involved in the construction and scientific program of FAIR, particularly strong in the fields of nuclear and hadron physics and the development of new technologies.
In future, up to ten students and doctoral candidates per year will profit from this new partnership: In the framework of short-term internships or research visits lasting several years, they will be able to learn and work in the pioneering research environment at GSI/FAIR, which will, among others, nominate mentors for them and help them, if required, to find accommodation for the duration of their stay. The program participants can also participate in GSI/FAIR events, including symposia and lectures and the GSI’s summer program for students.
The GET_INvolved Programme partners will form a joint jury for the selection procedure. Internships can last between three and six months and require at least a bachelor's degree. Applicants for research visits must hold a master's degree, be a doctoral candidate or produce evidence of at least two years of research experience. Such visits can last up to two years.
“FAIR/GSI has been a talent factory, and through the framework of the GET_INvolved Programme, young students and researchers at Warsaw University of Technology will profit more easily and extensively from the FAIR scientific community’s technical knowledge and expertise while performing their training. I am delighted to sign this GET_INvolved Programme partnership with WUT, an institution of excellence with which we already carry very fruitful cooperation. This agreement will provide brilliant young scientists and engineers from WUT with first-hand exposure in an advanced international laboratory,” says Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR.
“I am delighted to welcome this initiative and acknowledge the long-standing cooperation between the Warsaw University of Technology and GSI/FAIR. WUT has been a reliable partner, and this relationship is even more strengthened with this corporation agreement on the GET_INvolved Programme. I am hopeful that with this signature agreement, we will be able to further our cooperation in all fields of engineering and technology and provide more opportunities for our young students and researchers at the international laboratory FAIR,” says Professor Mariusz Malinowski, Vice Rector of research, WUT, Warsaw. (BP)
WUT Warsaw and GSI/FAIR Darmstadt have worked on different levels for quite some time. WUT researchers, experts and students under the leadership of Professor Hanna Paulina Zbroszczyk are part of the two International collaborations at FAIR. A similar program in the framework of traineeship has been initiated since 2019 with specific research groups to support bright young minds and engage them in the science facility at FAIR Darmstadt. With "GET_INvolved", this is now being substantially expanded to all students and researchers at WUT..
The Warsaw University of Technology builds upon the traditions of Polish technical universities that used to function in Warsaw – the Polytechnic Institute founded in 1826 thanks to the efforts of Stanisław Staszic, and the School of Hipolit Wawelberg and Stanisław Rotwand established in 1895. Working uninterruptedly, the University has been producing generations of graduates and has had many scientific and technical achievements. It is not only the oldest but also the best technical University in Poland; in the ranking of Polish universities, it has taken first place in its category for fifteen years.
The GET_INvolved Programme provides international students and early-stage researchers from partner institutions with opportunities to perform internships, traineeships and early-stage research experience to get involved in the international FAIR accelerator project while receiving scientific and technical training. The GET_INvolved Programme has currently more than 35 program partners worldwide.
Further details of the application procedure for students and researchers will be published shortly. Further information on the GET_INvolved Programme can be found on the program pages of the WUT and GSI/FAIR websites. For immediate queries, it is possible to get in touch with Prof. Hanna Paulina Zbroszczyk (hanna.zbroszczyk@pw.edu.pl), program coordinator at WUT or Dr. Pradeep Ghosh, (Pradeep.Ghosh@fair-center.eu), program coordinator on behalf of GSI/FAIR.
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Spano is one of three Artist-in-Science-Residents who the association "Kultur einer Digitalstadt" has awarded for artists of all disciplines for the first time in 2022. The studio stay on the Rosenhöhe in Darmstadt is linked to the cooperation with a renowned Darmstadt research institute: Cooperation partners are the European Space Agency (ESA) / European Space Operations Center (ESOC), the GSI Helmholtz Center for Heavy Ion Research and the Hessian Center for Artificial Intelligence (hessian.AI). The international interest was immense: 158 artists from all disciplines from 59 countries applied for the three scholarships advertised in spring 2022.
Luca Spano takes stock of his residence: „I had a beautiful time at the institute. Their research digs into the fundamental questions of humanity, the materiality of our universe, as much as the most pressing philosophical ideas that hunt us. The environment at GSI is very collaborative and open-minded. Although I come from another field of research, the institute showed a large degree of openness. Art and science are very close to each other and they share many more contact points than what we usually think. I strongly believe bridging the two fields is needed. I’m not going to list the reasons, I will just say that the disciplines themselves, the people involved and the society at large can really benefit from this relationship.“
“In Luca Spano, the colleagues met a person who is open and curious, and who asked challenging questions in order to take new perspectives on research. Luca initiated discussions and thought processes and it became apparent that the approaches in science and art are very similar,” reports Kathrin Göbel, who supervised the residency at GSI/FAIR, about the intensive time of the exchange.
Luca Spano‘s work with GSI is part of “After the Last Image”, a project about the biological and technological limits of sight, and their role in the construction of reality. The work "Symphony of Chances" was created in six weeks of in-depth exchange with researchers from GSI/FAIR and intensive work in the studio.
„I met many researches at GSI, and it was a privilege to have very long and thoughtful conversations with them. A constant pattern started to appear since the first of these meetings. Nothing is fixed. Everything is constantly changing. So, the universe, our planet and us are constantly transforming. Everything is based on probabilities, or as I love to call them “chances”.
The goal of the experimental field is to repeat experiments one identical to the other, so they can test their theories, reaching a form of standardized certainty. They tune and control everything to repeat the performance. I had the feeling to be in front of an Orchestra, where everyone was practicing to reproduce perfectly a specific symphony. But like any performance of the same piece of music, any experiment is different from the other. It is a symphony that can approximate very closely itself, never being identical. And what this symphony does? This symphony creates chances to see events, chances to collect data, chances to test the theory. Yes, there is no certainty. An experiment is based on creating the setting to generate probabilities for something to happen. But it is not said. We know that something can trigger a specific reaction, but we don’t know if and when that is going to happen. It is a Symphony of Chances.“
Luca Spano's residency ended at the beginning of September with a spectacular exhibition in the Rosenhöhe studio. The work's interdisciplinary approach has created an ecology of text, images, sculptural artifacts and sound. It is the result of many conversations with physicists, the aesthetics of scientific research, the exploration of the hidden systems that shape our reality.
The first cycle of the artist-in-science residencies ended at the end of October. Kultur einer Digitalstadt draws a consistently positive conclusion: "During the six-week residencies of Alvaro Rodriguez Badel (with hessian.AI), Luca Spano (with GSI/FAIR) and most recently Swaantje Güntzel (with ESA/ESOC), there was an intensive exchange between the participating scientists and artists, which was surprisingly positive for everyone. The familiar methods (modeling, experimentation, trial and error and the interest in failure, also with regard to the question "is it a bug or a feature") enabled a lively and creative exchange. And the questions asked in science and art are similar. After all, both disciplines are about expanding knowledge into areas that are unexplored, and therefore (still) invisible. And always about investing the invisible, understanding it and making it more visible. By jointly addressing the “big questions” by artists and scientists and by publishing their discourse through round table discussions and exhibitions, it not only becomes available to society, but also enables participation. This is important, because people's culture is common property.”
The participants and organizers would like to thank all those active at GSI / FAIR who were involved in this project and who gave insights into their research and their personal perspectives on research: Oliver Keller, who worked with Luca Spano on a sound installation, Christian Sürder and Davide Racano who supported the realization of a work, Haik Simon, Joachim Stroth, Bettina Lommel, Francesca Luoni, Daniel Severin, Adrian Rost, Matthias Zander, Helmut Kreiser, Bastii Löher, Magdalena Gorska, Christian Schmidt, Lena Weitz, Gabi Otto, Paolo Giubellino and Kathrin Göbel.
The "Artist-in-Science-Residence" is realized with the support of Kulturfonds Frankfurt RheinMain, Merck’sche Gesellschaft für Kunst und Wissenschaft, Wissenschaftsstadt Darmstadt, and Digitalstadt Darmstadt GmbH as well as the participating institutes. (KG/BP)
„Kultur einer Digitalstadt“ (KeD) is an interdisciplinary project aimed at artists and people interested in culture from Darmstadt, the surrounding region and beyond. KeD sees itself as a platform from which different aspects of digitality can be observed, commented on and helped to shape from an artistic and cultural perspective. With the residence, KeD offers the opportunity to bring together the scientific and technical potential of the city with the equally comprehensive and relevant cultural and artistic tradition. Such a linking of artistic and scientific research on common themes and questions can make a significant contribution to understanding the world, people and their society.
]]>In her dissertation "Time for Hyperons. Development of Software Tools for Reconstructing Hyperons at PANDA and HADES", Physicist Jenny Regina presented a detailed simulation study of hyperons in the PANDA detector, developments of time-based track reconstruction algorithms for PANDA and a library for kinematic fitting in the HADES experiment. A candidate for online track reconstruction algorithms on free streaming data based on a 4D Cellular Automaton has been developed and is benchmarked. It utilizes information from the PANDA straw tube tracker and is agnostic to the point of origin of the particle. The track reconstruction quality assurance procedure and results from the tracking at different event rates have also been presented. Finally, extrapolation algorithms for including hit information from additional detectors in the tracks are outlined.
In order to maximize the potential of the predecessor experiment PANDA@HADES, a kinematic fitting procedure has been developed for HADES that combines geometric the decay vertex information of neutral particles and track parameters such as momentum. Journal publications are prepared for each part and Dr. Regina has presented her work at several national and international conferences, as well as in plenary sessions at the PANDA collaboration meeting.
The PANDA Collaboration awards the PhD Prize to specifically honor students’ contributions to the PANDA project. Candidates for the PhD Prize are nominated by their doctoral advisors. In addition to being directly related to the PANDA Experiment, the nominees’ doctoral degrees must have received a rating of “very good” or better. Up to three candidates are shortlisted for the award and can present their dissertations at the PANDA Collaboration meeting. The winner is chosen by a committee that is appointed for this task by the PANDA collaboration. (BP)
About the doctoral thesis of Dr. Jenny Regina
About the PANDA Prize
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The FAIR Project Associate Programme will allow industrial potential partners from FAIR Shareholders to directly GET_INvolved and work hand-in-hand with technical groups at FAIR/GSI in accomplishing integrated work-packages within the mega science project FAIR.
The FAIR Project Associate Programme was conceptualized in 2021 by FAIR Management as part of the GET_INvolved Programme. This program's main goal is to support, encourage, and help industrial partners from FAIR Shareholders’ nations to find mutually beneficial work packages that fit the project timeline and were strategically in everyone's best interests. This program includes representatives from FAIR GmbH and Shareholders and potential industrial partners who can supply the host lab GSI with the necessary human resources.
The pilot program seeks to identify appropriate projects and work packages where the participation of partners would directly benefit from the human resources of partner nations and associated enterprises. S2Innovation from Krakow, Poland, was chosen as the first partner in the pilot program because it was a success. There were additional partners in the trial phase as well.
The signing ceremony introduces a brand-new area of the program's portfolio that is geared toward companies like S2Innovation that have been chosen to collaborate on a particular work package at FAIR and would benefit from a clear structure for deploying skilled labor there. Up to 10 people (including students, researchers, and staff) will be able to work with the FAIR Project each year through this unique GET_INvolved Project Associate Programme with S2Innovation.
These people will have the opportunity to learn and work in the cutting-edge research environment at GSI/FAIR, which will, among other things, suggest mentors and supervisors for them and aid with their project onboarding.
In a joint jury with the FAIR sub-project directors, the partners will choose the work packages for which skilled workers from S2Innovation will be matched to carry out their projects at FAIR. The Office of International Cooperation will be in charge of managing the program's implementation.
"It is the perfect time for industrial partners from FAIR partner nations to join forces with FAIR/GSI, invest in future leaders, and provide their talent resources with an opportunity to explore the rich technology-driven innovation environment. This opportunity will also allow them to bring in their skills to specific work-packages to FAIR in a mutually beneficial framework like GET_INvolved Programme. I strongly support the initiative, and we wish that additional industrial partners will take the way and GET_INvolved with FAIR," says Dr Ulrich Breuer, Administrative Managing Director of GSI and FAIR.
"FAIR Project is entering into a new phase, soon the civil construction at FAIR very much advanced. Therefore, we need a strong engagement of our partners worldwide, especially skillful engineers and technicians, to coherently and carefully execute our plan for the installation and commissioning of state-of-art-technologies for our accelerators and experiments developed and produced proudly in different parts of the world. This planned execution would also require strong support and participation from our industry partners, who can quickly jump into specific work packages when necessary and contribute with their available resources. I am delighted that S2Innovation from Krakow has become the first among several others to join this common endeavor and be part of the GET_INvolved Programme," says Mr Joerg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR.
“The Polish Shareholder strongly supports the initiative of engaging industrial partners in the first-hand training and development of talented youth for the future FAIR facility. We are delighted to note that S2Innovation is one of the first companies that became part of this joint endeavor. The Polish Shareholder and Jagiellonian University believe that investment today in the training & research experience Programme of the younger generation is essential for the success of the FAIR project,” says Professor Zbigniew Majka, representative of Polish Shareholder at the FAIR Shareholders’ Council.
“S2Innovation is proud to become part of the “GET_INvolved Programme” through which we are hoping to build the basis for future larger collaboration. FAIR project creates unique opportunities for innovative companies like S2Innovation. It is a great satisfaction to help scientists to build such an amazing research facility, which one of the main goals is to investigate the evolution of the Universe. The success of BIG Science projects, due to their innovative nature, requires very close collaboration between the partners. GET_INvolved program is a perfect way for new companies to understand the complexity of the project and build trust between them and FAIR team,” says Wojciech Soroka CEO of S2Innovation. (BP)
In 2021 the FAIR Delegation on the invitation of the Polish Shareholder Jagiellonian University (JU) Krakow organized the "FAIR Days Poland". The “FAIR Days”, aimed to boost the Polish participation in FAIR. It was a very successful event with a number of important meetings, including such with the Vice Rector Research of the Jagiellonian University, with the Polish Academy of Sciences, with a very large and qualified delegation of Polish industries, with authorities and with representatives of the different universities which are participating in FAIR. A colloquium and the signature of cooperation agreements were also part of the program. In the specific meeting with the shareholder, Polish companies were introduced to opportunities to participate in open tenders with production and manufacturing capabilities and also through GET_INvolved Programme.
„S2Innovation“ is a polish company founded at the end of 2017 in Krakow on the basis of experience built during the construction of the SOLARIS Synchrotron - a unique electron accelerator in Central Eastern Europe and the largest investment in research infrastructure in Poland in recent decades. S2Innovation specializes in the development and maintenance of dedicated software for monitoring and control of research equipment or processes using both open-source tools as well as commercial software. Their mission is to support research institutions to work better, faster, and more efficiently using the most advanced software. The ambition is to participate in the leading scientific projects, which bring science to the next level.
´The GET-INvolved Programme provides international students and early-stage researchers from partner institutions with opportunities to perform internships, traineeships and early-stage research experience to get involved in the international FAIR accelerator project while receiving scientific and technical training. The GET_Involved Programme has currently more than 35+ partner Programme from partners worldwide.
Further details of the application procedure for students and researchers will be published shortly. Further information on the GET_INvolved Programme can be found on the program pages of S2Innovation and GSI/FAIR websites. For immediate queries, get in touch with Tomasz Ostatkiewicz at Tomasz.Ostatkiewicz@s2innovation.com, Key Account Representative, at S2INOVATION and Dr. Pradeep Ghosh, Head of International Cooperations on behalf of GSI/FAIR, atPradeep.Ghosh@fair-center.eu.
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Scientists call the state, which hibernating animals enter, torpor. In this state, life-supporting functions of an organism are reduced: Body temperature is lowered, metabolism is reduced and body functions such as heart rate and respiration rate or oxygen uptake are significantly slowed down. At the molecular level, gene activity and protein biosynthesis are also reduced to a slower pace. In the study now published on synthetic torpor (i.e. a kind of artificially produced hibernation) and protection from ionizing radiation, the scientists demonstrated biological effects suggesting that synthetic torpor increases resistance to radiation. A proof that can be very useful in the long term for astronauts.
Space radiation is acknowledged as one of the main health risks for human space exploration. Harmful effects of space radiation are a major challenge, especially for future long-term missions. The majority of radiation dose absorbed by crews in manned interplanetary missions is produced by galactic cosmic radiation (GCR), high-energy charged particles, including densely ionizing heavy ions, produced in distant galaxies. The energy of these particles is so high that shielding of the spacecraft cannot stop them and lead to exposure rates over 200 times higher than the radiation background on Earth over a very long period. For these reasons, radiation countermeasures for future missions are being investigated.
“The connections between torpor and radioresistance represent a highly innovative research approach. Our results indicate that synthetic torpor is a promising tool to enhance radioprotection in living organism during long-term space missions. It could thus be an effective strategy to protect humans as they explore the solar system”, summarizes Professor Marco Durante, Head of the GSI Biophysics Division.
It is already known that naturally hibernating animals acquire radioresistance in this state. However, the recent study is so significant because it is the first time that a hibernation-like biological state was induced in a non-hibernating animal (rat) and radioresistance to high-energy heavy ions could be proved. In experiments at Japan's Gunma University Heavy-ion Medical Center, accelerated carbon ions were used to simulate radiation in space. The other in vitro cell experiments were performed at the GSI/FAIR campus in Darmstadt and were part of the FAIR Phase 0 experimental period.
The main results of the research team after irradiation and induction of a synthetic torpor proved the hypotheses: Synthetic hibernation may have protective effects on a lethal dose of C‑ions. In addition, synthetic hibernation reduces the tissues damage from total body irradiation.
Furthermore, GSI scientists were able to characterize the underlying mechanism in their studies on rat tissue cells. They showed that lower oxygen concentration in the tissues (hypoxia) and reduced metabolism at low temperature (hypothermia) could be two important factors in the prevention of cell damage. The immunohistological analyses indicated that the synthetic torpor spares the tissue from energetic ion radiation. In addition, changes in metabolism at low temperatures could also affect DNA repair.
A lot of research is still needed to investigate and better understand the radioprotective effect of synthetic torpor in organs. Currently it is not possible technically to hibernate a human in a safe and controlled way. However, research is progressing. Only recently, the neuronal pathways that control torpor are been unraveled. Now the current publication adds another important component.
The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, emphasizes that the international accelerator center FAIR, currently under construction at GSI, will offer unique opportunities for research in the field of cosmic radiation. “Already today, the GSI facility is able to produce beams of heavy nuclei as they occur in cosmic radiation. At FAIR, experiments with a much wider range of particle energies and intensities will be possible. This will allow researchers to study the effects of cosmic radiation on humans and on technical instrumentation, which are fundamentally necessary to make human Mars missions possible. I am very delighted that the European Space Agency ESA has a cooperation with FAIR since many years to foster this field of research." (BP)
Many of Europe's biggest facilities in physics-related disciplines have just cemented a long-term deal to commit to sharing and processing open data. This agreement was signed at the “ESCAPE to the Future” conference, where partners of the European Science Cluster of Astronomy & Particle physics ESFRI research infrastructure (ESCAPE) project as well as members of the scientific community and the European Commission gathered at the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Science in Brussels (Belgium). GSI/FAIR also signed the ESCAPE collaboration agreement.
ESCAPE, initiated in 2019, has brought together a cluster of ESFRI (European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures) projects and other world-class research organizations with the aim of implementing a section of a European Open Science Cloud (EOSC) to foster Open Science in astrophysics and particle physics. As the ESCAPE project, funded by the H2020 grant, is coming to its end, the members of the cluster shared their results and achievements, discussed the next challenges and presented an outlook for the future. The event represented the starting point of a new era: after the successful experience of the ESCAPE project, the nine core ESCAPE Research Infrastructure partners have signed a new Open Collaboration Agreement, which consolidates their cross-border action for the benefit of Open Science, the implementation of the EOSC and the establishment of new sustainable cooperative schemes within Horizon Europe for the benefit of the European Strategy for data and excellence science.
During the implementation period of the ESCAPE project, partners from the astronomy, astroparticle, particle and nuclear physics communities have worked together on the development of software for Open Data management, in a cross-border and multi-disciplinary open environment, according to FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Reusable) principles. The “ESCAPE to the Future” event serves as an end point of the H2020 funded project, where partners discussed the achieved goals and future work lines.
“Scientific Research is progressing towards the new paradigm of Open Science for more open, transparent, collaborative and inclusive scientific practices to enhance the impact of science in our society, fostered by the expansion of information and communication technologies. This is the fundamental motivation of the ESCAPE scientific community and it is also the challenge shared by pan-European Research Infrastructures (RIs) that are members of the ESCAPE science cluster,” explains Dr. Giovanni Lamanna, Coordinator of the ESCAPE project. “The successful work programme, the achievements and the ability of ESCAPE RIs to cooperate in the context of open data intensive science to lead to new insights and innovation are widely recognised. The ESCAPE RIs are willing to continue cooperative actions by joining their efforts. Bottom-up demands of the involved scientists not to interrupt but to continue the cross-fertilisation in science and innovation that ESCAPE has been able to build, are strongly considered. For these reasons a new ESCAPE open collaboration agreement is established.”
The new Open Collaboration Agreement, publicly announced during the “ESCAPE for the Future” event and signed by all the Directors of all the research infrastructure partners, will take effect from January 2023, and will also help continue the synergies and joint work of all five domain-based Science Clusters (see paragraph “ESFRI Clusters” below) involved in the implementation of EOSC. The agreement is also open to further research infrastructures to join. This agreement is expected to maintain the collaborative and human experience represented by the Science Cluster and strengthen the role and impact of astronomy and nuclear/particle physics in the field of open science and, more broadly, in the European Research Area. (ESCAPE/BP)
European Open Science Cloud (EOSC) is a cloud for research data in Europe allowing for universal access to data; a single online platform where all European researchers will be able to: (i) find, access and re-use data produced by other scientists; (ii) deposit, analyse and share data they have been paid to produce. EOSC will help increase recognition of data intensive research and data science. Its architecture is developed as a data infrastructure common serving the needs of scientists, providing both common functions and localised services delegated to community level. EOSC will federate existing resources across national data centres, European e-infrastructures and research infrastructures by gradually opening up its user base to the public sector and industry.
Research Infrastructures have strong links with research communities and projects, manage significant data volumes and develop innovative data analytics tools, ensuring effective research data exploitation. Five ESFRI cluster projects were launched in 2019, within the H2020 framework of the European Union, providing a gathering point for various ESFRI projects and landmarks to connect to the EOSC. The five Science Clusters are ENVRI-FAIR for environmental research, EOSC-Life for life sciences, ESCAPE for astronomy, particle physics and nuclear physics, PaNOSC for multidisciplinary scientific analysis based on light and neutron sources facilities and SSHOC for social sciences and humanities. The ESFRI science cluster projects implement interfaces to integrate computer and data management solutions to create cross-border, interdisciplinary and open cooperation spaces for European researchers.
The first RIs that have signed the ESCAPE Open Collaboration agreement include ESFRI projects/landmarks and research infrastructures such as the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), the Cherenkov Telescope Array Observatory (CTAO), the KM3NeT Neutrino Telescope Research Infrastructure (KM3NeT), the European Gravitational-Wave Observatory (EGO-Virgo), the European Southern Observatory (ESO), the European Solar Telescope (EST), the Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (FAIR), the Joint Institute for VLBI-ERIC (JIV-ERIC) and the Square Kilometre Array Observatory (SKAO).
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The one-hour events begin with a short lecture on the research topic of the scientists, after which they are available for a discussion with the students. All scientific topics related to GSI and FAIR are covered: Whether construction and operation of accelerators, work on detectors for measuring nuclear reactions, events in the universe, research into new, super-heavy elements or tumor therapy with ion beams — a total of twelve experts are available for all these and many more research areas. Career stages from PhD students to professors are represented to provide insight into career paths.
The events take place online as video conferences. High-school teachers can request appointments to "Meet a scientist" as a class. Classes can then dial into the events either as individuals or as a group. An overview of participating scientists, available times, and how to participate can be found at www.gsi.de/meet-a-scientist. Interested parties can register directly on the web or contact meetascientist(at)gsi.de with any queries. (CP)
Kreiser was elected by the readers of the Vogel IT-Akademie publications. In total, over 1200 votes were received for the eleven nominated candidates. In addition to the Innovation category, an award was also presented in the areas Transformation, Sustainability and Efficiency. The award, which was bestowed for the first time, is intended to honor people in companies and the teams behind them who drive innovation and new infrastructure strategies.
GSI/FAIR’s Green IT Cube is a very energy-efficient and sustainable data center, its technology is based on cold water cooling of the computing racks and the reuse of the dissipated heat. Interested partners can deploy their computer systems in the racks as part of the living lab “Digital Open Lab” and operate them for the development, testing and upscaling of energy-efficient high-performance computers to the scale of industrial demonstrators on campus.
In doing so, GSI/FAIR are focusing on the Open Innovation Strategy and the Co-Innovation Strategy. It means that the Green IT Cube has become a living lab where new ideas, innovations and approaches can be tackled together with startups, companies and research institutes. GSI/FAIR are interested in implementing these new solutions in the Green IT Cube. The strategy not only promotes new innovations, but also creates the opportunity to expand the Green IT Cube with these new innovations. GSI/FAIR want to further develop and optimize concepts in order to operate data centers in a more efficient and eco-friendly way. (CP)
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The new building of the Helmholtz Institute Jena, a branch of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt, was constructed in the immediate vicinity of the existing institute building on the campus of the Friedrich Schiller University (FSU) Jena. Several floors provide additional offices, seminar and laboratory areas, which are necessary for the increased number of employees as well as for the amount of laboratory and research equipment. The new four-story building provides around 550 square meters of additional floor space. Offices and a seminar room are available on the two top floors, while the two lower floors mostly house research laboratories in addition to building technology and supply services. The basement is connected to the already existing target laboratory.
The infrastructure, which has been additionally improved by the new building, is a guarantee for the cutting-edge research that will take place at the Helmholtz Institute in the future and has been conducted since the institute was founded in 2009. The research profile of the Helmholtz Institute Jena is characterized by physics at the interface between conventional accelerator technology and the rapidly developing field of laser-based particle acceleration. The institute offers outstanding research in the areas of the coupling of intense photon fields and the supporting development of adequate instrumentation. The institute benefits from the close connection to the FSU and its scientific expertise, as well as to the large research facility GSI with the international accelerator center FAIR which is currently under construction.
About 100 employees and associated researchers in ten research groups are currently working at Helmholtz Institute Jena. Furthermore, there is a graduate school ("Research School of Advanced Photon Science") with about 60 PhD students. In addition to the successful acquisition of third-party funding, the regional networking that the Jena location brings with its specialization in the field of photonics and optical technologies is particularly important. Successful collaborations with the Fraunhofer Institute for Optics and Precision Engineering and the Leibniz Institute for Photonic Technologies are just two examples.
The Thuringian Ministry of Infrastructure had announced an architectural competition for this new research building. A regional office emerged as the winner: the jury unanimously selected the design of the office "Osterwold°Schmidt EXP!ANDER Architekten" from Weimar, which had submitted the plans together with Impuls Landschaftsarchitektur Jena. Groundbreaking for the new building, which was constructed on a hillside location on a state-owned plot of land within the university site below the Landgrafen, took place in October 2019. The €8.9 million construction cost of the research building was fully financed by state funds from the Thuringian Ministry of Infrastructure and Agriculture. (HI Jena/CP)
Following introductory information about the FAIR project, the campus development, the previous research successes and the current experiments, the SPD politician had the opportunity to visit the research facilities during a tour of the GSI campus. At the linear accelerator UNILAC and the experimental storage ring ESR, scientists provided insights into the functioning of the GSI accelerator facility. Afterwards, the guests visited the therapy unit for cancer therapy, the large experiment HADES, the energy-efficient supercomputing center Green IT Cube as well as the target laboratory, and had the opportunity to talk to researchers on site.
The guests were given an overview of the activities around FAIR during a visit to the magnet testing facility for cryogenic magnets and the FAIR viewing platform. Afterwards, the guests took a tour of the FAIR construction site and got a close-up view of the construction progress. One highlight was the tour of the underground accelerator tunnel. Other stops on the bus tour included the transfer building, the CBM experiment cave and the buildings for the NUSTAR experiments. Dr. Harald Hagelskamp, the manager of the FAIR construction site, guided the politician through the site.
An open discussion and lively exchange about the activities of the works council with Jan Regler, the chairman of the works council of GSI and FAIR, rounded off the visit to GSI and FAIR, which lasted about five hours in total. (JL)
]]>Karthein received the award for applying the superior phase-imaging ion cyclotron resonance technique to short-lived nuclides, reaching relative uncertainties of 10-9, the application to neutrino-less double beta decay, and for pursuing new applications using radioactive molecules. The Young Scientist Award is bestowed annually by GENCO to outstanding young researchers working in the field of experimental or theoretical nuclear physics or chemistry. The winners are selected by an international jury. It is endowed with 1,000 euros and is awarded during the NUSTAR annual meeting.
Additionally, the GENCO community honored Dr. Emma Haettner of GSI/FAIR with a Membership Award for having a decisive role in recent improvements of the Fragment Separator FRS for experiments and for the development of the new medical-physics program using radioactive beams for improved PET imaging. (CP)
The team of external experts was headed by the experimental particle physicist Professor Rolf-Dieter Heuer, who was director-general of the European Organization for Nuclear Research CERN for six years, and the experimental physicist Professor Robert Tribble, deputy director for science and technology at Brookhaven National Laboratory, USA. The committee consisted of renowned experts, who have been assessing the project in great detail since April 2022.
The expert group evaluated the science program of FAIR as compelling, often world-leading: According to the expert report, there is no other facility now being planned or under construction that can carry out the full program of science planned for FAIR. Even in case of delays, it will still be possible for FAIR to tackle many of the outstanding questions in nuclear physics.
The committee suggests a stepwise approach for the realization of the project, bringing the facility progressively into operation. It has also recognized that, as a consequence of various unforeseeable developments additional costs are unavoidable to reach the first step of viable operation. The FAIR Council will now consider the steps to be taken based on the outcome of the review, including the implementation of a proposed cost cap for the realization of the first step.
The Scientific Managing Director, Professor Paolo Giubellino, said: “I am very proud that the scientific program of FAIR once again has been rewarded with a very positive response of an international committee with high standing. We are grateful to the international scientific collaborations for their outstanding job in preparing FAIR’s scientific program”.
The FAIR management is looking forward to the next realization steps, following the decisions of the FAIR-Council, in order to realize the first scientific experiments at FAIR as early as possible. (red)
Neutron stars are remnants formed during stellar collapse in a supernova explosion. They have extremely strong gravitational fields, exceptionally intense magnetic fields, and consist of matter with very high density, making them important natural laboratories for fundamental physics. In binary systems consisting of two neutron stars, mergers of these extreme objects can occur: The two high-density stars collide at about 20% of the speed of light, leading to temperatures of several 100 billion kelvin. During the collision, considerable amounts of neutron-rich matter are expelled, in which heavy chemical elements such as silver, gold, platinum and many more are formed. The ejected matter evolves into a fireball, which is visible as a so-called kilonova.
“Kilonova science is emerging as a new field in astrophysics, offering an enormous discovery potential for understanding neutron stars, the origin of the heavy elements in particular, the physics of exotic heavy nuclei, and the phases of hot, ultra-dense, and exotic matter”, Bauswein explains his research focus. “The increasing sensitivity of gravitational wave detectors, also providing improved sky localisations for follow-up observations, and the next generation of telescopes, means that we expect an abundance of new kilonovae observations in the coming years. I look forward to exploring the research field in the best possible way together with my colleagues within the framework of the ERC Synergy Grant.”
The research project HEAVYMETAL (How Neutron Star Mergers make Heavy Elements) aims to make a big step in explaining kilonova explosions by spectroscopically dissecting their emissions and connecting them quantitatively to the physical properties of the neutron star merger. In doing so, HEAVYMETAL will probe the origin of the heavy elements, and delineate the nuclear and astrophysical pathways that created them — the so-called “r-process”. The research team will try to decipher the details of the observed spectra and use that information to gain unprecedented insight into the physical processes of the neutron star merger.
HEAVYMETAL brings together experts from different fields related to kilonova research who, by working together, can exploit synergies in the ambitious goal of explaining element synthesis: Andreas Bauswein and his team at GSI/FAIR have a long and high impact track record in connecting advanced hydrodynamical simulations to r-process nucleosynthesis, kilonova modelling and the properties of high-density matter. Already in 2017, Bauswein succeeded in securing an ERC Starting Grant of 1.5 million euros with his project GreatMoves on the simulation of neutron star mergers. In addition to Bauswein, Professor Darach Watson, University of Copenhagen, Denmark, Professor Padraig Dunne, University College Dublin, Ireland, and Dr. Stuart Sim, Queen's University, Belfast, UK, are also members of the research team funded by the ERC Synergy Grant.
Watson has been a key player in gaining and interpreting kilonova data and has worked in observational astronomy for two decades. Dunne is a leading experimental physicist in the area of laser plasma spectroscopy with a focus on laser plasmas of heavy elements. Sim is an expert in the modelling of radiation in explosive environments and in the development of codes designed to simulate detailed radiation-matter interactions and photon transport in rapidly expanding matter ejecta.
“We are very proud to have gained the support of the European Union for this cutting-edge research project,” says Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR. “International and interdisciplinary collaboration has always played a major role in our work. The implementation of many scientific projects is hardly conceivable without worldwide collaborations and the use of synergies between researchers. This starts with individual research areas such as the study of kilonovae in this group of experts and continues with the construction of our future research facility FAIR, which is being built in international collaboration between many researchers and nations.” FAIR is currently under construction in Darmstadt and will be connected to the GSI accelerator facility. In the future, it will be possible at FAIR to study states of matter similar to those occurring in the interior of stars, stellar explosions and neutron star mergers in the laboratory, which directly links to the HEAVYMETAL project.
ERC Synergy Grants are awarded by the European Union to research groups of two to a maximum of four scientists in any research area, exclusively on the basis of scientific excellence. The decisive factor for the grant is that the research in question cannot be carried out by the individual researchers alone, but only through joint cooperation. (CP)
Dr. Harald Hagelskamp, head of the FAIR construction site, Emmanuel Rosi, head of the FAIR Project Management Office, and Dr. Ingo Peter then accompanied the guest to the magnet testing facility and the FAIR view point. During a bus tour, he was given an overview of the entire FAIR construction field and the activities in the northern and southern construction areas. During the tour of the underground SIS100 accelerator tunnel and the CBM experiment, both of which are completed in shell construction, as well as the transfer building, which forms the central hub of the facility beamline, and the NUSTAR experiment, the guests were able to gain a direct impression of the progress of construction work.
Afterwards, Dr. Holger Becker had the opportunity for a detailed exchange about current and future plans at GSI and at the FAIR project in a video conference with Prof. Dr. Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Director of GSI and FAIR, and Jörg Blaurock, Technical Director of GSI and FAIR, as well as Dr. Ulrich Breuer, Administrative Director of GSI and FAIR. (LW)
In his PhD thesis titled „Application of pulsed UV laser systems for cooling of high-relativistic ion beams and laser spectroscopy of Be-like krypton ions” Dr. Sebastian Klammes focused on ion beam cooling at particle accelerator facilities. Ion beam cooling with lasers is one of the indispensable techniques for the production of high-quality ion beams with a narrow velocity distribution and of a particular importance to the SIS100 ring accelerator at the international accelerator facility FAIR. During his research, the storage ring ESR served as a pilot and test facility for laser cooling of high-energy and intense ion beams.
In his work, Klammes used a pulsed UV laser system to successfully demonstrate broadband laser cooling of relativistic and bunched carbon ions (C3+). The laser system was converted to a transportable version and enhanced with a state-of-the-art data acquisition system. For the precise examination of theoretical models for the description of the atmic structure of complex many-electron systems, experiments on laser spectroscopy of krypton (Kr32+; a krypton atom with four electrons) were performed at ESR. The scope of the thesis also comprised participation in the laser cooling of oxygen ions (O5+) at the storage ring CSRe in Lanzhou, China.
The SPARC PhD Award has been presented annually since 2018 and comes with a prize money of 300 euros. The award honors the best PhD thesis within the collaboration concerning atomic physics with heavy ions at the research facilities of GSI and FAIR. SPARC stands for Stored Particles Atomic Physics Research Collaboration. Currently, more than 400 members from 26 countries belong to the collaboration. They experiment with the existing atomic physics facilities at GSI and prepare new experiments and setups at the future FAIR accelerator. (CP)
GSI/FAIR present as a strong innovation partner for start-ups in the Darmstadt transfer ecosystem. GSI as a long-standing facility with the international mega construction project FAIR as an additional innovation driver showcase an extensive portfolio of intellectual property (IP), know-how and technical problem solving competence, which enables an optimal economic utilization for various applications of the respective innovations.
Access to this broad portfolio for industrial use is to be achieved not only through IP licensing and transfer agreements and joint R&D projects, but also through the route of spin-offs. The goal is to promote the establishment of start-ups or spin-off companies whose activities are based in whole or in part on GSI/FAIR knowledge and technologies. The staff unit Technology Transfer supports GSI/FAIR employees as well as external persons who want to establish such a company.
At the exhibition booth, GSI/FAIR present technologies, competences and cooperation offers in the areas of energy efficiency, material research, electronics and IT/software, for example the offer for start-ups to use the living lab “Digital Open Lab” for R&D projects in the supercomputing center Green IT Cube. GSI/FAIR’s Green IT Cube is a very energy-efficient and sustainable data center, its technology is based on cold water cooling of the computing racks and the reuse of the dissipated heat. Interested partners can deploy their computer systems in the racks as part of the Digital Open Lab and operate them for the development, testing and upscaling of energy-efficient high-performance computers to the scale of industrial demonstrators on campus.
Start-up & Innovation Day is where founder spirit and the power of innovation meet business, academia and government. For a whole day, innovation projects and (tech) start-ups present themselves at the fair, from initial ideas or early innovations to knowledge- and technology-based start-ups that have already successfully entered the market. Numerous network partners and start-up support organizations from the start-up scene of the Rhine-Main region will also be on site with booths, demonstrating the region's enormous innovative power.
Interested parties can visit the event free of charge. Tickets are available from the organizers at Technical University of Darmstadt. (CP)
Heavy quarkonium is a non-relativistic system made by a heavy quark and a heavy antiquark that has been at the root of the development of the strongly interacting quantum physics called quantum chromo dynamics. It has a pattern of separated energy scales qualifying it as special probe of complex environments and consequently it plays an important role at the frontier of our knowledge from particle to nuclear physics and cosmology. It is, however, difficult to be addressed in theory, thus the field is continuously crafting cutting-edge advanced tools and techniques.
In the last decades, this field has seen a plethora of surprising discoveries that have greatly expanded our perception of the variety of states that exist in nature. Tetraquarks, pentaquarks, hadro-molecules, and doubly-heavy baryons are the newest members of the particle zoo, and the study of these states will lead us to a deeper understanding of the strong interactions.
Members of all the collider experiments were present, from the Large Hadron Collider at CERN to the Beauty Factory in Japan and the Tau-Charm factory in China, and provided an innovative and unconventional interface of new ideas, new data, new theories and prospects for new experiments.
The QWG chose to convene at GSI/FAIR in strong appreciation, support and expectation for the upcoming FAIR facility. The future PANDA experiment (antiProton ANnihilation at Darmstadt) at FAIR will offer a broad physics program, covering different aspects of the strong interaction and will play a key role for quarkonium physics.
The meeting contributed considerably to the preparation of the PANDA experiment which develops and is constructed inside a very international framework and is comparable to high-energy physics experiments. Results in this field will impact on the ability to do precision physics and control strong systems. New tools will be of use for a wider community. (CP)
Since 2008, a framework agreement has formed the basis of the close scientific cooperation between Goethe University Frankfurt and the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt. Now the framework agreement has been renewed and updated under legal and science policy aspects. The framework agreement on strategic cooperation between the two institutions aims to strengthen research and development for the FAIR particle accelerator. One focus is on accelerator and heavy ion physics as well as “green” IT technology, which are anchored in the agreement as specific research areas.
In the scientific network of the Rhine-Main region, the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung and the Goethe University have been cooperating closely for many years. There are eight jointly appointed professors, for example in theoretical physics and accelerator physics, as well as numerous cooperation projects, for example the Helmholtz Research Academy Hesse for FAIR (HFHF), a think tank for basic physics research, and the graduate academy GRADE Center for Hadron and Ion Research, which is located at Goethe University. The GSI's Green IT Cube, a particularly energy-efficient high-performance computing centre, was also developed by scientists from Goethe University and GSI.
Professor Enrico Schleiff, President of Goethe University Frankfurt, explains: “GSI, with its large accelerator facility FAIR, which is currently being built, has been an extremely important strategic cooperation partner for Goethe University Frankfurt for many years. In GRADE and the Helmholtz Research Academy HFHF, for example, we jointly qualify the next generation of young, talented researchers and open up opportunities for them to establish themselves scientifically. Furthermore, last year we launched the priority project ELEMENTS, funded by the state of Hesse, in which Goethe University, the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung and TU Darmstadt are involved.” In ELEMENTS, scientists experiment at particle accelerators to understand the matter in such extreme astrophysical objects like neutron stars and to describe it with theoretical models.
President Schleiff is convinced: “We are connected with GSI through basic research in physics and mathematics, one of the defining research topics of Goethe University, which we have bundled in our profile area ‘Space, Time & Matter’: Around 150 professors and 1000 employees work here and educate 10,000 students. Together with GSI, we want to further advance cutting-edge research in this area. But the new cooperation agreement goes far beyond cooperation in research and thus also offers room for new cooperation formats right into administration.”
Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, explains: “With FAIR, a worldwide unique accelerator facility for research in particle and nuclear physics is being built at GSI, with which we will gain new insights into the structure of matter and the development of the universe. The close partnership with Goethe University will further promote our scientific exchange of experience and expand basic research in this fascinating field of science. In addition to pure knowledge gain, we also expected highly exciting scientific results from biomedical radiation research and materials research. And high-tech new developments in the areas of detector and sensor technologies or in energy-saving supercomputers generate benefits not only for science, but also for the economy and society. We are glad to have such a strong research partner in Goethe University.” (JL)
Press release of Goethe University (only in german)
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An international team at the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM), a branch of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum in cooperation with the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU), has received the “Erwin Schrödinger Prize — Science Award of the Stifterverband” of the year 2021 for important advances in the field of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). The award ceremony took place during the Helmholtz Annual Meeting in Berlin. “The Science Award of the Stifterverband rewards scientifically or technically innovative achievements that have been made in frontier areas between different subjects of medicine, natural sciences and engineering. This curiosity and the will to join forces across borders also characterize our award winners today," said Professor Michael Kaschke, President of the Stifterverband, in his laudatory speech. The award ceremony was originally scheduled to take place in December 2021, but was postponed due to the Corona situation.
Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, was also pleased about the scientists’ recognition: “The Helmholtz Institute Mainz offers the researchers in this interdisciplinary collaboration an environment to enable top performance. The results of this outstanding research team demonstrate the overriding importance of close global networking in the scientific community. I am therefore delighted that this great scientific achievement has been honored with the Erwin Schrödinger Prize.”
The group led by Professor Dmitry Budker, professor of Experimental Atomic Physics at JGU and Section Head at HIM, developed a technique to improve hyperpolarized magnetic resonance imaging. The new technique for observing metabolic processes in the body promises to be much cheaper and simpler than previous methods. MRI, or magnetic resonance imaging, has become a standard method for medical examinations in recent decades. It can be used to examine soft tissues of the body such as the brain, intervertebral discs or even the formation of tumors.
The Erwin Schrödinger Prize 2021 went in detail to Dmitry Budker (physicist, HIM), James Eills (chemist, HIM), John Blanchard (chemist, HIM), Danila Barskiy (physical chemist, HIM), Kerstin Münnemann (chemist, University of Kaiserslautern), Francesca Reineri (chemist, University of Turin), Eleonora Cavallari (pharmaceutical and biomolecular scientist, University of Turin), Silvio Aime (biological scientist, University of Turin), Gerd Buntkowsky (physical chemist, TU Darmstadt), Stephan Knecht (physicist, TU Darmstadt and NVision, Ulm), Malcolm H. Levitt (chemist, University of Southampton) and Laurynas Dagys (chemist, University of Southampton). The prize is endowed with a total of 50,000 euros.
The Helmholtz Institute Mainz was founded in 2009 by GSI and JGU to further strengthen the long-standing cooperation between the two institutions. At its location in Mainz, HIM addresses questions concerning the structure, symmetry and stability of matter and antimatter in experimental and theoretical investigations. Basic funding is provided by the federal government and the state of Rhineland-Palatinate. The JGU supports HIM by providing infrastructure. (CP)
Big Science Business Forum 2022 will be the second edition of the single one-stop shop for European companies and other stakeholders to learn about Europe’s Big Science organisations’ future investments and procurements worth €37 billion. Following the success of the first edition, which took place in 2018 in Copenhagen, the forum will again offer businesses the chance to learn about business opportunities in the coming years, within a wide range of business areas and technologies.
Three of GSI/FAIR’s technology transfer proposals have been accepted for the dedicated technology transfer session and we look forward to finding partners to help us realize the enormous potential:
BSBF 2022 is the opportunity to meet representatives from Europe’s eleven Big Science organisations (like FAIR) and their key suppliers and technology experts; to network and establish long lasting partnerships, showcase their expertise and potential for the Big Science market by participating in the open exhibition area and get insight in how businesses can interplay with the Big Science market. (CP)
Each year, the Summer Student Program offers a glimpse into research at a particle accelerator. “The program outgrew my expectations far and beyond” said Julia Świątkowska, participant from Warsaw, Poland, at the end of the eight weeks of program. “The people were amazing, my project and the extra activities were unbelievably interesting. Overall, the experience at GSI opened my mind to a whole new world of science."
All summer students worked on their own small scientific or technical project from ongoing research in a research group. The topics ranged from atomic physics and materials science to nuclear and astrophysics. Developments and tests of technical and experimental components for the FAIR accelerator facility, which is currently being built at GSI, and its future experiments were the main focus. “The program has been an incredible experience both in terms of what I have learnt and what I have experienced with people I will always consider my friends,“ said Pablo Garcia Gil from Vigo, Spain.
Many of the international students come back to Darmstadt after the Summer Student Program for a master or PhD thesis at GSI and FAIR. Already for the 40th time the Summer Student Program took place, which is organized in cooperation with the PhD school HGS-HIRe. In addition to scientific events, the program included a pedestrian rally, sports activities and self-organized ventures in the region. Accompanying lectures presented the broad research spectrum of GSI and FAIR and the scientific results achieved. (LW)
Six new elements were discovered at GSI from 1981 to 1996. Some of the research instruments that made these discoveries possible are now on public display on Museum Island in Munich.
To create a new element, two elements that occur naturally on Earth are used. For example, element 110, darmstadtium, was created by fusing nickel (element 28) and lead (element 82) (28+82=110). For this purpose, ions are brought to about 10% of the speed of light with a particle accelerator at GSI and then shot onto thin foils in a target wheel. The high speed overcomes the enormous repulsion of the two atomic nuclei and they can fuse to form a new element. Such a target wheel is now on display at Deutsches Museum, as is one of the detectors that was in use for years at the so-called SHIP velocity filter (Separator for Heavy Ion reaction Products) at GSI. Using a combination of very strong electric and magnetic fields, SHIP separated the electrically charged reaction products flying through the vacuum from the projectiles (nickel in this case) on the basis of their different velocities. After separation, the new elements were stopped in a silicon semiconductor detector, as now on display, and identified by measuring their characteristic alpha radiation. In this way, the six new elements Bohrium (107), Hassium (108), Meitnerium (109), Darmstadtium (110), Roentgenium (111), Copernicium (112) were discovered. (LW)
Atomphysik-Ausstellung im Deutschen Museum (German only)
]]>From September 19 to 24, 2022, the science festival “Highlights der Physik” will take place in Regensburg. Central elements of the event are the large hands-on exhibition and the science shows as well as a lecture program. For those who cannot be there, numerous live streams are offered. GSI and FAIR will also be represented with a stand and will offer knowledge and entertainment about the future accelerator facility FAIR — “The Universe in the Lab” — which is currently under construction at GSI in Darmstadt.
At the GSI and FAIR stand on Neupfarrplatz, two hands-on experiments will attract the public: Visitors can try out for themselves how a particle accelerator works and how to investigate the structure of matter to learn more about one of the largest construction projects for fundamental research. Those who cannot be on site in Regensburg can still participate: The exhibition can be visited on three days via live stream on YouTube. On Tuesday, September 20, the GSI and FAIR stand will be live.
The physics festival kicks off on September 19 with the big Highlights Show in the Donau Arena with science and entertainment for the whole family — with breathtaking experiments, demonstrated by top-class guests such as Harald Lesch. The festival week will conclude with a special evening lecture, in which Communicator Award winner Professor Metin Tolan will explore the question of whether scenes from James Bond films are physically possible at all.
The “Highlights of Physics” are organized by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), the German Physical Society (DPG) and the University of Regensburg. The “Highlights of Physics” were launched in 2001 by the BMBF and the DPG. In the past years, they have attracted up to 60,000 visitors.
Admission is free to all events. Free admission tickets are required for the big “Highlights Show” in the Donau Arena, “James Bond im Visier der Musik” in the Audimax of the University of Regensburg and for all lectures. Tickets are available at highlights-physik.de/tickets.
In addition to the on-site visit, many events of “Highlights of Physics” will also be available online in a live stream and afterwards “on-demand”. (KG/BP)
An international research team has succeeded in gaining new insights into the chemical properties of the superheavy element flerovium — element 114 — at the accelerator facilities of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt. The measurements show that flerovium is the most volatile metal in the periodic table. Flerovium is thus the heaviest element in the periodic table that has been chemically studied. With the results, published in the journal “Frontiers in Chemistry”, GSI confirms its leading position in the study of the chemistry of superheavy elements and opens new perspectives for the international facility FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research), which is currently under construction.
Under the leadership of groups from Darmstadt and Mainz, the two longest-lived flerovium isotopes currently known, flerovium-288 and flerovium-289, were produced using the accelerator facilities at GSI/FAIR and were chemically investigated at the TASCA experimental setup. In the periodic table, flerovium is placed below the heavy metal lead. However, early predictions had postulated that relativistic effects of the high charge in the nucleus of the superheavy element on its valence electrons would lead to noble gas-like behavior, while more recent ones had rather suggested a weakly metallic behavior. Two previously conducted chemistry experiments, one of them at GSI in Darmstadt in 2009, led to contradictory interpretations. While the three atoms observed in the first experiment were used to infer noble gas-like behavior, the data obtained at GSI indicated metallic character based on two atoms. The two experiments were unable to clearly establish the character. The new results show that, as expected, flerovium is inert but capable of forming stronger chemical bonds than noble gases, if conditions are suitable. Flerovium is consequently the most volatile metal in the periodic table.
Flerovium is thus the heaviest chemical element whose character has been studied experimentally. With the determination of the chemical properties, GSI/FAIR confirm their leading position in the research of superheavy elements. “Exploring the boundaries of the periodic table has been a pillar of the research program at GSI since the beginning and will be so at FAIR in the future. The fact that a few atoms can already be used to explore the first fundamental chemical properties, giving an indication of how larger quantities of these substances would behave, is fascinating and possible thanks to the powerful accelerator facility and the expertise of the worldwide collaboration,” elaborates Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR. “With FAIR, we are bringing the universe into the laboratory and explore the limits of matter, also of the chemical elements.”
The experiments conducted at GSI/FAIR to clarify the chemical nature of flerovium lasted a total of six weeks. For this purpose, four trillion calcium-48 ions were accelerated to ten percent of the speed of light every second by the GSI linear accelerator UNILAC and fired at a target containing plutonium-244, resulting in the formation of a few flerovium atoms per day.
The formed flerovium atoms recoiled from the target into the gas-filled separator TASCA. In its magnetic field, the formed isotopes, flerovium-288 and flerovium-289, which have lifetimes on the order of a second, were separated from the intense calcium ion beam and from byproducts of the nuclear reaction. They penetrated a thin film, thus entering the chemistry apparatus, where they were stopped in a helium/argon gas mixture. This gas mixture flushed the atoms into the COMPACT gas chromatography apparatus, where they first came into contact with silicon oxide surfaces. If the bond to silicon oxide was too weak, the atoms were transported further, over gold surfaces — first those kept at room temperature, and then over increasingly colder ones, down to about -160 °C. The surfaces were deposited as a thin coating on special nuclear radiation detectors, which registered individual atoms by spatially resolved detection of the radioactive decay. Since the decay products undergo further radioactive decay after a short lifetime, each atom leaves a characteristic signature of several events from which the presence of a flerovium atom can unambiguously be inferred.
“Thanks to the combination of the TASCA separator, the chemical separation and the detection of the radioactive decays, as well as the technical development of the gas chromatography apparatus since the first experiment, we have succeeded in increasing the efficiency and reducing the time required for the chemical separation to such an extent that we were able to observe one flerovium atom every week,” explains Dr. Alexander Yakushev of GSI/FAIR, the spokesperson for the international experiment collaboration.
Six such decay chains were found in the data analysis. Since the setup is similar to that of the first GSI experiment, the newly obtained data could be combined with the two atoms observed at that time and analyzed together. None of the decay chains appeared within the range of the silicon oxide-coated detector, indicating that flerovium does not form a substantial bond with silicon oxide. Instead, all were transported with the gas into the gold-coated portion of the apparatus within less than a tenth of a second. The eight events formed two zones: a first in the region of the gold surface at room temperature, and a second in the later part of the chromatograph, at temperatures so low that a very thin layer of ice covered the gold, so that adsorption occurred on ice.
From experiments with lead, mercury and radon atoms, which served as representatives of heavy metals, weakly reactive metals as well as noble gases, it was known that lead forms a strong bond with silicon oxide, while mercury reaches the gold detector. Radon even flies over the first part of the gold detector at room temperature and is only partially retained at the lowest temperatures. Flerovium results could be compared with this behavior.
Apparently, two types of interaction of a flerovium species with the gold surface were observed. The deposition on gold at room temperature indicates the formation of a relatively strong chemical bond, which does not occur in noble gases. On the other hand, some of the atoms appear never to have had the opportunity to form such bonds and have been transported over long distances of the gold surface, down to the lowest temperatures. This detector range represents a trap for all elemental species. This complicated behavior can be explained by the morphology of the gold surface: it consists of small gold clusters, at the boundaries of which very reactive sites occur, apparently allowing the flerovium to bond. The fact that some of the flerovium atoms were able to reach the cold region indicates that only the atoms that encountered such sites formed a bond, unlike mercury, which was retained on gold in any case. Thus, the chemical reactivity of flerovium is weaker than that of the volatile metal mercury. The current data cannot completely rule out the possibility that the first deposition zone on gold at room temperature is due to the formation of flerovium molecules. It also follows from this hypothesis, though, that flerovium is chemically more reactive than a noble gas element.
The exotic plutonium target material for the production of the flerovium was provided in part by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), USA. In the Department of Chemistry’s TRIGA site at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU), the material was electrolytically deposited onto thin titanium foils fabricated at GSI/FAIR. “There is not much of this material available in the world, and we are fortunate to have been able to use it for these experiments that would not otherwise be possible,” said Dr. Dawn Shaughnessy, head of the Nuclear and Chemical Sciences Division at LLNL. “This international collaboration brings together skills and expertise from around the world to solve difficult scientific problems and answer long-standing questions, such as the chemical properties of flerovium.”
“Our accelerator experiment was complemented by a detailed study of the detector surface in collaboration with several GSI departments as well as the Department of Chemistry and the Institute of Physics at JGU. This has proven to be key to understanding the chemical character of flerovium. As a result, the data from the two earlier experiments are now understandable and compatible with our new conclusions,” says Christoph Düllmann, professor of nuclear chemistry at JGU and head of the research groups at GSI and at the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM), a collaboration between GSI and JGU.
How the relativistic effects affect its neighbors, the elements nihonium (element 113) and moscovium (element 115), which have also only been officially recognized in recent years, is the subject of subsequent experiments. Initial data have already been obtained as part of the FAIR Phase 0 program at GSI. Furthermore, the researchers expect that significantly more stable isotopes of flerovium exist, but these have not yet been found. However, the researchers now already know that they can expect to find a metallic element.
In addition to GSI/FAIR and JGU, the HIM, the University of Liverpool (UK), the University of Lund (Sweden), the University of Jyväskyla (Finland), the University of Oslo (Norway), the Institute of Electron Technology (Poland), the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (USA), the Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics and the Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee (India), the Joint Atomic Energy Agency and the RIKEN Research Center (Japan) as well as the Australian National University (Australia) were involved in the experiment. (CP)
Researching cosmic radiation and their effects on humans, electronics and materials is a decisive contribution to the future of human spaceflight, so that astronauts and satellites in space are provided with the best protection during the exploration of our solar system. Furthermore, it also contributes to detailed knowledge about the risks of radiation exposure on Earth. The establishment of the Summer School is a direct result of the close cooperation between ESA and FAIR on cosmic radiation research: For many years, ESA has been implementing space radiation research at the GSI particle accelerator in Darmstadt. The existing GSI accelerator facility already is the only one in Europe that can generate all of the ion beams that occur in our solar system, which range from the lightest one, hydrogen, to the heaviest, uranium. At the future FAIR accelerator center, even higher energy will be available for cosmic ray simulation, enabling groundbreaking new insights.
With these forward-looking research opportunities as a framework, the participants of the Summer School will be able to enhance their knowledge of radiation research in a unique combination of lectures and practical workshops. The Summer School will be held at ESA´s European Space Operations Center ESOC as well as at the GSI/FAIR campus in order to train students in basic heavy ion biophysics for both terrestrial and space applications. The ESA -FAIR Radiation Summer School thus contributes significantly to research and development in the field of biomedical and biophysical applications of heavy ions in Europe. Main topics of the two-week event are space research activities at ESA, space radiation physics, space radiation biology, applied physics at GSI/FAIR, particle accelerators and particle therapy.
The Summer School’s top-class scientific program, opened by Dr. Dr. Jennifer Ngo-Anh, ESA Directorate of Human and Robotic Exploration programs, and Professor Marco Durante, Head of the GSI Department of Biophysics, includes lectures from experts such as former astronaut Thomas Reiter and former ESA Director General Johann-Dietrich Wörner, site visits to facilities in Darmstadt and practical training and research opportunities at GSI/FAIR. At the ESA-FAIR Radiation Summer School, participants will also take written exams and carry out teamwork, which will be evaluated and rated by the faculty. (BP)
With the future requirements for FAIR, the operation of SIS18 will be fundamentally different from the current operation to supply experiments: To achieve the planned highest intensities in the five times longer SIS100, the SIS18 must accelerate and extract the ion beam four times within one second. This results in a repetition rate of 2.7 hertz, significantly higher than the rate of maximum one hertz that has been common in experimental operation so far. Operation with heavy ions with low charge states, as intended for FAIR (only with them the highest intensities can be achieved), further increases demands on the devices.
To enable booster operation, which was previously not required to operate the current experimental program at GSI, various technical changes have been made over the past 15 years as part of an extensive upgrade program. In particular, the performance of the main power supplies and the high-frequency acceleration systems was improved to achieve the shortening of the acceleration cycle required for booster operation.
Realizing the high ramp rate of the magnetic field in the SIS18's deflecting magnets of ten tesla per second is very challenging. It requires the magnetic current to be brought up to a maximum current of 3500 amps at a rate of 19,000 amps per second. The current generated by the power supply must not deviate from the specified profile by more than 0.01 percent at any time. These requirements can only be met by special power supply units with outstanding control characteristics. The high-frequency facilities of SIS18 were extended by a group of broadband MA cavities, which together provide an accelerating voltage of 40 kilovolt in the frequency range from 0.4 to 1.6 megahertz. Only with these cavities, the energy of low charge state heavy ions can be increased sufficiently per revolution to follow the fast magnetic ramp.
Taking all devices together, the SIS18 reaches pulse powers in the range of 50 megawatts in booster operation. The special characteristic of the SIS18 is that, unlike other very fast-pulsed synchrotrons, it is not constructed as part of an oscillating circuit and thus always delivers the same pulses at a fixed repetition frequency. Instead, it offers the flexibility to change the settings of all devices from cycle to cycle to supply the various experiments.
In addition to the technical demands on the SIS18 equipment, booster operation also brings new challenges for the timing control systems due to its high repetition rate. For example, it must be ensured that the four injections from the linear accelerator UNILAC take place exactly when the SIS18 is ready for injection, without having to wait at this point as in normal operation. In order to demonstrate the booster operation, the control systems were adapted in such a way that the injections could be performed with a known procedure, previously used for the "multi-multiturn injection". With this intermediate step, a U28+ beam could be accelerated and extracted at a repetition rate of 2.3 hertz for the first time.
After this first successful booster demonstration, further extensive developments in the control system for FAIR are required in the next step for the routine realization of booster operation. In particular, the timing system for the UNILAC must be renewed in order to combine the independent parallel operation of the UNILAC with those conditions that result from synchronization with the SIS18 in booster operation. (BP)
]]>On a tour of the GSI/FAIR campus, the guests then took a look at the construction progress from the FAIR viewing platform. Other stops included the test stand for the superconducting magnets for the FAIR accelerator SIS100, the Green IT Cube — the high-performance computing center that is particularly energy-efficient thanks to water cooling and has been awarded the “Blue Angel” — as well as the the HADES experiment. (CP)
]]>On a tour of the FAIR construction site, he then took a close look at the construction progress and visited the tunnel structure for the SIS100 accelerator, the building for the large experiment for compressed nuclear matter CBM and the so-called transfer building. On the GSI/FAIR campus, he visited the Green IT Cube — the high-performance computing center that is particularly energy-efficient thanks to water cooling and has been awarded the “Blue Angel” — as well as the experimental storage ring ESR and the HADES experiment. (CP)
]]>FLASH experiments focus on very short and very high-intensity radiation pulses, where the treatment dose is delivered in sub-second timescales. The FLASH effect is a potential breakthrough in radiotherapy because ultra-high dose-rate irradiation can substantially widen the therapeutic window. In fact, pre-clinical data show that when the dose is delivered in less than a second it destroys the tumor but spares the surrounding healthy tissue. While this normal tissue sparing at high doses and short irradiation times has been demonstrated with electrons, photons, and protons, so far evidence with heavy ions is limited to in vitro cell experiments. Now the efficacy of the new FLASH radiotherapy using high-energy carbon ions delivered at an ultra-high dose rate was demonstrated for the first time in living organisms.
The scientists, including the head of the GSI Department of Biophysics, Professor Marco Durante, and his team, as well as researchers from the University of Naples Parthenope, the German Cancer Research Center DKFZ and the University of Heidelberg, present these first in vivo results in their current publication. The team with lead author Dr. Walter Tinganelli (GSI) has shown a 150 millisecond pulse of high-energy carbon ions reduces normal tissue toxicity compared to conventional irradiation in more than a minute and sterilizes the cancer (a mouse osteosarcoma). Furthermore, with great surprise, the investigators found that FLASH irradiation reduces the number of lung metastases generated by the primary tumor. FLASH with carbon ions is therefore not only able to spare the healthy tissue surrounding the tumour target, but may also elicit a systemic effect able to destroy distal metastasis.
Professor Durante, a renowned expert in the field of particle therapy and recently elected president of the international organization “Particle Therapy Co-Operative Group (PTCOG)” summarizes: “We demonstrated the FLASH effect with high-energy carbon ions for the first time in vivo. The results are important and very useful for understanding the FLASH mechanisms and for possible applications of the ultrahigh dose rate particle therapy in clinical settings. However, much more research needs to be carried out in order to translate this laboratory experiments in clinical settings. The goal is always to answer the central question: How should radiation be applied to get the most efficient, the best possible treatments in the fight against cancer?”
The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, is also delighted about the promising results, obtained during the FAIR Phase 0 experimental period: “Modern radiobiology will substantially benefit from beams with even higher intensities, such as we will have at the FAIR facility currently under construction. FLASH is a first example of this. The present results also show the great potential of carbon ion therapy, pioneered at GSI. Research on this highly relevant topic will continue in the coming years. The first stage of the FAIR experimental program, FAIR Phase 0, already offers outstanding opportunities in this field.” (BP)
Further lectures will deal with the modes of action and possible applications of nuclear spins as well as with the miniCBM experiment, which is already in operation at the GSI accelerator facility as a precursor for the large FAIR experiment to study compressed nuclear matter (CBM). At the end of the year in December, the scientific experiments during this year’s recent operational phase of the GSI/FAIR accelerator facility will be reported in the traditional Christmas lecture.
The lectures start at 2 p. m., further information about registration, access and the course of the event can be found on the event website at www.gsi.de/wfa
The lecture series “Wissenschaft für Alle” is aimed at all persons interested in current science and research. The lectures report on research and developments at GSI and FAIR, but also on current topics from other fields of science and technology. The aim of the series is to prepare and present the scientific processes in a way that is understandable for laypersons in order to make the research accessible to a broad public. The lectures are held by GSI and FAIR staff members or by external speakers from universities and research institutes. (CP)
Information on scientific activities, the progress of the FAIR project and a tour were part of the program. Marcus Bühl got insights into newly developed and completed high-tech components for the accelerator facility FAIR. After that, a walking tour of the FAIR construction site was on the agenda. This included the underground accelerator ring tunnel, the central transfer building, the crucial hub for the facility’s beamline, and the buildings for the CBM experimental cave and the NUSTAR experimental caves. The test facility for superconducting accelerator magnets was also visited. There, mainly high-tech components for FAIR are tested, for example the dipole magnets for the ring accelerator SIS100.
]]>GSI/FAIR must not be missing in the anniversary of the City of Science: After all, GSI has represented cutting-edge research in Darmstadt for more than 50 years, world-leading and at the same time rooted in the region, sharpening the profile of Darmstadt as a city of science. With FAIR, the groundbreaking course is set for the future: The FAIR accelerator center enables scientists to study the universe into the laboratory to address fundamental questions such as the origin of the chemical elements and the evolution of the universe.
With FAIR, the international dimension will be significantly expanded: From the very beginning, GSI has been bringing scientists from all over the world to Darmstadt. Many more will come here for the future international facility FAIR to carry out world class, excellent science. This is also a contribution to the visibility of Darmstadt as a science city at the international level.
The aim of the current anniversary campaign "Brought to the point" is to increase the visibility and tangibility of scientific institutions in Darmstadt. Similar to a baton, a symbolic "Knowledge point" has been on the road since June on a "Route of places of knowledge” in Darmstadt. At each location where the "Knowledge point" stops for one or more days, visitors can expect an exciting program. The campaign will last until October.
As part of the anniversary campaign, interested persons could already register for a tour of the unique particle accelerator facility at GSI/FAIR, which will take place on August 25. In the days around the "Knowledge point" visit, there are also fascinating things to discover and interesting facts to learn on Instagram and Facebook. Interested people have the opportunity to look behind the scenes of a research institute in a variety of ways and gain surprising insights into science at GSI/FAIR.
The "Knowledge point" tour and program are continuously updated and expanded on the website of the city of Darmstadt. There is an overview map showing where Darmstadt's places of knowledge are located. (BP)
An international research team with participation by the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung succeeded for the first time to create an isolated four-neutron system with low relative energy in a volume corresponding to that of an atomic nucleus. The scientists have overcome the experimental challenge by employing a new method.
The experiment has been carried out at the Radioactive Ion Beam Factory RIBF at RIKEN (Japan) by a large international research team led by Technical University Darmstadt. Significantly involved besides GSI were scientists from TU Munich and the RIKEN Nishina Center. The experiment yielded an unambiguous signal for the first observation of the tetraneutron. The result has been published in the current issue of “Nature”.
The building blocks of atomic nuclei are nucleons, which exist as two kinds, the neutral neutrons and the charged protons, representing the two isospin states of the nucleon. To our present knowledge, nuclei made of neutrons only are not existing as bound nuclei. The only bound systems known made of almost only neutrons are neutron stars, which are very compact high-density objects in the universe bound by the gravitational force with typical radii of around 10 kilometers. Atomic nuclei are bound by the nuclear strong force with a preference to balance neutrons and protons, as known for the light stable nuclei we find on earth.
The study of pure neutron systems is of particular importance since they provide the only means to extract experimental information on the interaction among several neutrons and thereby on the nuclear force. If multi-neutron systems do exist as resonances or even bound states has been a long-standing quest in nuclear physics. The exploration of the so far hypothetical particles might furthermore provide information helping for a better understanding of neutron-star properties. If multi-neutron systems do exist as unbound resonant states or even bound states has been a long-standing quest in nuclear physics. The research team set out to undertake a new attempt by using a different experimental technique as compared to previous attempts. This work was supported by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) via the SFB 1245.
“This experimental break-through provides a benchmark to test the nuclear force with a pure system made of neutrons only", says Dr. Meytal Duer from Institute for Nuclear Physics at the TU Darmstadt. “The nuclear interaction among more than two neutrons could not be tested so far, and theoretical predictions yield a wide scatter concerning the energy and width of a possible tetraneutron state. We are currently planning to a next-generation experiment at R3B at FAIR, which will detect directly the correlations among the four neutrons with the R3B NeuLAND detector, which will give deeper insight to the nature of this four-neutron system”.
The experimental study of pure neutron systems is challenging because targets — which are the matter samples subject to the particle beam — solely made of neutrons do not exist. In order to create multi-neutron systems in a volume where the neutrons can interact via the short-range nuclear force (few femto-meter, 10-15 meter), nuclear reactions have to be used. Here, the interaction of the neutrons with other particles involved in the reaction process poses a major problem, which can mask the properties of the pure neutron interaction. The scientists have overcome this problem by using a high-energy 8He beam. The 8He consists of a compact alpha particle (4He) which is surrounded by the additional four neutrons in a cloud of lower density. The alpha particle is removed from 8He in a high-energy reaction instantaneously, induced by a proton of the liquid hydrogen target. The remaining four neutrons are suddenly free and can form a four-neutron state.
“Key for the successful observation of the tetraneutron was the chosen reaction, which isolates the four neutrons in a fast (compared to the nuclear scale) process, and the chosen kinematics of large momentum-transfer, which separates the neutrons from the charged particles in momentum space”, says Professor Dr. Thomas Aumann, head of the research department “Nuclear Reactions” at GSI/FAIR and a professor at the Institute for Nuclear Physics of TU Darmstadt. “The extreme kinematics resulted in an almost background-free measurement. We now plan to employ the same reaction in an 6He experiment at the RIBF to make a precision measurement of the low-energy neutron-neutron interaction. A dedicated neutron detector for this experiment is currently being built at our university”. (TUDa/CP)
GSI is the birthplace of a new form of cancer treatment. This development was the result of many years of research in conjunction with GSI’s large ion-beam accelerator system. To date, ion-beam radiotherapy has been used to treat more than 440 patients for tumors in the head or neck region. The advantage of this new treatment modality is that the ion beam selectively damages tumor tissues while sparing the surrounding healthy tissues. Further research will focus on applying the new treatment method to other malignant tumors as well. An ion-beam radiotherapy center was constructed at the Heidelberg University Medical Center under the technical direction of GSI. Since its opening in November 2009 patients can be treated in clinical routine operation.
The Association for the Promotion of Tumor Therapy is closely linked to GSI/FAIR and supports activities for the research in the field of tumor therapy with heavy ions by providing nonmaterial and financial support. The major aims are further improvements of the tumor treatment and awarding these in the framework of the Christoph-Schmelzer-Award. The association pursues exclusively and directly charitable purposes.
The "Tour der Hoffnung" is one of the largest, privately organized charity cycling tours, which has raised more than 42 million euros in the past 38 years, the organizers say. They emphasize, "All donations go to the last cent for the benefit of those affected, while the organizational costs are borne by sponsors. This clear separation has been enormously well received nationwide. This is an important reason why every year many celebrities from business, politics, show business and sports put themselves at the service of the good cause."
This year, around 160 participants, including well-known athletes, will be pedaling to raise funds for children with cancer. The 254-kilometer charity bike tour traditionally begins on August 11 with a prologue in and around Giessen and ends on August 13 in Fulda. This year's patron of the tour is once again Petra Behle, Olympic champion and nine-time world champion in biathlon. The captain of the field of riders is Klaus Peter Thaler, a multiple cross-country world champion from Gevelsberg. (BP)
Ion-beam radiotherapy in the fight against cancer at GSI/FAIR
Association for the Promotion of Tumor Therapy with Heavy Ions
Tour der Hoffnung (in German)
]]>Radiation therapy is a proven approach to destroying tumours. However, it is possible that it might be able to do even more in the future – namely stimulate the immune system at the same time and so fight cancer even more intensively. Researchers led by TU Darmstadt and with participation of GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung have found that x-rays trigger a calcium signalling cascade in cells of the immune system. The results have now been published in the “Journal of General Physiology”.
Ionising radiation is successfully used in cancer treatment to kill tumor cells and is an important research topic of the GSI Biophysics Department. Over the past two decades, it has become clear that treatment success can be increased even further if the radiation treatment is combined with measures to stimulate the immune system. In this context, a new study being carried out with researchers from TU Darmstadt and GSI plus researchers from the clinics of the Frankfurt and Homburg universities is attracting attention.
The researchers report in the Journal of General Physiology that the desired stimulating effect on the immune system is triggered directly when T-cells are also irradiated by x-rays. Dominique Tandl, researcher at the Department of Biology at TU Darmstadt, and her co-authors, also including Claudia Fournier and Burkhard Jakob from GSI, demonstrate in the recently published study that clinically relevant doses of x-rays in T lymphocytes trigger a signalling cascade that is typical of the immune reaction that begins with the release of the messenger substance calcium (Ca2+) from internal stores.
Activated by what is known as store operated Ca2+ entry (SOCE), the concentration of Ca2+ in the cells begins to oscillate at a critical frequency, which in turn leads to the displacement (translocation) of a transcription factor from the cytoplasm into the cell nucleus. Once there, this transcription factor initiates gene expression, and the cell begins to make molecules that are important for the immune response, such as cytokines.
Since the irradiation of tumours invariably always affects the blood cells in the target tissue, medicine could utilise the stimulating effect of x-rays on T lymphocytes. The researchers hope that their studies will contribute to improving cancer treatment in the long term, as Professor Gerhard Thiel, head of the Membrane Biophysics Department at the Department of Biology at TU Darmstadt and co-author of the study, says. “It could be possible to enhance the killing effect of ionising radiation on tumour cells and at the same time to stimulate the immune system with the help of this radiation.” (TUDa/BP)
The sophisticated and creative film technique convinced the jury: The time-lapse video produced by GSI/FAIR to show the developments on the construction site of the particle accelerator facility FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) was judged as an outstanding contribution in the category "Public Relations/Research and Science". The jury of the "WorldMediaFestivals | Television & Corporate Media Awards" honored the video with the "Intermedia Globe SILVER Award".
The progress made on one of the largest construction sites for basic research worldwide is made particularly visible with the special GPS filming and processing technique of the "Longterm Dronelapse". Lars Möller from the interdisciplinary media production company "Zeitrausch" from Breuberg regularly flies the same routes over the FAIR construction site with a drone. The moving time-lapse videos filmed in the process are then combined into a single video. Time-lapse videos which have now been recorded over four years are superimposed in the World Media Festival award-winning video thanks to GPS support, so that the developments of the construction activities can be experienced in an impressive way. Last year's Longterm Dronelapse, which shows the development from 2018 to 2020, already won an award at the World Media Festival.
For 22 years, WorldMediaFestivals have been honoring excellence in television, corporate film, online and print at an international level. The awards are, according to intermedia, internationally recognized as a symbol of the highest production standards and one of the world's highest honors in visual competition. The jury decides based on creativity and effectiveness. (LW)
Sigurd Hofmann was born on February 15, 1944 in Böhmisch-Kamnitz, Bohemia and came to Groß-Umstadt (near Darmstadt) shortly after the end of the second world war. He went to school there and attended the Max Planck High School until 1963. He then began studying physics at the former TH Darmstadt (now TU Darmstadt), where he received his diploma in 1969 and his doctorate in 1974 with Egbert Kankeleit. His scientific work, which he then began at GSI in Darmstadt, occupied him for almost 50 years. Most recently, he worked on a book on the current state of worldwide heavy element research and on the publication of a method for energy calibration of semiconductor detectors, which he had already developed in the 1990s - accuracy and scientific exactness were always important to him. After joining GSI in 1974, he devoted himself to investigating fusion reactions and radioactive decays in the group of Peter Armbruster and worked together with Gottfried Münzenberg. Sigurd Hofmann achieved international fame through the discovery of proton radioactivity from the ground state of lutetium-151 in 1981, a previously unknown decay mechanism. When analyzing the data, he benefited from his pronounced thoroughness and scientific curiosity.
At the same time, Sigurd Hofmann had begun work on the synthesis, unambiguous identification and study of the properties of the heaviest chemical elements, which were to shape his further scientific life. The first highlights were the synthesis of the new elements bohrium (Bh, Z=107), hassium (Hs, Z=108) and meitnerium (Mt, Z=109) in the years 1981 to 1984, with which GSI for the first time – and at the same time very prominently ¬¬– entered the international stage of this renowned research field. The semiconductor detectors, that Sigurd Hofmann had developed specifically for these experiments, were crucial here. Far ahead of its time, such detectors are now used worldwide to search for new chemical elements. At the end of the 1990s, Sigurd Hofmann took over the management of the heavy element group and - after instrumental improvements at the GSI linear accelerator UNILAC, the velocity filter SHIP, further detectors as well as the detection electronics – he crowned his scientific success with the discovery of the chemical elements darmstadtium (Ds, Z=110), roentgenium ( Rg, Z=111) and copernicium (Cn, Z=112) in the years 1994 to 1996. The concept "SHIP-2000", a strategy paper developed under his leadership in 1999 for long-term heavy element research at GSI, is today still current. In 2009 he was appointed Helmholtz Professor and from then onwards he was able to devote himself entirely to scientific work again. For many years he maintained a very intensive collaboration and scientific exchange with his international colleagues in Dubna, where he co-discovered element flerovium (Fl, Z=114) in a joint experiment.
For his outstanding research work and findings, he received a large number of renowned awards and prizes, of which only the most important ones can be mentioned here. Since 1996 he has been an honorary doctor of the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics at Comenius University in Bratislava (Slovakia), since 1998 honorary professor at Goethe University in Frankfurt am Main, since 2001 Dr. h.c. of the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR) in Dubna and since 2004 Professor Laureate of the Josef Buchmann Foundation of the Goethe University in Frankfurt am Main. In 1984 he received the Physics Prize of the German Physical Society (together with Gottfried Münzenberg, Willibrord Reisdorf and Karl-Heinz Schmidt), in 1996 the Otto Hahn Prize of the City of Frankfurt am Main (together with Gottfried Münzenberg), in 1997 the G.N. Flerov Prize of the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR) in Dubna and in 1998 the SUN-AMCO Medal of the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics; in 2011 he received the Nicolaus Copernicus Medal of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw (Poland) and in 2011 the Medal of the City of Toruń and Nicolaus Copernicus University of Toruń (Poland).
Sigurd Hofmann was a diligent writer and speaker. He has been invited to speak at countless international conferences, authored a large number of review articles, books and book chapters, many widely cited publications etc. He also liked to present scientific results at public events, including as "Confessing Heiner" in the “Darmstadt Ziegelhütte” event location. In doing so, he was able to develop a thrilling picture of modern physics, but also of the big questions of cosmology and element synthesis in stars; he was also able to convey very clearly to the public how atoms can be made "visible".
Many chapters of his contemporary scientific life are recorded in his 2002 book “On Beyond Uranium”. His modesty and friendly nature were remarkable. You could always rely on him. His care, accuracy and deliberateness in all work was outstanding. His persistence was one of the foundations for the groundbreaking scientific achievements he achieved for GSI. He was always in the office or at the experiment, even late in the evening and on weekends, so that you could ask him at any time and always got detailed answers and competent advice. There was practically nothing in nuclear physics or GSI that he didn't know.
We are pleased that we have been able to work with an excellent scientist and colleague as well as an outstanding teacher and great person for so many years. Now we mourn Sigurd Hofmann. Our deepest sympathy goes out to his family. We will remember him fondly. (JL)
The guests were welcomed by Jutta Leroudier from the Public Relations Department and Thomas Neff from the Theory Department, who was also a participant in the Chemistry Olympiad more than 30 years ago. After an introductory presentation on past research successes, current experiments and the status of the FAIR project, the program included a tour of the construction site platform and various research facilities. “It is a unique opportunity for the young people enthusiastic about chemistry to experience the large experiments and particle accelerators of GSI/FAIR, on site, to get an impression of the dimension of the experiments and to experience the discovery site of six chemical elements,” Marco Dörsam, the organizer of the excursion and state representative of the competition, was pleased.
After the official program of the visit, things got exciting for the young people once again. The team of supervisors around Marco Dörsam announced the winners of the individual competition categories. During the excursion, the students completed a theoretical exam and conducted comprehensive experiments in small groups. During this selection process, a total of ten young people qualified for the national final in Leipzig in September. “From now on, the excursion to GSI/FAIR will be a fixed program item in the 3rd selection round of the chemistry competition and we are happy that with GSI/FAIR we can offer such an excellent venue for our young people who are enthusiastic about chemistry,” says Marco Dörsam. (JL)
]]>The symbolic laying of the foundation stone took place on March 29, 2022 with high representatives from politics, science and the building industry. Among others, the Federal Minister of Education and Research Bettina Stark-Watzinger, the Hessian Minister of Higher Education, Research, Science and the Arts Angela Dorn, the Hessian Minister of Finance Michael Boddenberg, and the Lord Mayor of the Science City of Darmstadt Jochen Partsch took part in the ceremony.
In the meantime, the structural work continues to take shape. The foundations of the MCR have been completed, the floor slab has been concreted and work on the basement ceiling has been finalized. The walls on the ground floor, where meeting rooms and offices for accelerator operations will be located in the future, have largely been built. Parallel to the structural work, the elevator system was commissioned. Upcoming tenders for roof sealing and metal construction work as well as for technical building equipment are currently being prepared and will be awarded in the near future.
When completed, the FAIR Control Center will be a crucial hub for the entire infrastructure on the GSI/FAIR campus. In the future, all accelerators of the GSI/FAIR facilities will be controlled from there. In addition to the MCR, the building will house around 200 office workstations, meeting rooms and a visitors' gallery. After its completion, the five-story building with a partial basement will have a total gross floor area of around 6000 square meters. (JL)
]]>After an introductory presentation on the status of the FAIR project, campus development, previous research successes and current experiments, the guests visited the FAIR construction site. The tour took them to the underground SIS100 accelerator tunnel and the CBM experiment, both of which have completed shell construction, and the transfer building, which forms the central hub of the facility beamline. A stop at the shell construction area of the Super-FRS, which will sort exotic particles, and the future NUSTAR experiment area rounded off the comprehensive picture of the future international research facility. (LW)
]]>Durante was elected president by the PTCOG Steering Committee, to which each clinical particle therapy center in the world sends representatives. The handover of the presidency took place during the recent PTCOG60 conference in Miami, USA. With Durante, for the first time a representative from Germany and also from research is appointed as president, after the position was previously held mainly by physicians or clinical medical physicists. As president, he will chair the PTCOG Governing Board.
“The appointment is a great honor for me and I am very grateful to fill this position for the next three years,” Durante said on the occasion of the election. “During my term, I would like to advocate for more focus on research within PTCOG. It is essential in order to further optimize particle therapy, which is already very successful as a therapy method and also gentle to the patients, and to make it available for additional conditions.”
The goal of particle therapy is to destroy tumor cells while sparing surrounding healthy cells. Accelerated ions are better suited for this purpose than the conventionally used X-rays. They unfold their damaging effect at the end of their trajectory at a certain depth. This groundbreaking tumor therapy was developed at GSI's large accelerator facility. With great success, more than 440 people with tumors in the head and neck region have been treated with ion beams there in the past. At the existing research facility, as well as in the future with the FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) accelerator facility currently under construction in Darmstadt, researchers are working to improve the method through new technologies and treatment procedures.
PTCOG, founded in 1985, is a global non-profit organization of researchers and professionals in the field of radiation therapy with protons, light ions, and heavy charged particles. Its mission is to promote the science, technology, and practical clinical application of particle therapy with the goal of improving treatment of cancer methods to the highest possible standard in radiation therapy. To accomplish its objectives, PTCOG encourages education in the field and promotes other global activities, such as international conferences and meetings.
Marco Durante is head of the GSI Biophysics Research Department and professor at the TU Darmstadt Department of Physics, Institute of Condensed Matter of Physics. He studied physics and got his PhD at the University Federico II in Italy. His post doc positions took him to the NASA Johnson Space Center in Texas and to the National Institute of Radiological Sciences in Japan. During his studies, he specialized in charged particle therapy, cosmic radiation, radiation cytogenetics and radiation biophysics. He has received numerous awards for his research, including the Galileo Galilei prize from the European Federation of Organizations for Medical Physics (EFOMP), the Timoffeeff-Ressovsky award of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS), the Warren Sinclair award of the US National Council of Radiation Protection (NCRP), the IBA-Europhysics Prize of the European Physical Society (EPS), the Bacq & Alexander award of the European Radiation Research Society (ERRS) and the Failla Award of the Radiation Research Society. Additionally, he has been awarded an ERC Advanced Grant of the European Union for the continuation of his research activities. (CP)
From July 25 to September 2, the Italian artist Luca Spano will come to Darmstadt and, together with researchers from GSI and FAIR, will deal with the limits of vision and the visible. He investigates the perception of reality and the process by which we construct knowledge. “We produce images from data, we use our cultural background to imagine the unreachable, we create our beliefs,” says Luca Spano. “Every time we invent technology that changes how or what we can see, we change ourselves and the world around us.”
With the Artist-in-Science-Residence, GSI/FAIR establishes an interdisciplinary dialogue between artists and physicists, which offers the opportunity to pursue artistic questions and to reflect on them in a scientific context. From the artistic dialogue and in experimental workshops with the public and our scientists, images will be generated of what cannot be seen with the naked eye: the building blocks of matter and antimatter and their interactions. (KG/BP)
On June 12, a ceremony was held on the joint campus of the GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research (GSI) and the international Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (FAIR) to commemorate the signing of an agreement on collaborative research (Memorandum of Understanding) in the area of nuclear physics. The agreement was made between the Japanese RIKEN Cluster for Pioneering Research (CPR), GSI and FAIR.
Chief Scientist Professor Takehiko Saito of RIKEN CPR has had ongoing collaboration with GSI/FAIR, and it was decided to take this partnership further with the establishment of a joint laboratory. The joint laboratory will be headed by Saito and Professor Christoph Scheidenberger of GSI/FAIR, with the aim of promoting collaborative research and expanding exchanges of researchers, including students.
The agreement also provides for the establishment of new research collaboration between RIKEN and GSI/FAIR, which will be carried out by researchers from three CPR laboratories, the Atomic, Molecular & Optical Physics Laboratory led by Professor Toshiyuki Azuma, the Meson Science Laboratory led by Professor Masahiko Iwasaki, and the High Energy Nuclear Physics Laboratory led by Takehiko Saito.
The agreement was signed both on-site at GSI/FAIR and online. From GSI and FAIR’s side, Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, and Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, participated. From RIKEN’s side, Dr. Shigeo Koyasu, Director of CPR participated. Additionally, Dr. Keitaro Ohno, State Minister for Cabinet Affairs in charge of Science and Technology Policy and Economic Security, visited GSI and FAIR on the same day and witnessed the signing, expressing his strong support for the cooperative relationship.
“Japanese research institutions in general and RIKEN in particular are strong and very valuable partners for GSI and FAIR. The cooperation with Japan’s highly qualified scientists has been extremely fruitful for us, as demonstrated by the many successful collaborations and research achievements, in the past and in the ongoing FAIR Phase 0 experiments. Many joint projects have been carried on by our scientists both in Japan and here. We hope for an intensified continuation in the future for which the signing of today’s agreement will pave the way”, says Professor Paolo Giubellino.
„Building on the previous joint activities between CPR and GSI, we hope that the signing of this MoU will further advance the collaboration,” added Dr. Shigeo Koyasu. (RIKEN/CP)
In his work, which was conducted under the supervision of Privatdozent Bastian Kubis at the University Bonn, Dr. Bai-Long Hoid studied the dominating theoretical uncertainties regarding the prediction of the muon anomalous moment, which are limited by calculations of hadronic vacuum polarization and hadronic light-by-light scattering.
Dr. Bai-Long Hoid successfully addressed a very complex problem and significantly advanced the theoretical tools that are required to carry out high-precision calculations for the relevant hadronic quantities in this low-energy regime. His scientific publications have received high recognition in the theory community and beyond.
The PANDA Collaboration bestowes PhD Prizes to specifically honor students’ contributions related to the PANDA project. Candidates for the PhD Prize are nominated by their doctoral advisors. In addition to being directly related to the PANDA experiment, the nominees’ doctoral degrees must have received a grade of “very good” or better. Up to three candidates are shortlisted for the award and can present their dissertations at the PANDA Collaboration Meeting. The winner is chosen by a committee that is appointed for this task by the PANDA Collaboration. (CP)
Following a welcome and an introductory talk about GSI/FAIR by Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, and Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Ohno was then given an insight into the research facilities and infrastructure. In particular, existing collaborations with Japanese research institutions and ongoing experiments lead by Japanese scientists played a major role. The minister had the opportunity to meet many of the Japanese researchers currently working at GSI/FAIR.
In the Green IT Cube computing center, which is particularly energy-efficient due to its innovative water-cooling system for the computer racks, he learned about high-performance computing, experiment simulations, data analysis and sustainable computing. Afterwards, he visited the WASA experiment setup at the existing GSI fragment separator, which was installed and commissioned in cooperation with Japanese scientists during the recent months on the occasion of current measurements within the FAIR Phase 0 experiments. At the Experimental Storage Ring ESR, he learned more about atomic physics research headed by Japanese researchers in the framework of the ILIMA collaboration at FAIR.
On a bus tour of the construction site and a walk-through of the SIS100 accelerator tunnel, Ohno also was informed about the FAIR project and the progress of construction. Finally, in a joint video conference with the RIKEN research center, a Memorandum of Understanding was signed between RIKEN, GSI and FAIR in the presence of the Minister. (CP)
The collaboration aims to allow the use of the latest technologies for patient radiation at ultra-high FLASH dose rates. The topic of FLASH radiation currently is in strong focus worldwide and is also a main research topic within GSI’s Biophysics Department, headed by Professor Marco Durante. The FLASH method is a new highly promising radiation experimental therapy method. The word “flash” refers to lightning. Fitting to that, in radiation medicine, this means ultra-short and high radiation. Traditional radiation therapy, as well as proton or ion therapy, deliver doses of radiation to a patient over a period of one minute or longer, whereas FLASH radiations are used to be delivered in just a few hundred milliseconds or even shorter. In the future, FLASH may potentially reduce side effects in healthy tissues and thus increase the therapeutic window. The benefit of FLASH radiation has been significantly demonstrated in many preclinical studies, especially for electron beam radiation. However, the promising effect is not yet fully understood from a radiobiological perspective.
To perform such FLASH radiation – that is, to apply a high dose in a very short time –, the clinical accelerators must be operated at the highest intensity level to provide the necessary dose rate. However, there is a crucial hurdle to overcome: particle therapy usually uses raster scanning, a method of radiation in which the beams are precisely modulated in intensity and guided exactly over the tumor using fast magnets, a technology developed at GSI Helmholtzzentrum in the 1990s. In addition, the energy is varied at the same time, because how deep the beam enters the tissue depends on the respective energy of the beam. With this method, the tumor volume can be treated in a tailored manner and with millimeter precision. However, this procedure is not possible for FLASH radiation due to time constraints; multi-energy raster scanning would take much too long. This is where the current research by GSI/FAIR, THM and Varian comes in.
The collaborators are focusing on FLASH therapy with protons. The aim of the cooperation is the development and validation of a new clinical workflow. Instead of raster scanning with approximately 30 to 60 different energy steps, only one single energy step is used. To ensure that the radiation can nevertheless be adapted to the tumor volume, a so-called patient-specific 3D range modulator ("3D-RM") is used to achieve a comparable result – but in a much shorter time in the millisecond range. This relatively compact 3D-RM, produced with high-quality 3D printers and optimized for the particular tumor shape consists of many pyramid-shaped basic structures, each with a microscopically well-defined contour. The range modulator is produced individually for each patient and is placed upstream in the beamline before the particles reach the body. This enables the desired tumor-adapted distribution of the dose. In the coming two years, the research team will work with Varian on establishing and optimizing this process scientifically and technically.
Dr. Uli Weber, Technical Project Manager from GSI Biophysics, is very happy about the new cooperation with Varian. "What matters most to me is to bring the new modulator technology into clinical use. And here Varian is the ideal collaborator because they are the world market leader in radiotherapy and, once it can be used safely, want to continue to test FLASH in clinical trials with selected institutions as early as possible.”
Together with the scientific-technical side, GSI’s Technology Transfer staff unit, headed by Dr. Tobias Engert, also developed the new cooperation. The goal is to ensure that the innovative ideas and technologies generated at GSI/FAIR can also be transferred into applications. For this purpose, the unit bundles all competencies and support services relevant to technology transfer. In the current cooperation between GSI, THM and Varian, Technology Transfer Manager Dr. Alicja Surowiec is responsible for this administrative project coordination, Dr. Uli Weber and Dr. Christoph Schuy for the scientific project coordination and project implementation at GSI.
On the part of the University of Applied Sciences Giessen, Germany (THM), the working group of Prof. Klemens Zink is responsible for the project. Already in the last 5 years, he has worked together with his PhD students and with Dr. Uli Weber from GSI on the further development and practical implementation of the idea of the range modulator and is now pleased that these ideas are finding their way into clinical application. In this context, the work of his doctoral student Yuri Simeonov, who has developed the principles for the clinical use of the modulator and has already received several awards for his work, deserves special mention.
The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Dr. Paolo Giubellino, was highly delighted by the new cooperation: "We are very proud to further advance radiotherapy together with such a globally renowned company as Varian. This international agreement builds a bridge between research institution, university and industry, enabling an extremely fruitful cooperation of powerful allies. Promoting this technology transfer bridge from fundamental science to industry is one of our fundamental missions as a research institution. Here, expertise in biophysics and medicine as well as engineering excellence come together in a promising way. New applications in tumor therapy are one of the research areas that can particularly benefit from the recently increased beam intensities of the GSI accelerators and from the unmatched beam intensities at the FAIR facility currently under construction." (BP)
]]>The newly concluded cooperation agreement between the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung and the Worms University of Applied Sciences opens up two new branches of cooperation. Opportunities for innovation through cooperative collaboration have been identified for both the Business Computing and the Logistics Management degree programs.
The common goal of the contract partners is the expansion of dual study opportunities. The involved parties are optimistic to promote knowledge transfer in the areas of dual bachelor degree programs in business computing and logistics management in the near future. The target group consists of people who usually have little work experience yet and want to combine study and practice. However, it is also about fresh ideas from a generation that is very familiar with innovative technology and can provide completely new impulses.
“Our computer science and logistics courses are currently in high demand among young people and can be made more application-oriented through the cooperation with the GSI Helmholtzzentrum, theory and practice can be even better interlinked,” Prof. Dr. Jens Hermsdorf, President of Worms University of Applied Sciences, is pleased to say.
“Networking with the local universities is an important factor for us in order to sustainably attract young talent in science, but also in the area of application. The two dual courses of study together with Worms University of Applied Sciences are a new building block that expands our existing portfolio and opens up further training opportunities for young people,” says Dr. Ulrich Breuer, Administrative Managing Director of GSI and FAIR.
A cooperation with perspective and many facets
Both contractual partners strive for a trustful cooperation and are excited about these promising opportunities. “I consider the GSI Helmholtzzentrum particularly interesting as a partner, since it conducts fundamental research, and I look forward to training the future business computing specialists who will later support this important research via the IT and process side,” adds Professor Marie-Luise Sessler from the Department of Computer Science.
“Securing the recruitment and development of young professionals, especially in the IT sector as well as in logistics, is of great importance to us — the positive experiences with dual students and the tight job market among the graduates of these two fields of study are motivation for this cooperation in the Rhine-Hesse region,” explains Dorothee Sommer, head of the GSI human resources department. “For the management of our major project FAIR, the competences of both disciplines are a key for success.”
During the initiation to the cooperation, special thanks go to the GSI Human Resources Department for the excellent organization and to the coordinator for dual study programs at the University of Worms, Seyit Tokmak.
About GSI/FAIR: The GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt operates a world unique accelerator facility for ions. Some of the best-known results are the discovery of six new chemical elements and the development of a new type of cancer therapy. The new international accelerator center FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research), one of the largest research projects worldwide, is currently under construction at GSI. At FAIR, matter that usually only exists in the depth of space will be produced in a lab for research. Scientists from all over the world will use the facility for experiments to gain new insights about the building blocks of matter and the evolution of the universe, from the Big Bang to the present. They will also develop new applications in medicine and technology. (Hochschule Worms/CP)
Accompanied by Prof. Dr. Giubellino und Dr. Peter, Dr. Harald Hagelskamp, FAIR Site Manager, led Mr Larem, directly elected member of the Bundestag for the district of Darmstadt since 2021, and his scientific assistant at the constituency office, Annika Zecher, to the FAIR construction site. Via bus, they got an overview of the activities in the northern and southern construction areas.
While taking a tour through the underground ring tunnel for the future ring accelerator SIS100 and the CBM experimental cave, which are both completed in shell construction, as well as of the transfer building, the central hub of the facility's beamline, the guests were able to gain a direct impression for future research on our campus. (BP)
]]>The Summit was opened by Professor Dr. Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, and Alexander Rabe from the Eco Association of the Internet Industry. Numerous operators, planners and customers of data centers and server rooms came together to exchange ideas on forward-looking topics and to network with important players in the sector. Various strategy and technology sessions were offered to the internet industry.
The GSI/FAIR research campus in Darmstadt is an ideal location for an event on data centers: The high-performance data center Green IT Cube of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung and the Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (FAIR) is one of the most powerful scientific data centers in the world. It will provide enormous computing capacities for experiments at the accelerator facilities of GSI and, in the future, FAIR. The GSI/FAIR Digital Open Lab has also been established at the Green IT Cube. In this living lab (Test Data Center), computing and storage systems can be optimally tuned to an efficient cooling system with the respective application-specific requirements for performance capabilities, temporal load distributions and the like, and in different operating modes and system configurations.
The Digital Open Lab (Test Data Center) is available for industry and research partners. The offer to private and public partners includes, for example, the provision of the infrastructure and IT competences of GSI and FAIR for joint development around the topics of HPC, Big Data and ultra-fast data acquisition, including software developments and products. Access to HPC systems and projects for external partners via collaboration projects is also possible, as is an offer of services in the data center, such as the provision of rack space. The AI innovation lab currently being set up at the Hessian Center for Artificial Intelligence hessian.AI will be located at the Green IT Cube with its AI computing infrastructure. This was announced recently by the Hessian Ministry for Digital Strategy and Innovation.
At the Data Center Expert Summit 2022, Dr. Helmut Kreiser, head of the Green IT Cube, reported on the special features of the Green IT Cube and the Digital Open Lab. He explained how energy-efficient the data center is and what tasks it performs on the GSI/FAIR campus. It sets standards in IT technology and energy saving: Thanks to a special cooling system, it is particularly energy and cost efficient. The Green IT Cube cools its computers with an innovative air and water method. As a result, the energy required for cooling is less than seven percent of the electrical power used for computing, instead of 30 up to 100 percent, as is the case in conventional data centers with air-cooling. The high-performance concept has already won several awards for innovation and environmental friendliness, including the Blue Angel eco-label of the German government. (BP)
Professor Dr. Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director GSI and FAIR: “We are delighted that this important data center conference with its top-class guests takes place at our facility. The Green IT Cube high-performance computing center is an outstanding example of how innovative, broadly usable developments and new cutting-edge technologies evolve out of basic research. It is an important goal for us to work together with partners from industry and business to provide new impulses for promising research and development projects”.
Patrick Burghardt, State Secretary in the Hessian Ministry for Digital Strategy and Development and CIO of the Federal State of Hesse: “High-performance computing capacities are the basis for innovative projects and products: whether in industry, agriculture, healthcare, energy supply or mobility. Data centers are the spine of digitization. Together with gigabit-capable networks and high-performance mobile networks, they provide the infrastructure and the foundation for digital transformation. Because we are aware of this, we have dedicated a separate target to data centers in the Hessian Digital Strategy. We want to strengthen the high-performance data infrastructures in Hesse and develop them into a pioneer in the field of energy-efficient, sustainable data centers and green IT, so that the Hessian data ecosystem can develop its enormous application potential in a fruitful way. With the Hessian Data Center Office and in contact with the data center operators and the municipalities we want to contribute to ensuring that innovative sustainable solutions secure the progress and future of Hesse as a business location”.
An international research team, including researchers from the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt, has for the first time combined data from heavy-ion experiments, gravitational wave measurements and other astronomical observations using advanced theoretical modelling to more precisely constrain the properties of nuclear matter as it can be found in the interior of neutron stars. The results were published in the journal “Nature”.
Throughout the Universe, neutron stars are born in supernova explosions that mark the end of the life of massive stars. Sometimes neutron stars are bound in binary systems and will eventually collide with each other. These high-energy, astrophysical phenomena feature such extreme conditions that they produce most of the heavy elements, such as silver and gold. Consequently, neutron stars and their collisions are unique laboratories to study the properties of matter at densities far beyond the densities inside atomic nuclei. Heavy-ion collision experiments conducted with particle accelerators are a complementary way to produce and probe matter at high densities and under extreme conditions.
“Combining knowledge from nuclear theory, nuclear experiment, and astrophysical observations is essential to shedding light on the properties of neutron-rich matter over the entire density range probed in neutron stars,” said Sabrina Huth, Institute for Nuclear Physics at Technical University Darmstadt, who is one of the lead authors of the publication. Peter T. H. Pang, another lead author from the Institute for Gravitational and Subatomic Physics (GRASP), Utrecht University, added, “We find that constraints from collisions of gold ions with particle accelerators show a remarkable consistency with astrophysical observations even though they are obtained with completely different methods.”
Recent progress in multi-messenger astronomy allowed the international research team, involving researchers from Germany, the Netherlands, the US, and Sweden to gain new insights to the fundamental interactions at play in nuclear matter. In an interdisciplinary effort, the researchers included information obtained in heavy-ion collisions into a framework combining astronomical observations of electromagnetic signals, measurements of gravitational waves, and high-performance astrophysics computations with theoretical nuclear physics calculations. Their systematic study combines all these individual disciplines for the first time, pointing to a higher pressure at intermediate densities in neutron stars.
The authors incorporated the information from gold-ion collision experiments performed at GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt as well as at Brookhaven National Laboratory and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in the USA in their multi-step procedure that analyses constraints from nuclear theory and astrophysical observations, including neutron star mass measurements through radio observations, information from the Neutron Star Interior Composition Explorer (NICER) mission on the International Space Station (ISS), and multi-messenger observations of binary neutron star mergers.
Including data of heavy-ion collisions in the analyses has enabled additional constraints in the density region where nuclear theory and astrophysical observations are less sensitive. This has helped to provide a more complete understanding of dense matter. "In the future, improved constraints from heavy-ion collisions can play an important role to bridge nuclear theory and astrophysical observations by providing complementary information," said Dr. Arnaud Le Fèvre, co-author from GSI.
Especially experiments that probe higher densities while reducing the experimental uncertainties have great potential to provide new constraints for neutron star properties. New information on either side can easily be included in the framework to further improve the understanding of dense matter in the coming years. “In particular, the experiment for Compressed Baryonic Matter CBM at the new FAIR facility will play a significant role and contribute new insights,” explains Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR. “CBM will provide unique opportunities to produce and study nuclear matter at densities comparable to those in the interior of neutron stars or in neutron star mergers.” The international accelerator center FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) is currently under construction at GSI. (TUD/CP)
Specifically, a co-funding mechanism for the GET_INvolved Programme at GSI/FAIR will be established, which aims to offer young students and early-stage researchers a unique opportunity to learn and experience first-hand-work in all areas of the laboratory through technical or scientific projects related to research at GSI/FAIR.
Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee is celebrating its 175 years of imparting technical education and contributing to the development of several countries. The current agreement is also a milestone for IIT Roorkee because this is 100th agreement.
Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI und FAIR, says: “FAIR and GSI are proud to be a talent factory and India is one of FAIR's founding members, so I am delighted to see the formalization of the collaboration between IIT Roorkee and FAIR/GSI. The GET_INvolved Programme partnership with IIT Roorkee will be another step forward towards providing young students with access to first-hand training and fostering the growth of early-stage researchers, which is a fundamental element of our mission.”
Professor Ajit K Chaturvedi, Director IIT Roorkee, says: “The collaboration between GSI/FAIR and IIT Roorkee will accelerate knowledge sharing and capacity building between the two countries. The formalization of our agreement could not have taken place at a more opportune time than during the visit of our Prime Minister to Germany. I wish all the success to the GET_Involved program which has a great potential as a platform for our students and faculty members across various disciplines to utilize and contribute to the state-of-the-art international facility.” (BP)
IIndia as the third-largest contributor among the countries that are working as partners to build this facility has major roles to play. Indian companies will supply and design critical items such as ultra-stable power converters, co-axial power cables for powering the magnets, beam stoppers, ultra-high vacuum chambers and superconducting magnets for the FAIR accelerator system. Indian scientists are also working on the CBM and NUSTAR experiments. In CBM, the major responsibility of Indian scientists is to build a Muon detection system based on Gas Electron Multiplier (GEM) technology. In the NUSTAR experiment, Indians are involved in building a high-resolution gamma-ray spectrometer (DESPEC Germanium Array) and Modular Neutron Spectrometer. BOSE Institute is representing the Republic of India at the Council of FAIR Shareholders.
For more information on the GET_INvolved Programme between IIT Roorkee and GSI/FAIR interested persons may contact the respective Programme coordinators: Professor P. Arumugam (IIT Roorkee, dean.ir@iitr.ac.in) and Dr. Pradeep Ghosh (GSI and FAIR, Pradeep.Ghosh@fair-center.eu).
The GET-INvolved-Programm provides international students and early-stage researchers from partner institutions with opportunities to perform internships, traineeships and early-stage research experience to get involved in the international FAIR accelerator project while receiving scientific and technical training.
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For the first time, comprehensive data on the search for dark matter using a global network of optical magnetometers has been published by an international group of scientists with key participation from the PRISMA+ Cluster of Excellence at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU) and the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM). According to the scientists, dark matter fields should produce a characteristic signal pattern that can be detected by correlated measurements at multiple stations of the GNOME network. Analysis of data from a one-month continuous GNOME operation has not yet yielded a corresponding indication. However, the measurement allows to formulate precise predictions of the characteristics of dark matter, as the researchers report in the prestigious journal Nature Physics.
GNOME stands for Global Network of Optical Magnetometers for Exotic physics searches. Behind it are optical magnetometers distributed around the world. With GNOME, the researchers particularly want to advance the search for dark matter – one of the most exciting challenges of fundamental physics in the 21st century. After all, it has long been known that many puzzling astronomical observations, such as the rotation speed of stars in galaxies or the spectrum of the cosmic background radiation, can best be explained by dark matter.
“Extremely light bosonic particles are considered one of the most promising candidates for dark matter today. These include so-called axion-like particles – ALPs for short,” says Prof. Dr. Dmitry Budker, professor at PRISMA+ and at HIM, an institutional collaboration of Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz and the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt. “They can also be considered as a classical field oscillating with a certain frequency. A possible theoretically predicted peculiarity of such bosonic fields is that they can form patterns and structures. As a result, the density of dark matter could be concentrated in many different regions – discrete domain walls smaller than a galaxy but much larger than Earth could form, for example.”
“If such a wall encounters the Earth, it is gradually detected by the GNOME network and can cause transient characteristic signal patterns in the magnetometers,” explained Dr. Arne Wickenbrock, one of the study's co-authors. “Even more, the signals are correlated with each other in certain ways – depending on how fast the wall is moving and when it reaches each location.”
The network meanwhile consists of 14 magnetometers distributed over eight countries worldwide: in Germany, Serbia, Poland, Israel, South Korea, China, Australia and the United States. Nine of them provided data for the current analysis. The measurement principle is based on an interaction of dark matter with the nuclear spins of the atoms in the magnetometer. The atoms are excited with a laser at a specific frequency, orienting the nuclear spins in one direction. A potential dark matter field can disturb this direction, which is measurable.
Figuratively speaking, one can imagine that the atoms in the magnetometer initially dance around in confusion, clarifies Hector Masia-Roig, a doctoral student in the Budker group and also an author of the current study. “When they ‘hear’ the right frequency of laser light, they all spin together. Dark matter particles can throw the dancing atoms out of balance. We can measure this perturbation very precisely.” Now the network of magnetometers becomes important: When the Earth moves through a spatially limited wall of dark matter, the dancing atoms in all stations are gradually disturbed – one of these stations is located in a laboratory at the Helmholtz Institute in Mainz. “Only when we match the signals from all the stations can we assess what triggered the disturbance,” says Hector Masia-Roig. “Applied to the image of the dancing atoms, this means: If we compare the measurement results from all the stations, we can decide whether it was just one brave dancer dancing out of line or actually a global dark matter disturbance.”
In the current study, the research team analyzes data from a one-month continuous operation of GNOME – statistically significant signals do not appear in the investigated mass range from one femtoelectronvolt (feV) to 100,000 feV. Conversely, this means that the researchers can narrow down the range in which such signals could theoretically be found even further than before. For scenarios that rely on discrete dark matter walls, this is an important result – “even though we have not yet been able to detect such a domain wall with our global search,” says Joseph Smiga, another PhD student in Mainz and author of the study.
Future work of the GNOME collaboration will focus on improving both the magnetometers themselves and the data analysis. In particular, continuous operation should be even more stable. This is important to reliably search for signals that last longer than an hour. In addition, the alkali atoms previously used in the magnetometers are to be replaced by noble gases. Under the title Advanced GNOME, the researchers expect this to result in considerably better sensitivity for future measurements in the search for ALPs and dark matter. (JGU/BP)
Link to publication in Nature Physics
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Dr. Robert Summerby-Murray (President and Vice-Chancellor), Dr. Malcolm Butler (Vice-President, Academic and Research), Dr. Adam Sarty (Associate Vice-President, Research), Dr. Lori Francis (Dean of Science), Dr. Ian Short (Chairperson) and Dr. Rituparna Kanungo (Astronomy and Physics Department) represented SMU Halifax. Professor Paolo Giubellino (Scientific Managing Director, Professor Karlheinz Langanke (Research Director), Professor Christoph Scheidenberger (Head of NUSTAR Department) and Dr. Pradeep Ghosh (Program Manager) represented GSI and FAIR.
The aim was also to outline the progress of the civil construction and the achievements of the FAIR's precursor program FAIR Phase 0 and exchange how the scientific collaboration can be ramped up and offer more training and research possibilities to young researchers affiliated with SMU Halifax. During the meeting, Professor Paolo Giubellino introduced the FAIR facility and the current status of the civil construction through an extraordinary time-lapse drone video of the construction site from 2018-2021 to distinguished guests from SMU Halifax in the meeting.
Professor Giubellino said, “We at GSI/FAIR are providing the opportunities for young minds to develop their talent, to get acquainted with advanced technologies and to get trained in an international environment so that they are ready to have an impact to the society at large. Science is made by the people, by brains. Our mission is to give them the opportunities to blossom. I am looking forward to welcome young scientists from SMU Halifax at FAIR”.
Professor Scheidenberger said, “For many years, SMU Halifax, GSI Darmstadt, and TRIUMF Vancouver have had closely aligned research priorities in the fields of nuclear reactions, nuclear structure and accelerator sciences. I’m pleased to learn that SMU Halifax and GSI/FAIR are formalizing their ongoing collaboration and expanding possibilities for mobility in research. The GET_INvolved Partnership agreement will offer more avenues, allowing future leaders to receive more skilled training”.
Dr. Summerby-Murray said, “This new partnership between Saint Mary’s University and our colleagues at GSI/FAIR represents our shared commitment to international research and collaboration. As scholars, we are linked by our desire to create knowledge, to explore frontiers and to demonstrate the significance of discovery and innovation to civil society. Our partnership is built around these shared values and our acknowledgement of the importance of providing opportunities for early-career researchers. Together, we are investing not only in advancing scientific inquiry but in the success of future scholars. I offer my congratulations to everyone involved in the launch of this important collaboration”. (BP)
For more information on the GET_INvolved Programme, interested persons can contact the respective coordinators: Dr. Pradeep Ghosh (GSI and FAIR, Pradeep.Ghosh@fair-center.eu) and Professor Rituparna Kanungo (Saint Mary’s University, ritu@triumf.ca, Rituparna.Kanungo@smu.ca).
Saint Mary's University located in Halifax, Nova Scotia Canada was founded in 1802 and is a national leader in international and intercultural education. The mission statements of the university include engaging in research and serving the community from the local to the international level. The university is a hub of subatomic physics research in Atlantic Canada. The university’s present nuclear physics research infrastructure is housed at Canada’s particle accelerator center TRIUMF in Vancouver.
The GET-INvolved-Programme provides international students and early-stage researchers from partner institutions with opportunities to perform internships, traineeships and early-stage research experience to get involved in the international FAIR accelerator project while receiving scientific and technical training.
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In the meantime, several experiments have been performed successfully to search for and study very special exotic atoms, especially mesic atoms and hypernuclei. The experiments build on a long-standing and intense collaboration between GSI and RIKEN, Japan's largest comprehensive research institution renowned for high-quality research in a wide range of modern scientific disciplines.
Regular atomic nuclei are made of protons and neutrons, which in turn are composed of a total of three up and down quarks. They form the nucleus and, together with the surrounding electrons, an atom. If one of the quarks in the nucleus is replaced by another type, a so-called strange quark, a hypernucleus is formed. Hypernuclei can be produced in energetic particle collisions at accelerators, and their decay can be observed in experiment setups such as the WASA detector and the FRS in order to study their properties in detail. They are particularly interesting because current theories expect them to determine important properties of neutron stars. In a similar way, an exotic atom can be formed if electrons in the surrounding atomic shells of nuclei are replaced by other charged particles, like for instance a meson. A meson is an unstable pair of a quark and an antiquark. Studying these exotic atoms could provide a hint to understanding the origin of the mass of matter in the universe. WASA@FRS allows to produce and study such exotic, very rare systems with very high experimental sensitivity and purity.
While the FRS is largely used for the separation and identification of exotic nuclei, the Super-FRS Experiment Collaboration takes advantage of its high momentum-resolution capabilities, which are unique in the world in the domain of relativistic proton and heavy-ion beams, thus allowing for unrivalled particle physics studies. The combination of a high-resolution momentum spectrometer with the “Wide Angle Shower Apparatus” WASA, which is designed to trace the tracks of large numbers of particles emitted in energetic nuclear collisions, opens a door to unprecedented experimental opportunities at the border line of atomic, nuclear and hadron physics.
The present experiments serve as pilot study for even further advanced science goals at the Super-FRS of FAIR, which is presently under construction. “The WASA research activities are largely driven by Japanese scientists. The cooperation with Japanese research institutions has been extremely valuable for GSI and we hope for an intensified continuation of this fruitful collaboration in the future”, says Paolo Giubellino. (CP)
]]>Physicist Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo's work has helped to solve one of the biggest unsolved problems in physics in the 21st century: Where does the Cosmos produce heavy elements, such as precious metals gold and platinum? Together with other scientists, including Professor Almudena Arcones from Darmstadt, Martínez-Pinedo showed that these elements are created during the merger of neutron stars and that this process produces a distinct electromagnetic signal, a light curve, for which Martínez-Pinedo and colleagues created the term "kilonova." In 2017, such a kilonova was observed for the first time, following the detection of a neutron star merger in gravitational waves.
This scientific breakthrough is considered the birth of multi-messenger astronomy and opens up new scientific possibilities to understand the dynamics and nucleosynthesis of neutron star mergers. In the future, for example, the nuclear physics processes involved in the merger of neutron stars will be studied with unprecedented quality in the laboratory after completion of the international accelerator center FAIR currently being built at GSI in Darmstadt.
The Joint Committee of the DFG awarded the 2022 Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize to ten researchers – five women and five men. They had previously been selected from 134 nominees. Of the ten prizewinners, four are from the humanities and social sciences, four from the natural sciences and the engineering sciences, and two from the life sciences. The prizewinners each receive prize money of €2.5 million. They are entitled to use these funds for their research work in any way they wish, without bureaucratic obstacles, for up to seven years. (TUD/DFG/BP)
On 12 May 2022, the Leibniz Prizes was awarded in Bonn in front of an audience of invited guests. The event was also live streamed on the DFG’s digital channels and can be viewed again at: https://www.youtube.com/user/DFGScienceTV
On the occasion of the awarding of the Leibniz Prizes, portrait films of all prize winners were made.
Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR: „I am extremely delighted about the great appreciation of the excellent scientific work of Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo. At the same time, the award is a proof of the outstanding opportunities in the research area of Darmstadt, at GSI and FAIR as well as at TU Darmstadt. With FAIR, we will be able to further extend the perspectives of such groundbreaking research as conducted by Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo and enable further important pioneering achievements.“
Professorin Tanja Brühl, President of TU Darmstadt: “Research personalities like Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo strengthen the role of the Technische Universität Darmstadt and the GSI Helmholtzzentrum, which together have become an internationally outstanding center of nuclear astrophysics. We are proud that with Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo another Leibniz prizewinner is helping to shape the research field of Matter and Materials at TU Darmstadt.“
Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo studied at the Autonomous University of Madrid, where he received his PhD in Theoretical Physics. His further career took him to the California Institute of Technology, the universities of Aarhus, Basel and Barcelona, among others. Since 2005, he has worked at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt, where he heads now the Nuclear Astrophysics and Structure Theory Department and in 2020 became one of the directors of the Helmholtz Research Academy of Hesse for FAIR. Since 2011, Martínez-Pinedo has held the professorship of Theoretical Nuclear Astrophysics in the Department of Physics at TU Darmstadt. Martínez-Pinedo has received many awards; among others, he received an ERC Advanced Grant last year for the project "Probing r-process nucleosynthesis through electromagnetic signatures (KILONOVA)". He is a much sought-after speaker at international conferences, represents his field in important international committees, and publishes in prestigious scientific journals.
The Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize is the most important research award in Germany. The Leibniz Programme, established in 1985, aims to improve the working conditions of outstanding researchers, expand their research opportunities, relieve them of administrative tasks, and help them employ particularly qualified early career researchers. A maximum of €2.5 million is provided per award. Prizewinners are first chosen from a slate of nominations put forward by third parties; the Joint Committee selects the actual prizewinners based on a recommendation from the Selection Committee for the Leibniz Program.
Awards are made to individuals who, with regards to the stage of their careers, have demonstrated superior achievements in their research areas both in a national and an international context and who show exceptional promise for future top-level accomplishments that will have a sustainable impact on the German research landscape. The prizes are not limited to certain research areas; the scientific quality of the previous work is the sole criterion for nomination. The prize may be awarded to individuals or research teams working at a research institution in Germany or at a German research institution abroad
Both graduates would like to expand their professional qualifications even further. “For the time being, I was taken on at GSI/FAIR in the metalworking shop, but for the future I am interested in a master craftsman training or an academic course of studies”, Paul Döbel reports. Merlin Weiland has similar plans: “I would like to complete further training as a technician.”
“Our two apprentices can be very proud of this great success. The result of Mr. Döbel and Mr. Weiland is, besides their high personal qualification, of course also a result of the work of our very competent and dedicated instructors,” explained Jasmin List from the Human Resources Development department of GSI/FAIR Human Resources. “The training of the next generation in the specialized professions employed on our campus is of great concern to us. We would like to invite all interested young people to apply for an apprenticeship with us.”
At GSI/FAIR currently 22 apprentices are trained as systems mechanics, electronic technicians, industrial mechanics, office managers or construction mechanics. Furthermore, two dual courses of studies belong to the training portfolio. Already in 2019, a GSI/FAIR apprentice was among the best of the year. (CP)
The polarization of electromagnetic radiation describes in which plane in space a wave oscillates. While everyday electromagnetic radiation, such as sunlight, is unpolarized, lasers produce polarized radiation. This is an important requirement for a wide range of experiments from solid-state physics to quantum optics.
Additional polarizers, such as those being developed at the Helmholtz Institute in Jena, have the purpose of further improving polarization purity, but for a long time the limit of a few 10-10, i.e., out of ten billion photons, only a handful have the unwanted polarization, could not be pushed any further. In 2018, Kai Schulze, first author of the paper now published in Physical Review Research, found that the divergence of synchrotron radiation is the reason for this limit. "So to get a further improvement in purity, we needed a source with better divergence," says the physicist, who leads work on vacuum birefringence at HI Jena and is jointly responsible for related DFG research projects at the University of Jena. "The commissioning of the European X-ray laser, European XFEL, in Schenefeld near Hamburg set the course for this."
Together with scientists from the Friedrich Schiller University of Jena and the Helmholtz Center Dresden-Rossendorf, Schulze and his team developed an experiment setup at the European XFEL that set a new purity record of 8×10-11 thanks to special polarizer crystals, a very precise alignment and a stable setup. This new purity record has already enabled a number of experiments on quantum optics in the X-ray range and on charge distribution in solids. However, special interest is devoted to the detection of the so-called vacuum birefringence.
The interaction of light with light was described as early as 1936 by Werner Heisenberg and Hans Euler, but has not yet been directly observed on Earth. "Vacuum birefringence is currently the most promising effect to directly detect light-light interaction," Schulze explains. "In this process, the polarization of a sample beam changes when it collides in vacuum with a very intense second light beam. The vacuum thus acts like a birefringent crystal, which also affects the polarization; hence the name. The effect is extremely small, but grows with decreasing wavelength of the sample beam. Precise polarizers in the X-ray range therefore provide a good tool to detect the effect."
The High Energy Density instrument at the European XFEL will provide the ideal conditions for such an experiment in the future, Schulze further explains. And the research team now has a setup with which the smallest polarization changes can be measured. The detection of vacuum birefringence would not only further underpin the foundations of quantum electrodynamics, but, if deviations from theoretical expectations emerge, also provide clues to previously unknown elementary particles (such as axions, or millicharged particles). "We hope to be able to launch the first experiments in the next few years."
Detection of the phenomenon would also be interesting for future experiments at the FAIR particle accelerator center. "If we succeed in measuring vacuum birefringence, this will help interpret the measurement data from FAIR. Among other things, vacuum polarization will play a role there, which is closely linked to vacuum birefringence," Schulze said. (LW)
Original publication: Towards perfectly linearly polarized x-rays, Physical Review Research
]]>After an introductory presentation on the status of the FAIR project, campus development, previous research successes and current experiments, the guests were invited to take a tour to the FAIR construction site and the research facilities at GSI/FAIR. One highlight was the walk-through of the underground ring tunnel for the future ring accelerator SIS100 which will be the heart of the FAIR facility. Furthermore the guests could visit the central transfer building, the crucial hub for the facility’s beamline, which is currently being built over several floors.
Another important focus was on the high-tech components developed specifically for FAIR. The guests were shown the testing hall, where new FAIR components are assembled and tested. The energy-efficient high-performance data center Green IT Cube was also visited. It is one of the leading scientific computing centers in the world, setting new benchmarks in IT technology and energy saving. (BP)
]]>Following a welcome by the organizing Public Relations department and the deputy head of the Human Resources department, Mathias Mauer, the girls first went on an accompanied discovery tour to some stations on campus. They took a look at the experimental storage ring ESR, visited the treatment site for tumor therapy with carbon ions and marveled at the large detector setup HADES. The program also included a walk to the viewing platform of the large construction site for the future FAIR accelerator.
Afterwards, the girls learned more about individual work areas on campus in small groups. These included science activities in materials research, atomic physics and at the ALICE experiment, as well as numerous infrastructure facilities such as the target laboratory, cryogenics, the mechanical workshop and IT. In a special FAIR construction offer, some of the girls were also able to get a glimpse of construction activity on the large-scale site, getting up close and personal with excavators, cranes and lots and lots of concrete.
“We were very glad that the pandemic situation allowed us to conduct the event on site again this year,” explains organizer Carola Pomplun, who is a physicist herself and works in the Public Relations department at GSI and FAIR. “Last year we had a very successful online event on the occasion of Girls'Day, but it is still different for both the supervisors and the participants when you can get into personal contact, see the work ‘live’ and ask and answer questions directly. Many groups built or made something small on campus that could be taken home. The girls took up the offer enthusiastically and our spots were fully booked within a short time.”
“In addition to the possibility of working at GSI/FAIR as part of scientific study, for example for bachelor's, master's or doctoral theses, we also offer apprenticeships in seven professions as well as dual study programs,” says Mathias Mauer. “If the girls liked it here, I’d like to very much encouraged them to apply for those or for an internship as well.”
Girls’Day is a day of action all over Germany. On this day, businesses, universities, and other institutions all over Germany open their doors to schoolgirls from grade 5 and above. The participants learn about courses of study and training in professions in the areas of IT, natural sciences, and technology — areas in which women have rarely been employed in the past. GSI and — since its foundation — also FAIR have been participating in the annual event since the early days of Girls'Day. (CP)
Website of the nation-wide day of action "Girls'Day" (German)
]]>With the Green IT Cube, GSI and FAIR have a very energy-efficient and sustainable data center, whose technology is based on the cold water cooling of the computer racks and the reuse of the dissipated heat. As a result, the energy used for cooling is equivalent to less than seven percent of the electrical power used for computing, instead of 30 to 100 percent as is the case in traditional data centers with air cooling. Originally envisioned as an environmentally friendly solution to house the computing capacity for the FAIR accelerator which is currently under construction, the facility has since attracted significant interest from a wide range of research and industrial sectors.
“The funding will enable research and development projects on a more sustainable operation of data centers, also together with industrial partners, and to exploit synergies. The partners will contribute their know-how and innovation potential,” says Professor Paolo Giubellino, the Scientific Managing Director of FAIR and GSI. “The expansion also allows partners from the scientific environment to use our data center space for their own research work. Just a few days ago, the Hessian Ministry for Digital Strategy and Development announced that the Hessian Center for Artificial Intelligence hessian.AI will use the space in our data center to establish an AI innovation lab.”
The project funds are part of the REACT-EU (Recovery Assistance for Cohesion and the Territories of Europe) program, which the European Commission distributes through the German federal states. Funding is provided for projects on direct Covid 19 pandemic response and for furthering sustainability. The state of Hesse is using the funds, among other things, to expand research and infrastructure facilities at universities and non-university research institutions. “This is a grant with an extremely small own contribution, but the funds must be spent in a relatively short period of time,” explains Dr. Arjan Vink, head of the GSI/FAIR Grant Office.
By the end of the year, two available floors of the Green IT Cube will be equipped with the necessary power and water cooling supplies, and one of these floors will be equipped with a total of 128 racks. Interested partners, such as hessian.AI (via the Technical University of Darmstadt), can then install their computer systems in the racks and operate them on the GSI/FAIR campus. A similar agreement already exists with Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences, which uses several of the existing racks. Negotiations have already begun with other interested parties.
In order to begin communication with interested partners, the Digital Open Lab has been established by the Technology Transfer staff unit of GSI and FAIR as an environment for developping, testing and upscaling of energy-efficient high-performance computing to the scale of industrial demonstrators. It offers partners the infrastructure and in-house IT expertise for joint development projects, access to GSI/FAIR high-performance computing systems and rack space for their own systems, and it provides a living lab dedicated to future research and development projects and to the provision for third-party funded projects.
Funding for the Green IT Cube in particular can help strengthen future technologies and provide the infrastructure to increase innovation potential. Funding will also enable the procurement and testing of novel, as yet little-established systems that could enable particularly sustainable data center operations with low energy consumption. Research and development on such systems aims at contributing to efficient and energy-saving computing clusters in the future.
Originally, scientists use the Green IT Cube to perform simulations and develop detectors for FAIR. They also analyze measurement data from experiments at GSI's accelerator facilities and, in the future, at FAIR, which are used to gain fundamental insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe. The efficient cooling process makes allows the placement of the computers in the Green IT Cube in a space-saving manner. At present, two of the six floors are equipped with a maximum cooling capacity of four megawatts. When completed, the Green IT Cube will be able to achieve a cooling capacity of twelve megawatts. Due to saving energy and space, it is very cost-efficient. In addition, the waste heat of the Green IT Cube’s servers is already being used to heat a modern office and canteen building on the GSI/FAIR campus. The high-performance concept has already won several awards for innovation and environmental friendliness, including the Blue Angel eco-label of the German government. (CP)
This project is funded by the European Regional Development Fund as part of the Union's response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
]]>The delegation included, in addition to the minister Professor Mikheil Chkhenkeli, also Levan Diasamidze, Georgian consul general in Frankfurt, Nikoloz Chkhetiani, Chairman of the board of the international charity foundation Cartu, Vakhtang Tsagareli, Director of Project Management and Operations at the international charity foundation Cartu and Professor Alexander Tevzadze, Rector of Kutaisi International University (KIU). Participants from GSI and FAIR were Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director, Dr. Ulrich Breuer, Administrative Managing Director, Dr. Ingo Peter, Head of Public Relations Department, Professor Marco Durante, Head of Biophysics Department, Professor Christian Graeff, Deputy Head of Biophysics Department, Dr. Christian-Joachim Schmidt, Head of Detector Lab and Dr. Irakli Keshelashvili, Staff Scientist at Detector Lab.
An important subject of the visit was the strengthening of scientific relations. This included the intensification and expansion of collaboration in the field of particle therapy using ions and protons as well as in detector and IT technologies. Possibilities for Georgian participation in the FAIR project were also discussed during the high-ranking visit. The promotion of young international scientists, for example via specific exchange and student programs such as the GET_INvolved program running very successfully at GSI/FAIR, was another important topic. The guests were impressed by GSI/FAIR's world-class research and its great potential for the future. They expressed their great wish for future cooperation.
The extensive two-day program for the Georgian visitors included an introductory presentation about the FAIR project, campus development, research successes and current experiments of the FAIR Phase 0 program. From the viewing platform, the guests were able to get an overview of the current FAIR construction activities on the 20-hectare construction field in the east of the existing GSI and FAIR campus.
The test facility where high-tech superconducting accelerator magnets (Series Test Facility, STF) for FAIR are tested, was also among the tour stops. The program also included the treatment unit for tumor therapy, the detector lab and the energy-efficient supercomputing center Green IT Cube. (BP)
]]>In the framework of the ALICE Masterclass, 13 students were able to gain an insight into the scientific work and data analysis . Under the expert guidance of the scientists, they analyzed the ALICE experiment data themselves and discussed their results with other participants in a joint video link. A virtual visit to the ALICE measurement setup at CERN was also part of the day's program.
ALICE is one of the four large-scale experiments at the LHC collider at the CERN research center in Geneva and deals in particular with heavy ion collisions of lead atomic nuclei. When lead atomic nuclei collide with unimaginable impact in the LHC, conditions are created similar to the first moments of the universe. During the collisions, a so-called quark-gluon plasma is created for a very short time - a state of matter that existed in the universe shortly after the Big Bang. This plasma transforms back into normal matter within fractions of a second. The particles produced in the process provide information about the properties of the quark-gluon plasma. Thus, the measurements can peer into the birth of the cosmos and reveal information about the basic building blocks of matter and their interactions.
The relationship between GSI and ALICE is traditionally very close: The two large ALICE detector systems Time Projection Chamber (TPC) and Transition Radiation Detector (TRD) were designed and built with significant contributions of GSI’s ALICE department and Detector Laboratory. Today scientists from both departments focus on the TPC, which is the centerpiece for track reconstruction in the central ALICE barrel setup and is also indispensable for particle identification. Scientist from GSI's IT department contribute strongly to the new data acquisition and analysis software O2, and the GSI computer center is an integral part of the computer network for data analysis of the ALICE experiment.
The Masterclasses are organized by the IPPOG (International Particle Physics Outreach Group), of which GSI is an associate member. Each year, more than 13,000 students from 60 countries take part in the events of about 225 universities or research centers for a day to unlock the mysteries of particle physics. All events in Germany are held in collaboration with the Netzwerk Teilchenwelt, of which GSI/FAIR is a member. The goal of the nationwide network for communicating particle physics to young people and teachers is to make particle physics accessible to a broader public. (CP)
Under the leadership of the University of Bochum, the researchers of the NRW-FAIR network want to play a major role in shaping the scientific work at FAIR, the Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research in Darmstadt. From August 2022, the network will be funded by the state government of North Rhine-Westphalia with around 16,5 million euros over a period of four years.
In addition to the University of Bochum, the University of Bonn, the Research Centre Jülich and the University of Münster and the University of Wuppertal as well as the GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research are involved in the NRW-FAIR network. In addition, an extension of the network to the universities of Bielefeld and Cologne is being considered.
The funding of the NRW-FAIR network underlines the relevance of the FAIR Scientific program. A major focus of the participating universities are the research pillars PANDA and CBM. “We are delighted that these major universities team up to strengthen their participation in FAIR,” says Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI/FAIR. “The NRW-FAIR network will significantly intensify our cooperation and will help us to fulfill the fundamental mission of our laboratory which is to provide scientists in research institutions all over the world with opportunities to conduct outstanding research.”
The long-standing cooperation between GSI/FAIR and the universities of North Rhine-Westphalia is reflected in the close collaborations already in place. The universities are involved both in working on scientific questions for FAIR and in developing experimental technology for FAIR.
The aim of the entire funding program of the state of North Rhine-Westphalia is to sustainably strengthen existing topic-related and cross-location research networks of universities, universities of applied sciences and non-university research institutions, to expand them and to increase their visibility and international competitiveness. (LW)
Press release of the state government of north rhine-westphalia (German only)
]]>Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences (h_da), as representative of the “European University of Technology” (EUt+), GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung (GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research) and the FAIR accelerator centre have signed a contract aimed at deepening their cooperation yesterday. Over the longer term, the “GET_INvolved” Programme will offer students and researchers the possibility to complete internships and research visits at GSI/FAIR. It is open to all students and researchers – above all doctoral candidates – from EUt+ universities. The contract was signed yesterday at h_da by Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, and Professor Arnd Steinmetz, President of Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences.
In future, up to ten students and doctoral candidates per year will profit from this new partnership: in the framework of short-term internships or research visits lasting several years, they will be able to learn and work in the pioneering research environment at GSI/FAIR, which will, among others, nominate mentors for them and help them, if required, to find accommodation for the duration of their stay. The participants of the programme can also take part in GSI/FAIR events. These include symposia and lectures as well as the GSI’s summer programme for students.
The partners will form a joint jury for the selection procedure. Internships can last between three and six months and require at least a bachelor’s degree. Applicants for research visits must hold a master’s degree, be a doctoral candidate or produce evidence of at least two years’ research experience. Such visits can last up to two years.
“The coming years are critical to significantly sharpen the science at FAIR as one of the best scientific laboratories in the world, along with the broad FAIR international scientific community,” says Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR. “FAIR/GSI has been a talent factory, and through the framework of the GET_INvolved Programme, young students and researchers at Hochschule Darmstadt and EUt+ alliance partners in 7 European countries would considerably profit from the FAIR scientific community’s technical knowledge and expertise while performing their training.”
Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR: “Hochschule Darmstadt and the European University of Technology alliance (EUt+) are natural partners for FAIR/GSI. Through their ingenuity, FAIR/GSI scientists and engineers are constantly pushing the frontiers of technology. I am delighted to see that the GET_INvolved Programme partnership is established, as it will provide young brilliant engineers from alliance partners with first-hand exposure in a mega-science facility.”
“The new partnership with GSI/FAIR opens up completely new opportunities for students and young researchers from the whole EUt+. It is a further important step for h_da and shows our significance as a partner in the science and research landscape,” says Professor Arnd Steinmetz, President of Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences. (HDA/LW)
Details of the application procedure for students and researchers interested in the h_da/EUt+ and GSI/FAIR GET_INvolved Programme will be published shortly. Further information on the GET_INvolved Programme can be found on the programme pages of the h_da/EUt+ and GSI/FAIR websites. For immediate queries, please contact Dr Jorge Medina, EUt+ Coordinator, at coordinator-eutplus(at)h-da.de or Dr Pradeep Ghosh, Programme Coordinator on behalf of GSI/FAIR, at Pr.Ghosh(at)gsi.de.
Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences (h_da) and GSI/FAIR have already been working together on different levels for quite some time. A similar contract in the area of internships and research visits has existed since 2014. With “GET_INvolved”, this is now being substantially expanded – among others to all students and researchers in the EUt+ alliance.
EUt+ stands for “European University of Technology”, a joint project between h_da and seven partner universities throughout the whole of Europe. The European Commission is supporting the alliance in the framework of the European Universities Initiative, which aims to strengthen the European Education Area (EEA). Step by step, the universities want to grow closer together. EUt+ helps students to spend part of their studies at one of the partner universities. It is also increasing staff mobility as well as the number and volume of joint research projects. The European University of Technology unites 100,000 students and 12,000 staff. The participating institutions are connected by their shared focus on technologies that centre on human and environmental needs.
The GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung (GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research) in Darmstadt operates a globally leading accelerator facility for research purposes. Around 1,600 staff work at GSI, who are joined each year by some 1,000 researchers from universities and other research institutes around the world. Their experiments at the facility enable them to gain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the Universe. They also develop innovative medical and technical applications. GSI is a limited liability company (GmbH). Shareholders are Germany’s Federal Government with 90%, the State of Hesse with 8%, as well as the State of Rhineland-Palatinate and the Free State of Thuringia with 1% each. GSI is a member of the Helmholtz Association, Germany’s largest research organisation. FAIR, an international accelerator facility for research with antiprotons and ions, which is being developed and built in cooperation with international partners, is currently under construction at GSI. It is one of the largest construction projects worldwide for international cutting-edge research. The FAIR project was initiated by the scientific community and researchers at GSI. The GSI accelerators will become part of the future FAIR facility and perform the first acceleration stage.
GET_INvolved Programme
GSI and FAIR
European University of Technology
Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences
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The FAIR accelerator facilities will provide particle beams of unprecedented intensity and precision, enabling scientist to perform unique experiments to gain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe from the Big Bang to the present. Therefore, an integrated state-of-the art control center is needed to control and monitor the extremely complex accelerator facility. The control tasks will be performed by a specialized accelerator operation team exploiting sophisticated software tools including AI based processes. The future Main Control Room (MCR) is significantly larger than the existing main control room at the GSI facility, which is suitable to serve the GSI facilities but could no longer meet additional space and technical requirements for FAIR. The FAIR facility is about four times as large as the existing GSI facility and will enable the realization of a significantly higher number of experiments. In addition, with FAIR the parallel operation of experiments increases.
In addition to the main control room, more than 200 new scientific office workplaces will be established in the building, as well as meeting rooms for experiment collaborations and a visitors' gallery. The five-story FAIR Control Center, partial with basement, has a total gross floor area of approximately 6000 square feet.
At the same time as the foundation stone is being laid, FAIR's scientific program is already in its first stage of implementation, the so-called "FAIR Phase 0". Here, the researchers are using the GSI accelerator facilities, which have been significantly improved for their later use as pre-accelerators for FAIR and will be further technically upgraded. Thanks to the detectors and instrumentation already developed by the large international FAIR collaborations and the improved particle accelerators, it is already possible to enter new physics territory.
During the foundation stone ceremony, high representatives from politics, both the federal government and the state, as well as from science and the building industry gave greetings and symbolically laid the foundation stone for the FCC. The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, emphasized the great potential FAIR offers for research worldwide: “FAIR will open up outstanding research for decades involving a world-wide scientific community. With the FAIR facility, researchers from all over the world will be able to investigate key questions about the structure of the universe by producing the fundamental processes in the laboratory, but also to advance applications in medicine, materials research, and IT, for example. FAIR is also an ideal education site for the next generations of scientists and engineers. The current research program FAIR-Phase-0 already offers excellent research programs; in the coming years, FAIR will progressively enter into operation opening unique opportunities for science and technology.” (BP)
Bettina Stark-Watzinger, Federal Minister of Education and Research, says: “The establishment of FAIR emphasizes Germany’s outstanding position in basic physical research. The construction of facilities like FAIR is an investment in the future of our country. The Federal Ministry of Education and Research supports FAIR in becoming a magnet for the world’s best scientists. Today’s laying of the foundation stone together with the federal state of Hesse is another important step in this direction.”
Angela Dorn, Hessian Minister of Higher Education, Research, Science and the Arts, says: “FAIR is a worldwide unique facility, which is also of outstanding importance for the Hessian research landscape. The particle accelerator will allow to study the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe from the Big Bang to the present. It is about fundamental knowledge, about whatever holds the world together in its inmost folds, as well as about developing new applications for technology and medicine. The international collaboration of the global research community on this project is an important foundation for its success, but it also holds challenges in light of the current world situation. We welcome the FAIR Council's constructive engagement with them to realize this outstanding scientific facility."
Michael Boddenberg, Hessian Minister of Finance, says: “The laying of the foundation stone for the FAIR Control Center creates the basis for groundbreaking scientific findings. It forms the interface to the international FAIR project and will sustainably strengthen our science and business hub through cutting-edge research. Together with the Federal Government and in cooperation with its international partners, the Hessian State Government has always supported GSI's research operations and the construction of FAIR. I would like to thank all those involved in the project who have contributed to the fact that we can celebrate this important construction progress together today.
Jochen Partsch, Lord Mayor of the Science City of Darmstadt, says: “The pioneering FAIR Control Centre project confirms our location's qualities as an important reference point for top international research and will boost research and science to a new dimension. I am proud to witness that the City of Science Darmstadt is further opening the door to the universe and offering the unique opportunity to conduct cutting-edge research.”
Volker Pohlschmidt, Managing Director of Bauunternehmung Karl Gemünden GmbH & Co. KG, says: “As the executing shell construction company for the construction of the FAIR Control Center FCC, we would like to thank you for the opportunity to participate in this seminal building. We consider ourselves very fortunate that the public sector trusts in our range of services. It represents an important contractor for us, especially in times of crisis."
The international accelerator center FAIR, which is currently being built at GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, will be one of the largest and most complex accelerator facilities in the world. The centerpiece is the ring accelerator SIS100 with a circumference of 1100 meters, which has already been completed in its structural shell. Connected to this is a complex system of storage rings and experimental stations. The existing GSI accelerators serve as pre-accelerators. Engineers and scientists work together in international collaborations to drive forward new technological developments in many areas, for example in information technology or superconductivity technology. In the future, about 3000 researchers from all over the world will be able to conduct cutting-edge research at FAIR. In outstanding experiments, they will gain fundamental new insights into the structure of matter and the development of the universe.
Additional images can be found at www.gsi.de/fcc-footage
]]>FAIR’s socio-economic impact is the sum of the effects of the project on everyone and everything it has touched. Socio-economic impact refers to jobs for people in the Rhein-Main region, in Germany and abroad. It includes the education and training young people receive at FAIR under the mentorship of the master craftspeople in their workshops and from scientists and engineers. It means the impact of discoveries made at FAIR and GSI on innovative materials, medical treatments and energy. It includes, for example, positive effects through inventions like the energy efficient supercomputing center Green IT Cube at GSI/FAIR.
To measure and to prove these factors is a challenge. But FAIR is committed to finding ways to determine its socio-economic impact and to develop it positively. For this purpose, FAIR has received an EU grant to develop a methodology, with emphasis on the impact of innovation. The project is called CASEIA (Comparative Analysis of Socio-Economic Impact in ATTRACT), it will run until September 2024 and is funded with 120,000 €. CASEIA is part of ATTRACT that has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme. Leading the study consortium is Dr. Sonia Utermann (FAIR). The other consortium members are Steinbeis Research Center Technology Management North East (Rostock), the Fraunhofer Institute for Systems and Innovation Research (Karlsruhe) and the Human Sciences Research Council (Stellenbosch, South Africa).
CASEIA aims for its findings to be relevant for future strategic innovation programming at FAIR and other large research infrastructures, and to establish methodologies transferrable to other fields of socio-economic impact. (CP)
]]>In the scientific journal Nature, the BASE collaboration at CERN reports on the world's most accurate comparison between protons and antiprotons: The charge-to-mass ratios of antiprotons and protons are identical to eleven digits. This new measurement improves the accuracy of the previous best value by more than a factor of four. The data-set, collected over a period of 1.5 years, also enables a test of the weak equivalence principle, which says that matter and antimatter behave the same under gravity. Researchers from GSI/FAIR are actively involved in the BASE collaboration.
Symmetry and beauty are closely related, not only in music, arts and architecture, but also in the fundamental laws of physics that describe our Universe. It is in some sense ironic that our existence seems to be a consequence of a broken symmetry in the best fundamental theory that exists, the Standard Model (SM) of particle physics. One of the cornerstones of the SM is the charge, parity, time (CPT) reversal invariance. Applied to the equations of the SM, the CPT operation translates matter into antimatter. As a consequence of CPT symmetry, matter/antimatter conjugates have the same masses, charges, and magnetic moments, the latter of opposite sign. Another consequence of CPT is that once matter/antimatter conjugates collide, they annihilate to pure energy and other particle-antiparticle pairs, as observed in many laboratory experiments. In that sense, the existence of our Universe is not self-evident at all. We have reason to assume that in the Big Bang matter and antimatter were created in equal amounts. Why only matter remained, which makes up the celestial bodies in the Universe, has yet to be understood.
Another hot topic in modern physics is the question whether matter and antimatter behave the same under gravity. In their new paper, the BASE scientists compare the similarity of antiproton and proton charge-to-mass ratios as well as antimatter and matter clocks while the Earth was tracing the gravitational potential of the sun, which means, that they have simultaneously studied both questions in one measurement.
To perform their high-precision studies, the team led by Stefan Ulmer, chief-scientist at RIKEN, Japan, and spokesperson of the BASE collaboration, used a Penning trap, i.e. an electromagnetic container capable of storing and detecting a single quantum of charge. A single particle in such a trap oscillates with a characteristic frequency defined by its mass. Listening to oscillation frequencies of antiprotons and protons in the same trap allows the scientists to compare their masses. “By loading a cylindrical stack of several such Penning traps with antiprotons and negative hydrogen ions, we were able to perform a mass comparison in a measurement time of only four minutes, which means 50 times faster than previous proton/antiproton comparisons by other trap groups,” explains Stefan Ulmer. “Compared to our earlier measurements, we have substantially improved the experimental apparatus. That increases experiment stability and reduces systematic shifts in the measurements.” With this advanced instrument, the BASE team sampled a data set of about 24000 individual frequency comparisons in a time window of 1.5 years. By combining all the measured results, the researchers found that the charge-to-mass ratio of antiprotons and protons is identical, with a precision of 16 parts in a trillion, a number with 11 significant digits. This improves the precision of the best previous measurement, also from BASE, by more than a factor of 4: a significant advance in precision physics.
A particle oscillating in a Penning trap can be considered as a “clock”, an antiparticle as an “anti-clock”. Clocks at high gravitational potential go slower. During the long-term measurement of 1.5 years, the Earth, on its elliptic orbit, was exposed to different gravitational potentials of the Sun. With different gravitational behavior of antimatter and matter, the matter and antimatter clocks would experience different frequency shifts along Earth’s planetary trajectory. Analyzing their data, the BASE scientists were not able to find any frequency anomaly. This enabled them to set first direct and largely model-independent limits for anomalous behavior of antimatter in gravitational fields, or, in other words, confirmed the validity of the weak equivalence principle for clocks within the limit of measurement accuracy.
“To measure with even higher precision, we need to move the antiprotons from the accelerator environment of CERN's antimatter factory to dedicated calm laboratory space,” explains Christian Smorra, physicist at the Mainz based PRISMA+ Cluster of Excellence and deputy-spokesperson of BASE, the next steps. “For this purpose, the BASE team is currently constructing the transportable antiproton trap BASE-STEP.” The current plan is to move the antiprotons to a calm laboratory at CERN. If that was successful, the antiprotons can also be distributed to other trap labs. “We will use the transport trap to make even more sensitive tests with antiprotons. In this way, we want to make sure that no new physics with antiprotons will elude us.”
The BASE collaboration consists of scientists from RIKEN Fundamental Symmetries Laboratory, the European Center for Nuclear Research (CERN), the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg, the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU), the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM), the University of Tokyo, the GSI Helmholtzzentrum in Darmstadt, the Leibniz University Hannover, the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB) Braunschweig and ETH Zürich. The research presented now was performed as part of the work of the Max Planck-RIKEN-PTB Center for Time, Constants and Fundamental Symmetries. (MPIK/JGU/BP)
Scientific publication in Nature
Press release of the Max Planck Institut for Nuclear Physics, Heidelberg
Press release of the Johannes Gutenberg University, Mainz
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This time, the "Giersch Award for an Outstanding Doctoral Thesis", worth 6000 euros each, was presented to four young researchers for their completed dissertations who have demonstrated their exceptional scientific talent: Dr. Frédéric Julian Kornas („Global polarization of Λ hyperons as a probe for vortical effects in A+A collisions at HADES“, TU Darmstadt), Dr. Daria Kostyleva („Experimental Studies of Proton-Unbound Nuclei via In-Flight Decay Spectroscopy“, Justus Liebig University Gießen), Dr. Tabea Pfuhl („Influence of secondary electron spectra on the enhanced effectiveness of ion beams”, TU Darmstadt) und Dr. Lukas Weih („Multimessenger Approaches to Exploring Dense Matter in Neutron Stars“, Goethe University Frankfurt)
Another 24 promising young researchers, currently in the doctoral phase at universities in the region, were awarded a "Giersch Excellence Grant" of 2,500 euros each: Nora Weickgenannt, Jan Fotakis, Jan-Erik Christian, Carolin Schlosser, Marc Winstel, Tim Rogoschinski, Matthias Kleiner, Michael Jung, Patrick Müller, Thorsten Conrad, Manjunath Omana Kuttan, Simon Spies, Sabrina Huth, Jan Hoppe, Leon Kirsch, Verena Velthaus, Patrick Müller, Maximilian Wiest, Wilhelm Krüger, Simon Lauber, Julian List, Gabriella Kripko-Koncz, Esther Menz und Nico Santowsky.
The young scientists were chosen by a selection committee consisting of expert representatives of the Goethe University Frankfurt and the Technische Universität Darmstadt and chaired by Professor Henner Büsching. For pandemic reasons, the traditional award ceremony was not held in attendance form.
The Helmholtz Graduate School for Hadron and Ion Research "HGS-HIRe for FAIR" is a joint endeavor of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, the universities at Darmstadt, Frankfurt, Giessen, Heidelberg and Mainz together with FIAS to promote and support structured PhD education for research associated with GSI and FAIR. Currently, within this framework more than 300 doctoral students are working on their dissertations with a connection to GSI and FAIR.
The Giersch Foundation was established in 1994 by the founding couple Senator E.h. Professor Carlo Giersch and his wife Senator E.h. Karin Giersch and is committed to the fields of science and research, art and culture as well as the promotion of medical projects in the Rhine-Main area. (BP)
Mentoring Hessen supports women on their career paths in science and business. From the very beginning, since 1998, colleagues from GSI and FAIR have actively participated in Mentoring Hessen and its predecessor projects. GSI has also been a cooperation partner for over 20 years. Christina Trautmann, head of materials research, has been a member of the steering group for GSI since 2017.
In the past, there have always been exciting encounters between mentors and mentees. And sometimes mentees find their mentor's job so interesting that they successfully apply for a job or a doctoral position at GSI/FAIR at the end of the mentoring year. (KG/CP)
We condemn the war of aggression of Russia and the breach of international law by the Russian government. That is why we fully stand behind the sanctions imposed by the German government and its international partners. We are aware that they will have a strong impact on our own activities, but we believe that these measures are necessary in the current situation.
In accordance with the Alliance of German Science Organizations, GSI/FAIR will immediately suspend all cooperation with Russian state institutions and business enterprises. Ongoing bilateral cooperation projects with researchers from Russian institutions will be suspended with immediate effect, furthermore we will not conclude any new bilateral cooperation projects. For multilateral projects involving Russia, which include the FAIR project, GSI/FAIR will coordinate with the other partners regarding further implementation of the international agreements. Adjustments of the measures will be made depending on the further development of the situation.
We are very saddened and concerned by the tragic events in the Ukraine. Also at GSI/FAIR, employees are affected by the war in Ukraine, whether directly, because families or friends live in the contested areas, or through professional or personal ties to Ukraine or Russia. Our thoughts go to all the people who are affected directly or indirectly, with our deepest sympathy and support in these difficult times.
Prof. Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director GSI/FAIR
Dr. Ulrich Breuer, Administrative Managing Director GSI/FAIR
Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director GSI/FAIR
]]>The physicist Professor Dr. Hannah Elfner studies processes involving the very smallest particles in the universe, in particular strongly interacting particle in extreme conditions of temperature and density, when they form the so-called quark-gluon plasma, a state which was probably prevalent in the Universe shortly after the big Bang. For her outstanding research on these processes, which allow us to better understand the evolution of the Universe in its first instants, the physicist is now being honored by the Alfons and Gertrud Kassel Foundation as "Scientist of the Year" 2021 at the Goethe University Frankfurt. Hannah Elfner conducts research and teaches at Goethe University in Frankfurt and the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt.
Mechanical engineer, pilot or physicist? The fact that Hannah Elfner decided to study physics after graduating from high school and that she was then soon determined to research the quark-gluon plasma is a stroke of luck for this field of research. For in her award-winning dissertation, the physicist already pointed out that the sequences in the quark-gluon plasma are far more complex than was assumed at the time. In 2016, she received the prestigious Heinz Maier-Leibnitz Prize for Young Scientists, among other prizes, for further insights into the extremely brief moment after the Big Bang.
At that time, she had already been researching for four years as Helmholtz Young Investigator in Frankfurt how heavy ion collisions, which experimental physicists can use to simulate processes after the Big Bang and in which the quark-gluon plasma is created, can be described with mathematical models. Appointed as one of the youngest female physics professors in Germany, Elfner occupies a dual position at the Goethe University, the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung and the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS). In the meantime, she teaches and conducts research in a joint permanent professorship of Goethe University and GSI, where she is involved in the "Elements" cluster project, among other things. For a few months now, she has also been coordinating the theory department at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum, where she previously headed a Helmholtz Young Investigator Group for several years.
Hannah Elfner is also a stroke of luck for her team of young scientists. In the laudation for the "Scientist of the Year" award, former and current employees impressively describe the individual attention that the physics professor gives to each and every one of her students and doctoral candidates - which is one of the reasons why Hannah Elfner is now being honored as "Scientist of the Year". University President Enrico Schleiff says: "Ms. Elfner is an excellent young scientist who is very committed to her subject and her team and whose expertise makes an ideal contribution to our research priorities. That this commitment is appreciated and supported by the Kassel Foundation naturally makes me particularly happy."
The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, also congratulates warmly on the award: "I am delighted about this special recognition of Hannah Elfner's scientific work. The theory department at GSI/FAIR, which Prof Elfner now leads, is an essential element for the overall success of our research Institution, constantly in close interaction with the experimental activities. The future accelerator center FAIR will provide researchers with unprecedented opportunities to study key processes defining our universe. Hannah Elfner's work is an important building block in this regard, providing essential tools for the understanding of the experimental result."
The Alfons and Gertrud Kassel Foundation awards the "Scientist of the Year" prize every two years to researchers at the Goethe University in Frankfurt and its related institutions who, in addition to their own outstanding scientific work, have also rendered outstanding services to the promotion of young scientists. Part of the prize money of 25,000 euros is therefore also to be used to promote young scientists. The award ceremony planned for early December has now been postponed until spring due to the pandemic. (BP/GU)
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The FAIR Council and the GSI Supervisory Board are delighted that the international renowned scientist and former CERN experiment leader Professor Giubellino has accepted their proposal to stay in his position as Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR. “We are convinced that with Professor Giubellino's leadership, the GSI/FAIR site will continue to stand for excellent science at the highest international level and will further expand this position in the coming years. The promising preparations of the future research operations at the FAIR facility are the result of the great commitment of the employees of GSI and FAIR, but in particular also his merit. In this context, the excellent research results of FAIR Phase 0 speak for themselves,” emphasized Ministerialdirigent Dr. Volkmar Dietz, who is director at the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and the Chair of the GSI Supervisory Board and the FAIR Council.
Professor Giubellino looks forward to his second term with enthusiastic motivation. “The coming years are decisive for firmly shaping the science at FAIR as one of the top scientific laboratories in the world, involving the wide international FAIR scientific community. FAIR has an enormous potential to produce ground breaking results in a broad range of research areas. For me as a scientist it is a unique opportunity to work for its success”. As important goals for his upcoming term, he names to further define the science opportunities at FAIR and GSI and to create the conditions that the experimenters need for cutting-edge research.
In the recent years, Professor Giubellino led FAIR's scientific program into its first implementation, the so-called FAIR Phase 0, which enabled a restart of on-campus research at GSI/FAIR, allowing the scientific community to reach top science results and to strengthen their attachment to the campus. This first stage of the experimental program has been writing success stories for three years, even under difficult corona conditions: Thanks to the detectors and instrumentation already developed by the large international FAIR collaborations and the improved particle accelerators, it is already possible to enter new physics territory. The scientific output is impressively strong, many scientific milestones have been achieved, and numerous prestigious national and international prizes have been awarded to researchers at GSI and FAIR.
Together with Dr. Ulrich Breuer as Administrative Managing Director and Jörg Blaurock as Technical Managing Director, Professor Giubellino will continue to steer GSI and FAIR. In Professor Giubellino's second term, his focus will be on getting the experiments ready for the start of the FAIR facility. The promotion of young scientists for FAIR will also continue to play a decisive role, in close ties with partner universities in Hesse and Germany, through targeted international agreements and the establishment of support programs to pave the way for highly qualified young scientific and technical personnel to join GSI/FAIR. The international focus and visibility of GSI/FAIR is to be consistently advanced, according to Professor Giubellino, who, in addition to his scientific expertise, has extensive experience with international collaborations and has already assumed many key roles in multilateral research programs.
Since January 2017 Professor Giubellino is Scientific Managing Director of GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH (GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research) and the Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research in Europe GmbH (FAIR GmbH). The research track record of Paolo Giubellino is the physics of high-energy heavy ion collisions and the matter produced in them. After studying at Turin University and the University of California in Santa Cruz, he took part in many heavy-ion experiments at the European Organization for Nuclear Research CERN in Switzerland. Since the early 1990s, he has held several senior positions at CERN’s ALICE experiment. In 2011 Professor Giubellino was appointed Spokesperson of ALICE. He has also worked at the Torino section of the Italian National Institute for Nuclear Physics (Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare, INFN) since 1985. For his work he has received numerous awards. Among other things, he received the Lise Meitner Prize of the European Physical Society in 2014 as well as the Enrico Fermi Prize, the highest award bestowed by the Italian Physical Society (2013). He is member of the Accademia delle Scienze di Torino, founded by the famous mathematician and astronomer Joseph-Louis Lagrange. In 2012 the Italian president awarded him the title of “Commendatore della Repubblica Italiana” for his scientific achievements. In 2016 he was elected into the Academia Europaea. (BP)
]]>After introductory information on the FAIR project, the campus development, previous research successes and current experiments, the CDU politician was given insights into the FAIR construction activities on the 20-hectare construction field in the east of the existing GSI and FAIR campus.
Minister for Europe Lucia Puttrich was impressed by the globally unique research project: "The international accelerator center FAIR is one of the most impressive research facilities in the world. In addition to the federal government and the state of Hesse, European research funding programs have also supported the GSI Helmholtzzentrum and FAIR for many years. More than 27 million euros come from European funding. With the new particle accelerator, one of the world's largest facilities for fundamental physics research is being built in our state. This makes Hesse one of the top locations for science in Europe. Scientists from all over the world can already use the research facilities today. This is international cooperation in science in daily life and I am proud that we have contributed to the success of the project with our intensive promotion in Berlin and Brussels," said Minister for Europe Lucia Puttrich.
During their visit the guests had the opportunity to get an overview of the entire construction site and the activities in the northern and southern construction areas from the viewing platform on the edge of the construction site. Then they took a tour of the site, in which also participated FAIR Site Manager Dr. Harald Hagelskamp, to get a close-up view of the construction progress. The agenda also included a walk-through of the underground accelerator tunnel, completed in shell construction, and the transfer building.
The transfer building is the most complex building of the facility and the central hub of the facility’s beam guidance system. The large, 1.1 kilometer ring accelerator SIS100 will be the heart of the future facility. The ring closure, which took place in 2021, represents an important milestone in the realization of the entire FAIR project, and installation of the technical building equipment will start in the near future.
The FAIR facility will provide researchers from all over the world with unique experimental opportunities to produce and examine cosmic matter in the laboratory that usually only exists in the depth of space. In giant planets, stars, and also during stellar explosions and collisions, matter is subject to extreme conditions such as very high temperatures, pressures and densities. FAIR will enable scientists to create such conditions in the laboratory. To do so, they will bombard small samples of matter with ions (electrically charged atoms). These collisions will, for very short periods of time, create the cosmic matter at the tiny impact points. Scientists can thus gain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe, from the Big Bang to the present day. They also develop new applications in medicine and technology. (BP)
]]>Within the framework of the ALICE Masterclass, 44 female students gained an insight into the work of physicists and into data evaluation. Under the expert guidance of the scientists, they analyzed measurement data from the ALICE experiment by themselves and discussed their findings in an international video conference with researchers at CERN, in India and in Greece.
ALICE is one of the four large-scale experiments at the LHC collider at the CERN research center in Geneva and deals in particular with heavy ion collisions of lead atomic nuclei. When lead atomic nuclei collide with unimaginable impact in the LHC, conditions are created similar to the first moments of the universe. During the collisions, a so-called quark-gluon plasma is created for a very short time - a state of matter that existed in the universe shortly after the Big Bang. This plasma transforms back into normal matter within fractions of a second. The particles produced in the process provide information about the properties of the quark-gluon plasma. Thus, the measurements can peer into the birth of the cosmos and reveal information about the basic building blocks of matter and their interactions. (CP)
For the production of a newly developed and improved contrast agent for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) with hydrogen gas, the scientists* Dmitry Budker (physicist, HIM), James Eills (chemist, HIM), John Blanchard (chemist, HIM), Danila Barskiy (physical chemist, HIM), Kerstin Münnemann (chemist, University of Kaiserslautern), Francesca Reineri (chemist, University of Turin), Eleonora Cavallari (pharmaceutical and biomolecular scientist, University of Turin), Silvio Aime (biological scientist, University of Turin), Gerd Buntkowsky (physical chemist, TU Darmstadt), Stephan Knecht (physicist, TU Darmstadt and NVision, Ulm), Malcolm H. Levitt (chemist, University of Southampton) and Laurynas Dagys (chemist, University of Southampton) receive the Erwin Schrödinger Prize, which is endowed with 50,000 euros.
Nuclear magnetic resonance is one of the standard analytical methods used to determine the structure and dynamics of materials and living objects. Including magnetic resonance imaging, the method is used in chemistry, biochemistry and medicine, among other fields. In both methods, liquids are particularly well suited as contrast agents for examination. However, the methods used to date have reached their limits: The interaction of nuclear spins with their environment is very weak and the methods therefore have low sensitivity. This is where the new development comes in: To overcome this limitation, researchers have developed a series of so-called “hyperpolarization techniques”. These are chemical and physical techniques that can be used to prepare atoms and molecules in such a way that their magnetic resonance signals are amplified by a factor of about a million at a low cost.
Hyperpolarization techniques are complex and can currently only be used in a few clinics worldwide. This project only became possible thanks to the cooperation of a team of chemists, physicists, engineers, biologists and clinical practitioners. The team is made up of experts from Germany, England, Italy and the USA, and includes the GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research, the Helmholtz Institute Mainz, the Technical University of Darmstadt, the Technical University of Kaiserslautern, the University of Southampton and the University of Turin. The Helmholtz Institute Mainz, where the award winners conduct research, is jointly supported by the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt and the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz.
“The goal of our scientific work is to provide easy-to-produce, safe and long-lived hyperpolarized molecules for both medical applications and research purposes,” says Dmitry Budker, Professor of Experimental Atomic Physics at the PRISMA+ Cluster of Excellence at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU) and Section Head at the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM). “Our method represents a major step and a decisive improvement in this process. We were able to achieve this through interdisciplinary and transnational collaboration. We are very pleased and proud that our long-standing and intensive research collaboration has been recognized with the prestigious Erwin Schrödinger Prize.”
Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Director of GSI and FAIR, says: “The impressive results of this outstanding research team vividly demonstrate the overarching importance of close global networking in the scientific community. The Helmholtz Institute Mainz offers the researchers in this special collaboration an environment to enable top performance. I am therefore delighted and proud that this great scientific achievement is being honored with the Erwin Schrödinger Prize and convey my congratulations to all the researchers involved.”
“The impressive research work of this international winning team shows once again what science can achieve when it collaborates across disciplines and national borders,” says Otmar D. Wiestler, President of the Helmholtz Association. “The enormous amplification of magnetic resonance signals represents a crucial improvement for medical applications. I extend my heartfelt congratulations to the award winners.”
“The internationally staffed research team has done an outstanding job of successfully bringing together expertise from different areas of the natural sciences,” said Michael Kaschke, president of the Stifterverband. “This highly committed, interdisciplinary approach has improved magnetic resonance imaging analytics for medicine and research in a decisive way. It is precisely these outstanding projects that we want to honor and make visible with this award.”
With the Erwin Schrödinger Prize, Helmholtz and the Stifterverband jointly honor outstanding scientific achievements. The prize is intended to honor interdisciplinary research that has been achieved in border areas between different subjects of medicine, natural sciences and engineering and with participation of representatives of at least two disciplines. (CP)
In addition to the superconducting dipole modules, the superconducting quadrupole modules are among the most important components of the SIS100. While there are only two different types of dipole modules, the series of quadrupole modules comprises eleven different types. Of these, two modules, for the areas of injection and extraction, have a particularly sophisticated mechanical design. Series production and cold testing of the 110 dipole modules were successfully completed in 2021, and has now begun for the quadrupole modules.
Essential components of the very complex quadrupole modules are the superconducting quadrupole units. Each module includes two quadrupole units. In addition to the quadrupole magnets in various configurations required for beam focusing, these also contain superconducting correction magnets, for example the "steerer" magnets required for path correction or sextupole magnets for correcting chromaticity, i.e. focusing differences caused by the energy distribution of the particles in the beam. These correction magnets are supplemented by additional superconducting magnets placed at the ends of the arcs.
All superconducting focusing and correction magnets are manufactured as a Russian Inkind contribution at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR) in Dubna, Russia. The development of the magnet technology was carried out jointly by GSI and JINR during the project's preliminary phase. While the further developed Nuclotron cable is used in the quadrupole magnets as well as in the dipole magnets, a new, special superconducting cable with insulated strands had to be developed for the correction magnets. The design of the various quadrupole units, based on the joint development, is carried out by the GSI design office.
All quadrupole units are tested in Dubna in both warm and cold conditions. For the cold test at 4 Kelvin (which corresponds to 4 degrees Celsius above absolute zero at around -273 degrees), a cryogenic test facility comprising six test benches was previously set up under a collaboration agreement. This facility is used to test both the superconducting magnets of the future accelerator center FAIR being built at GSI in Darmstadt and the NICA accelerator facility currently being built at JINR in Dubna.
After extensive acceptance tests, all quadrupole units manufactured in Dubna will be shipped to Bilfinger Noell in Würzburg, which has been contracted to integrate the quadrupole modules. In addition to the quadrupole units from Dubna, GSI provides numerous other cryogenic components for integration, such as beam position monitors, ion catchers, and thin wall quadrupole chambers, among many others. The production of these components was previously ordered by GSI from various companies. The most important task here is the synchronization of all activities in time, a special challenge due to the technical complexity of the trades.
In parallel, negotiations were held with the Italian National Nuclear Physics Institute (INFN, Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare) for the use of the superconducting test facility in Salerno for the SIS100 project and a collaboration agreement was signed. The series of SIS100 quadrupole modules integrated at Bilfinger Noell will be tested at the test facility.
After successful implementation of the high quality standards and quality assurance standards at JINR, the successful start of series production at JINR and series integration at Bilfinger Noell was achieved. 26 quadrupole units could be manufactured and tested at JINR in 2021 and provided to Bilfinger Noell for integration. At the same time, the integration of the modules was parallelized at Bilfinger Noell. GSI will accompany the cold testing of the series modules in Salerno by testing about 20 integrated quadrupole modules at the "Series Test Facility" (STF) on the Darmstadt campus. (BP)
]]>Nuclear reactions taking place inside stars play a central role in their evolution. Measuring these reactions in laboratories here on Earth is needed to answer fundamental questions about the origin of the elements that make up our Universe. The ELDAR project will develop new approaches for charged-particle detection at two world-leading European laboratories, FAIR (Germany) and Gran Sasso (Italy), and forge new links between leading European science communities using different methods to study stellar scenarios that are intimately linked in nature.
At FAIR, ELDAR will use a novel and world-unique approach, studying reactions induced by stable and radioactive beams at the newly commissioned CRYRING@ESR heavy ion storage ring, using the recently installed CARME detector array. While the new FAIR accelerator is currently under construction, the CRYRING@ESR is already in operation at the existing accelerator facility of GSI and employed in the ongoing experimental program FAIR Phase 0. Measurement of reactions involving radioactive nuclei are critical to model and understand the wealth of new astronomical data from stellar explosions. ELDAR will make use of CRYRING@ESR to investigate key nuclear reactions that play an important role in stellar scenarios from the Big Bang to supernovae explosions.
At the low temperatures of slow stellar burning, nuclear reactions rates are too low to be detected above natural radioactive background on Earth. The LUNA accelerator, located underground at Gran Sasso, is the world-leading facility to study reactions that drive slow stellar evolution. ELDAR will build a new array to study charged-particle reactions at LUNA, making full use of the capabilities of this cutting-edge facility to study a key issue in globular clusters.
ERC Starting Grants support outstanding researchers at an early career stage showing great promise and an excellent research proposal under the EU’s Research and Innovation program, Horizon Europe. Grants worth on average €1.5 million will help ambitious researchers launch their own projects, form their teams of postdoctoral researchers and PhD students, and pursue their research ideas. Researchers from or closely connected to GSI and FAIR have been very successful in the past years in receiving ERC Starting or Advanced Grants. (CP)
Using a sophisticated filming technique that is not yet widely available, a time-lapse video was shot from the air showing the development of the past four years: For this so-called "Longterm Dronelapse", a drone was used to regularly fly the same routes over the huge construction site. The moving time-lapse videos filmed in the process over the course of four years have now been combined into a single video. Thanks to GPS support, they can be precisely superimposed so that the progress of construction activities becomes particularly clear.
Last year's Longterm Dronelapse, showing the development of 2018 to 2020, was awarded the "Intermedia-globe SILVER Award" by the World Media Festival. The jury of the "WorldMediaFestival | Television & Corporate Media Awards" judged the video to be an outstanding contribution in the category "Public Relations/Research and Science" and presented the "Intermedia-globe SILVER Award" for it. (LW)
Video: FAIR construction site in time-lapse - Longterm Dronelapse
News on Intermedia-globe SILVER Award
Following introductory information on the status of the FAIR construction project, the campus development, previous research successes and current experiments, the FDP politician, who was accompanied by Patrick Schütz, staff member of his constituency office, was given insights into the research facilities at GSI/FAIR and the FAIR construction activities. Oliver Stirböck is his parliamentary group's spokesman for digitization, for European policy and for Frankfurt as a financial site.
One central topic of the visit was sustainable digitalization. During a guided tour of the Green IT Cube, the guests were informed comprehensively about the high-performance data center and its infrastructure. The Green IT Cube on the GSI/FAIR campus provides enormous computing capacities for experiments at the accelerator facilities of GSI and, in the future, FAIR. It is one of the most capable scientific computing centers in the world. At the same time, it sets standards in IT technology and energy saving: Thanks to a special cooling system, it is particularly energy- and cost-efficient. Therefore, the energy required for cooling is less than seven percent of the electrical power used for computing. In conventional data centers with air cooling, this relation amounts to 30 up to 100 percent. The innovative cooling system also enables a compact and space-saving design. The Green IT Cube has already received numerous awards, including the Blue Angel, the eco label of the German government.
After the tour of the Green IT Cube, the guests had the opportunity to learn about the large experiment HADES and the current status of the FAIR construction project. They were able to see the progress on the construction site directly from the viewing platform and to take a look at the 20-hectare FAIR construction site with the completed ring tunnel of the large accelerator ring SIS100, the heart of the future accelerator facility. (BP)
]]>An international team of researchers with participation of the Cluster of Excellence PRISMA+ of the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU) and the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM) has successfully advanced a laboratory method to search for extremely light “axion-like” particles (ALPs), which are possible canditates for being the elusive dark matter. The researchers use nuclear magnetic resonance techniques in their experiments: by using a new setup, they have now been able to increase the sensitivity by five orders of magnitude compared to previous experiments, as they show in their article in Nature Physics, a leading journal in the field.
Little is known about the exact nature of dark matter. Today, extremely light bosonic particles, such as the so-called axions, axion-like particles, and dark photons, are considered to be promising candidates. These can be regarded as a classical field oscillating at a certain frequency. How large this frequency - and consequently the mass of the particles - is, is not yet known. That is why the researchers are systematically searching different frequency ranges with their experiments for evidence of dark matter. “There is still a lot of work to be done, because we have not yet checked a large mass range for ALPs,” says Prof. Dr. Dmitry Budker, a principal investigator at PRISMA+ and Section Leader at HIM, an institutional cooperation of the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz and the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt. “In doing so, we continue to rely on the principle of nuclear magnetic resonance, i.e., the fact that nuclear spins respond to magnetic fields that oscillate at a certain resonance frequency. We determine the strength of this resonance signal with a sensitive magnetometer.”
The basic premise of the experiments: A dark matter field also affects the nuclear spins of a sensor in this way. As the Earth moves through this field, the nuclear spins in the sensor behave exactly as they would in an oscillating magnetic field. The result is a nuclear spin signal caused by dark matter.
The Mainz scientists and their colleagues at the University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) use the noble gas xenon, or more precisely the isotope xenon-129, as a sensor. The magnetometer, which measures potential signals, is based on the element rubidium. There are two main special characteristics here: “We set up the experiment in such a way that the xenon atoms first amplify an oscillating field: so the effect triggered by a potential ALP field would be a factor of 100 larger,” describes co-author Antoine Garcon, a PhD student at HIM. “Moreover, our magnetometer - that is, the readout unit - is located in the same cell as the sensor gas, xenon. The stronger contact between the two, in addition to the stronger signal, increases the sensitivity of the measurement.”
“This is more or less the same principle underlying our ‘Cosmic Axion Spin Precession Experiment’ research program - CASPEr for short - a collaboration between PRISMA+/HIM and Boston University in the US. However, the details of the technical implementation are quite different,” explains Dmitry Budker.
In the current work, the cooperation partners first showed that their idea basically works: They apply a weak oscillating magnetic field to simulate an ALP field and can thus detect the predicted signals exactly. In the next step, they determine the sensitivity of their experimental setup. As a result, it is five orders of magnitude better than in previous experiments.
After successful proof-of-principle, the scientists started the first series of measurements to search for dark matter. They were able to survey the mass range from a few femtoelectronvolts (feV) to almost 800 feV. Although they have not yet been able to find an ALP signal in this range, the much higher sensitivity has enabled them to formulate new and stringent limits with respect to the strength of the ALP interaction with normal matter. In addition, they were able to extend the search range by an order of magnitude towards higher masses compared to the earlier CASPEr experiments - further narrowing the search range for ALPs after the exclusion procedure. The setup could also be used for the search for dark photons. And here, too, the research team has succeeded in setting appropriate limits. Longer measurement times could further improve the sensitivity of their method, as the authors explain in Nature Physics.
A very similar experimental setup is described in another paper recently published in Science Advances. Again, Dmitry Budker is involved: “We use essentially the same spin amplifier, but for a different purpose. Instead of looking for the dark matter field, we are looking for a possible exotic interaction between a mass source and nuclear spins - a ‘fifth force,’ so to speak. The exotic interactions would arise from the existence of ‘new’ particles, which in turn might have a connection to dark matter.” In any case, in the search for new physics beyond the Standard Model, the new method offers exciting new approaches and perspectives. (JGU/BP)
In her doctoral thesis, which she completed at the Justus Liebig University of Giessen in the research group of Professor Christoph Scheidenberger, Dr. Daria Kostyleva used a novel experimental method that allowed her to study atomic nuclei at the limits of stability, their internal structure as well as some of their characteristic properties such as lifetime, ground state and excited levels. To this end, nuclear reactions at the fragment separator FRS at GSI were used to produce very neutron-deficient argon, potassium, and chlorine isotopes, which are extremely short-lived: some of them have lifetimes as short as 10-12 seconds (which is a trillionth of a second) or even shorter.
Because of their short lifetimes, these atomic nuclei decay in flight, emitting one, two, or three protons while transitioning to a more stable, longer-lived configuration. The protons can be detected with a special detector arrangement that Dr. Kostyleva contributed to develop. For the first time, this experimental method was used to detect the three-proton decay of an atomic nucleus: on 31K, a potassium atom with mass number 31, consisting of 19 protons and only 12 neutrons. Also for the first time, the detection of some previously unknown isotopes — 28Cl, 30Cl, 29Ar, and the aforementioned nuclide 31K — was successful. For other nuclides, two-proton radioactivity was observed, a particular decay mechanism discovered at GSI in the early 2000s. For some of the studied nuclei, it was even possible to derive a level scheme, i.e., to describe the internal structure that forms under these extreme conditions.
Half-lives, binding energies and a wealth of other information could also be determined in a single experiment. These findings are particularly noteworthy because Dr. Kostyleva's experiments, to date, extend the farthest beyond the so-called proton dripline. As such, they provide a first insight into areas far beyond nuclear stability and into novel phenomena with the potential to our picture of the structure of atomic nuclei. The experiments open a perspective to gain a deeper understanding of the transition from the ordering effect of nuclear forces in atomic nuclei to a structureless assembly of nucleons at the dripline. The super-conducting Fragment Separator (Super-FRS), currently under construction at the international FAIR facility, is expected to provide further insights.
The annual FAIR-GSI PhD Award honors an excellent PhD thesis completed during the previous year. Eligible for nominations are dissertations that were supported by GSI in the context of its strategic partnerships with the universities of Darmstadt, Frankfurt, Giessen, Heidelberg, Jena, and Mainz, or through the research and development program. In the framework of the Graduate School HGS-HIRe (Helmholtz Graduate School for Hadron and Ion Research), more than 300 PhD students currently perform research for their PhD theses on topics closely related to GSI and FAIR. GSI has a long-standing partnership with the award sponsor, Pfeiffer Vacuum GmbH, which offers vacuum technology and pumps. Vacuum solutions from Pfeiffer Vacuum have been successfully used in GSI's facilities for decades. (CP)
]]>The guest of honor, Dr. Tomaž Boh, Director-General Science Directorate, Ministry of Education, Science and Sport, Republic of Slovenia, welcomed all participants to the Workshop. Professor Boštjan Zalar, Director of the Jožef Stefan Institute, delivered a welcome speech. Dr. Albin Kralj from the Ministry of Education, Science and Sport, Republic of Slovenia, greeted the participants. The Scientific Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, Professor Paolo Giubellino, and the Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Jörg Blaurock, informed the workshop participants on the scientific objectives, the status and the recent advances of the FAIR project to kick off the information session. Dr. Jürgen Gerl of NUSTAR collaboration, one of the four experimental pillars of FAIR, and Dr. Jelena Vesić of the Jožef Stefan Institute presented the Slovenian contribution to the NUSTAR experiments.
In addition to the Jožef Stefan Institute (JSI), the event also involved representatives of the Ministry of Education, Science and Sport and “Tehnodrom d.o.o.” with leading companies Cosylab and Instrumentation Technologies, as FAIR will play a significant role in the growth of the high-tech industry. Janko Bugar, CGO & Senior Business Development Manager, Cosylab, and Elvis Janežič, CEO, Instrumentation Technologies, presented all activities and contributions from the Tehnodrom consortium Slovenian companies participating in the FAIR project. The Workshop allowed the exchange of valuable information on the present status of activities at Campus GSI/FAIR and highlighted scientific and technical developments on the Slovenian side.
At the event it was highlighted how FAIR, in addition to promoting scientific research, is also of significance to the growth of the high-tech industry for Slovenia. Thus, many Slovenian high-tech companies develop and construct technological equipment through the consortium Tehnodrom. The leading partners in the consortium Tehnodrom are Cosylab and Instrumentation Technologies. Participation in the FAIR Project opens up exceptional research opportunities for Slovenian scientists and thus also extraordinary opportunities for cooperation with the Slovenian economy to develop new technologies and other products with high added value. (BP)
For more information on the GET_INvolved Programme, interested persons can contact the respective coordinators: Dr. Pradeep Ghosh (GSI and FAIR, Pradeep.Ghosh@fair-center.eu), Dr. Jelena Vesić (Jožef Stefan Institute, Jelena.Vesic@ijs.si) und Prof. Dr. Simon Širca (University of Ljubljana, Simon.Sirca@fmf.uni-lj.si).
The Jožef Stefan Institute is the leading Slovenian scientific research institute, covering a broad spectrum of basic and applied research. Natural sciences, biological sciences, and engineering are among the specialties of the team of roughly 1000 people. Production and control technologies, communication and computer technologies, knowledge technologies, biotechnologies, new materials, environmental technologies, nanotechnology, and nuclear engineering are among the topics covered. The Jožef Stefan Institute's aim is to accumulate - and disseminate - knowledge at the frontiers of natural science and technology for the benefit of society at large by pursuing education, learning, research, and high-tech development at the highest worldwide levels of quality.
The University of Ljubljana is the oldest and largest higher education and scientific research institution in Slovenia. The university, which has a long history, was founded in 1919. It is Slovenia's biggest and most important educational institution. With 30 percent of all registered researchers, it is one of Slovenian biggest research institutions. In 23 faculties and three art academies, it has over 37,000 undergraduate and postgraduate students and employs approximately 6,000 higher education instructors, researchers, assistants, and administrative employees.
The GET_INvolved Programme provides international students and early-stage researchers from partner institutions with opportunities to perform internships, traineeships and early-stage research experience to get involved in the international FAIR accelerator project while receiving scientific and technical training.
]]>Why am I who I am? Is my personality genetically determined? Is my destiny fixed with conception? Or do I have a chance to change myself actively and independently? Yes, say systemic neurobiology and psychology today: In all stages of life, the environment influences the brain and thus the development and shaping of our personality. Whether we grow up and live in a diverse and green or a non-stimulating environment, whether we are socially secure or uprooted, even subtle influences such as light and month of birth have a measurable and sometimes significant impact on brain and personality.
In his lecture, Dr. Konrad Lehmann shows that you are the master of yourself, and how you can always take control of your own life by changing your environment. We have the possibility to change ourselves through our environment. We are free in our decisions and our personality and therefore responsible for our own brain. The modern understanding of the brain combines freedom, openness and responsibility. Lehmann calls this idea "neuro-humanism", and sets it against the doctrine of the heteronomy of man.
Dr. Konrad Lehmann calls himself a “brain communicator”; he teaches brains about the brain, so to speak. He studied biology at the University of Bielefeld and received his doctorate with a thesis in neurobiology. Since 2006, he has conducted research on the brain's adaptability and learning mechanisms at Friedrich Schiller University in Jena, where he completed his habilitation in 2011. Since September 2019, he works at GSI/FAIR as a laboratory manager in the Biophysics Department. His research broadly revolves around how the mammalian brain adapts to different environmental conditions. In addition to a number of scientific publications, he has authored several books on the subject.
Other lectures in the course of the semester will focus, for example, on phenomena of the universe that evade our direct perception: black holes and dark matter. Two presentations will also deal with making tiny things visible via microscopy or making radioactivity visible at all. Finally, two lectures on machine learning in biomedicine and computer visualization will deal with the processing of data.
The German lectures will each begin at 2 p.m. For more information on access and the schedule of the event, please visit the event website at www.gsi.de/wfa.
The lecture series “Wissenschaft für Alle” is aimed at anyone interested in current science and research. The lectures will report on research and developments at GSI and FAIR, but also on current topics from other fields of science and technology. The aim of the series is to prepare and present scientific processes in a way that is understandable to people outside the field, thus making research accessible to a broad audience. The lectures are given by GSI and FAIR staff or by external speakers from universities and research institutes. (CP)
Giuliano Franchetti studied physics at the University of Padua in Italy. He conducted his PhD research at GSI in the accelerator physics department and received his doctorate from the University of Bologna in 1998, where he studied the physics of high-intensity ion beams from a theoretical point of view. Since 2000 he has been a scientist at GSI in various positions, currently he is actively involved in the beam physics of storage rings. In addition to his work at GSI, he gained broad experience with visits at Brookhaven National Laboratory, the European research center CERN, and the Institute for Theoretical and Experimental Physics in Moscow/FAIR-Russia Research Center, among others. Dr. Franchetti is co-coordinator of the task "Pushing Accelerator Frontier" (WP5.2, iFAST) of the EU Network "Innovation Fostering in Accelerator Science and Technology”. He has been teaching at the Institute of Applied Physics at Goethe University Frankfurt since 2010 and since 2020 is a member of the Helmholtz Forschungsakademie Hessen für FAIR (HFHF).
"Being named an APS Fellow is a very special honor for me. I am very pleased and thankful for the great recognition from my colleagues worldwide," Giuliano Franchetti said on his appointment. "With my work, I will continue to contribute to current and future research at GSI and FAIR and to add new knowledge, especially in the field of storage rings. The combination of existing research structures and future FAIR storage rings creates an extraordinary research potential."
The APS is one of the world's most important and prestigious physics societies. Founded in 1899, the professional organization for physicists today has more than 55,000 members worldwide, from academia, national laboratories and industry. The APS is divided into numerous specialist groups covering all areas of physical research. APS members attain the status of a Fellow on the basis of a precisely defined nomination and evaluation process. Each year, the APS elects no more than one-half of one percent of the society’s membership as Fellows. This year, two APS Fellowships went to GSI/FAIR. In addition to Giuliano Franchetti’s fellowship, Professor Yury Litvinov from the Research Department Atomic Physics also received this prestigious award, once again confirming the exceptional quality of our human capital. (BP)
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The FAIR/GSI delegation with Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director, Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director, and GET_INvolved Programme coordinator Dr. Pradeep Ghosh visited the Institute of Nuclear Physics, Polish Academy of Sciences (IFJ PAN) in Krakow, where they met with Director Professor Tadeusz Lesiak and several department heads to learn about the institute's research activities. The meeting was very insightful for the Management as the skillset and experience of the researchers and engineers are considered as a powerful resource when comes to the commissioning and the installation of the FAIR components. There was also an opportunity to visit the Cyclotron Centre Bronowice (in Polish - Centrum Cyklotronowe Bronowice, CCB), where the cyclotron facility serves as a perfect example of the application of fundamental science in tumor radiotherapy.
FAIR/GSI and Jagiellonian University authorities signed a cooperation document (“memorandum of understanding”) and an agreement on student and staff mobility within the framework of the GET_INvolved Program. At the event at the Collegium Maius in Krakow, Poland's oldest University in Poland was represented by Professor Piotr Kutrowski, Vice-Rector for Research at JU. The FAIR/GSI delegation included Professor Paolo Giubellino, Jörg Blaurock, and Dr. Pradeep Ghosh.
As a result of the new collaboration agreement, students and workers of the Jagiellonian University will be able to take benefit from the extensive research capabilities of the future FAIR accelerator center. Young researchers, in particular, will benefit from specialized internships for bachelor's and master's degree programs as well as joint research for PhD programs.
The signing of the agreement, which was also attended by several representatives from Jagiellonian University and the JU Faculty of Physics, Astronomy, and Applied Computer Science, was followed by a discussion on the role of Jagiellonian University in FAIR, which included Professor Piotr Salabura, Professor Zbigniew Majka, and Alicja Nowakowska, in addition to the FAIR/GSI delegation and Professor Kustrowski.
An instructive session was organized at Jagiellonian University for representatives from several Polish firms that are either making high-tech products or are interested in participating in the mega-science project. The representatives of the industry had the opportunity to explain the significant qualities of their products and for the FAIR project. The firms Prevac, KrioSystem, Kordecki Automation and S2innovation offered themselves to the management during this event. Solaris - National Center for Synchrotron Radiation and AGH University of Science and Technology officials also spoke about their achieved results. Ms. Nowicka, the liaison officer for the Polish shareholders explained how industry representatives may have access to information about forthcoming bids and how they can actively search for interdisciplinary projects at FAIR.
The second day of the visit of the FAIR Delegation began providing an inaugural seminar about FAIR, which was a webcast live for all Jagiellonian University students and researchers. FAIR Seminars is a new initiative of the Jagiellonian University and the Institute of Nuclear Physics PAN to organize a series of monthly seminars on the FAIR project. This initiative aims to disseminate among Polish scientists, engineers and students the knowledge about the project of the FAIR accelerator center being built at Darmstadt, which will be one of the largest centers of this type in the world. The seminars will discuss the main research pillars of FAIR (NUSTAR, CBM, PANDA, APPA), the status of the project, and above all - the participation of Polish research groups in this project. This public session was the starting point of a series of FAIR seminars at Jagiellonian University.
The FAIR Management met with nominated representatives from the National Consortium FEMTOPHYSICS (NCF) (in Polish Krajowe Konsorcjum FEMTOFIZYKA), which is made up of 12 Polish institutions that collaborate on the FAIR experiments. The delegates got a unique opportunity to speak with the FAIR/GSI Management about their concerns and questions, as well as discuss important problems related to FAIR Experiments. This discussion was crucial in terms of scheduling the following steps for the FAIR Phase 0 experiments in 2022, as well as the Project's transition from construction to Day 1 experiments.
The “FAIR Days Poland” hosted by the Jagiellonian University were very fruitful as all aspects of the FAIR Project were covered. Moreover, the signed agreements will enable scientists from the Jagiellonian University to significantly broaden the use of the research possibilities of the FAIR center. The prepared contract is particularly oriented towards young scientists by launching a dedicated system of apprenticeships, research internships and jointly conducted masters and doctoral dissertations. (BP)
The Jagiellonian University (JU) was founded on 12 May 1364 by the Polish king Casimir the Great. It is the oldest higher education institution in Poland and one of the oldest in Europe. Jagiellonian University was nominated by the Minister of Science and Higher Education for international shareholder in FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research in Europe) GmbH. The Jagiellonian University has been coordinating and managing Polish participation in the FAIR program since 2010. The Jagiellonian University – Faculty of Physics, Astronomy and Applied Computer Science – is working on several large projects related to the design of FAIR’s scientific equipment.
The National Consortium of FEMTOPHYSICS was established to prepare a structure focusing on experimental research activities at FAIR. The area of substantive activities of the National Consortium FEMTOPHYSICS is research in the field of physics and its applications. The national consortium includes the following prestigious institutes (in alphabetical order): the AGH University of Science and Technology, the Institute of Nuclear Physics PAN, the National Centre of Nuclear Research, the Cracow University of Technology, the Warsaw University of Technology, the Wroclaw University of Science and Technology, the Gdańsk University of Technology, the Jagiellonian University in Kraków (coordinating entity), Jan Kochanowski University of Kielce, the University of Lodz, the University of Silesia in Katowice and the University of Warsaw.
The GET_INvolved Programme provides international students and early-stage researchers from partner institutions with opportunities to perform internships, traineeships and early-stage research experience to get involved in the international FAIR accelerator project while receiving scientific and technical training. For more information on the GET_INvolved Programme, interested persons can contact the respective coordinators: Dr. Pradeep Ghosh (GSI and FAIR, Pradeep.Ghosh@fair-center.eu) and Professor Piotr Salabura (Jagiellonian University, Piotr.Salabura@uj.edu.pl).
Jagiellonian University, Krakow, Poland
Centrum Cyklotronowe Bronowice, CCB
National Consortium FEMTOPHYSICS
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Professor Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo will receive the 2022 Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation). This is most important and highest endowed German research prize. Martínez-Pinedo is award for his outstanding work at the interface between astrophysics, nuclear physics and neutrino physics. He researches and teaches at the Institute for Nuclear Physics at the TU Darmstadt and at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt.
Physicist Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo's work has helped to solve one of the biggest unsolved problems in physics in the 21st century: Where does nature produce heavy elements, such as the noble metals gold or platinum? Together with other scientists including Professor Almudena Arcones from Darmstadt, Martínez-Pinedo showed that these elements are created during the merger of neutron stars and that this process produces a distinct electromagnetic signal, a light curve, for which Martínez-Pinedo and colleagues created the term "kilonova." In 2017, such a kilonova was observed for the first time, simultaneously by the "messengers" of light and gravitational waves.
This scientific milestone, in which Martínez-Pinedo was involved in a leading role, is considered to be the birth of multi-messenger astronomy, which opens up completely new scientific possibilities. In the future, for example, the nuclear physics processes involved in the merger of neutron stars will be studied with unprecedented quality in the laboratory after completion of the international accelerator center FAIR currently being built at GSI in Darmstadt. This opens up the opportunity to unravel the dynamics involved in the merger of two neutron stars from details of the gravitational wave and light curve signals and to address fundamental questions - such as how the transition of the merging neutron stars to a black hole proceeds, whether a new form of matter, "quark matter," is passed through during the merger, or whether merging neutron stars are the only place where heavy elements can be created in the astrophysical r-process. Most of the nuclei involved in the r-process are extremely short-lived, so their properties must be modeled theoretically in order to explore the r-process. In this, Martínez-Pinedo has taken a world-leading role in recent years.
Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo combines the expertise in the research fields of astrophysics, nuclear physics, and neutrino physics, which positions him to be a world leader in a highly interdisciplinary research field.
Another highlight of Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo's scientific career was the discovery of the neutrino-p-process, a nucleosynthesis process occurring during a supernova. More recently, the physicist has been working on the description of the interaction of neutrinos with matter in supernovae. At TU Darmstadt and GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo heads the Theoretical Nuclear Astrophysics groups. With his work at both research institutions, he has contributed significantly in establishing Darmstadt as a center of nuclear astrophysics worldwide.
The Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize has been awarded annually by the DFG since 1986 to scientists working in Germany in a wide range of disciplines. Up to ten prizes can be awarded each year, each with a prize money of 2.5 million euros. The prize money is intended, among other things, to expand the research opportunities of the award recipients. The Joint Committee of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) today awarded the 2022 Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize to ten scientists. They had previously been selected from 134 proposals. The prize money is intended, among other things, to expand the research opportunities of the award recipients; the award winners can use it for their research work for up to seven years according to their own ideas and without bureaucratic effort.
Professor Paolo Giubellino, the Scientific Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, says, “I am extremely delighted about this decision of the German Research Foundation and the great appreciation of the excellent scientific work of Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo. At the same time, the award is a proof of the outstanding opportunities in the research area of Darmstadt, at GSI and FAIR as well as at TUD. With FAIR, we will be able to further extend the perspectives of such groundbreaking research as conducted by Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo and enable further important pioneering achievements. Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo is one of the key players in the research community as a world-renowned expert on the formation of chemical elements in the universe."
"We congratulate the laureate Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo on this outstanding award," says Professor Tanja Brühl, President of TU Darmstadt. "He has initiated a paradigm shift in the study of the formation of heavy elements. Research personalities like him strengthen the role of the Technische Universität Darmstadt and the GSI Helmholtzzentrum, which together have become an internationally outstanding center of nuclear astrophysics. We are proud that with Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo another Leibniz prizewinner is helping to shape the research field of Matter and Materials at TU Darmstadt. With his expertise, he also strengthens the excellence cluster initiative ELEMENTS, funded by the HMWK, which we are developing together with Goethe University."
Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo studied at the Autonomous University of Madrid, where he received his PhD in Theoretical Physics. His further career took him to the California Institute of Technology, the universities of Aarhus, Basel and Barcelona, among others. Since 2005, he has worked at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt, where he heads now the Nuclear Astrophysics and Structure Theory Department and in 2020 became one of the directors of the Helmholtz Research Academy of Hesse for FAIR. Since 2011, Martínez-Pinedo has held the professorship of Theoretical Nuclear Astrophysics in the Department of Physics at TU Darmstadt. Martínez-Pinedo has received many awards; among others, he received an ERC Advanced Grant last year for the project "Probing r-process nucleosynthesis through electromagnetic signatures (KILONOVA)". He is a much sought-after speaker at international conferences, represents his field in important international committees, and publishes in prestigious scientific journals. (TUD/BP)
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When we turn our head, our brain realizes this rotation primarily through the visual impression — that is, through what we see. Technical devices, on the other hand, rely on gyroscopes, i.e. rotation sensors. Among other things, these are important for navigation. In an airplane's autopilot, for example, a gyroscope detects the three different types of rotation that the plane can perform: It can roll, i.e. turn one wing down and the other up, pull the nose up or down (pitch), or turn relative to the ground (yaw). Gyroscopes are also important in vehicles on the ground, such as autonomous cars.
The research group led by Prof. Dr. Dmitry Budker published their idea of using color centers in diamonds as gyroscopes already back in 2012. Now the researchers have been able to provide practical proof. They recently published their results in the journal Science Advances.
“We and other groups have already used these color centers to measure magnetic fields for several years,” explains Budker, a physicist at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU) and the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM), which, in addition to the university, is also funded by the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt. “In principle, the measurement of rotations works as with a magnetometer, but some challenges arise.” For example, the sensor must ignore fluctuating magnetic fields in order to measure rotations. Budker and his team were able to address this problem, however. On the one hand, they use nuclear spins instead of electron spins for gyroscopy, which have a much smaller magnetic moment and therefore lower sensitivity to magnetic fields. On the other hand, the scientists were able to shield external magnetic fields to a large extent and still maintain a very stable bias magnetic field internally to generate the measurement effect, which also hardly reacts to temperature fluctuations. Should fluctuating magnetic fields occur in the external space, the color centers do not “see” them. Dr. Peter Blümler from JGU addressed the questions and challenges surrounding this magnetic field. However, the experiments and the first proof were achieved by Dr. Andrey Jarmola and Budker's former PhD student, Dr. Sean Lourette, at the University of California at Berkeley.
Thus, the researchers report two innovations in their paper. First, they were able to realize their 2012 idea and use diamond color centers as gyroscopes. Second, they worked out a technical way to make it happen. However, there are still more challenges to overcome before the method is feasible in everyday applications. (JGU/CP)
Unfortunately, due to the current pandemic situation the award ceremony that was planned for November 25 at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt had again to be cancelled, as already in 2020. However, a special seminar will be held beginning of 2022 were the awardees will be given an opportunity to present their work to the interested community. Also the two 2020 award winners, Dr. Alina Bendinger from the German Cancer Research Center DKFZ Heidelberg and Dr. Giorgia Meschini from the State Polytechnic University in Milan (Politecnico di Milano) will contribute to this seminar.
In her PhD thesis entitled „Normal brain tissue reaction after proton irradiation“ Theresa Suckert has investigated the damaging effects on the normal tissue in the brain after proton irradiation, a highly relevant topic for clinical applications of proton beams. She has analyzed the potential of tissue slice cultures as surrogate for in-vivo experiments, and she has gained important insights into the applicability of this approach to investigate radiation induced tumor and normal tissue response. Furthermore, based on a mouse model she has performed challenging experiments, aiming at the high precision irradiation of small, clinically relevant subvolumes of the mouse brain. Therefore, she has developed and implemented the complete, very complex workflow including imaging, treatment planning, positioning verification, dosimetry as well as tissue excision and preparation. This approach represents an essential basis for upcoming preclinical experiments aiming at the further elucidation of ion specific radiation response mechanisms.
Dr. Felix Horst has performed experiments to determine nuclear reaction cross sections of light ions in the therapeutically relevant energy range; his PhD thesis is entitled „Measurement of Nuclear Reaction Cross Sections for Applications in Radiotherapy with Protons, Helium and Carbon Ions”. He has performed these experiments at the medical ion beam centers at Marburg (MIT) and Heidelberg (HIT). His results allowed the optimization of nuclear reaction models and with that substantially improving the therapeutic dose calculations. The direct implementation of these improved models in treatment planning for patients treated with Helium ions at HIT highlights the particular clinical relevance. An additional part of the PhD thesis aimed at improved measurements of reaction cross sections of radiation induced positron emitters, which are relevant for an increased accuracy of range verification measurements based on the PET method. The PET method allows precise monitoring of patient irradiation with ion beams.
The prize money for the dissertations is 1500 Euro each. The award is named after Professor Christoph Schmelzer, co-founder and first Scientific Managing Director of GSI. The promotion of young scientists in the field of tumor therapy with ion beams has meanwhile been continuing for many years, and the award was presented for the 23rd time. The topics of the award-winning theses are of fundamental importance for the further development of ion beam therapy and often find their way into clinical application. (BP)
The Association for the Promotion of Tumor Therapy supports research activities in the field of tumor therapy with heavy ions with the aim of improving the treatment of tumors and making it available to general patient care. At the accelerator facility at GSI, more than 400 patients with tumors in the head and neck area were treated with ion beams as part of a pilot project from 1997 to 2008. The cure rates of this method are sometimes over 90 percent and the side effects are very low. The success of the pilot project led to the establishment of clinical ion beam therapy centers in Heidelberg and Marburg, where patients are now regularly treated with heavy ions.
Association for the Promotion of Tumor Therapy with Heavy Ions e.V.
Technical University of Dresden
Justus Liebig University of Giessen
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Physicists call the atomic nucleus of tin-100 doubly magic because it simultaneously has two shell closures. Nevertheless, it is very difficult to measure its mass. An international group of scientists at the European research centre CERN (Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire) including physicists from GSI Helmholtzzentrum and University of. Greifswald has now succeeded in measuring the precise masses of the indium isotopes 99In, 100In and 101In, thus making it possible to draw conclusions for the mass value of tin-100.
Similar to electrons in atomic shells, the building blocks of the atomic nuclei, protons and neutrons, quantum mechanically group together in nuclear shells. Full shells correspond to particularly high binding energies and stabilities. Thus, the shell closure numbers 8, 20, 28, 50, 82 and 126 are called “magic” numbers. The doubly-magic nuclei are particularly interesting. For these nuclei, both the proton number Z and the neutron number N indicate shell closures. And, among those doubly-magic nuclei, the nucleus of the tin isotope 100Sn is the most prominent: It is the heaviest nucleus for isotopes that have the same Z and N values, Z = N = 50. But so far, a direct experimental determination of its mass is extremely challenging. This is due to the difficulties in the production of 100Sn as well as in its short half-life of just about a second.
Directly adjacent to the doubly-magic 100Sn, we find the nuclei of the element indium, which have one proton less than the tin nuclei. It was now possible to perform precision mass measurements of the indium isotopes 99In, 100In and 101In with the ISOLTRAP setup at CERN. This was the first direct mass measurement for indium-99; the accuracy of the indium-100 and indium-101 mass values have been improved significantly. Ivan Kulikov, a PhD student at GSI and FAIR, was involved in the experiments and was assigned to CERN for four years.
The new results, published in Nature Physics, confirm values measured at GSI in cooperation with scientists from the Technical University of Munich. “Beta decay of 100Sn has been studied 13 years ago within the RISING gamma-spectroscopy project behind the FRS of GSI and then more recently and with a higher statistics at RIKEN in Japan within EURICA campaign. The observed discrepancy between those two results causes intense discussions in the community,” says Dr. Magdalena Gorska, the co-author of both measurements.
Yuri Litvinov, the principal investigator of the ERC project "ASTRUm", within which the researchers from GSI Atomic Physics division contributed to this experiment, explains:
“By using the new mass value of 100In and with help of theoretical calculations performed by the group of Prof. Achim Schwenk at the TU Darmstadt, it became possible to draw a clear conclusion on the mass of 100Sn, favoring an older GSI measurement of C. Hinke et al. published in Nature.”
Among other funding sources, this research was supported by the European Research Council (ERC) through the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (grant agreement 682841 ‘ASTRUm’).
New possibilities to answer challenging questions in nuclear structure and reactions will be opened up with FAIR. The international accelerator facility, one of the largest research projects worldwide, is currently under construction at GSI. This research at FAIR is pursued by the NUSTAR Collaboration, which builds dedicated state-of-the-art experiments at the future in-flight fragment separator Super-FRS. (LW/Universität Greifswald)
Original paper: M Mougeot et al. (2021): Mass measurements of 99-101In challenge ab initio nuclear theory of the nuclide 100Sn, Nature Physics.
Press release of University of Greifswald
Through an introductory lecture and short video clips, the students had the opportunity to learn about GSI's facilities and research and the construction of components and buildings for the future international research center FAIR. The guided video tour took them to the linear accelerator UNILAC, the main control room and the heavy ion synchrotron SIS18. They learned how to produce new elements at the SHIP experiment, how to treat tumors with carbon ions, and how the large experiment HADES can be used to unravel the mystery of mass. The program also included a virtual visit to the test facility for superconducting FAIR magnets and to the viewpoint of the FAIR construction site. A drone flight over the construction field rounded off the event. Afterwards they had the opportunity to ask questions via a live chat, which was actively used by the participants.
The "Saturday Morning Physics" event series is organized by the Physics Faculty of the TU Darmstadt. It takes place annually and aims to encourage young people's interest in physics. In the events, students learn more about physics research at the university. Those who participate in all events receive the “Saturday-Morning-Physics” diploma. GSI and later FAIR have been among the sponsors and supporters of the series since its beginning. (CP)
In his dissertation, Physicist Oliver Noll worked on the development of the PANDA electromagnetic calorimeter, which is one of the main subsystems of the PANDA experiment. Prior to Oliver Noll’s work no specific algorithm for the digital processing of the APFEL readout chip signals existed. In the thesis work, a detailed study of the APFEL pulse shape and noise components was performed. Within the PhD work also were carried out major contributions to the development, construction and operation of EMC prototypes, which were used in beam tests for proving the functionality of the PANDA EMC design and optimizing its performance.
The PANDA Collaboration has awarded the PhD Prize once per year since 2013 in order to honor the best dissertation written in connection with the PANDA experiment. Candidates for the PhD Prize are nominated by their doctoral advisors. In addition to being directly related to the PANDA experiment, the nominees’ doctoral degrees must have received a rating of “very good” or better. Up to three candidates are shortlisted for the award and can present their dissertations at the PANDA Collaboration meeting. The winner is chosen by a committee that is appointed for this task by the PANDA Collaboration. The PANDA Collaboration awards the PhD Prize to specifically honor students’ contributions to the PANDA project. (BP)
About the doctoral thesis of Dr. Oliver Noll
About the PANDA prize
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During the so-called second long shutdown (LS2), the CERN accelerator LHC (Large Hadron Collider) underwent extensive upgrades and can now collide lead nuclei at rates of up to 50 kilohertz in the ALICE detector. To fully exploit this potential, the measurement setup also had to be improved. For this purpose, the Time Projection Chamber TPC could be renewed and reinstalled at the ALICE detector. A new Muon Forward Tracker was also installed. In May, the largest pixel detector ever built — the Inner Tracking System ITS — took the seat of its predecessor between the beam pipe and the TPC. The final piece of the puzzle, the Fast Interaction Trigger FIT, was installed in July.
The TPC in particular represents a real innovation: The previous TPC readout chambers could process a maximum of three kilohertz. The new chambers use so-called GEM technology (Gas Electron Multiplier) and can read out data continuously — in contrast to the previous technology, which was based on multi-wire proportional chambers. The changed method is the only option to process the LHC's new high collision rates. As a consequence, this also required new software systems for data acquisition, calibration, reconstruction and analysis.
GSI has been involved in the development of new measurement instruments, in particular in the design and construction of the ALICE TPC, and in the ALICE scientific program from the very beginning. Also this time, GSI contributed significantly to the development of the new readout chambers. A substantial part of the chambers was built in collaboration between the ALICE research department and the detector laboratory at GSI. Staff from both GSI departments also assisted in the insertion of the chambers on site at CERN. Likewise, GSI’s IT department made key contributions to the new software systems. The GSI computer center remains an integral part of the computer network for data analysis of the ALICE experiment. The expertise from the upgrades is also relevant for the future operation of FAIR. For example, continuous data streams will also be read out at the Compressed Baryonic Matter (CBM) experiment.
The work on ALICE was part of a Helmholtz-wide initiative, including, next to GSI, also the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) and the Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron (DESY): a large investment fund of the Helmholtz Association was devoted to upgrades of ALICE as well as the two other experiments ATLAS and CMS for the “Full Exploitation of the Large Hadron Collider”.
ALICE is one of the four large experiments at CERN's LHC collider and in particular investigates heavy ion collisions of lead atom nuclei. When the nuclei collide with unimaginable energy, conditions like those prevailing in the first moments of the universe are created. During the collisions, a so-called quark-gluon plasma is formed for a very short time — a state of matter that existed in the universe shortly after the Big Bang. This plasma transforms back into normal matter within fractions of a second. The particles produced in the process provide information about the properties of the quark-gluon plasma. Thus, the measurements can look into the birth of the cosmos and reveal information about the basic building blocks of matter and their interactions. (CP)
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Rather than there being a single ‘silver bullet’, different particles and their combination can provide a breakthrough in radiotherapy treatments in specific cases. This is one of the key messages of the review, which Professor Durante published together with the radiation oncologists Professor Jürgen Debus, Scientific Medical Director of the Heidelberg Ion Beam Therapy Center (HIT) and Medical Director of the Clinic for Radio Oncology and Radiotherapy at the University of Heidelberg, and Professor Jay Stephen Loeffler, chair of Radiation Oncology at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School in Boston.
The GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung had pioneered new approaches to radiation therapy at an early stage and was the first in Europe to start heavy ion therapy. This treatment method can meet the requirements of modern radiation therapy particularly well: Radiotherapy should have low toxicity in the entrance channel, where normal tissue exists, and thus spare healthy tissue, and be very effective in cell killing in the target region, in the tumor itself. In this regard, ions heavier than protons have both physical and radiobiological advantages over conventional X- rays. This is also underlined by Professor Durante and his colleagues in their review of the present status quo: “Charged particle therapy is the most advanced radiotherapy technique. Most of the patients are treated with protons, but heavy ions present additional biological advantages.”
More than 20 years ago, the clinical studies of an innovative cancer treatment with accelerated carbon ions began at GSI in Darmstadt. This was preceded by joint studies with the Clinic of Radiology and the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) in Heidelberg, and the Helmholtz research laboratory in Rossendorf. It was a starting point of a success story that has led from fundamental research to a widespread medical application. In the meantime, there are a dozen carbon ion clinical centres in Europe and Asia, where the therapy is ongoing. And more are under construction or at the planning stage, including the first in the USA. Clinical results are promising, whereas new ions will be used in the future, like 4He, the more frequent of the two stable isotopes of helium or the stable isotope of oxygen 16O.
The authors of the review article not only provide with great expertise an overview of the rapidly developing research field of particle therapy, but also present the entire wide-ranging spectrum from the physics and technology of heavy ions to radiobiology and the application of new ions and technologies. They also identify the key factors that will determine the future success of particle therapy: So a heated debate on the cost- effectiveness is ongoing in the clinical community, owing to the larger footprint and greater expense of heavy ion facilities compared with proton therapy centers. Heavy ion therapy is more expensive than X- ray therapy. On the other hand, radiobiology suggests that heavy ions for example can be exquisitely effective against hypoxic tumors, i.e. tumor tissue with a poor oxygen supply, and improve the effects of immunotherapy.
Thus, for the future of particle therapy further R&D in accelerators and beam delivery is necessary to make the machines smaller and cheaper and to exploit new, fascinating treatment modalities such as FLASH and radioactive ion beams for image-guided therapy.
Finally, Professor Durante and co-workers suggest that a combination of light and heavy ions can provide optimal biological effects, and underline the necessity of more pre-clinical research in these fields. “The potential of heavy ions has not been fully exploited in clinics.”
Current research at GSI and FAIR is also contributing an important part to the future of particle therapy, always with the goal of further increasing the therapeutic window in radiotherapy. For example, in the current experiment period FAIR Phase 0 GSI and FAIR succeeded in performing a carbon ion FLASH experiment for the first time. This work is about ultra-short and ultra-high radiation, where the treatment dose is delivered in sub-second timescales. The aim of FLASH irradiation is to apply even less damaging a high dose in a short time.
In addition, Professor Marco Durante's current BARB project, which is funded and acknowledged by an ERC Advanced Grant, aims at the use of the same beam for treatment and for imaging during treatment and thus increase precision. Radioactive ion beams are the ideal tool. Only cutting-edge facilities such as FAIR can generate such intense beams. (BP)
Yury Litvinov studied physics in St. Petersburg and is a scientist at GSI since 1999. In 2009, he went to the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg for two years, where he completed his habilitation. Since 2011, Litvinov is actively involved in FAIR's APPA/SPARC research activities. Among other responsibilities, he is the coordinator of experiments at the Experimental Storage Ring ESR, and since 2012 he acts as the head of the group "SPARC Detectors" for FAIR, which is a part of the "Atomic Physics" department. Since 2016, Litvinov has been Principal Investigator for the EU-funded ERC Consolidator Grant "ASTRUm" and since 2017 he holds an adjunct professorship at the University of Heidelberg.
“It is a great honor and I am very excited to receive this important recognition,” Litvinov said on the occasion of his appointment. “I will continue to strive to expand knowledge of atomic, nuclear and astrophysics with help of the research facilities, storage rings and traps available now at GSI and in the future at FAIR, as well as worldwide, and to pass this knowledge on to young researchers as part of my teaching activities.”
APS is the major professional organization for physicists in the United States. It has over 55,000 members from academia, national laboratories, and industry. The mission of the APS is to advance and diffuse the knowledge of physics for the benefit of humanity, promote physics, and serve the broader physics community. Fellows are selected for their outstanding contributions to physics. Each year, the number of APS fellows elected is no more than one half of one percent of the membership. (CP)
"The closeness of the publication of the two contents exemplifies the extraordinarily broad thematic spectrum of cutting-edge research at GSI and FAIR, from basic research to applied research. I am very pleased about the outstanding and broad-based science on our research campus," says the Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino.
Medical research is the subject of the article by Professor Marco Durante, Head of the GSI Biophysics Department , which he published together with two renowned radiation oncologists: Professor Jürgen Debus, Scientific Medical Director of the Heidelberg Ion Beam Therapy Center (HIT) and Medical Director of the Clinic for Radio Oncology and Radiotherapy at the University of Heidelberg, and Professor Jay Stephen Loeffler, chair of Radiation Oncology at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School in Boston.
The article describes the state-of-the-art of heavy ion radiotherapy that GSI first started in Europe. Clinical results from Japan and Germany are promising, but R&D in accelerators and beam delivery is necessary to make the machines smaller and cheaper and to exploit new, fascinating treatment modalities such as FLASH and radioactive ion beams for image-guided therapy. Durante and co-workers suggest that, rather than a “silver bullet”, combination of light and heavy ions can provide optimal biological effects, and underline the necessity of more pre-clinical research in these fields.
The article by Professor Takehiko R. Saito, leading scientist in the GSI/FAIR research pillar NUSTAR, which he published as first author together with several research colleagues, is about basic research. From GSI/FAIR, Vasyl Drozd, Dr. Shizu Minami and Professor Christoph Scheidenberger were involved.
The researchers are directing the attention to hypernuclei; these are nuclei that, in addition to protons and neutrons, contain a further nuclear building block with a so-called strange quark. The investigations of such hypernuclei by means of energetic heavy ion collisions have revealed some surprises in the case of the light hypernuclei with only a few protons or neutrons and a Λ-hyperon - the latter containing the strange quark - e.g. the unexpected existence of a bound state of two neutrons with such a Λ-hyperon. “Solving these puzzles will not only impact our understanding of the fundamental baryonic interactions with strange quarks but also of the nature of the deep interior of neutron stars. We summarize ongoing projects and experiments at various facilities worldwide and outline future perspectives,” the authors explain. (BP)
Publication "New directions in hypernuclear pysics" in Nature Reviews Physics
]]>All heavy elements on Earth today were formed under extreme conditions in astrophysical environments: inside stars, in stellar explosions, and during the collision of neutron stars. Researchers are intrigued with the question in which of these astrophysical events the appropriate conditions for the formation of the heaviest elements, such as gold or uranium, exist. The spectacular first observation of gravitational waves and electromagnetic radiation originating from a neutron star merger in 2017 suggested that many heavy elements can be produced and released in these cosmic collisions. However, the question remains open as to when and why the material is ejected and whether there may be other scenarios in which heavy elements can be produced.
Promising candidates for heavy element production are black holes orbited by an accretion disk of dense and hot matter. Such a system is formed both after the merger of two massive neutron stars and during a so-called collapsar, the collapse and subsequent explosion of a rotating star. The internal composition of such accretion disks has so far not been well understood, particularly with respect to the conditions under which an excess of neutrons forms. A high number of neutrons is a basic requirement for the synthesis of heavy elements, as it enables the rapid neutron-capture process or r-process. Nearly massless neutrinos play a key role in this process, as they enable conversion between protons and neutrons.
“In our study, we systematically investigated for the first time the conversion rates of neutrons and protons for a large number of disk configurations by means of elaborate computer simulations, and we found that the disks are very rich in neutrons as long as certain conditions are met,” explains Dr. Oliver Just from the Relativistic Astrophysics group of GSI's research division Theory. “The decisive factor is the total mass of the disk. The more massive the disk, the more often neutrons are formed from protons through capture of electrons under emission of neutrinos, and are available for the synthesis of heavy elements by means of the r-process. However, if the mass of the disk is too high, the inverse reaction plays an increased role so that more neutrinos are recaptured by neutrons before they leave the disk. These neutrons are then converted back to protons, which hinders the r-process.” As the study shows, the optimal disk mass for prolific production of heavy elements is about 0.01 to 0.1 solar masses. The result provides strong evidence that neutron star mergers producing accretion disks with these exact masses could be the point of origin for a large fraction of the heavy elements. However, whether and how frequently such accretion disks occur in collapsar systems is currently unclear.
In addition to the possible processes of mass ejection, the research group led by Dr. Andreas Bauswein is also investigating the light signals generated by the ejected matter, which will be used to infer the mass and composition of the ejected matter in future observations of colliding neutron stars. An important building block for correctly reading these light signals is accurate knowledge of the masses and other properties of the newly formed elements. “These data are currently insufficient. But with the next generation of accelerators, such as FAIR, it will be possible to measure them with unprecedented accuracy in the future. The well-coordinated interplay of theoretical models, experiments, and astronomical observations will enable us researchers in the coming years to test neutron star mergers as the origin of the r-process elements”, predicts Bauswein. (CP)
The Management of GSI and FAIR congratulates warmly on the Nobel Prize: "We are very delighted for Giorgio Parisi, who, in addition to his Nobel Prize-winning contributions, has been recognized for outstanding science in the field of elementary particle physics, as it is also conducted on our campus at GSI and FAIR."
The Italian Giorgio Parisi has been working on the physics of elementary particles in addition to and in time before his now awarded work on "disorder and fluctuations in physical systems". Together with the Italian physicist Nicola Cabibbo, he made an important contribution to the understanding of the phase transition between quark-gluon plasma and hadronic matter and made fundamental discoveries on the structure of hadrons, in particular on "glueballs", in the framework of the APE collaboration (Array Processor Experiment at the Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare, INFN, in Italy). His pioneering paper with Italian physicist Guido Altarelli on "Asymptotic freedom in parton language" (Nucl.Phys.B 126 (1977) 298-318 ) is one of the most cited papers in all of nuclear and particle physics, with more than 7500 citations, and has laid the foundations for our understanding of the role of gluons in collisions between elementary particles and/or atomic nuclei at high energy. It has led to the "DGLAP" equations, which are central to the quantitative description of the vast majority of high-energy collisions.
Giorgio Parisi's scientific approaches will continue to have a lot of weight in research at the future FAIR accelerator center: The work with Cabibbo is an important milestone for the physics on the quark-gluon plasma and thus directly linked to the physics program of the CBM experiment. The work with the APE collaboration and in particular that with Altarelli, also forms the basis for research planned at the PANDA experiment.
Parisi also gave the opening lecture to the scientific program at the 2018 "Quark Matter Conference" in Venice, the most important international conference in this field, entitled "Some considerations on the quark-gluon plasma". The first part of the talk was on the Cabibbo-Parisi paper cited above and the question of thermalization in complex systems, which is still relevant today, thus preparing the ground for important discussions at the conference. The second part dealt with the structure of complex systems, the research area now awarded the Nobel Prize.
The Nobel Prize Committee's statement honoring Giorgio Parisi's achievement states: “Around 1980, Giorgio Parisi discovered hidden patterns in disordered complex materials. His discoveries are among the most important contributions to the theory of complex systems. They make it possible to understand and describe many different and apparently entirely random materials and phenomena, not only in physics but also in other, very different areas, such as mathematics, biology, neuroscience and machine learning.”
This range is also emphasized by the Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino: “The decision of the Nobel Prize Committee shows how closely apparently distant fields of research are related and how important the basic methodologies are for the complex description of very different scientific phenomena. They advance each other and cross-fertilize each other. Basic research is therefore quite crucial. I am extremely pleased about this exceptional appreciation for the scientific work of my colleague and friend."
A native of Rome, Parisi graduated in physics from La Sapienza University in Rome in 1970, where he has been a professor of quantum physics since 1992. He works in various subfields of physics, such as high-energy physics, quantum chromodynamics, phase transition theory, statistical mechanics, mathematical physics, biophysics and others. (BP)
]]>GSI and FAIR employees can get a copy at the foyer or at the reception in Borsigstraße. If you want to order the DIN-A2-sized calendar from FAIR and GSI, please contact gsi-kalender(at)gsi.de (Data Protection) directly via e-mail and receive the calendar by post. Please include the following information: your name, your address and the number of calendars you wish to order. We kindly ask for your understanding that because of the limited quantity a maximum of three calendars can be sent per request (while stocks last). (LW)
]]>All known atomic nuclei and therefore almost all visible matter consist of protons and neutrons, yet many of the properties of these omnipresent natural building blocks remain unknown. As an uncharged particle, the neutron in particular resists many types of measurement and 90 years after its discovery there are still many unanswered questions regarding its size and lifetime, among other things. The neutron consists of three quarks which whirl around inside it, held together by gluons. Physicists use electromagnetic form factors to describe this dynamic inner structure of the neutron. These form factors represent an average distribution of electric charge and magnetization within the neutron and can be determined by means of experimentation.
“A single form factor, measured at a certain energy level, does not say much at first,” explains Professor Frank Maas, a researcher at the PRISMA+ Cluster of Excellence in Mainz, the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM) and the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung Darmstadt. “Measurements of the form factors at various energies are needed in order to draw conclusions on the structure of the neutron.” In certain energy ranges, which are accessible using standard electron-proton scattering experiments, form factors can be determined fairly accurately. However, so far this has not been the case with other ranges for which so-called annihilation techniques are needed that involve matter and antimatter mutually destroying each other.
In the BESIII experiment being undertaken in China, it has recently proved possible to precisely determine the corresponding data in the energy range 2 to 3.8 gigaelectronvolts; as pointed out in the article published in the current issue of Nature Physics by the partnership, this is over 60 times more accurate compared to previous measurements. “With this new data, we have, so to speak, filled a blank space on the neutron form factor ‘map’, which until now was unknown territory,” points out Frank Maas. “This data is now as precise as that obtained in corresponding scattering experiments. As a result, our knowledge of the form factors of the neutron will change dramatically, and as such we will get a far more comprehensive picture of this important building block of nature.”
To make inroads into completing the required fields of the form factor ‘map’, the physicists needed antiparticles. The international partnership therefore used the Beijing Electron-Positron Collider II for its measurements. Here, electrons and their positive antiparticles, positrons, are allowed to collide in an accelerator and destroy each other, creating new, other particle pairs – a process known as ‘annihilation’ in physics. Using the BESIII detector, the researchers observed and analyzed the outcome, in which the electrons and positrons form neutrons and anti-neutrons. “Annihilation experiments like these are nowhere near as well-established as the standard scattering experiments,” adds Frank Maas. “Substantial development work was needed to carry out the current experiment – the intensity of the accelerator had to be improved and the detection method for the elusive neutron had to be practically reinvented in the analysis of the experimental data. This was by no means straightforward. Our partnership has done truly pioneering work here.”
As if this was not enough, the measurements showed the physicists that the results for the form factor do not produce a consistent slope relative to the energy level, but rather an oscillating pattern in which fluctuations become smaller as the energy level increases. They observed similar surprising behavior in the case of the proton - here however, the fluctuations were mirrored, i.e. phase-shifted. “This new finding indicates first and foremost that nucleons do not have a simple structure,” explains Frank Maas. “Now our colleagues on the theoretical side have been asked to develop models to account for this extraordinary behavior.”
Finally, on the basis of their measurements, the BESIII partnership has modified how the relative ratio of the neutron to proton form factors needs to be viewed. Many years ago, the result produced in the FENICE experiment was a ratio greater than one, which means that the neutron must have a consistently larger form factor than the proton. “But as the proton is charged, you would expect it to be completely the other way round,” asserts Frank Maas. “And that's just what we see when we compare our neutron data with the proton data we’ve recently acquired through BESIII. So here we’ve rectified how we need to perceive the very smallest particles.”
According to Maas, the new findings are especially important because they are so fundamental. “They provide new perspectives on the basic properties of the neutron. What’s more, by looking at the smallest building blocks of matter, we can also understand phenomena that occur in the largest dimensions – such as the fusion of two neutron stars. This physics of extremes is already very fascinating." (JGU/JL)
The Otto Hahn Prize 2021 goes to nuclear physicist Professor Klaus Blaum of the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg. The award is endowed with 50,000 euros and is jointly sponsored by the City of Frankfurt am Main, the German Chemical Society (GDCh) and the German Physical Society (DPG). The award ceremony took place on November 5 in the festive setting of Frankfurt's Paulskirche. Through his scientific work, but also through important committee activities, Klaus Blaum has been related to GSI and FAIR for a long time. For example, he was a member of the GSI Supervisory Board for many years and Vice Chair of the FAIR-GSI Joint Scientific Council.
"A passion for precision" concisely characterizes the research of physicist Klaus Blaum, who will be awarded the Otto Hahn Prize this year. His work is pioneering for broad areas of atomic, nuclear and particle physics, especially for the test of the fundamental forces of nature in the microcosm.
"The questions that Klaus Blaum addresses are only at first glance far away from the reality of our lives," said Mayor Peter Feldmann, describing the award winner's work. "He is, as a layman might say, the cartographer of the microcosm. With meticulousness and precision, he surveys what forces are at work there. Through him we understand the mechanisms of action of our environment. He proves that working on a small scale is not `small-small´ - but, on the contrary, virtually challenges our understanding of the world."
"With his research, Blaum is expanding our knowledge of the fundamental properties of the constituents of the matter that surrounds us," adds Lutz Schröter, president of the German Physical Society (DPG). Blaum's research activities are wide-ranging and can best be summarized as "the study of exotic particles and states." These include studies of highly charged ions, short-lived atomic nuclei, antimatter, and the heaviest artificial elements.
"With Klaus Blaum, an exceptional scientist is receiving the Otto Hahn Prize," says Peter R. Schreiner, president of the German Chemical Society (GDCh). "The findings of his work also create important foundations for chemical research."
Today, the properties of elementary particles and the forces acting between them are often studied at the highest energies. However, a number of fundamental questions in particle physics and cosmology can be pursued particularly well at low energies.
Since the effects here are usually extraordinarily tiny, the highest precision is required. To this end, Blaum and his group developed a large number of sophisticated techniques, often performing the experiments on single particles at the lowest temperatures. By applying a series of brilliant ideas and exceptional experimental skills, he combined sophisticated techniques from atomic, nuclear and accelerator physics.
Blaum published his scientific results in more than 450 scientific articles in the leading and most internationally recognized physics journals. Although considered young in scientific circles at 49, he is already one of the world's most productive and cited researchers in the field of precision physics and measurement.
Klaus Blaum was born in Bad Sobernheim, Rheinland-Pfalz, Germany, on December 27, 1971. He studied physics at the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz, where he received his doctorate in 2000 under Ernst-Wilhelm Otten (1934 - 2019) after receiving his diploma in 1997 and several research stays at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) in Richland, USA. Subsequently, he was a research associate at the GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research in Darmstadt until 2002 and worked at the European Nuclear Research Center CERN near Geneva. There he was project leader for "Mass spectrometry of exotic nuclei with ISOLTRAP at ISOLDE" until 2004. In October 2004, Blaum took over the position of project leader of the Helmholtz-University Young Investigators Group "Experiments with Stored and Cooled Ions" at the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz for four years. In 2006, he habilitated there on high-precision mass spectrometry with Penning traps for charged particles and storage rings.
Blaum taught at the University of Mainz from 2004 to 2008. He was awarded the 2006 Teaching Prize of the State of Rheinland-Pfalz, Germany, for his teaching activities. In October 2007, at the age of only 35, he received an appointment as director and scientific member of the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg. This was followed in April 2008 by his appointment as Honorary Professor (W3) of the Ruprecht Karls University in Heidelberg. Since July 2020, Blaum has been Vice President of the Max Planck Society, responsible for the institutes of the Chemical-Physical-Technical Section.
At a young age, Blaum was awarded numerous highly prestigious prizes, including the Gustav Hertz Prize of the German Physical Society in 2004 for his outstanding work on the mass determination of unstable atomic nuclei, as well as the Helmholtz Prize of the Physikalisch-Technischen Bundesanstalt (PTB) in 2012 and the Lise Meitner Prize of the European Physical Society (EPS) in 2020. In 2019, he was accepted as a foreign member of the physics class of the "Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences".
The Otto Hahn Prize is awarded jointly by the City of Frankfurt am Main, the German Physical Society (DPG) and the German Chemical Society (GDCh). It serves to promote science, particularly in the fields of chemistry, physics and applied engineering sciences, by recognizing outstanding scientific achievements. It is endowed with 50,000 euros and is awarded every two years with a ceremony in Frankfurt's Paulskirche. (DPG/GDCh/Stadt Frankfurt/BP)
Stream from the awarding of the Otto Hahn Prize 2021 to Klaus Blaum (in German)
About the Otto Hahn Prize (in German)
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Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Marco Durante, Head of GSI's Biophysics Department, Professor Silvia Masciocchi, Head of the ALICE Research Group at GSI, and Dr. Ingo Peter, Head of Press and Public Relations of GSI and FAIR, welcomed the Italian guests. The visit program focused on the current and planned research activities as well as the high-tech developments for FAIR, especially the Italian activities in this regard.
H.E. Ambassador Armando Varricchio is regarded as one of the most prominent and well-known diplomats of the Republic of Italy. He has broad international experience at various political levels and served as diplomatic advisor to several Italian Prime Ministers. He has been Italian Ambassador to Germany since June 2021, and previously served as Ambassador to the United States. During his visit, Armando Varricchio was impressed by the highly promising prospects opened up by the FAIR international accelerator center currently being built at GSI: "FAIR is a fascinating international project that offers unique opportunities and promotes new developments. The research and experiments at GSI and FAIR are important for scientific progress that benefits the entire society. I am pleased that Italy plays an important role here with the cooperation of many dedicated Italian scientists and the Italian high-tech industry."
"I am extremely pleased that we could warmly welcome Armando Varricchio to our institution. We are very honored that one of his first travels as ambassador to Germany is to our research facility. We would like to thank him for his great interest in our science," said Professor Paolo Giubellino. "The Italian science community and GSI/FAIR are closely linked. Researchers from Italy are making excellent contributions in a variety of scientific and technical fields at GSI and FAIR and Italy has a huge industrial return from the realization of high-tech components for FAIR. We hope to further strengthen this successful collaboration with Italy in the future."
Italy is strongly involved on the scientific and technological side with GSI/FAIR: Building on a long-standing collaboration between Italian research institutions such as the Italian National Nuclear Physics Institute (Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare, INFN) and GSI/FAIR, Italian researchers are represented in many fields and collaborations at GSI and FAIR. This for example refers to the field of biophysics with its wide thematic range from space research to tumor therapy, or to the large-scale experiment R3B, which allows reaction experiments with high-energy exotic nuclei. Moreover, over 40 GSI/FAIR employees are Italian, including the Scientific Managing Director and two heads of departments.
In addition, a number of important assignments for FAIR high-tech components are realized by Italian companies. For example, the superconducting magnets for the fragment separator (Super-FRS), the central apparatus of the NUSTAR experiment, are manufactured by ASG Superconductors and power converters by OCEM, both Italian companies. Further examples of important technological collaboration also exist at the large FAIR ring accelerator: Parts of the test program for the quadrupole module series are carried out at a test facility in Salerno, Italy.
During a guided tour, the guests were able to inform themselves in detail about FAIR. Some of the stations where young Italian researchers as well as responsible scientists gave insights into their work were the HADES experiment, the medical radiation unit of biophysics and the test facility for superconducting accelerator magnets. The guests were also able to see the progress of the construction work for the future accelerator center from the viewing platform located directly at the FAIR construction site. Afterwards, there was an opportunity for a meeting of the diplomatic visitors with Italian scientists and a short address of the ambassador to his compatriots working at GSI/FAIR. (BP)
Armando Varricchio has been Italian Ambassador to the Federal Republic of Germany since June 21, 2021, after serving as Italian Ambassador to the United States since March 2, 2016. At the Permanent Representation of Italy to the European Union, as Head of Cabinet of the Minister for European Affairs and as Diplomatic Advisor to the President of the European Commission, Ambassador Varricchio dealt mainly with European and transatlantic issues. As Diplomatic Advisor to Prime Ministers Enrico Letta and Matteo Renzi, and previously as Assistant Diplomatic Advisor to President Giorgio Napolitano, he handled the most complicated international issues, particularly security issues.
As a personal representative ("Sherpa") at the G7/G8 and G20 summits, he dealt with the most important global issues, especially economic and financial issues, at both the national and European levels.
He was Ambassador in Belgrade and before that Head of the Economic Section of the Embassy in Washington, while as a young diplomat in Budapest he witnessed the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact and the Soviet Union. He graduated with honors (Laurea con lode) in international relations from the University of Padua and embarked on a diplomatic career in 1986, reaching the rank of ambassador in 2014. Previously, he worked in the private sector as assistant to the financial director of the Italian textile company Marzotto Group.
He is a recipient of the Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic and has received numerous honors from abroad.
]]>Dr. Christian Graeff, who leads the Medical Physics group at GSI Biophysics, is a new professor at the Department of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology (ETIT) at TU Darmstadt. His teaching is within the framework of the Master's program in Medical Technology, which provides knowledge and skills in engineering and human medicine. After studying medical engineering at the Technical University of Hamburg-Harburg, Christian Graeff received his doctorate with a study on computer tomography-assisted diagnostics of osteoporosis. He worked as postdoc in the Medical Physics group of the Biophysics Department at GSI, before taking over as head of this group in 2012.
His research has focused on innovative applications of ion beams (for example, research on the treatment of cardiac arrhythmias with the use of carbon ions), the development of methods for irradiating moving targets with scanned ion beams and the development of new therapy control systems for raster scanning. For his scientific achievements, Christian Graeff was awarded the Günther von Pannewitz Prize of the German Society of Radiation Oncology (DEGRO) and the Behnken-Berger Prize for young scientists.
Dr. Burkhard Jakob, who heads Molecular Radiobiology and Imaging group within GSI Biophysics, is taking over an honorary professorship at the Department of Biology at TU Darmstadt; his teaching activities include, for example, conducting the master's module "Radiation Biophysics". After studying chemistry at the University of Würzburg, Burkhard Jakob obtained his PhD on oxidation-sensitive fluorescent dyes for the determination of ozone distribution in leaves. He joined GSI as a postdoc already in 1999, after that he worked in the Molecular Radiobiology group as a senior scientist before taking over as head of this group in 2019.
His research focuses on the biological effects and molecular and the microscopic visualization of cellular responses to ionizing radiation, as DNA damage and subsequent repair mechanisms especially following particle irradiation. For his scientific achievements, Burkhard Jakob received the prize of the German Society for Radiation Biology Research (GBS) for young scientists and the Hanns Langendorff Award for the first evidence of a localized DNA damage response in a cell nucleus after densely ionizing particle irradiation as well as the live cell microscopy measurements of dynamic repair processes at the GSI beamlines.
The Head of the Department, Marco Durante, who is already professor at TUDa-Physics said “I am very proud of the group leaders in the Biophysics Department. Their appointment at TUDa is a sign of the world-class science that our group is doing at GSI, and of the quality of the group leaders. GSI-Biophysics is world leader in research in heavy ion biological effects ad its applications in therapy and space”. (BP)
]]>The trilateral science platform was held under the theme "Cross-border innovations for Central Europe". Organized by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) in close cooperation with the Free State of Saxony, the conference brought together high-ranking representatives from politics, science and research in Poland, the Czech Republic and Germany. Among others the President of the German Bundestag Wolfgang Schäuble, the Prime Minister of Poland Mateusz Morawiecki and Petr Očko, Deputy Minister at the Ministry of Industry and Trade of the Czech Republic, participated.
The platform provided great visions in burning topics such sustainable regional cooperation, Industry 4.0, hydrogen based mobility options for future, industry participation in incubating more startups in a tri- or bilateral framework, existing partnerships and funding programs for mobility of young scientists and students, and also highlighted how can one benefit from exiting partnership. The participants discussed opportunities and challenges of research and innovation for the sustainable economic development of Central Europe.
On the second day, a panel discussion focused on German-Polish cooperation in multilateral-large facilities was held, moderated by Ms. Ministerial Conductor Dr. Oda Keppler from the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF). Professor Paolo Giubellino (Scientific Managing Director of GSI/FAIR, Germany), Alicja Nowakowska (Vice-Chair of Administrative and Finance Committee FAIR, Jagiellonian University Poland), and Professor Maciej Chorowski (Wrocław University of Science and Technology, Poland) were on the panel. The panel participants educated the audience on how the FAIR project has been an exemplary example of Polish-German cooperation, emphasizing the importance of an international effort, scientific collaboration, and strong business partnerships in bringing cutting-edge technology to big science infrastructure and to the market.
The event marked yet another step in the cooperation based on mutual interests between GSI/FAIR and the Polish universities with the aims to promote mobility opportunities for young students and researchers, create synergies between partners, and facilitate the creation of a framework for conducive capacity building for FAIR's future operation. At the signing ceremony, in presence of State Secretary Professor Wolf-Dieter Lukas, FAIR/GSI and the respective Polish university representatives Professor Przemyslaw Wiszewski, rector of the University of Wrocław, and Professor Maciej Chorowski, Wrocław University of Science and Technology, inked the respective partnership agreements with FAIR managing directors Dr. Ulrich Breuer and Professor Paolo Giubellino. The event was streamed live though the BMBF streaming platform on their website.
Professor Paolo Giubellino said: “The FAIR Project is an international endeavour to build a world-class facility for next-generation scientists. Poland is one of the founding members of FAIR. It brings me great satisfaction to see that two of the premier universities from Poland and FAIR/GSI team up to promote mobility opportunities and support early-stage researchers to cooperate in collaborative research in basic science and advance technologies. International collaborations are essential to improve research quality and to promote talent development. The GET_INvolved partnerships with the University of Wrocław and the Wrocław University of Science and Technology are examples of our fruitful collaboration with Polish universities in creating opportunities for young scientists”.
Professor Przemyslaw Wiszewski said: “The University of Wrocław wishes to conduct joint, top-quality international research together with other research centers. It is important to take advantage of our geographical location for this purpose. Here in Central Europe, where Poland, the Czech Republic and Germany meet, we hope to conduct research and projects that are important on a European scale. Our goal is that in a few years, Europe will hear about a strong international research consortium, in which scientists not only from our three countries work together, but to which, thanks to the strong scientific position, we attract outstanding researchers from all over the world.”
Professor Maciej Chorowski said: “Wrocław University of Science and Technology is a well-recognized center of excellence in cryogenics – a key superconducting high energy accelerator technology. Thanks to the construction of FAIR accelerator complex, we have a unique possibility to develop and deliver state of art components allowing cryostating of superconducting magnets and bus bars. The experience gained at FAIR and other Big Science laboratories allows us to participate actively in hydrogen driven transformation of power generation and mobility. The GET_INvolved partnership with FAIR will help students and young scientists to enter a global research community.”
Professor Dariusz Lydzba said: “At Wrocław University of Science and Technology we strive to become a major European research university. That is why developing international cooperation is so important to us. Not only to show the possibilities and laboratories that we have, but also to make it easier for the scientists from Wrocław Tech to access the solutions that our European partners have. This agreement proves it, but it is also a clear signal that the position of Wrocław University of Science and Technology is getting stronger. I believe that it will be a big step into the future for all the consortium members, and we will not have to wait long for the effects.” (BP)
For more information on the GET_INvolved program interested persons can contact the respective coordinators Dr. Pradeep Ghosh GSI und FAIR, Pradeep.Ghosh@fair-center.eu), Dr. Jaroslaw Polinksi (WUST, jaroslaw.polinski@pwr.edu.pl) and Professor Eugeniusz Zych (University of Wrocław, prorektor.nauka@uwr.edu.pl).
Very special exotic nuclei are in the focus of researchers in the upcoming experiment period: so-called hypernuclei. Regular atomic nuclei are made of protons and neutrons, which in turn are composed of a total of three up and down quarks. If one of these quarks is replaced by another type, a so-called strange quark, a hyperon is formed. Atomic nuclei that contain one or more hyperons are called hypernuclei. They can be produced in particle collisions at accelerators, and their decay can then be observed in experiment setups such as the WASA detector and the FRS in order to study their properties in detail.
Professor Takehiko Saito, leading scientist in the GSI/FAIR research pillar NUSTAR, is the first author of the paper “New directions in hypernuclear physics” in the journal Nature Reviews Physics, which highlights previous results, open questions and new possibilities in the field of hypernuclear research. “Hypernuclei could shed light on what happens inside neutron stars. According to current predictions, hypernuclei should exist there abundantly. However, some of their properties have not yet been accurately determined. Among other things, the researchers want to determine the binding energy and lifetimes of different hypernuclei more precisely in future experiments, as well as discover new variations,” Saito says. “For this purpose, the HypHI experiment, previously operated at GSI/FAIR, has already achieved exciting results, but has now reached its limits. The combination of WASA and FRS promises new insights and information. The detector has a higher detection efficiency for measuring all the decay products of the hypernuclei. In the future, the FAIR facility, which is currently being built, will also open up extensive new opportunities for the study of hypernuclei.”
WASA stands for “Wide Angle Shower Apparatus” and is designed to trace the tracks of large numbers of particles that are emitted in energetic nuclear collisions. Thus, the device is a huge, almost closed sphere, equipped with countless measuring instruments, some of which protrude outward like spikes. They consist of scintillators and gaseous detectors that can detect charged and neutral particles. Inside is a superconducting solenoid magnet that must be cooled to four Kelvin with liquid helium. Most of the detectors are currently improved by the international WASA@FRS collaboration. The Japanese team of the collaboration plays a leading role in the development and upgrade of the detector.
Responsible for the technical setup of the WASA detector at FRS are the two NUSTAR engineers Tobias Weber and Philipp Schwarz. “Due to the tight spatial constraints at the FRS, the compact and powerful WASA detector was the best choice for the planned experiments at FRS,” Weber explains. “We had to remove several parts of the FRS to make space available for WASA.” Schwarz adds: “To transport the detector to its final destination, we had to carefully move the delicate components, which weigh several tons, across our experiment halls via several overhead cranes. Fortunately, everything went well and according to schedule so far. Soon we will be able to start the commissioning at the FRS to ensure everything will be ready for the experiments next year.”
Prior to the installation at GSI/FAIR, WASA had already completed a number of experiment campaigns. The setup was originally used at the Svedberg Laboratory in Sweden and later at the COSY ring at Forschungszentrum Jülich. Its installation at FRS is also only temporary. Following the upcoming experiments, it will be removed and the FRS will again be ready for other NUSTAR experiments studying further exotic nuclei. (CP)
The work addresses high-power laser-driven sources in the XUV range as an alternative to large-scale light sources such as synchrotrons or free-electron lasers (FEL). These can be obtained, as Klas has shown, by high harmonic generation (HHG) of high average power ultrafast fiber lasers. Such laser-like XUV sources, which are less complex and more accessible to the user, nowadays find applications in lensless imaging or time-resolved spectroscopy. In particular, they can be combined with the storage ring facilities at GSI and FAIR for precision spectroscopy. This combination will enable unique research beyond today’s state of the art.
In this context, a proof-of-principle experiment targeting XUV photoionization of carbon ions based on a laser-driven table-top XUV source has been proposed, granted beam time, and conducted by the SPARC collaboration at CRYRING in 2019 and 2021. Klas provided groundbreakting contributions during his doctoral studies to enable XUV laser spectroscopy at heavy ion storage rings for the first time. The work was carried out at Friedrich Schiller University Jena, the Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Optics and Precision Engineering in Jena, and the Helmholtz Institute Jena.
The SPARC PhD Award has been presented annually since 2018 and comes with a prize money of 200 euros. The award honors the best PhD thesis within the collaboration concerning atomic physics with heavy ions at the research facilities of GSI and FAIR. SPARC stands for Stored Particles Atomic Physics Research Collaboration. Currently, more than 400 members from 26 countries belong to the collaboration. They are experimenting with the existing atomic physics facilities at GSI and preparing new experiments and setups at the future FAIR accelerator. (CP)
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The cryostat of the HELIAC demonstrator has a length of five meters in total. In the future, it will contain three accelerator cavities of Crossbar H-mode (CH) type, as well as a beam focusing cavity (buncher). These components are still being tested or manufactured. This is why, for now, externally identical dummy cavities were installed, which do not contain the internal structures. They are used to ascertain the mechanical behavior of the module under cooling. Two finalized solenoid lenses and two steering elements — both superconducting — are already installed.
For the first time, the demonstrator has now been successfully cooled down to four Kelvin using liquid helium from the GSI magnet test facility. The superconducting solenoid lenses were used to focus heavy ion beams from the GSI high-charge injector through the cryomodule and keep them on axis using correction coils.
“Thus, all relevant transverse beam optical investigations could already be successfully performed with the setup. This means that an important milestone in the commissioning of the module has been achieved,” explains Professor Winfried Barth, head of the Section 1 for Accelerators and Integrated Detectors at the Helmholtz Institute Mainz and, at the same time, head of the GSI “Linac” department. The Helmholtz Institute Mainz, a branch of GSI, is responsible for all R&D-activities in order to realize the HELIAC project.
“Shortly, the Advanced Demonstrator will be transported to the Superconducting Radio Frequency Laboratory of the Helmholtz Institute in Mainz, which provides unique manufacturing infrastructure and the high-purity conditions for the final assembly of the cryogenic module,” adds his deputy and HELIAC project manager Dr. Maksym Miski-Oglu. “The next step there will be to integrate the three functional CH cavities and the buncher into the cryomodule. Final commissioning with heavy-ion beam is planned for mid-2022 at GSI/FAIR.”
The HELIAC CH-cavities, which are also superconducting, can accelerate heavy ions with high efficiency. Because of its continuous-wave mode of operation, the setup is also known as a cw linac. Several experimental areas shall benefit from the continuous particle beam in the future, such as superheavy elements research and materials research. (CP)
]]>By linking different technologies, an interdisciplinary team of scientist of the Materials Research Department of GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, the National Scientific and Technical Research Council (CONICET) in Argentina and the University of Illinois in the USA, has developed a highly sensitive nanopore sensor that specifically detects SARS-CoV-2 viruses and human adenoviruses in a variety of specimen including saliva, serum or environmental samples such as wastewater. The sensor combines two key components: a sensitive nanochannel and highly specific DNA molecules attached to the channel surface. According to the research groups, the method is as precise as PCR tests, but simpler and faster providing results in less than two hours. The results are published in the prestigious journal Science Advances.
The technology for the fabrication of membranes with single nanopores has been developed at GSI over many years. Thin polymer films are irradiated with one individual high-energy heavy ion projectile (e.g. 1 GeV gold ion) at the linear accelerator UNILAC. As the ion passes through the film, it creates a nanoscopic damage trail that is converted into an open nanochannel by chemical etching. The precise diameter and the shape of the channel are adjusted by the etching parameters. For this work, asymmetric nanopores with a small opening of less than 50 nanometers were fabricated. The small size and the specific geometry ensures a particularly high level of sensitivity for transport processes through the channel.
The selectivity of the sensor is provided by an in-vitro selection process for DNA fragments, so-called aptamers, which are incorporated into the nanopore. These selective aptamers are not only able to recognize the specific virus but can also differentiate the infectivity status of the virus. The here applied aptamers were developed by Ana Sol Peinetti during her work as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Being familiar with the GSI nanopore technology from her previous stay in the group of Omar Azzaroni, at the Institute for Theoretical and Applied Physicochemical Research (INIFTA, CONICET-UNLP) (Argentina), she successfully combined both technologies.
The fact that this method can distinguish infectious from noninfectious viruses is an essential innovation, according to the scientists. The well-known PCR tests detect viral genetic material but cannot distinguish whether a sample is infectious or whether a person is contagious. The only tests which can currently detect infectious viruses are plaque assays. They require special preparation and days of incubation before providing results, while the new aptamer-nanopore sensor yields results within 30 minutes up to two hours and requires no pre-treatment of the sample.
Reading out the infectivity status of a virus not only provides information about whether patients are contagious or not, but also offers a way of finding out if certain inactivation strategies actually work. “Together with Omar Azzaroni and Ana Sol Peinetti (now group leader at the Institute of Chemistry, Physics of Materials, Environment and Energy, in Buenos Aires), we collaborate in a new project, where based on this new sensor the efficiency of various virus inactivation protocols will be tested,” states Maria Eugenia Toimil-Molares, leader of the ion-track nanotechnology group at GSI.
Nanopore-sensor technology also has great potential beyond the Corona pandemic. "To detect other viruses, you have to look for the pool of molecules that serve as aptamers; new molecules for new viruses. We even intend to obtain aptamers that can discern between different variants of SARS-Cov-2," explains Peinetti. In the paper, the authors also demonstrate the detection of infectious human adenoviruses, responsible for respiratory water-borne diseases worldwide.
Beyond the virus detection, the GSI nanopore technology is the basis of other sensor options. Numerous groups around the world are developing specific functionalization strategies to impart selective functionalities to nanopore sensors. Nanopores in ion-track membranes are very versatile because they can be modified to respond to many different external changes, such as temperature, pH, light, voltage, or the presence of specific ion species, molecules, or drugs. During the last years, several highly sensitive nanopore-sensor platforms have been developed in collaboration with the colleagues at INIFTA. “Our vision is to integrate the functionalized nanopore membrane into a portable device for rapid and efficient virus detection and diagnosis,” says Christina Trautmann, head of the GSI Materials Research Department. (LW)
The Hessian Ministry of Higher Education, Research, Science and the Arts has approved the foundation of a research academy to further the involvement of Hessian universities in the FAIR particle accelerator and will fund it with three million euros per year. The new Helmholtz Research Academy Hesse for FAIR (HFHF), with three locations in Darmstadt, Frankfurt and Giessen, will support FAIR-focused science at Technical University of Darmstadt, Goethe University Frankfurt and Justus Liebig University Giessen.
“With FAIR, a globally unique facility is being built that is also of outstanding importance for the Hessian research landscape,” explains Hesse's Science Minister Angela Dorn. “With the particle accelerator, it will be possible to investigate the structure of matter and the development of the Universe from the Big Bang to the present. The topics range from fundamental knowledge to the development of novel applications for technology and medicine. Hesse's universities are to play a leading role in this. The bright minds of tomorrow will also benefit from this source of knowledge — Hesse's young scientists and students. This is why we are establishing the Helmholtz Research Academy Hessen for FAIR.”
The international large research facility FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) is being built as a non-university research facility next to the site of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt. As an institution spanning across universities, the research academy is to expand the expertise in the FAIR research areas available at the three universities and the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS), and establish it in the long term. The state has already supported FAIR-oriented research at the universities within the framework of the LOEWE Excellence Initiative, thus enabling the establishment of around 30 new professorships. The HFHF is now mainly dedicated to promoting talented young researchers.
“As FAIR promises world-class research for several decades, it is essential to attract and nurture the best young scientists today in order to make the most of these long-term opportunities. The Research Academy enables us to achieve this goal at the universities and to play a leading role in FAIR research,” emphasizes Professor Dr. Dr.-Ing. Peter Kämpfer, spokesperson of the HFHF Board and Vice President for Research and Graduate Studies at the Justus Liebig University in Gießen.
The scientific orientation of the HFHF is coordinated by eight directors who hold professorships at HFHF partner universities and are internationally renowned experts in the various research fields of FAIR. The Managing Director of the Research Academy, Professor Dr. Dr. h. c. Marcus Bleicher of Goethe University Frankfurt, sees the new institution as a unique opportunity: “The funding of the Research Academy will allow me and my colleagues at the partner institutions to conduct long-term FAIR-oriented research at a high international level and to play a leading role in the various FAIR research areas.”
An international evaluation committee reviewed HFHF's research plan for 2021 to 2025 very favorably and recommended it for implementation. “In the expert panel, we were very impressed with the research plan that was submitted to us for evaluation. On this basis, the research academy will be able to achieve excellent scientific results and secure a leading role for the Hessian universities in FAIR research,” says Professor Karl-Heinz Kampert, astroparticle physicist at the University of Wuppertal and chairman of the evaluation committee, summarizing the result.
The three universities participating in the research academy contribute a total of 5 million euros annually to the academic endowment of the HFHF. “The promotion of excellent young scientists and the cooperation with GSI is worth it to us,” emphasizes Professor Dr. Barbara Albert, Vice President for Research and Early Careers at the TU Darmstadt.
GSI flanks the funding via bilateral collaborations with research groups of the partner universities and FIAS in the financial scope of 3 million euros per year also. “GSI and later FAIR as well as our Hessian partners will benefit greatly from continuing this tradition in the long term. It is essential for our center not only to enable cutting-edge research, but also to inspire young scientists for this research. We have succeeded through our close cooperation with the universities. HFHF will not only continue this tradition, but also expand it further, for the benefit of research in general, but above all to secure Hesse as a location for science,” enthuses Professor Dr. Dr. h.c. mult. Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR and Professor of Nuclear Physics at the TU Darmstadt. (HMWK/BP)
The Helmholtz Research Academy Hesse for FAIR
Press release by the Hessian Ministry of Higher Education, Research, Science and the Arts
]]>The one-hour events begin with a short lecture on the research topic of the scientists, after which they are available for a discussion with the students. “This should not be limited to scientific questions, but can also be about the everyday life of researchers. Students are invited to also talk about other aspects such as choosing a course of study, career, work-life balance or gender aspects,” says project manager and initiator Dr. Arjan Vink, head of the GSI/FAIR Grant Office. “These deeper insights into science are intended to provide an incentive for young people to consider a career in science in their upcoming choice of profession.”
The more than 20 participating researchers from GSI and FAIR were specifically prepared in previous workshops to answer the questions of the students, aided by technical equipment for video conferences, which was acquired especially for the project. All scientific topics related to GSI and FAIR are covered: Whether construction and operation of accelerators, work on giant detectors for measuring nuclear reactions, events in the Universe, research into new, super-heavy elements or tumor therapy with ion beams — experts are available for all these and many more research areas. Career stages from PhD students to professors are represented to provide insight into career paths.
The events take place online as video conferences. High-school teachers can request appointments to "Meet a scientist" as a class. Classes can then dial into the events either as individuals or as a group. An overview of participating scientists, available times, and how to participate can be found at www.gsi.de/meet-a-scientist. Interested parties can register directly on the web or contact meetascientist(at)gsi.de with any queries. If demand is high, the project will possibly continue beyond the two weeks.
The pilot project "Meet a scientist" is supported by the Hessian Ministry of Science (HMWK) and Arts and by the Helmholtz Research Academy Hessen for FAIR (HFHF). (CP)
From 27 September to 2nd October, 2021, the big science festival "Highlights of Physics" will take place in Würzburg. The central element is a large hands-on exhibition on the market square. Scientists from all over Germany will present their research there and will be available for questions, explanations and discussions. GSI and FAIR are also represented with a booth and offer facts and entertainment around the future particle accelerator facility FAIR - the universe in the lab.
At the GSI and FAIR booth on the market place, the accelerator game attracts the public: Young and old can try out for themselves how a particle accelerator works and learn more about one of the largest construction projects for fundamental research. Those who are not on site in Würzburg can still participate: The exhibition can be visited on three days via live stream on YouTube. On Friday, October 1, the GSI and FAIR booth will also be presented. In a subsequent live chat, all online viewers can ask questions and participate interactively.
In addition to the exhibition, there will be daily science shows on the open-air stage at the marketplace, a varied lecture program, live experiments, and an extensive online offering with an interactive children's program. A daily lecture program will take place in the Audimax of the University of Würzburg, as will the Phänomikon hands-on exhibition. With an exciting mix of an interactive on-site program and digital offerings, physicists will provide an X-ray view into space and show, for example, how lasers can be used to track down greenhouse gases. In addition, the latest developments for quantum computers will be presented, as well as many other interesting topics where physics plays an important role in our lives. With the daily lecture series "Röntgenblicke," the organizers of the "Highlights of Physics" will commemorate the 175th birthday of Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen last year.
The week-long physics spectacle kicked off on September 27 with the big Highlights Show at the s.Oliver Arena with ARD presenter Ranga Yogeshwar (watch now on YouTube). The week of events will conclude with a special evening lecture in which Communicator Award winner Prof. Metin Tolan will explore the question of whether scenes from James Bond films are physically possible at all; the lecture will be accompanied by live James Bond film music performed by the Würzburg Philharmonic Orchestra. Both events can also be seen in the YouTube live stream.
The "Highlights of Physics" are organized by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), the German Physical Society (DPG) and the University of Würzburg. The "Highlights of Physics" were launched in 2001 by the BMBF and the DPG. In recent years, they have attracted up to 60,000 visitors.
Admission to all events is free (in some cases free admission tickets or registration are required). The conditions and infection control measures required for on-site visits can be found here. (LW)
The very first superconducting magnets for NUSTAR (Nuclear Structure Astrophysics and Reactions) have been tested at the European research center CERN in Switzerland. NUSTAR is one of the four large experiment pillars at the future international accelerator center FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research), which is currently being built at GSI.
As part of a collaboration agreement between CERN and GSI/FAIR signed in 2012, 56 magnet assemblies intended for the Super-Fragment Separator (Super-FRS), the central device of the NUSTAR experiment, will be entirely tested and validated at CERN. Thus, 32 multiplets and 24 dipoles will be tested at the Laboratory. The multiplets are manufactured by the Italian company ASG, the dipoles by the Spanish company Elytt. For this purpose, a new test facility has been especially designed and constructed in CERN’s Building #180 to validate no fewer than 30 types of magnets. Three test benches have been created by experts from CERN and GSI to accommodate up to 7-metre-long, 3.5-metre-high magnet assemblies. The heaviest ones weigh up to 70 tons.
“A large and complex cryogenic system has been developed, combining two pre-cooling/warming-up units and a 4.5 K liquid helium refrigerator,” explains Antonio Perin, work package leader for the cryogenic system. “The plant is designed for continuous operation: the validation tests are performed on one bench, while the second bench is cooling down and the third one is warming up; the test sequence lasts about six weeks for each magnet.” During the tests, the magnets are powered to their nominal current and their magnetic field is accurately mapped. The powering and magnetic measurement systems have been adapted to the new test facility, which was made possible thanks to the unique combination of competences existing at CERN.
“We are currently testing the first-of-series magnets; the multiplet series will be delivered next year. All 56 magnet assemblies should be tested by 2026,” says Dr. Germana Riddone, CERN’s technical coordinator of the test facility at CERN. “Many CERN groups and GSI partners have been involved in the successful installation of the new test facility and its commissioning, and still are now for the validation tests. The collaboration with GSI is a very good example of how CERN works hand-in-hand with national infrastructures and how that adds mutual value.” Dr. Antonella Chiuchiolo, GSI work package leader for on-site testing at CERN, agrees: "We are very pleased that our testing activities at CERN can proceed so smoothly and on schedule."
The Project Leader Super-FRS at GSI/FAIR, Dr. Haik Simon, was also very pleased with the start of the tests and explains: “The multiplets will later be used in FAIR's Super-FRS for beam focusing in order to achieve a high-precision particle beam. The dipoles will serve later to specifically deflect a split up the particle beam“. The Super-FRS of the future FAIR accelerator center is an important component of the entire facility with great potential for scientific discovery: This part of the accelerator complex will be used for experiments on the fundamental structure of extremely rare exotic nuclei. “For these experiments, ions of the heaviest elements will be shot at a target, where they will shatter upon impact. The resulting fragments will include exotic nuclei that the Super-FRS can separate and supply for further experiments. With the new separator, nuclei up to uranium can be produced at relativistic energies and can be separated into pure isotopes. Because this entire process lasts for only a few hundred nanoseconds, the Super-FRS provides researchers access to very short-lived nuclei,” says Dr. Haik Simon. (CERN/BP)
The participants of the HITM school were presented with a multidisciplinary approach which started from basic concepts, included state-of-the-art practices and methods, and involved discussions of open points and needed research, as well as future plans for upcoming upgrades and developments. While overview lectures, partly delivered by GSI experts, provided the necessary broad panorama, specialized presentations and hands-on sessions focused on the treatment planning details. These were based on the matRad open-source professional toolkit, developed by the Deutsches Krebsforschungszentrum (DKFZ) in Heidelberg specifically for training and research.
Expert matRad tutors from DKFZ and LMU guided participants from software installation to the execution of involved treatment planning cases, demonstrating the benefits, but also the challenges of heavy-ion therapy compared to different treatment modalities. Approx. 200 participants delivered their hands-on results, which was awarded with a certificate of attendance.
The course used informative videos of the European heavy-ion therapy centers and research infrastructures, including GSI/FAIR, included real-time virtual visits to these labs and offered numerous opportunities for interaction with their experts. GSI experts also participated in dedicated sessions, where students presented their results and research projects as well as in the evening social events providing information on future career paths.
The online mode made the school easily accessible worldwide: Over thousand participants, almost equally distributed between European and non-European countries, ranging from undergraduate students to practitioners, followed all or parts of the program. These unprecedented high numbers, as well as the received comments, show an increasing interest in heavy-ion therapy, the technology introduced in Europe by GSI.
Within the HITRIplus project, promising early stage researchers will be candidates to be further supported by the upcoming HITRIplus schools on clinical and medical aspects, as well as by HITRIplus internships. Thus, they can optimally access the existing European heavy-ion therapy centers and research facilities, among which GSI/FAIR, contributing to relevant research projects, upgrades and future developments.
The format of the HITM school was inspired by the Particle Therapy MasterClasses (PTMC), a project also coordinated by GSI, that in 2021 attracted more than 1500 high-school students in 20 countries and 37 institutes. Several of the HITM school participants were eager to participate in future PTMC projects as tutors and moderators further motivating the younger generations.
The HITRIplus project, that has received funds from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under grant agreement No 101008548, motivated by the response and success of this first course is preparing already the next courses based on the uplifting received feedback of numerous grateful participants. (CP)
After introductory information on the status of the FAIR construction project, the campus development, previous research successes and current experiments, the FDP politician and a physicist by education was given insights into the existing research facilities on the GSI and FAIR campus during a guided tour. The tour included the test facility for superconducting accelerator magnets, where mainly high-tech components for FAIR are tested, the linear accelerator UNILAC, the SHIP experiment, where the GSI elements 107 to 112 were produced, and the energy-efficient supercomputing center Green IT Cube.
After this, Till Mansmann had the opportunity to get an overview of the entire construction site and the activities in the northern and southern construction areas from the viewing platform on the edge of the construction site. Subsequently, the FAIR construction site and the progresses there were visited at close range during a tour. One highlight was the walk-through of the recently completed underground accelerator tunnel. The central ring accelerator SIS100 will be the heart of the future facility.
Also shown was the CBM experiment, which is well advanced in construction. The unique CBM (Compressed Baryonic Matter) experiment is one of the four research pillars of the future FAIR accelerator facility. The focus is on the investigation of highly compressed baryonic matter, as it exists in neutron stars and in the center of supernova explosions.
The development in the south of the construction field is also progressing well: This includes the structural work for six buildings and for a futher experimental facility – the superconducting fragment separator (Super-FRS). It will focus on research topics concerning the nuclear structure and interactions of extremely rare, exotic particles. The bus tour was completed with a stop at the large container facility on the southwestern edge of the FAIR construction site. From there, the construction planning for FAIR and the coordination of the FAIR construction site takes place. (BP)
]]>Two state-of-the-art instruments, GLAD and COCOTIER, were designed and built at the Institute of Research into the Fundamental Laws of the Universe (Institut de recherche sur les lois fondamentales de l’Univers, IRFU) in Saclay, France, recently and are now operational in the R3B experimental site of GSI. In the future, both will be used at FAIR, the international accelerator facility currently under construction at GSI.
GLAD is a large acceptance spectrometer for the analysis of relativistic radioactive heavy ion beam reactions. It was installed on site in 2015 and saw beam for the first time in fall of 2018. In some experiments, these beams will interact upstream with the COCOTIER liquid hydrogen target. The latter has just been used for the first time in the FAIR Phase 0 experiments in March 2021. These two pieces of equipment are key elements for measuring the properties of nuclei at the limit of nuclear stability and allow current nuclear models to evolve towards more predictive ones.
Following the successful testing of the cold mass (screen, vacuum chamber) of the GLAD magnet, (22 tons at 4.5 Kelvin) at Saclay in a cryogenic test station of IRFU, GLAD had been installed in its cryostat and transported to GSI, where it was installed in the experimental halls. It was positioned, as well as connected to its power supply and to its cooling system by GSI teams. Following a beam test in the fall of 2018, GLAD was successfully used in the 2019, 2020 and also the 2021 R3B FAIR Phase 0 campaigns, where for the first time the COCOTIER target was employed.
The COCOTIER (COrrélations à COurte porTée et spin IsotopiquE à R3B – for short-range Correlations and Isotopic spin at R3B) liquid hydrogen target is designed to perform quasi-free scattering experiments where the nucleus to be studied, in the form of a beam, impacts on a target of protons that will selectively eject a proton or a neutron from the nucleus in question. To compensate for the low intensity of the exotic beams, dense (hence the need to liquefy hydrogen) and very thick (up to 15 centimeters) proton targets are used. It is therefore necessary to reconstruct the position of the reaction vertex inside the target using a tracking detector. This information is necessary to perform the spectroscopy of the studied nuclei in order to correct the trajectories and the energy loss of the measured particles.
To liquefy hydrogen at pressures close to atmospheric pressure, it must be cooled to cryogenic temperatures (21 Kelvin). The hydrogen is liquefied in a condenser cooled by a cryocooler and flows into the target cell due to gravity. Turbomolecular pumping allows to obtain a high vacuum (10-6 millibar in the cryostat and in the target chamber) in order to limit the convective flows. The integration into the constrained R3B setup posed many challenges. The target is placed in the middle of the CALIFA calorimeter, far from the vertical of the cryostat.
The target cell is wrapped in several five micrometers thick multi-layer insulation sheets in order to reduce the radiation heat flux, especially from the tracking detectors placed at 25 millimeters in the same reaction chamber and which allow to reconstruct the position of the reaction vertex inside the target. Three target lengths of 15 millimeters, 50 millimeters and 150 millimeters were produced to meet the requirements of the experiments approved by the GSI experiment committee.
The target system was funded by the French Research Agency as a so-called in-kind contribution with the aim of pursuing the study of short-range correlations in exotic nuclei. It was designed and built at IRFU and installed at the end of 2019 at GSI by IRFU teams.
The system is controlled by a supervision system, developed at IRFU, which centralizes the information coming from the programmable logic controller and the various controllers. The system allows connecting and remote piloting via a secured internet client. During the recent FAIR Phase 0 scientific experiments this allowed in particular to perform all filling and monitoring operations of the target remotely, which was necessary due to the absence of the IRFU team on site because of the pandemic. (CP)
"The human spirit shines brightest where splendor of art unites with splendor of science," said the 19th century scholar Emil Heinrich du Bois-Reymond. Drawers and designers at GSI and FAIR have taken up this challenge and captured on paper both, the visible world of particle accelerators with their magnets and detectors and the invisible world of atoms, forces and structures. The results impressively show the wide variety of perceptions, viewpoints, and modes of representation at the limits of human imagination and at the limits of what is technically possible.
In January 2020, the Urban Sketchers Rhine-Main visited the research facilities of GSI and FAIR with about 40 people for a sketching excursion. Urban Sketchers is a global network of artists who draw the places in which they live or to which they travel, capturing what they see from direct observation. Their mission is to "show the world, one drawing at a time." In the summer of 2020, 12 students from the Offenbach University of Applied Sciences (HfG) spent a week on the GSI/FAIR campus for the workshop "Sketching as a visual means of conveying knowledge at the interface between design and science." They drew experiment setups and accelerators, but were also introduced to the world of experimental physics - from the idea of the experiment, to the technical execution and the data analysis. A selection of the works created during these two visits can be seen in the illustrated book "The Art of Science at GSI and FAIR".
The illustrated book invites to look at science and technology from different angles. As means of expression, art and design enable people to reflect on scientific and technical topics in a very special way. The illustrated book is now available at the GSI/FAIR shop and in Darmstadt at the Darmstadt Shop at the Luisenplatz (price: 24 euros). (LW)
]]>On the occasion of the 314th lecture of the series " Wissenschaft für Alle " (Pi is often given as 3.14 in short form), Professor Beutelspacher gets to the bottom of the number. Pi has fascinated humankind for thousands of years, because while this number can be explained quite simply on the one hand, it is very difficult to calculate and plays a role in surprisingly many areas of mathematics on the other hand. In the lecture all these aspects will be presented, partly supported by small experiments. A lecture that is entertaining and instructive.
Professor Albrecht Beutelspacher studied mathematics, physics and philosophy at the University of Tübingen and was subsequently awarded his doctorate and habilitation at the University of Mainz. He has been a professor at the University of Gießen since 1988. Since 2002, he has been the founding director of the Mathematikum, the world's first hands-on mathematical museum.
The following lecture by Professor Markus Roth from the Technical University of Darmstadt will take a closer look at the physics of the popular science fiction universe Star Trek in October. In November, Dr. Julia Regnery from the Alfred Wegener Institute in Bremerhaven will report on MOSAiC, the largest Arctic expedition ever undertaken. At the end of the year in December, Dr. Daniel Severin of GSI/FAIR, together with other colleagues, will report on the scientific experiments during the last operational phase of the GSI/FAIR accelerator facility in the traditional Christmas lecture.
The lectures start at 2 p. m., further information about access and the course of the event can be found on the event website at www.gsi.de/wfa (in German)
The lecture series “Wissenschaft für Alle” is aimed at all persons interested in current science and research. The lectures report on research and developments at GSI and FAIR, but also on current topics from other fields of science and technology. The aim of the series is to prepare and present the scientific processes in a way that is understandable for laypersons in order to make the research accessible to a broad public. The lectures are held by GSI and FAIR staff members or by external speakers from universities and research institutes.(CP)
The guests were welcomed by Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director and Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director as well as Dr. Ingo Peter, Head of Public Relations. Dr. Michael Meister is directly elected Member of the Bundestag for the Bergstraße constituency, Dr. Astrid Mannes is directly elected Member of the Bundestag for the Darmstadt constituency.
First, the guests gained an overview of the 20-hectare construction site from the viewing platform directly adjacent to the construction area. Subsequently, the FAIR construction site was visited at close range during a tour. One highlight was the walk-through of the recently completed underground accelerator tunnel. The central ring accelerator SIS100 will be the heart of the future facility.
The CBM experiment, which is well advanced in construction, was also shown. The unique CBM (Compressed Baryonic Matter) experiment is one of the four research pillars of the future FAIR accelerator facility. The focus is on the investigation of highly compressed baryonic matter, as it exists in neutron stars and in the center of supernova explosions.
Efficient construction progress was also noted in the construction field south: this includes the structural work for six buildings and for a further experimental facility - the Superconducting Fragment Separator (Super-FRS). There, the focus is on research topics concerning the nuclear structure and interactions of extremely rare, exotic particles.
State Secretary Meister was impressed by the significant progress made on the construction site in recent years despite pandemic conditions: "I have seen today how a vision is becoming reality in an impressive way. With the ring closure of the accelerator tunnel, a major milestone of the FAIR project has been reached: For this I would like to congratulate all those involved very warmly."
Another important focus of the visit was the high-tech development for FAIR and the very successful current FAIR Phase 0 experiments. The guests were able to gain an insight into the high-tech developments in the test facility for cryogenic magnets, where all superconducting components for the SIS100 accelerator ring are tested for their specifications before being installed in the FAIR facility.
An example of the scientific capabilities at GSI and FAIR is the R3B (Relativistic Radioactive Reaction Experiment) experiment, which was also visited. Within the R3B experiment, which was set up for FAIR in international collaboration, reaction experiments with high-energy exotic nuclei are conducted. Through this, an understanding of the origin of heavy elements can be gained.
"I am particularly impressed by the fact that although FAIR is still in the middle of construction, groundbreaking science is already being carried out here today. Whether it is Covid 19 research with heavy ions or the first experiments at the CRYRING accelerator - FAIR is already making an important contribution to find solutions to major challenges faced by society," says Meister. (BP)
]]>At a "Meet and Greet", the Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, the Administrative Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Dr. Ulrich Breuer and the Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Jörg Blaurock, got into a joint conversation with the international students and researchers from around the world participating in the GET_INvolved Program.
In summary, great progress was made in the last three years: The GET_INvolved Program received around 670 applications through midyear 2021, with approximately 200 of them being accepted into various programs in the program portfolio. Students and researchers from 38 different countries have participated in the GET_INvolved Program, with up to 40 percent of them being female. At the FAIR Phase 0 program, the majority of these students/researchers engaged in and contributed to current experiments. This engagement provided them with real-time, hands-on expertise with an in-depth understanding of the research and development at GSI/FAIR.
The current meeting with GET_Involved participants demonstrates the commitment and support from the joint management for all activities that lead to skilled training of the young generation. The goal is to offer the best research environment for the participants allowing the development of future leaders to operate and exploit the FAIR facility in near future. The Scientific Managing Director Professor Paolo Giubellino emphasized: “FAIR is going to be a world-class facility which will provide forefront technology to researchers from all nations. Thanks to its precursory program FAIR Phase 0 FAIR is a talent factory already now. So join us and GET_INvolved!“ (BP)
The GET_INvolved Program is an umbrella program that includes several bilateral/multi-lateral programs and several frameworks programs with partners and third-party funding agencies. All students and researchers are involved in a dedicated scientific or technical project with a mentor, as a part of their short term internship, bachelor or master thesis, ERASMUS+ Traineeships, sandwich doctoral or a postdoctoral research experience at GSI/FAIR. The duration for these internships vary depending on individual projects and also on the program. The project duration can range from three months for short term internships to up to two years for a research experience as a postdoc.
GET_Involved Program for international students and researchers
]]>For the first time, physicists have succeeded in successfully realizing a new method for cooling protons using laser-cooled ions - in this case beryllium ions. The innovative feature of the new system is that the two particle types are located in spatially separated traps. This means it is now possible to provide the cooling effect with the help of an electrical resonant circuit over a distance of nine centimeters from one trap to the other. The team at the PRISMA+ Cluster of Excellence at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU), part of the BASE collaboration, was able to demonstrate that protons can be cooled to significantly lower temperatures in one of the traps than would be possible without beryllium.
The new technique can be used for all charged particles, even antiprotons, for which there is no other cooling method in this temperature range. What is particularly exciting is that it should now be possible to conduct experiments in which matter and antimatter can be compared more precisely. The results of the research have been published in the eminent scientific journal Nature. In addition to JGU, the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg (MPIK) and the Japanese Research Center RIKEN, also the European Organization for Nuclear Research CERN, the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt and the Leibniz University Hannover were significantly involved in the new development.
In order to be able to make precise measurements of individual ions, they must be captured and stored in a trap in which they are kept as inert as possible. To achieve this state, energy is removed from the charged particles, which reduces their temperature. With the new two-trap structure, the research team was able to reduce the temperature by about a factor of 10 in comparison with that reached using the previous best methods of cooling protons, thus attaining a temperature close to absolute zero. “The lower the temperature of the particle, the more precisely we can restrict the space in which the particle is present inside the trap. And the more accurately we can locate the particle, the better are the starting conditions and consequently also the results of our precision measurements,” explains Dr. Christian Smorra, physicist at the PRISMA+ Cluster of Excellence and co-author of the publication.
The new two-trap cooling method comes with even more advantages: It can also be used for antimatter particles because in a single-trap cooling system, the matter and antimatter would immediately destroy each other. The new concept will enable more precise comparison of protons and antiprotons. “We want to look specifically for any difference between the properties of protons and antiprotons. Our theory says that the two particles behave identically, the only distinction being the opposed charges. It is still unclear why our universe contains so many protons – and therefore matter – but almost no antiprotons, that is antimatter,” points out Matthew Bohman of MPIK, the first author of the study. Bohman has been working on the development of the new cooling method since 2018, when he was studying for his doctorate.
Whereas previous methods required distances of 0.1 millimeters or less between the particles to be cooled and the beryllium ions, the current research has shown it is in fact possible to transmit the cooling effect despite spatial separation over a distance of nine centimeters. This creates the basis for further research projects – and enables, for example, uninterrupted and more precise frequency measurements, which the BASE collaboration plans to carry out in the case of antimatter in the context of the search for dark matter. The research group had already investigated trapped antiprotons in a single trap during previous experiments at CERN – however, this was done by cooling them with liquid helium and without employing beryllium ions.
The two-trap method was proposed for the first time in 1990. The concept at the time did not include an electric resonant circuit – instead, the ions were to be connected by a common trap electrode. The advantage of this procedure was that no resistance was present, such as that caused by the resonant circuit, which produces heat and impairs the cooling process. The big disadvantage, however, is the low speed at which the energy of the ions is exchanged. As a result, the temperature of the charged particle does not decrease quickly enough. “The current system represents a practically workable development of the concept dating back to 1990. In this case, the energy exchange between the traps occurs within one second rather than taking getting on for two minutes,” stresses Dr. Christian Smorra. (JGU/BP)
Scientific publication "Sympathetic cooling of a trapped proton mediated by an LC circuit" in the journal Nature
]]>In the coming years, scientific experiments at next-generation research facilities will become increasingly complex, leading to an exponentially growing flood of data. Data rates of up to one TeraByte per second are expected for the experiments at the planned accelerator center FAIR, which is currently being built at GSI. The aim of PUNCH4NFDI is to systematically collect, intelligently link and make accessible this extensive data using novel methods. The organization of the data should follow the principles that it is easy to retrieve, easily accessible, linkable and reusable. An important contribution in this respect will be the development of software and algorithms and the creation of publicly available publications. At the heart of PUNCH4NFDI's activities is the development of a federated "Science Data Platform" that includes all the infrastructures and interfaces necessary for access to and use of data and computing resources. For this purpose, techniques and structures are first created on the basis of representative examples that are suitable for joint data management and address topics such as open data, open science and new ideas for processing and managing extremely large amounts of data.
In addition to GSI, the PUNCH4NFDI consortium includes 19 other funding recipients as well as 22 other partners from the Helmholtz Association, the Max Planck Society, the Leibniz Association and universities. "The coordination and cooperation of all consortium partners is one of the central challenges for the realization of universal research data management. Our activities in this regard focus on the exchange of concepts and developments as well as the provision of services provided to the PUNCH4NFDI partners and the entire NFDI. In a first step, we at GSI/FAIR will develop and provide a PUNCH4NFDI-wide authorization and authentication infrastructure together with Forschungszentrum Jülich. With these tools, we enable central access to all research data of the participating institutions,” explains Kilian Schwarz, Head of the Distributed Computing Group in GSI IT and representative of GSI in the management of PUNCH4NFDI. “In addition, we plan to develop metadata and analysis portals as well as to implement basic infrastructures for federated data management and the use of heterogeneous computing resources. With the sustainable high-performance data center Green IT Cube, we provide the consortium with computing time and storage space for its developments.”
Topics related to research data infrastructures already play a central role in the handling of scientific data from experiments at the GSI/FAIR research facility. Therefore, GSI/FAIR is also active in this field in the European environment, where the realization of a common scientific cloud is also promoted. “With their proficiency and expertise in data storage infrastructures and scientific computing, GSI and FAIR are among the key players in this field. Both GSI and FAIR as ‘ESFRI-Landmark’ are active participants in the consortium ‘European Science Cluster of Astronomy & Particle Physics ESFRI Research Infrastructures’ (ESCAPE), in which we are involved in the development of data infrastructures and analysis platforms as well as the provision of research software and services,” says Arjan Vink, head of the third-party funding office at FAIR/GSI, describing the European initiative. (JL)
The guests were welcomed by Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Dr. Ulrich Breuer, Administrative Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Dr. Haik Simon, Deputy Spokesperson of FAIR Experiment R3B/Project Leader Super-FRS, and Berit Paflik from the Press and Public Relations Department at GSI and FAIR.
The program included an overview of the current research topics and the strategic goals for FAIR and GSI, which are the basis of the site's activities. Central issues were the successful experimental program in 2021, part of “FAIR Phase 0”, the campus development within the framework of the master plan, and the progress in the procurement of FAIR components and on the 20-hectare construction field in the east of the existing GSI and FAIR campus.
During a guided tour, the guests were first able to gain insights into the research facilities on campus. The experiment R3B was visited as well as the therapy unit for tumor treatment using carbon ions and the linear accelerator UNILAC. The test facility for superconducting accelerator magnets, where mainly high-tech components for FAIR are tested, was also visited.
After this, Daniela Wagner, Nina Eisenhardt and Andreas Ewald had the opportunity to get an overview of the entire construction site and the activities in the northern and southern construction areas from the viewing platform on the edge of the construction site, before taking a tour of the site to get a close-up view of the construction progress. The agenda also included a walk-through of the recently completed underground accelerator tunnel. The central ring accelerator SIS100 will be the heart of the future facility. The ring closure marks an important milestone in the realization process of the entire FAIR project. (BP)
]]>The Mitacs-GSI exchange mobility program will boost existing partnerships and help build future scientists and leaders for the operation of science facilities like the Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research FAIR, which is currently being built at the GSI. GSI has been cooperating with and benefiting from scientific and technical collaboration with Canadian institutions for years in several research projects. The organization also has a special relation with the Canadian accelerator facility TRIUMF. The new partnership is remarkable also because it is formalized in the year of the 50th anniversary of the German-Canadian science and technology cooperation. Valuable in assisting in the recruitment of high-caliber qualified PhD students and postdoctoral fellows, the initiative aims to strengthen research collaborations between both countries.
Participants will receive a grant of $6,000 through the Globalink Research Award program to advance projects for 12 to 24 weeks under the supervision of a faculty member in the host institute. Mitacs and GSI’s three-year agreement will support a total of up to 36 researchers — six Canadian students and fellows per year going to GSI Germany and six coming to Canada from Germany.
Professor Dr. Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing director of GSI and FAIR said: “It brings me great satisfaction to see Mitacs and GSI team up to promote and support early-stage researchers to gain access to world-class facilities and cooperate in collaborative research in basic science, frontend technologies, and applications. GSI is eager to support young PhD students and postdoctoral fellows in Canada and Germany collaborate on research projects. International partnerships are essential to us because they enhance research quality and promote additional knowledge networks. The partnership with Mitacs is now a great example of our successful and productive collaboration with Canadian institutions.”
Dr. John Hepburn, CEO and Scientific Director, Mitacs, said: “I am delighted to sign Mitacs’s first agreement with the GSI Helmholtz Center for Heavy Ion Research — an important step to expand our already strong connections with the German research and innovation ecosystem. We are proud to offer opportunities for PhD students and postdoctoral fellows to develop skills and expand their professional networks, while deepening collaborations that will drive outcomes for Canada and Germany.”
The details about the application process for researchers interested in the Mitacs-GSI collaboration will be released in the near future. More information about the Globalink Research Award can be found on the program’s pages on the Mitacs and GSI/FAIR websites. For immediate questions can be contacted Étienne Pineault, Director, International Business Development, Mitacs at epineault(at)mitacs.ca or Dr. Pradeep Ghosh, Programme Manager, GSI at Pr.Ghosh(at)gsi.de.
Mitacs is a not-for-profit organization that fosters growth and innovation in Canada by solving business challenges with research solutions from academic institutions. Mitacs is funded by the Government of Canada along with the Government of Alberta, the Government of British Columbia, Research Manitoba, the Government of New Brunswick, the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador, the Government of Nova Scotia, the Government of Ontario, Innovation PEI, the Government of Quebec, the Government of Saskatchewan, and the Government of Yukon.
GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt operates a worldwide leading accelerator facility for research purposes. About 1,520 employees are working at GSI. In addition, every year approximately 1,000 researchers from universities and other research institutes around the world come to GSI. They use the facility for experiments to gain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe. They also develop new applications in medicine and technology. GSI is a limited liability company (GmbH). Shareholders are the German Federal Government with 90 %, the State of Hesse with 8 %, the State of Rhineland-Palatinate and the Free State of Thuringia with 1 % each. GSI is a member of the Helmholtz Association, Germany's largest research organization. At GSI, FAIR is currently being built, an international accelerator facility for the research with antiprotons and ions which is being developed and constructed in cooperation with international partners. It is one of the world’s largest construction projects for international cutting-edge research. The FAIR project was initiated by the scientific community and researchers of GSI. The GSI accelerators will become part of the future FAIR facility and serve as the first acceleration stage.
]]>In an introduction, the minister gained insights into current topics and activities at GSI and FAIR. He learned about the research program "FAIR-Phase 0", the perspectives of campus development, the substantial modernizations of the existing facility and the current status of the realization of the FAIR construction project, one of the largest projects for cutting-edge research worldwide.
After visiting the testing hall, where new hightech components for FAIR can be assembled and tested, Michael Boddenberg got an overview of the entire 20-hectare construction area from the viewing platform. Then he took a close view at the progress on the FAIR construction site during a tour. This included a walk-through of the recently completed shell construction of the underground accelerator tunnel. The central ring accelerator SIS100 will be the heart of the future facility. There was also an opportunity to visit the central transfer building, the crucial hub for the facility’s beamline, which is currently being built over several floors. (BP)
]]>After introductory information on the status of the FAIR construction project, the campus development, previous research successes and current experiments, the guests were given insights into the existing research facilities on the GSI and FAIR campus during a guided tour. The tour included the linear accelerator UNILAC, the therapy unit for tumor treatment using carbon ions, the large detector HADES, the R3B experiment for exotic nuclei and the test facility for superconducting accelerator magnets, where high-tech components for FAIR are tested.
Afterwards Hildegard Förster-Heldmann was able to take a look at the progress of the construction of the future FAIR accelerator center from the viewing platform on the FAIR construction site, from the completion of the structural work for the SIS100 accelerator ring tunnel to the central transfer building, which is being erected over several floors. In addition, foundations and walls for the first experiment have already been built. The Compressed Baryonic Matter (CBM) experiment is one of the four research pillars of the FAIR accelerator facility, one of the largest construction projects for cutting-edge research worldwide. (BP)
]]>The politician informed herself about the status of the FAIR construction project, which is one of the largest cutting-edge research projects worldwide, and about previous research successes and the current experiments. After an introductory presentation, Ines Claus was able to gain insights into the existing accelerator and research facilities during a tour of the GSI and FAIR campus. She visited the linear accelerator UNILAC, the therapy unit for tumor treatment using carbon ions, the large detector HADES and the R3B experiment for exotic nuclei.
On the viewpoint of the FAIR construction site Ines Claus could get an overview of the construction measures and the current status of the work on the 20-hectare construction site. The FAIR project is progressing very well, including the completion of the structural work for the SIS100 accelerator ring tunnel, the heart of the facility, and the structural engineering for the central transfer building, the central hub for the facility’s beamline. (BP)
]]>Using a sophisticated filming technique that is not yet widely used, GSI/FAIR have been creating annual longterm time-lapse videos since 2018 to show developments at the construction site of the FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) particle accelerator facility. The jury of the "WorldMediaFestival | Television & Corporate Media Awards" judged the video to be an outstanding contribution in the category "Public Relations/Research and Science" and awarded it the "Intermedia-globe SILVER Award".
With the new technique of "Longterm Dronelapse", the progress on one of the largest construction sites for fundamental research in the world becomes particularly tangible. For this purpose, Lars Möller from the interdisciplinary media production "Zeitrausch" from Breuberg regularly flies the same routes over the FAIR construction site with a drone. Several moving time-lapse videos are then combined into a single video. In the World Media Festival award-winning video, drone movies recorded over three years, are superimposed thanks to GPS support, so that the progress of the construction activities can be experienced in an impressive way.
The WorldMediaFestivals are located in Hamburg, Germany, and are an initiative by intermedia. According to their official website the WorldMediaFestivals | Television & Corporate Media Awards honor excellence in Television, Corporate Film, Online and Print productions on an international scale. These Awards are acknowledged internationally as symbols of the highest production standards and are one of the world's highest honors in visual competition. Experienced professionals from around the world serve in a volunteer capacity as judges. Decisions are based on both creativity and effectiveness. The criteria they use include for example writing, sound, editing, visuals, insights, and above all the extent to which the entry meets its stated goals, i.e. how well the defined target group is being addressed. (LW)
Award-winning drone video longterm dronelapse
List of award-winning entries World Media Festival
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The MP's visit was focused on sustainable, energy-efficient and high-performance IT infrastructure. Katy Walther from Bündnis 90/Die Grünen is responsible for the administrative district Offenbach and was accompanied by the members of the parliamentary group Olaf Hermann, managing director of county council group, the environmental policy spokesman René Bacher, the cultural policy spokesman Werner Kremeier, the office manager Corina Retzbach, Büroleiterin as well as the members of the county council Sonja Arnold, Christine Dammer and Karin Wagner.
The guests were welcomed by Dr. Ulrich Breuer, Administrative Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, and Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR. In addition, Dr. Helmut Kreiser, Group Manager of the IT Department DataCenter, and Dr. Ingo Peter, Head of Press and Public Relations, were among the participants of GSI and FAIR.
The guests took the opportunity to learn more about the high-performance data center and its infrastructure in presentations and during a guided tour through the Green IT Cube, and showed great interest in the promising perspectives. The Green IT Cube on the GSI/FAIR campus is one of the most capable scientific computing centers in the world. At the same time, it sets standards in IT technology and energy saving: Thanks to a special cooling system, it is particularly energy- and cost-efficient. Therefore, the energy required for cooling is less than seven percent of the electrical power used for computing. In conventional data centers with air cooling, this relation amounts to 30 up to 100 percent. The innovative cooling system also enables a compact and space-saving design. The Green IT Cube has already received numerous awards, including the Blue Angel, the eco label of the German government.
In addition to a tour of the Green IT Cube, the program included an overview of FAIR/GSI research topics and the current status of the FAIR construction project. Furthermore, the guests were able to take a look at the 20-hectare FAIR construction site with the completed structural work for the ring tunnel of the SIS100 from the viewpoint. (JL)
Within the framework of the project funding of the ErUM-Pro action plan of the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), the Institute of Nuclear Physics at the University of Cologne will receive a total of 2.8 million euros for the next three years. This funding will be used to support the projects of Professor Dr. Jan Jolie, Professor Dr. Peter Reiter and Professor Dr. Andreas Zilges, which address the investigation of the smallest structures of matter. The focus is on the development, setup and execution of experiments at the international research facility FAIR, which is currently under construction at GSI, and the research facility ISOLDE at the research center CERN near Geneva.
The aim of the investigations is the properties of short-lived, previously unknown atomic nuclei, which are made available for the experiments at the accelerators in Darmstadt and in Geneva. In this context, the Cologne groups contribute significantly to the instrumentation of future experiments with detectors for γ-spectroscopy, for the detection of neutrons, and for beam particles. The experiments with stable beams performed at the accelerator facility of the University of Cologne will thus be extended in an ideal way.
The Cologne collaboration with the European research facility ELI-NP (Extreme Light Infrastructure — Nuclear Physics) will also be strengthened. ELI-NP is being built near Bucharest, Romania. The unique combination of laser beams and electron beams from particle accelerators will enable a future light source characterized by extremely high intensities and extremely high energies.
99.9% of the visible matter around us consists of atomic nuclei. These consist of protons and neutrons, which interact with each other through the strong as well as the electromagnetic and the weak force. Despite intensive experimental and theoretical efforts, the strong interaction in nuclei is still not well understood. Atomic nuclei also play a central role in energy production and other processes in stars. This means that atomic nuclei have an important connecting role between the very smallest systems and the very largest systems (stars, galaxies, universe). Because of this unique position of the many-particle system atomic nucleus, it is of fundamental importance to understand the structure of nuclei and the interactions of nucleons in nuclei.
With the ErUM-Pro action plan, the BMBF promotes networking between universities, research infrastructures and society in order to further develop research infrastructures and enrich research there. The action plan is part of the BMBF framework program ErUM - Exploring Universe and Matter. (CP)
The linear accelerator UNILAC (Universal Linear Accelerator) serves as the first accelerator stage to bring ions up to speed. The Alvarez section, located at the rear of the 120-meter-long UNILAC, brings them from 5% to 15% of the speed of light so they can be injected into the GSI ring accelerator, accelerated further and later transferred into the FAIR facility. Since the existing Alvarez, which is in operation for nearly 50 years, doesn’t meet FAIR's high requirements, the decision for its replacement was made.
The new components combine large dimensions in the meter range with high precision in the submillimeter range. Internal surfaces must be manufactured to the highest quality with roughness of just a few micrometers to apply the copper plating afterwards. For the GSI electroplating department, which specializes in large components, the copper plating itself is a huge challenge due to the necessary homogeneity. The special surface is necessary for the device to start its “glossy” future in the accelerator.
“Another specialty are the quadrupole magnets integrated into the structure's drift tubes, which provide beam focusing during acceleration. Manufacturing, installation and adjustment must be exactly right to guarantee the magnetic field quality,” explains accelerator physicist Dr. Lars Groening, who is head of the responsible department “UNILAC Post Stripper Upgrade”. “We have greatly improved the quadrupoles compared to the existing Alvarez: they focus more strongly and, in quasi-simultaneous operation with several ion species, ensure optimal focusing properties for each species through rapid switching. This is essential for FAIR.”
Many of GSI/FAIR’s technical departments are involved in this project. Following extensive planning, design and construction of the components took place. A FoS Alvarez component was delivered in 2019 and assembled on campus. Testing took place for specified properties such as dimensions, tolerances and surface quality of the inside, as well as low-power electromagnetic field characteristics. In the previous year 2020 the structure received its characteristic high gloss: it was successfully copper-plated at GSI's electroplating facility and is now ready for testing in high-power operation.
Once the FoS passes all tests, 25 sections will be manufactured in series production. They, too, must undergo a defined acceptance procedure and tests of the high-frequency electromagnetic fields. For this purpose, five sections with three-ton end caps at each side and the drift tubes will be assembled to one cavity, so that in total five cavities of the Alvarez type will be tested. Subsequent to the careful test campaign, the replacement of the existing Alvarez section with the five new Alvarez cavities can begin at the UNILAC tunnel, which is estimated to take about one and a half years. (CP)
]]>Since 2018, PORR has been realizing one of the currently largest and most complex construction projects in international cutting-edge research as part of the ARGE FAIR Construction Site North: PORR is building the 1.1 km long FAIR accelerator tunnel including the building sections above, the transfer building with underground section for guiding the beam into the accelerator ring (SIS100) and the connected main supply building. (CP)
]]>In the FAIR ring accelerator, various sophisticated magnets and entire magnet systems will ensure that the ion beam is precisely guided and focused. The superconducting dipole modules also belong to them. In total 110 dipole magnets were produced, 108 will be installed in the ring accelerator tunnel and two more are spare ones. The dipoles, that will mainly be needed for deflecting the particle beam, make up more than a quarter of all 415 fast ramped superconducting magnets utilized in the SIS100.
The successful production of these dipole modules and their testing represents the largest series of accelerator components ever manufactured by order of GSI. The completion is an important milestone on the way to installation in the tunnel, which is scheduled to begin in the second half of next year. Bilfinger Noell in Würzburg, one of the few European manufacturers of superconducting magnets, was contracted for series production.
The SIS100 dipole magnets are so-called superferric magnets, consisting of a superconducting coil and an iron yoke to guide the magnetic field. The particular feature of the magnets is the superconducting coil, in which a special superconducting cable is used. This nuclotron cable - originally developed for the ring accelerator Nuklotron at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR) in Dubna, Russia - is particularly suitable for generating rapidly ramped magnetic fields.
The cable consists of a copper-nickel tube. Around this tube strands of niobium-titanium, a common superconductor, are coiled. The original design was optimized with regard to the requirements of FAIR. It is cooled with liquid helium and operated at a temperature of 4.5 Kelvin (equivalent to 4.5 degrees Celsius above absolute zero at around -273 degrees). The design of the magnets allows to integrate vacuum chambers for the ion beam, whose wall temperature is also just above absolute zero. Thus, the chamber walls act like a super pump onto which the remaining particles of the beam vacuum keep attached. The extremely low remaining gas pressure made possible by is a mandatory precondition for the acceleration of heavy ion beams with highest intensities. Highest particle intensities are part of the specifications of the FAIR facility, which offers a wide variety of new experimental possibilities.
Each of the magnets, which weight about three tons and are three meter long, is subjected to a comprehensive test program: The quality control of the production as well as several tests under room temperature conditions are performed in Würzburg before shipment to Darmstadt. Among other things, the geometric precision of the inner aperture and the electrical properties of the coil were measured as part of the so-called FAT (Factory Acceptance Test). Bilfinger Noell succeeded in making the production so precise over the entire series that the deviations of the geometry of the field-determining pole shoes were always less than 50 micrometers from the nominal geometry.
After delivery to GSI, all 110 dipole modules were subjected to a SAT (Site Acceptance Test), which included performance tests at the final operating temperature of 4.5 K. To cool the magnets down to this temperature, GSI has built an elaborate, almost 700-square-meter test facility with cryogenic equipment for superconducting accelerator magnets (STF, Series Test Facility). It has four so-called feed boxes to connect the dipole modules for parallel testing in different phases. Using a specially procured high-power power supply unit, the modules could be supplied during the performance test with amperage up to 17 kiloamperes at rise rates of 28000 amperes per second.
The test program for all 110 dipole modules was carried out in years of cooperation by employees from various specialist areas and departments. In a final integration step, the thin-walled dipole chambers, produced by PINK Vakuumtechnik in Wertheim, are now being installed. (BP)
]]>The "Diversity Charter" is the result of a corporate initiative to promote diversity in companies and public institutions. The German government supports this initiative, which operates under the aegis of German Chancellor Angela Merkel. More than 3,800 companies and institutions with about 14 million employees have signed the “Diversity Charter”.
The initiative has been supported by the non-profit association “Charta der Vielfalt e.V”. since 2010. Its goal is to promote the recognition, appreciation and inclusion of diversity in corporate culture in Germany. With various projects, the “Diversity Charter” continues to advance the discussion on diversity management in Germany.
Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR emphasizes: "For GSI/FAIR as a strongly internationally operating research institution, the cooperation with different people and cultures has long been part of everyday life. Cutting-edge research is based on lively collaborations across all borders, not only across state borders. An unprejudiced perspective that optimally promotes the diverse talents is of great importance for successful top-level science.
Ulrich Breuer, Administrative Managing Director of GSI and FAIR stresses: "The diversity of our employees with all their different skills and talents opens up a potential that we do not want to relinquish and cannot relinquish. Diversity is also an economic factor of success. It generates opportunities to meet the demands of modern business and working life even more successfully and efficiently, especially in an open-minded institution like GSI/FAIR."
Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR underlines: "Appreciation and recognition of diversity are an important resource that paves the way for innovative solutions. New perspectives and constructive cooperation make it possible to meet the challenges of increasing globalization. This capacity for innovation, which emerges from an organizational culture of diversity, must be harnessed to shape and advance promising future-oriented projects as FAIR."
Already last year, the centers of the Helmholtz Association agreed to develop and live a common understanding of diversity, inclusion and a diversity-aware organizational culture. All 19 members of the Helmholtz Association, among them also GSI, have officially adopted a corresponding guideline in their assembly of members in order to create the framework conditions for reflecting diversity and inclusion in the processes, structures and conditions of the centers. Now, with the signing of the "Diversity Charter", it was underlined how important it is for GSI/FAIR to have a climate of acceptance and mutual trust. (BP)
New measurements by the ALICE collaboration show that the way charm quarks form hadrons in proton-proton collisions differs significantly from expectations based on electron collider measurements. The ALICE research department at GSI was substantially involved in the measurement and evaluation of the results.
Quarks are among the elementary particles of the Standard Model of Particle Physics. Besides up and down quarks, which are the basic building blocks of ordinary matter in the Universe, four other quark flavors exist and are also abundantly produced in collisions at particle accelerators like the CERN Large Hadron Collider. Quarks are not observed in isolation due to a fundamental aspect of the strong interaction, known as color charge confinement. Confinement requires particles that carry the charge of the strong interaction, called color, to form states that are color-neutral. This in turn forces quarks to undergo a process of hadronization, i.e. to form hadrons, which are composite particles mostly made of a quark and an antiquark (mesons) or of three quarks (baryons). The only exception is the heaviest quark, the top, which decays before it has time to hadronize.
At particle accelerators, quarks with a large mass, such as the charm quark, are produced only in the initial interactions between the colliding particles. Depending on the type of beam used, these can be electron-positron, electron-proton or proton-proton collisions (as at the LHC). The subsequent hadronization of charm quarks into mesons (D0, D+, Ds) or baryons (Λc, Ξc, …) occurs on a long space-time scale and was considered to be universal - that is, independent of the species of the colliding particles - until the recent findings by the ALICE collaboration.
The large data samples collected during Run 2 of the LHC allowed ALICE to count the vast majority of charm quarks produced in the proton-proton collisions by reconstructing the decays of all charm meson species and of the most abundant charm baryons (Λc and Ξc). The charm quarks were found to form baryons almost 40% of the time, which is four times more often than what was expected based on measurements previously made at colliders with electron beams (e+e- and ep in the figure below).
“Coordinated by Dr. Andrea Dubla, our local ALICE group at GSI has produced and published many of these results. This also involved the use of a software framework for decay reconstruction developed for the FAIR experiment for studies of compressed nuclear matter CBM and now shared between CBM and ALICE,” explains Professor Silvia Masciocchi, head of the ALICE department at GSI. “The study of heavy quarks is one of the main focuses of our ALICE research at GSI, and we are very pleased that our long-standing efforts have now contributed to such impressive results. Our research also profits strongly from the postdoctoral research fellowship program HGF-GSI-OCPC, which allows us to attract and recruit excellent researchers from universities in China. This opens up exciting perspectives for the future.”
The measurements show that the process of color-charge confinement and hadron formation is still a poorly understood aspect of the strong interaction. Current theoretical explanations of baryon enhancement include the combination of multiple quarks produced in proton-proton collisions and new mechanisms in the neutralisation of the color charge. Additional measurements during the next run of the LHC will allow these theories to be scrutinized and further our knowledge of the strong interaction. (CERN/CP)
Dr. Dr. Jennifer Ngo-Anh works as Research and Payloads Coordinator in the Directorate of Human and Robotic Exploration programs. There she coordinate the research and payloads program, which has the overarching goal to enable safe and sustainable long-duration exploration missions into Deep Space with human crews. In her field of responsibility, she will also be in charge of the ESA-FAIR cooperation on cosmic radiation research, in which she has already been significantly involved before, among other things as part of the project team in the implementation of the joint ESA-FAIR Summer School.
The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR Professor Paolo Giubellino said: “GSI and FAIR sincerely thank Thomas Reiter for the excellent collaboration. He was one of the decisive initiators of the ESA-FAIR cooperation, which we were able to successfully launch with the signing of the contract in February 2018 and which has already generated numerous important research contributions. We are very much looking forward to working with Dr. Dr. Ngo-Anh in the future and the opportunity to further advance our collaboration together with her. The cooperation between FAIR and ESA opens up unique opportunities for excellent research in the field of cosmic radiation and its effects.”
One of the key questions that need to be addressed regarding the future of human spaceflight as well as robotic exploration programs is how cosmic radiation affects human beings, electronics, and materials. Another important component is the assessment of radiation risks. More precise research on cosmic radiation, undertaken by the ESA-FAIR cooperation, is thus one of the central tasks for the effective protection of astronauts and space systems.
The new ESA person responsible, Dr. Dr. Ngo-Anh, is also looking forward to a strengthened collaboration with GSI/FAIR and emphasizes the importance of it: “Space radiation is considered as being one of the potential showstoppers for long-duration human exploration missions into Deep Space. This is why we have the cooperation with GSI / FAIR in place through which we are trying to advance our space radiation understanding. The cooperation is unique, because in the area of space radiation research, very limited opportunities for exposing materials to (space) irradiation is available. One of the main objectives of the cooperation is to implement space-relevant experiments and directly apply the obtained knowledge at the state-of-the-art facilities and infrastructure of GSI and FAIR in Darmstadt – and thereby contribute to sustained and safe exploration of Deep Space with human crews”.
Dr. Dr. Jennifer Ngo-Anh studied medicine in Tübingen and received her doctorate there, followed by neuroscience studies with a PhD at the University of Portland in the US state of Oregon. Subsequently, she began her career at ESA in the Directorate for Astronautical Spaceflight. Today, as Program Coordinator Research and Payloads, she leads the mainly medical/life science aspects of the European space program with a team of 20 people. Her scope of activities includes the scientific planning, coordination and implementation of the European contribution to the International Space Station (ISS) as well as all European ground-based human and robotic space activities. (BP)
]]>In the ongoing experiment period on the GSI and FAIR campus, TRON, in collaboration with the GSI Department of Biophysics, is using the accelerator facilities for a new and promising combination of therapeutic approaches: combining carbon ion therapy and immunotherapy with an mRNA-based cancer vaccine. Combining this powerful systemic drug with localized heavy ion bombardment of the primary mass could be a key to defeat cancers in advanced stage.
TRON's research at GSI/FAIR is still a glance into the future. “The findings will give a first orientation if heavy ion radiotherapy can benefit from combined immunotherapy, using cancer vaccines, and are instructive for the translation of radioimmunotherapy combinations using heavy ions into the clinic,” explain TRON scientists Dr. Fulvia Vascotto and Dr. Nadja Salomon.
“The aim of the current experiment at GSI/FAIR is to directly compare the effectiveness of carbon ions and X-rays (conventional radiation therapy), each combined with mRNA based vaccine specific for a mouse tumor model,” describes Dr. Alexander Helm, scientist in GSI's Biophysics Department and responsible for the experiment coordination. The experiment breaks completely new ground: Particle therapy with carbon ions and therapeutic cancer vaccines were never combined before.
The immune system plays an important role in the prevention and cure against cancer. Usually, it recognizes degenerated cells and can “sort them out". At the same time, it is equipped with highly complex control mechanisms to avoid overreactions. This is exactly what cancer cells can sometimes use to their advantage and to down-regulate immune surveillance. They disappear from the radar, so to speak, they camouflage so skillfully that the endogenous defenses do not recognize the enemy or are too weak to attack it. Immunotherapy can reactivate the immune system in the fight against cancer.
The approach pursued in pre-clinical studies at TRON leads to stimulate the immune system via vaccination with messenger RNA (mRNA). With the vaccination - the fragile mRNA is packed in a protective lipid envelope - the tumor-diseased organism receives valuable information. Like an educator, the vaccine uptaken by antigen presenting cells instructs the immune system specifically, activates it to produce antigens and mobilizes it against the mutated cancer cells. This cancer vaccine is based on similar technologies as mRNA-based vaccines used against covid 19.
There is already an indication that conventional radiation therapy (high-energy X-rays) as a second component in addition to mRNA vaccine synergize, showing more efficient in anti-tumoral effects reinforcing the immune system. The immunological effects of heavy ion therapy in contrast are less known. Radiotherapy with carbon ions was developed at GSI and is now very successfully in clinical application in Heidelberg and Marburg and in nine other centers worldwide. Can carbon ion radiotherapy be beneficial for certain types of tumors and can it open up new clinical perspectives for more cancer patients? It is possible that this form of therapy is more immunogenic, i.e. it could trigger an even stronger immune response than conventional radiation therapy and, together with an individualized mRNA vaccine, might result in generating more patients responding to these therapeutic combinations. These are the type of questions, to which this proof-of-concept experiment would like to provide an answer.
Last year, an international team of researchers led by the GSI Department of Biophysics, with lead author Dr. Alexander Helm, had already published first promising results for the potential benefit of a treatment combination of carbon ions and immunotherapy. The researchers were able to demonstrate that carbon ions plus immunotherapy is more effective in controlling lung metastases than both therapies alone and more effective than X-rays plus immunotherapy. However, the immunotherapy was based on checkpoint inhibitors instead of the therapeutic mRNA vaccine used now.
The progress of the current cancer research at TRON in Mainz will provide new answers, for example regarding tumor control/regression (here a colorectal adenocarcinoma) and on the mechanisms involving immunological cell players acting in the anti-tumoral effects. In order to better assess this potential, further research has to be conducted and finally the application in clinical studies must be tested. “Scientific synergies by complementary research act as accelerator for the development of innovative therapeutic strategies. Joint research activities such as the ongoing one between GSI and TRON are therefore of great importance for future cancer research” emphasizes Michael Föhlings, Managing Director of TRON.
The further development of tumor therapy with charged particles is a field of expertise of Professor Marco Durante, Head of the GSI Biophysics Research Department. He is eagerly awaiting the results of the TRON studies: “Particle therapy is rapidly growing and is potentially the most effective and precise radiotherapy technique. Combining it with most advanced vaccines is an extremely promising approach. The goal is always to answer the central question: How to treat and to achieve the most efficient, the best immune response in the fight against cancer. The entire experience of TRON and GSI/FAIR in the field of cancer research will be bundled and strengthened in this project. For me, this is a highlight of our current FAIR Phase 0 experimental program.”
The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino says: “I am tremendously excited by these experiments. The fact that an mRNA-based vaccine is being studied in conjunction with ion beams to develop a potential new cancer therapy is one perfect example of the great potential of basic research at our accelerator facilities to produce new results, which can benefit society. The first stage of the FAIR experimental program, the precursor program FAIR Phase 0, is already offering outstanding opportunities. With the construction of the FAIR facility in Darmstadt, we want to expand and further develop this potential in global cooperation." (BP)
TRON gGmbH is a biopharmaceutical research organization that pursues new diagnostics and drugs for the treatment of cancer and other severe diseases with high medical need. A focus of TRON is the development of novel platforms for individualized therapies and biomarkers, translating basic research into drug applications. TRON partners with academic institutions, biotech companies and the pharmaceutical industry, executing research with leading-edge technologies and supporting the development of innovative drugs to promote human health.
The GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt operates a world unique accelerator facility for ions. Some of the best-known results are the discovery of six new chemical elements and the development of a new type of cancer therapy. The new international accelerator center FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research), one of the largest research projects worldwide, is currently under construction at GSI. At FAIR, matter that usually only exists in the depth of space will be produced in a lab for research. Scientists from all over the world will use the facility for experiments to gain new insights about the building blocks of matter and the evolution of the universe, from the Big Bang to the present. They will also develop new applications in medicine and technology.
]]>The VAJRA Faculty Scheme for scientists will allow Dr. Rahul Singh to conduct a joint research project together with his peers at the IUAC in New Delhi within 2021. This prestigious research grant of the Science and Engineering Research Board, Government (SERB), a statutory body under the Indian Department of Science and Technology, is a special funding program to enable talented researchers of Indian origin (It can also be German citizens) to engage in scientific exchange and research collaboration in India consequential to closer cooperation among partner institutes.
Dr Rahul Singh is in the Beam Diagnostics department at GSI and FAIR, working as a work package leader for closed orbit feedback for future Synchrotron machine of FAIR: SIS-100. His current research focus is on signal processing algorithms for synchrotrons and storage rings, feedback systems and optimization of slow extraction at FAIR. Further research interests include application of transition radiation for transverse and longitudinal diagnostics in different parts of GSI accelerator facility, inverse modelling of the accelerator as well as application of machine learning techniques towards performance improvements of diagnostic devices.
VAJRA (Visiting Advanced Joint Research) Faculty Scheme from Science and Engineering Research Board, Government (SERB) India is a dedicated program exclusively for overseas scientists and academicians with emphasis on Non-resident Indians (NRI) and Persons of Indian Origin (PIO) to work as adjunct / visiting faculty for a specific period of time in Indian Public funded academic and research institutions.
The Indian host research institute, the Inter-University Accelerator Centre (IUAC), is the first Inter-University Centre (IUC) of University Grant Commission (UGC) of India - established in 1984 as an autonomous institution called Nuclear Science Centre after dual approval of planning commission with an objective to provide within the university system world class accelerator systems along with experimental facilities and to create basic infrastructure to facilitate internationally competitive research in the area of Nuclear Physics, Material Science, Atomic Physics, Radiation Biology, Radiation Physics and Accelerator Mass Spectrometry. The center became a national user facility in 1991 and has India’s largest tandem accelerator and added subsequently other accelerators including a superconducting Linear accelerator, a 1.7MeV Pelletron accelerator, an Electron Cyclotron Resonance (ECR) Ion source based Low Energy Ion Beam Facility.
Interested to know more of the program can contact program coordinator Dr. Pradeep Ghosh.
Excellence Award to Dr Rahul Singh by GSI/FAIR management
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The topic of FLASH irradiation is in strong focus worldwide and is also a main research topic within clinical radiobiology at GSI Biophysics. The FLASH method is a new highly promising radiation therapy method. The word “flash” refers to lightning. Fitting to that, in radiation medicine, this means ultra-short and ultra-high radiation, where the treatment dose is delivered in sub-second timescales. The aim of FLASH irradiation is to apply a very high dose in a very short time. Traditional radiation therapy, as well as proton or ion therapy, deliver smaller doses of radiation to a patient over an extended period, whereas FLASH radiotherapy is thought to require only a few short irradiations, all lasting less than 100 milliseconds.
Recent in-vivo investigations have shown, in the field of electron radiation, that the FLASH method with an ultra-high dose rate is less harmful to healthy tissue, but just as efficient as conventional dose-rate radiation to inhibit tumor growth. Such an effect has not yet been demonstrated for proton and for ion beam irradiation, which is the basis of the tumor therapy with carbon ions developed at GSI. There is still a lot of research to be done here. The results of the current experiment at GSI are now being evaluated and will contribute to new knowledge.
However, the topic is not only a great challenge scientifically, but also technically: Until now, FLASH technique has only been applicable using electron and proton accelerators. While the required dose rates for electrons and protons can be achieved with a cyclotron (circular accelerator), this is more difficult with the synchrotrons required in heavy ion therapy, such as the SIS18 at GSI. That is why the current FAIR Phase 0 experiment is a very crucial step: Thanks to the improvements at the existing GSI accelerator facility as part of the preparations for FAIR, the necessary dose rate in millisecond range can now also be achieved for carbon. However, a lot of technical development and research is still needed, before the procedure is technically advanced enough to be routinely used on patients.
Professor Marco Durante, Head of the GSI Biophysics Research Department, was very pleased with the important success in FLASH irradiation: “It is a forward-looking method that could significantly increase the therapeutic window in radiotherapy. I am very happy that the researchers and the accelerator team were able to demonstrate the possibility to create conditions with carbon beams that are necessary for FLASH therapy of tumors. If we can combine the great effect and precision of heavy ion therapy with FLASH irradiation while maintaining efficacy and causing little damage to healthy tissue, this could pave the way of a future radiation therapy several years from now".
The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, is also very delighted: „The combination of expertise in biophysics and medicine as well as engineering excellence allows the first world-class experiments FLASH irradiation with ion beams to be performed. This could result in important complements to existing radiation therapies. Applications in tumor therapy are one of the research areas that can benefit from the recent increased intensities of GSI accelerators. However, modern radiobiology will substantially benefit from beams with even higher intensities, such as we will have at the FAIR facility currently under construction. FLASH is a first example of these future directions of work”. (BP)
]]>The large ring tunnel consists of the two tunnel areas running next to each other, one for the accelerator machine and the other for the corresponding technical and supply facilities. The base lies at a depth of 18 meter. The ring tunnel for the accelerator was built in several segments, each about 25 meters long. After the completion of the load-bearing parts, the ground slabs, walls and ceiling structure, the assembly of the technical building equipment (TGA) such as electrical supply, air-conditioning technology, safety technology etc. is upcoming. The excavation pit will now be backfilled progressively, and additional storage and lay-down areas for the TGA companies will be prepared above ground. After the last slab has been concreted, a logistics opening is still being kept open so that the majority of the formwork for the tunnel can be lifted through. Later, it will also be closed.
SIS100 is a project of superlatives, which is also reflected in some key data: In the northern excavation pit, with its underground ring accelerator as the central building structure, almost one million cubic meters of earth were excavated for construction, to a large part it will be backfilled on site. Around 159,000 cubic meters of concrete were used for the SIS100 accelerator ring, and 27,000 tons of steel ensure the reliable stability of the underground structure.
The Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Jörg Blaurock, was pleased with the completion of this stage, which is so important for the entire FAIR project: “FAIR is a scientifically and technically extraordinary construction project. It requires customized solutions, and numerous individual trades have to mesh. Therefore, structural and civil engineering, accelerator development and construction, and the scientific experiments are closely coordinated in our integrated overall planning. The recent ring closure is the result of precise planning and implementation and a substantial progress for the entire project. The close interlocking and integrated coordination with all parties and stakeholders involved is a decisive milestone of the realization strategy for the FAIR project”. (BP)
]]>A physics research team led by the TU Darmstadt has discovered the highest ever observed europium content in stars. The results of the EUROPIUM group led by Professor Almudena Arcones from the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung and TU Darmstadt, who was awarded a grant by the European Research Council, has now been published in "The Astrophysical Journal". Co-authors are Dr. Moritz Reichert (member of EUROPIUM) and Dr. Camilla Hansen from the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy, Heidelberg.
Europium is the key for understanding the formation of the heavy elements by the fast neutron capture process, the so-called r-process. This is crucial both for the formation of half of the elements heavier than iron and for the total abundance of thorium and uranium in the universe. The EUROPIUM group has combined theoretical astrophysical simulations with observations of the oldest stars in our Galaxy and in dwarf galaxies. The latter are small, dark-matter dominated galaxies orbiting our Galaxy. Dwarf galaxies are excellent test objects for studying the r-process, as some of the oldest metal-poor stars, those that have existed for 10 to 13 billion years, have exhibited an overabundance of r-process elements. Studies have even postulated that only a single neutron-rich event could be responsible for this enrichment in the smallest dwarf galaxies.
With their discovery, the researchers in Darmstadt and Heidelberg have succeeded in determining the highest europium content ever observed – and they have created a new name for these stars: "europium stars". These stars belong to the dwarf galaxy Fornax – a dwarf spheroidal galaxy with a high stellar content. In their publication, the group also reports the first ever observation of lutetium in a dwarf galaxy and the largest sample of observed zirconium.
The "europium stars" in Fornax were born shortly after an explosive production of heavy elements. Based on the high stellar metal abundance, the extreme r-process event must have occurred as recently as four to five billion years ago. This is a very rare finding, as most europium-rich stars are much older. Therefore, europium stars provide insight into the origin of elements in the universe at a very specific and late time.
Heavy elements are formed by the r-process in the merger of two neutron stars or in the explosive end of massive stars with strong magnetic fields. The EUROPIUM group has analyzed these two high-energy events and performed detailed studies of element production in these environments. However, due to the still large uncertainties in the nuclear physics data, it is not possible to unambiguously assign the heavy elements in the "europium stars" to one of these astrophysical environments. Future experiments in the new accelerator center FAIR at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt will significantly reduce these uncertainties. The FAIR facility promises unique opportunities in this field of research: With its motto "The Universe in the Laboratory", it is intended to reproduce conditions as they occur in astrophysical environments on Earth, thus expanding the knowledge about our cosmos.
In addition, the new Hessian cluster project ELEMENTS, in which Professor Arcones is a principal investigator, will uniquely combine simulations of neutron star fusion, nucleosynthesis calculations with the latest experimental information and observations to investigate the long-standing question: Where and how are heavy elements produced in the universe? (TUD/BP)
Achim Schwenk, Professor of Physics at the Technical University (TU) Darmstadt and Max Planck Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg, has been awarded a prestigious Advanced Grant by the European Research Council (ERC). His research project "Exploring the Universe through Strong Interactions" (EUSTRONG) will be funded with around 2.3 million euros over a period of five years. This is already the second ERC grant for Professor Schwenk.
The goal of the EUSTRONG project is to explore the Strong Interaction, one of the four fundamental forces of nature, in the Universe. The Strong Interaction is responsible for holding neutrons and protons together in the atomic nucleus and for understanding the densest observable matter inside neutron stars. In addition, atomic nuclei play a key role in the search for dark matter and in the study of the lightest neutrino particles. EUSTRONG will enable new discoveries in the physics of the Strong Interaction by developing innovative theories and methods.
The equation of state of dense nuclear matter, for example, sets the scale for the mass and radius of neutron stars. At extreme densities beyond those achieved in atomic nuclei, astrophysical observations are particularly interesting. For example, information about the radius of neutron stars, which is sensitive to high densities, can be obtained from LIGO/Virgo observations of gravitational waves from neutron star mergers, as well as from new observations with NASA's NICER instrument on the International Space Station.
“So far, this fits very well with our understanding about the equation of state of nuclear matter,” explains Professor Schwenk. “With EUSTRONG, we want to for the first time derive direct constraints on the dense-matter interactions from these astrophysical observations, and thus develop a unified description of matter in nuclei and stars.”
Another milestone of the ERC project is the acceleration of many-body calculations with new emulation and network methods to enable systematic and global ab initio calculations based on the Strong Interaction for heavy nuclei. One focus are extremely neutron-rich heavy nuclei (around neutron number 126), which play a central role in the synthesis of elements in the Universe. The accelerator facility FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) in Darmstadt will be leading in this region of the nuclear chart.
Based on these new developments, Professor Schwenk and his team also want to investigate key nuclei that are used in extremely sensitive detectors that search for dark matter and for the discovery of coherent neutrino scattering, which was recently achieved for the first time. In the exploration of dark matter in the Universe and of new physics beyond the Standard Model, the Strong Interaction therefore also plays an essential role.
“The second award by the ERC underlines how outstanding Professor Achim Schwenk's research achievements are,” emphasizes Professor Barbara Albert, Vice President for Research and Young Scientists at TU Darmstadt. Professor Schwenk is particularly excited to be working with excellent young scientists in the new EUSTRONG team, “because the conditions in nuclear physics are unique here and the students and postdocs are great”. (TUD/CP)
The new large tower crane for the southern area was delivered on twelve semitrailers, the installation team consisted of seven men, and the assembly time including preparation on the ground and calibration and adjustment works was two days. The new Potain MDT 809 crane is the largest so-called topless tower crane ever built by POTAIN (Manitowoc group). Tower cranes of this type are already in service on several construction sites in Europe, North America and Asia-Pacific, including the reconstruction of Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris, which was destroyed by a major fire. The tower crane MDT 809 at FAIR is the first to be put into service in Germany.
It will carry out its work there during the next years, lifting large loads that need to be moved on the mega construction site. The special features of the powerful crane — it is one of the largest at the FAIR construction site — include high load capacity and the use of high-performance technology such as very precise driving and remote diagnostics with Crane Control System (CCS). There were also particularities in the assembly by the company STRABAG BMTI. Due to the large unit weights, all components of the tower crane were assembled in the air in individual parts. This assembly process took 7 hours, which is fast for such a large tower crane. The weight of the complete tower crane is 155 tons.
STRABAG BMTI GmbH & Co. KG is a service company within the STRABAG Group responsible for the scheduling, procurement, rental and maintenance of all construction machinery and vehicles. Machines, equipment/plant technology and vehicles from all areas of activity of the Group are managed and supervised.
Founded in 1902, Manitowoc Company Inc. is a crane manufacturer with more than 115 manufacturing, sales and service facilities in 26 countries. The global company is a supplier of crawler cranes (Manitowoc brand), tower cranes (Potain), mobile telescopic cranes (Grove) and truck-mounted cranes (National Crane).
The GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt operates a large accelerator facility for ions that is unique in the world. The best-known results are the discovery of new chemical elements and the development of a new type of cancer therapy. The new international accelerator center FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research), one of the largest research projects worldwide, is currently under construction at GSI. Scientists from all over the world will use the facility for experiments to gain new insights about the building blocks of matter and the evolution of the universe, from the Big Bang to the present. They will also develop new applications in medicine and technology. (BP)
]]>First thing in the morning at 9 a.m., the video conference kicked off with a welcome from the organizing Public Relations department and a greeting from Dorothee Sommer, Head of Human Resources. "Gender equality is very important for us here at GSI and FAIR," Sommer explained. "Our goal is to get girls excited about working in science and technology and to encourage them to include these fields of activity in their career choices. We offer apprenticeships and the opportunity to conduct final theses for bachelor's, master's or PhD degrees together with our university partners. We‘d be delighted if the participants later chose to apply to work with us!"
The event continued with a get-to-know-you game and an online tour of GSI's accelerator facilities and experiments, as well as the construction site for the international research center FAIR. Whether it was the linear accelerator, the tumor therapy, the production of new elements or the HADES experiment — the girls were able to take a look at all the facilities via pre-recorded videos. The construction of FAIR was presented via clips of the tests of magnets and of the FAIR construction work and via a drone flight over the construction site.
As in a real science conference, two different sessions then went into detail: the girls could choose from two modules in which specialist departments presented their fields of work and job profiles. In these, research departments such as materials research and the ALICE detector introduced themselves, and many of the technical departments on campus gave an insight into their activities. The participants learned how the small targets for the particle accelerator are produced in the target lab, how cryotechnology is used to obtain extremely low temperatures and thus operate superconducting magnets, how components can be manufactured by turning, milling and drilling in the mechanical workshop, or how huge amounts of data are processed in the computing center. In addition, there was information about how a PhD thesis at GSI/FAIR is conducted. And here, too, an insight into the FAIR construction site and the everyday work of the architects and civil engineers was part of the proceedings.
The participants had the opportunity to ask questions to the experts during each presentation and made good use of it: "What are all the professional fields you have?", "How much do physicists earn and how long did you study per day?", "Can you also research a supernova with a particle accelerator?" or "How many particles are sent through a particle accelerator on average?” That it was a successful day was shown by comments such as "Thank you for the great presentations, it was super great!" or "The day was cool, you learned a lot, and you could understand the lectures well."
"It was a different Girls'Day than we are used to from the on-site events. But we had a lot of fun!" reported physicist and organizer Carola Pomplun from the Public Relations department of GSI/FAIR. "We were very pleased about the great response to our online offer and, of course, the lively participation of the girls on the day of the event. The many colleagues from the technical departments who supported us so energetically during the event were able to convey their enthusiasm for working in research and technology and gave fascinating insights into their everyday professional life. I hope this helped us inspire a few girls to pursue careers in STEM fields."
Girls’Day is a day of action all over Germany. On this day, businesses, universities, and other institutions all over Germany open their doors to schoolgirls from grade 5 and above. The participants learn about courses of study and training in professions in the areas of IT, natural sciences, and technology — areas in which women have rarely been employed in the past. GSI and — since its foundation — also FAIR have been participating in the annual event since the early days of Girls'Day. (CP)
Following an introductory lecture, a guided video tour will take the participants to several research sites and facilities on campus: Among other things, the participants can visit the 120-meter-long linear accelerator UNILAC or the main control room online and learn a lot about the unique research at GSI and FAIR. Interesting facts inform about the construction of components for the international accelerator center FAIR, currently being built at GSI.
Detailed information on technical requirements and access modalities to participate in the digital discovery tour into the world of GSI and FAIR is available at www.gsi.de/en/besichtigung. Registration for the event dates is not necessary. Up to 500 people can participate. Further questions about the online offer can be sent by e-mail to besichtigung(at)gsi.de. (BP)
All details about the online visits
Next date: 08.04.2021, 14:00
Further dates: im preparation (to be published here)
]]>Responsible for the organization of the ALICE Masterclasses at GSI/FAIR is Dr. Ralf Averbeck from the research department "ALICE". "GSI has been involved in the development of new detector instruments for ALICE and in the scientific program from the very beginning. The GSI computing center is an integral part of the computing network for data analysis of the ALICE experiment. An ALICE International Masterclass, which we are now conducting for the tenth time, therefore fits well into the program," explains the physicist. "In our Masterclass, the students have the opportunity to become researchers themselves and analyze real experimental data from ALICE, which was recorded in collisions of lead nuclei. Since the analysis takes place on the computer anyway, we could convert the usual in-person activity into a virtual format and thus continue it during the pandemic."
When lead atomic nuclei collide with unimaginable energy in the LHC collider, conditions like those prevailing in the first moments of the universe are created. During the collisions, a so-called quark-gluon plasma is formed for a very short time — a state of matter that existed in the universe shortly after the Big Bang. This plasma transforms back into normal matter within fractions of a second. The particles produced in the process provide information about the properties of the quark-gluon plasma. Thus, the measurements can look into the birth of the cosmos and reveal information about the basic building blocks of matter and their interactions.
In addition to data analysis on two consecutive afternoons, the program also included introductory lectures on particle physics and computer-based data analysis as well as a live tour of the ALICE experiment in Geneva.
The Masterclasses are organized by the IPPOG (International Particle Physics Outreach Group), of which GSI is an associate member. Each year, more than 13,000 students from 60 countries come to one of about 225 nearby universities or research centers for a day to unlock the mysteries of particle physics. Many of the otherwise on-site events have been transformed into online formats due to the Corona pandemic. All events in Germany are held in collaboration with the Netzwerk Teilchenwelt, of which GSI/FAIR is a member. The goal of the nationwide network for communicating particle physics to young people and teachers is to make particle physics accessible to a broader public. (CP)
With the help of RoSEN (Robust (hyper)Surface Extraction Prodecures in N Dimensions), data sets of any number of dimensions can be analyzed for similar data features. The resulting hypersurfaces of equal characteristic values can be identified, visualized and described, which, with the help of the results, enables a further digital processing, be it in the algebraic, numeric or graphical sense. The method was originally developed to evaluate experimental data and simulate complex physical phenomena in heavy ion physics, as they occur in accelerator experiments at GSI/FAIR.
"Compared to other methods, the RoSEN methods have been shown to have many advantages, such as a much lower error frequency, a more efficient computational performance, or the generality of being able to be used for data sets of arbitrary dimensionality," explains theoretical physicist Dr. Bernd Schlei. He develops software for the "System Design SIS 18 / SIS 100" department and is the inventor of the RoSEN method. "In particular, the efficiency and unlimited application bandwidth are properties that could be used for significant process innovations in existing digital tools and as product innovations in potential future application areas in the form of new digital tools."
In a feasibility study for future commercial use in four to five technical-economically relevant application fields, both potential process and product innovations are to be identified at an early stage to lay the foundation for a subsequent technology transfer project. The application scenarios will be tested in partnerships with cooperation partners, some of whom have already been preselected. "RoSEN is a good example of how findings derived from basic research can also be used for applications that can benefit society as a whole," says Dr. Tobias Engert, head of Technology Transfer at GSI/FAIR, in praise of the method. "We are interested in further cooperation partners, especially from the fields of medical technology, pharmacology and business administration, for the test phase."
GSI contracted TREAVES Research & Consult GmbH as a door opener to potential users and to coordinate the feasibility study. Treaves itself is a spin-off of graduates of the University of Applied Sciences and the Technical University Darmstadt and acts as a service provider for applied natural sciences. Particularly in the field of digitization, the company has already gained extensive experience in the implementation of funded projects and brings a wide range of contacts from industry.
Half of the project costs of around 91,000 euros will be financed by GSI/FAIR and the other half will be funded by the Distr@l funding from the Hessian Ministry for Digital Strategy and Development. The Distr@l funding program offers a needs-based funding program in the areas of digital innovations and research and development.
The fields of application currently planned for the RoSEN feasibility study are, on the one hand, the numerical simulation of technically relevant fluid and structural dynamic problems, such as the simulation of energy storage systems for regenerative energy supply, and, on the other hand, pharmacokinetic population modeling, which plays a major role in drug development and is also being used, for example, in the context of the current Covid 19 pandemic. In the view of Dr. Arthur Rudek, the founder and managing director of Treaves GmbH, further applications could lie in industrial photogrammetry, business management control or, more generally and across industries, in the more efficient execution of optimization studies with large data populations.
Photogrammetry is used, for example, to digitize technical facilities and buildings for computer-aided process or failure analysis. Image data processing also plays an important role in medical technology, for example in the time-dependent processing of three- to four-dimensional CT, MRI or X-ray images, in the diagnosis of diseases or injuries, or in the context of the Covid 19 pandemic, for example to investigate the late effects of impaired lungs. In the context of a use for business management control, multivariant parameter spaces of business key figures are to be used for the evaluation of the economic performance of individual parts of the company, thus enabling more efficient business management processes and increased profitability. (CP)
]]>At the same time, the construction of FAIR is progressing both on the construction field and in the production of components for accelerators and experiments. In three interviews, we introduce people whose stories are representative of all our dedicated employees and researchers. By moving to online formats, we were also able to maintain our event program for the public and expand it to new audiences. (CP)
Download of "target" – Issue 19, March 2021 (PDF, 20 MB)
FAIR and GSI Technical Managing Director Joerg Blaurock along with FAIR and GSI Administrative Managing Director Ulrich Breuer welcomed the Industry Liaison Officers. Technical Managing Director opened the meeting and presented the FAIR project status update and the progress of the construction work and informed the ILOs with the substantial progress made in the project execution. The meeting continued with an information on the mandate from the FAIR Council and objectives of the ILO meeting, presented by David Urner, Head of the GSI/FAIR In-Kind. Anna Hall, Director of Big Science Sweden moderated a lively discussion among ILOs.
An update on the procurement guidelines and options at FAIR was given by Michele Spatar, Head of Procurement, a presentation on upcoming FAIR tender opportunities was presented by David Urner, Head of In-Kind. Their presentations were followed by a moderated session of questions and answer section where each ILO could clarify issues with the Head of Procurement and Head of In-Kind. The representatives from Swedish ILO Big Science Sweden, Frida Tibblin-Citron and UK ILO from UKRI-STFC, Carol Watts presented their scope of work and provided useful resources and insights how these ILOs are organised in their country. The ILOs were informed about other ILO centric platform and events in foreseen future to generate closer engagements between ILOs of FAIR and other mega-science facilities in procurement stage.
The ILOs agreed to have biannual meetings to keep themselves informed. The main significance of the biannual meetings is to provide the ILOs with information to promote discussions with industry and partners in their respective countries on collaboration opportunities at FAIR. The ILOs will meet again on 17th September 2021 in Darmstadt.
Latest Drone Video of the FAIR construction site
Information on FAIR/GSI procurement
In-Kind and Procurement / ILOs information from partner countries
]]>A team of international researchers, including Professor Almudena Arcones from the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung and TU Darmstadt and Dr. Marius Eichler, went back to the formation of our Solar System, 4.6 billion years ago, and gained new insights into the cosmic origin of the heaviest elements on the periodic table, as reported in a study published in the journal Science.
The question of which astronomical events can host the rapid neutron-capture process, r-process in short, that produces the heaviest elements in the Universe such as iodine, gold, platinum, uranium, plutonium, and curium has been a mystery for decades. Presently, it is thought that the r-process can occur during violent collisions between two neutron stars, one neutron star and a black hole, or during rare supernova explosions following the death of massive stars.
Some of the nuclei produced by the r-process are radioactive and take millions of years to decay into stable nuclei. Iodine-129 and curium-247 are two of such radioactive nuclei. They were incorporated into meteorites during the formation of the Sun and have an amazing peculiarity: they decay at almost exactly the same rate. This means that the iodine-129 to curium-247 ratio did not changed since their production, billions of years ago. “With the iodine-129 to curium-247 ratio being frozen in time, like a prehistoric fossil, we can have a direct look into the last wave of heavy element production that built up the composition of the Solar System” says Benoit Côté, the first author of the study.
The team calculated the iodine-129 to curium-247 ratios created by collisions between neutron stars and black holes, and compared their model predictions to the value found in meteorites. They concluded that the number of neutrons during the last r-process event that preceded the birth of the Solar System cannot be too high, otherwise too much curium is produced relative to iodine. This implies that very neutron-rich sources, such as the material ripped off the surface of a neutron star during a collision, likely did not play an important role, while moderately neutron-rich conditions, often found in ejecta from the discs that form around the merging event are more consistent with the meteoritic value.
Because nucleosynthesis predictions rely on uncertain nuclear and stellar properties, the final answer to which astronomical object was the exact source is still elusive. However, “the ability of the iodine-129 to curium-247 ratio to peer more directly into the fundamental nature of heavy element nucleosynthesis is an exciting prospect” says Dr. Marius Eichler, who was also part of the investigating team and postdoc in the group of Prof. Almudena Arcones.
Following this work, future astrophysical simulations of stellar mergers and explosions combined with nuclear experiments – such as those planned at GSI and the international accelerator center FAIR being built here – can now also be tested against meteoritic constraints to reveal the source of the heaviest elements of the Solar System.
The work of Dr. Marius Eichler and Prof. Almudena Arcones was supported in part by the ERC Starting Grant EUROPIUM and the DFG Collaborative Research Center 1245.(TUD/BP)
Scientific publication in the journal Science
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The FAIR-GENCO Young Scientist Award went to Dr. Ruben de Groote, who received his PhD in 2017 at the University in Leuven, Belgium, and is currently conducting research in laser spectroscopy of exotic atomic nuclei in Jyväskylä, Finland. The Young Scientist Award is bestowed annually by the FAIR-GSI Exotic Nuclei Community to outstanding young researchers working in the field of experimental or theoretical nuclear physics or chemistry. The winners are selected by an international jury. It is endowed with 1,000 euros and is awarded during the NUSTAR annual meeting.
With the Membership Award, the GENCO community honored the following new members:
Dr. Kathrin Wimmer from the Institute for Structure of Matter (IEM-CSIC) coordinates the project LISA (Lifetime measurements with Solid Active targets), which aims to measure rare atomic nuclei with innovative detectors and high-resolution gamma-ray spectroscopy. For the practical research part, she will also use the GSI/FAIR facilities in the framework of her just awarded "ERC Consolidator Grant".
The aim of the LISA project is to develop a novel method for lifetime measurements in atomic nuclei. Lifetimes probe the collectivity of a nucleus through its electromagnetic transition properties. The experimental approach is based on active solid targets employing novel diamond detectors and will dramatically enhance the scope of measurements in exotic nuclei. Coupled to the state-of-the-art gamma-ray tracking detector AGATA, LISA will overcome the present challenges of lifetime measurements with low-intensity beams of unstable nuclei.
LISA will exploit the unique capabilities of the FAIR accelerator center, being built at GSI. The future fragmentation facility will deliver the most exotic and highest intensity radioactive ion beams. LISA will greatly expand the nuclear structure program of HISPEC, a prominent project within the NUSTAR science pillar at FAIR. The results will have significant impact on the theoretical descriptions and modelling of atomic nuclei making their predictions more reliable.
The award winner Dr. Kathrin Wimmer, currently working at CSIC Madrid, and Dr. Jürgen Gerl, NUSTAR coordinator and head of the nuclear structure department at GSI, are very much looking forward to working together on the exciting LISA project at GSI.
Professor Evgeny Epelbaum is thematically closely connected to GSI/FAIR via his project "Nuclear Theory from First Principles", which is funded by an ERC Advanced Grant. In the project, the holder of the Chair of Theoretical Physics at Ruhr-Universität Bochum (RUB) wants to use theoretical methods to describe the forces between three nuclear particles.
Pairwise interactions between two nucleons are already relatively well understood. This enables physicists to describe what is going on inside the simplest atomic nucleus, i.e. one that consists of two nucleons. The opposite is true for more complicated atomic nuclei consisting of three or more nucleons. Here, the interactions are still a mystery. This is where Evgeny Epelbaum's research project comes in. He and his team hope to describe the forces acting in a system of three or more nucleons. To this end, the researchers are using a theoretical method known as effective field theory, which is widely used in particle physics. With this approach, the Bochum-based group already described precisely the interactions between two nucleons in the past. Now, they intend to extend the approach to three-particle forces.
Based on the theory developed under the ERC Grant, the team also wants to analyse the existing experimental data for the three-nucleon system. Experiments to understand multi-nucleon systems are an essential part of the FAIR research program in nuclear structure. The team's goal is to resolve discrepancies between theory and experiment. Moreover, numerical simulations are planned for more complex nuclear systems, which consist of even more particles, in order to explore relationships between the nuclear forces and their properties. Such simulations also provide insights into areas that are not accessible to experimental research. For example, it is possible to explore how the properties of atomic nuclei or processes in the stars depend on the constants of nature – such as the masses of quarks.
Another example from 2020 of outstanding researchers honored with an ERC grant is Professor Beatriz Jurado from the Centre Etudes Nucléaires de Bordeaux Gradignan (CENBG), who received an ERC Advanced Grant at the same time as GSI physicists Professor Marco Durante and Professor Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo. She will also use the research facilities of GSI/FAIR to conduct the experimental part of her ERC Grant project.
Her project aims to develop a new methodology to indirectly infer neutron-induced cross sections of unstable nuclei. These cross sections are essential for nuclear astrophysics. The experimental part of Beatriz Jurado´s project will be realized at the accelerator facility on the GSI/FAIR campus as part of FAIR Phase 0, using the storage rings ESR and CRYRING.
The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, expressed his enthusiasm that in addition to GSI/FAIR’s own scientists, several EU award-winning researchers are closely associated with GSI/FAIR: "I am very happy that the research community demonstrates its interest in the GSI/FAIR research facilities and the science conducted here, and that the world-class value of these themes is recognized by the ERC grant committees." (BP)
]]>For the last 40 years, the workshop on High-Energy-Density Physics with laser and ion beams has taken place as an annual event at the Darmstädter Haus of the Technical University Darmstadt in Hirschegg, Austria, where the number of participants is limited to 90. It provides an international forum to discuss high energy density physics including fundamental science, intense laser and particle beams interaction with matter and inertial confinement fusion. Many of the participants are active members of the HED@FAIR collaboration, one of the collaborations responsible for the implementation of the experimental program at the FAIR facility.
In total, this year's event included 56 talks, two poster sessions with 15 posters each, and two tutorial sessions for students, a format that was newly introduced this year. The workshop gathered participants spanning over 19 time zones, from New South Wales in Australia to California. This was made possible not only through the live streaming of the contributions but also via recording and swift availability of these through GSI’s server. At peak times, more than 120 participants were online together, and some of the researchers were connected directly from the GSI/FAIR campus in compliance with Corona rules.
FAIR has been at the forefront of preoccupations of the community gathering at the workshop for many years. As such, the presentation by the Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Paolo Giubellino on the status of the project was highly expected and the news on the recent progress were very well received. Academician Vladimir Fortov, after his tragic death in 2020, one of the fathers of plasma physics at GSI and high-energy density research at FAIR was celebrated by many speakers, in memory of his work and engagement for science.
Current topics this year included the properties of high-energy dense matter created by intense ion beams and lasers, beam-plasma interactions, diagnostic methods for high-energy density matter, and accelerator issues of intense beams. New and upcoming high energy density (HED) facilities were also a topic.
The four Poster Awards for young scientists were presented on the last day of the event. This year, the awards were given to students from Germany, India and Russia. Professor Paolo Giubellino on this occasion emphasized the significance of junior staff development: "It is important to promote young, international talents at an early stage in order to attract the scientists of the future and offer them opportunities to develop their talent. Today's students are tomorrow's researchers, who will also work in the field of high-energy density physics. For science and also for research at the future FAIR accelerator facility, it is existential to attract and motivate the best minds." (BP)
]]>The Hessian state government is supporting cutting-edge research in Hesse with almost 40 million euros over a period of four years. Six projects of the universities in Darmstadt, Frankfurt, Giessen and Marburg together with further universities and non-university research institutions will be supported in the funding line "Cluster Projects" launched by the state from April 2021. In this way, the state is strengthening the research areas that shape the profile of Hessen's universities, including particle physics. One of the funded projects is ELEMENTS, in which the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung is involved.
In 2017, gravitational waves from merging neutron stars and their electromagnetic signals were detected for the first time — a turning point in multi-messenger astronomy. The cluster project ELEMENTS (Exploring the Universe from microscopic to macroscopic scales) brings together scientists from different fields of physics to investigate the origin of chemical elements in the universe. In the process, physics questions about the fundamental properties of matter will be answered. Experimentally, the project benefits from the worldwide unique infrastructure of particle accelerators in Hesse, including the FAIR facility currently under construction at GSI.
The project combines the strong research forces of several international leading institutions. It is being funded with 7.9 million euros until 2025 as part of the "Cluster Projects" funding line of the State of Hesse in preparation for the next round of the Bund-Länder Excellence Strategy. Besides Goethe University Frankfurt and TU Darmstadt, which are equally leading the project, the University of Gießen and the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt are also involved. This collaboration will allow the researchers to combine their outstanding expertise in gravitational physics and in the physics of nuclear reactions, as well as to make synergistic use of the accelerator facilities in Darmstadt — the FAIR facility at GSI and the TU's electron accelerator S-DALINAC at the Institute of Nuclear Physics.
"I am delighted with this decision of the State of Hesse," said the Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino. "In the State of Hesse we understand how to bring together the right people and the right topics. We provide research structures at international top level. That enables us to achieve a leading standing in important future research fields. The current research program at GSI and FAIR offers excellent opportunities, and in the coming years the FAIR accelerator center will open up further innovative potential."
"I am extremely pleased with the decision," TU President Professor Tanja Brühl said. "It honors the synergies between outstanding university and non-university research. The globally unique particle accelerator infrastructures established here, including the future FAIR facility, will contribute to a successful future." Brühl added that the project also strengthens the alliance of Rhine-Main universities formed by the universities of Mainz, Frankfurt and Darmstadt.
ELEMENTS will study neutron stars, the barely visible little brothers of black holes. They are formed after a star has burned out when it was not massive enough to be compressed into a black hole by its own gravitational pressure after its end. Neutron stars, like black holes, are the cause of extreme space-time curvature, and when neutron stars or black holes merge, detectable gravitational waves are created. Because of their cosmic effects and extreme conditions, both phenomena are very exciting for researchers around the world. However, unlike black holes, neutron stars also allow conclusions about their interior.
Thus, neutron star mergers are visible in the sky as extremely light-intense processes, kilonovae, where the heaviest chemical elements are produced through nuclear reactions under extreme conditions. The ELEMENTS project investigates the dynamics in the fusion of two neutron stars and in this context also examines the gravitational field, nuclear matter and — the main topic of the physicists at GSI/FAIR and the TU Darmstadt — the heavy chemical elements that are created in the process. For example, the luminosity of a kilonova as a fingerprint for the production of heavy elements was successfully predicted a few years ago by physicists working in Darmstadt. (HMWK / TUD / BP)
]]>The assembly of the yoke octants is aided by a star shaped installation tool. After its removal, the octants stayed in place with minimal deviation. All parts are surveyed with a laser tracker employing fixed fiducial marks even during the assembly process, which facilitates the whole operation providing much better precision. No mechanical stoppers are used, as their precision would be too low.
The four doors, two downstream and two upstream, are bolted to the yoke in their closed position. Before opening the doors, the bolts are unfastened and the doors are lowered to the sliding rails resting then on heavy weight rollers. The 22 tons door wings were opened sliding on the rollers with a friction of only about 0.5%: Two persons were able to move one wing with a simple manual winch.
In the final configuration, the Budker Institute for Nuclear Physics (BINP) will equip the doors with hydraulic jacks and actuators, which were not part of the deliverables of SET. The yoke was again disassembled and the parts will be transported to BINP. There, they will be assembled into the complete magnet.
Currently the cryostat of the superconducting solenoid is in production. At the same time, the production of the superconducting wire is in preparation. The assembly of the entire magnet at BINP will take place next year and allow first tests. It is finally planned, to perform a precision field mapping of the large active volume of the magnet, where in future particle tracks will bend to be detected by the PANDA experiment. (BP)
]]>The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, was enthusiastic about these successes: "Once again, the excellence of GSI and FAIR is underlined by the success in these calls. I am delighted about this funding, which the EU has made available to support extremely promising thematic areas. With their expertise, our researchers are among the key players in the fields now being funded. The integration of GSI and FAIR in the projects confirms the attractivity of our research infrastructures for the international community".
HITRIplus (Heavy Ion Therapy Research Integration plus) will receive the highest amount of funding, i.e. 680,000 euros. The project will be realized in the Research Department Biophysics under the leadership of Professor Marco Durante and coordinated by the National Center for Oncological Hadron Therapy CNAO in Pavia, Italy, as consortium leader. The aim of HITRIplus is to integrate pre-clinical and clinical research in cancer treatment with heavy ion beams while jointly developing its high technology.
Heavy ion beams are an extremely promising treatment method because they are more effective than any other treatment for radioresistant tumors. The ion beam focuses on the malignant tissue while sparing the healthy organs. The goal of HITRIplus is to improve heavy ion therapy as a cutting-edge tool to treat those tumors that are not curable with X-rays or protons, and that have better survival rates, lower recurrence or milder toxicity with ions.
The HITRIplus consortium brings together for the first time all major European heavy ion therapy centers with leading European industries, academia and research laboratories. The aim is to jointly build a strong pan-European Heavy Ion Therapy Research Community. The resulting networks will structure and foster the research in heavy ion therapy, including clinical and pre-clinical research, and also develop new accelerator and beam delivery technologies. Lower costs and dimensions of new facilities should help to make cancer ion therapy more accessible to even more patients and at the same time open up new markets for European industry.
The project RADNEXT (RADiation facility Network for the EXploration of effects for indusTry and research), which is funded with 342,000 euros in the GSI/FAIR part, deals with innovative radiation testing methodologies. The project at GSI/FAIR is conducted by the research departments Biophysics and Materials Research and with its leaders Professors Marco Durante and Christina Trautmann. RADNEXT is coordinated by CERN. The project focuses on irradiation at accelerators of electronic devices for the industrial sectors of space, automotive, communication technologies, medical and accelerators, among others, which require coordinated and streamlined testing.
At present, the European economy does not yet have a coordinated network of testing facilities for these purposes. For example, such a network could provide crucial support to small and medium-sized enterprises, which in many cases have difficulty in gaining access to the required facilities. Novel testing methodologies can also pave the way for generating new radiation standards, since the existing ones are mainly restricted to classical space applications and radiation-hardened components.
Research infrastructures can play a key role in the field of radiation testing by taking the first steps towards the creation of a sustainable, coordinated irradiation testing facilities network. Finally, it will also respond to the need of establishing a radiation hardness evaluation based on risk assessment and mitigation rather than on complete risk avoidance.
353,000 Euro will be made available to GSI/FAIR with the project I.FAST (Innovation Promotion in Accelerator Science and Technology). The EU tender focuses on the particle accelerators themselves. Their use spans from the large installations devoted to fundamental science, to a wealth of facilities providing X-ray or neutron beams to a wide range of scientific disciplines.
Almost 50 institutions are involved in the successor project to the ARIES program coordinated at CERN, in which GSI is also involved. CERN is also coordinating I.FAST. GSI/FAIR is again part of the consortium with a broad-based team of researchers from different areas, which underlines the varied expertise on-site. The project is advanced by numerous accelerator groups and research departments. It aims to advance new developments in the field of accelerator-based research infrastructures and to promote innovative technologies.
In scientific laboratories, but also in medicine and industry the use of accelerators is rapidly growing. Particle accelerators are now facing critical challenges, for example with regard to the size and performance of the planned facilities and the increasing demands to accelerators for applied science. The project aims to help developing more performant and affordable technologies, and reducing power consumption. This could pave the way to a sustainable next generation of accelerators.
By involving industry via the 17 industrial companies in the consortium, I.FAST aims to generate innovation and thus support the long-term evolution of accelerator technologies in Europe. Alternative accelerator concepts will be explored and the prototyping of key technologies will be promoted. These include techniques for increasing brightness and reducing dimensions of synchrotron light sources, advanced superconducting technologies to produce higher fields with lower consumption, and strategies and technical solutions for improving energy efficiency.
Finally, the Biophysics Department under the leadership of Professor Marco Durante has a small participation in the European medical isotope programme PRISMAP (PRoduction of high purity Isotopes by mass Separation for Medical Application), coordinated by CERN. In this context, 17,000 euros go to GSI and FAIR. PRISMAP will bring together key European intense neutron sources, isotope mass separation facilities, and high-power accelerators and cyclotrons with leading biomedical research institutes and hospitals. Together they will create a sustainable source of high purity new radionuclides to advance early-phase research into radiopharmaceuticals, targeted drugs for cancer, theranostics, and personalized medicine in Europe.
Referring to the fact that all of these projects are realized in international consortia, Scientific Managing Director Paolo Giubellino remarks: "Science is a World enterprise, in which progress in frontier initiatives can only be successful if carried out at the international level. For GSI/FAIR this is a vital, strategic way of operating, and we will be able to contribute actively with our specific competence and experience in these programs which will shape future research“. (BP)
]]>The Baryon Antibaryon Symmetry Experiment (BASE) at CERN’s Antimatter Factory has set new limits on the mass of axion-like particles – hypothetical particles that are candidates for dark matter – and constrained how easily they can turn into photons, the particles of light. This is especially significant as BASE was not designed for such studies. The experiment’s new result, published by Physical Review Letters, describes this pioneering method and opens up new experimental possibilities in the search for cold dark matter. GSI is involved in BASE, among other things, by manufacturing some components of the experimental setup.
“BASE has extremely sensitive tuned circuit detection systems to study the properties of single trapped antiprotons. We realized that these detectors can also be used to search for signals of other particles. In this recently published work we used one of our detectors as an antenna to search for a new type of axion-like particles,” explains Jack Devlin, a CERN research fellow working on the experiment.
Axions or axion-like particles are candidates for cold dark matter. From astrophysical observations, we believe that around 26.8 percent of the matter-energy content of the Universe is made up of dark matter and only about 5 percent of ordinary – visible – matter; the remainder is the mysterious dark energy. These unknown particles feel the force of gravity, but they barely respond to the other fundamental forces, if they experience these at all. The best accepted theory of fundamental forces and particles, called the Standard Model of particle physics, does not contain any particles which have the right properties to be cold dark matter. However, since the Standard Model leaves many questions unanswered, physicists have proposed theories that go beyond, some of which explain the nature of dark matter. Among such theories are those that suggest the existence of axions or axion-like particles. These theories need to be tested and there are many experiments set up around the world to look for these particles. For the first time, the BASE experiment at CERN has turned the tools developed to detect single antiprotons to the search for dark matter.
Compared to the large detectors installed in the LHC, BASE is a much smaller experiment. It is connected to CERN’s Antiproton Decelerator, which supplies the experiment with antiprotons. BASE captures and suspends these particles in a Penning trap, a combination of electric and strong magnetic fields. To avoid collisions with ordinary matter, the trap is operated at 5 Kelvin (~−268 °C) where exceedingly low pressures, similar to those in deep space are reached (10−18 mbar). In this extremely well-isolated environment, clouds of trapped antiprotons can exist for years at a time. By carefully adjusting the electric fields, the physicists at BASE can isolate individual antiprotons and move them to a separate part of the trap. In this region, very sensitive superconducting resonant detectors can pick up the tiny electrical currents generated by single antiprotons as they move around the trap.
In the now published work, the BASE team looked for unexpected electrical signals in their sensitive antiproton detectors. At the heart of each detector is a small, approximately 4cm diameter, donut-shaped coil, which looks similar to the inductors you might find in many ordinary electronics. However, the BASE detectors are superconducting and have almost no electrical resistance, and all the surrounding components are carefully chosen so that they do not cause electrical losses. This makes the BASE detectors extremely sensitive to any small electrical fields. Physicists used the antiproton as a quantum sensor to precisely calibrate the background noise on their detector. They then began to search for unusual signals, however faint, that could hint at those induced by axion-like particles and their possible interactions with photons. Nothing was found at the frequencies that were recorded, which means that BASE succeeded in setting new limits for the mass of axion-like particles and in investigating their possible interactions with photons.
With this study, BASE opens up possibilities for other Penning trap experiments to participate in the search for dark matter. Since BASE was not built to look for these signals, several changes could be made to improve the probability of finding an axion-like particle in the future. “With this new technique, we’ve combined two previously unrelated branches of experimental physics: axion physics and high-precision Penning trap physics. Our laboratory experiment is complementary to astrophysics experiments and especially very sensitive in the low axion mass range. With a purpose-built instrument we would be able to increase the bandwidth and sensitivity to broaden the landscape of axion searches using Penning trap techniques,” says Stefan Ulmer, spokesperson for the BASE experiment collaboration.
The BASE collaboration consists of scientists from RIKEN Fundamental Symmetries Laboratory, the European Center for Nuclear Research (CERN), the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics (MPIK) in Heidelberg, the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU), the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM), the University of Tokyo, the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt, the Leibniz University Hannover, and the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB) in Braunschweig. The research was performed as part of the work of the Max Planck-RIKEN-PTB Center for Time, Constants and Fundamental Symmetries, an international group established to develop high-precision measurements to better understand the physics of our Universe. (CP)
The complete accelerator facility will be in operation: the linear accelerator UNILAC, the ring accelerator SIS18, the experimental storage ring ESR, the fragment separator FRS, the high-power laser PHELIX and, for the first time, the new FAIR storage ring CRYRING will be available for use by the researchers. A large number of experimental sites will be served, partly in parallel operation, with different ion beams from hydrogen to uranium. The science run at the GSI facilities is part of the FAIR experimental program, the so-called FAIR Phase 0, which already offers excellent experimental opportunities while FAIR is still under construction.
During the previous shutdown, numerous maintenance and modernization measures could be implemented to further prepare the existing facility for future operation as a pre-accelerator of the FAIR facility. Due to the Corona pandemic, the usual travel of domestic and foreign guest scientists remains limited during this experiment period. However, the shutdown was also used to expand remote access to parts of the facility for the researchers and improve electronic communication in order to enable the best possible performance of the scientific work. (CP)
]]>“The GSI Supervisory Board, the FAIR Council and I personally are very delighted that Mr. Blaurock has accepted our proposal to serve in this position for another five years. The very good progress in the construction of FAIR in the last years is the result of the great commitment of the employees of GSI and FAIR, but in particular also his personal success. We are convinced that with his leadership the FAIR construction project will be successfully completed,” emphasized Ministerialdirigent Dr. Volkmar Dietz, who is the Chair of the GSI Supervisory Board and the FAIR Council and director in the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF).
The personnel decision is also a guarantee for continuity and stable conditions in the GSI and FAIR management: Together with Professor Paolo Giubellino as Scientific Managing Director and Ulrich Breuer as Administrative Managing Director, Jörg Blaurock will continue to form the joint top management of GSI and FAIR. The goal of the management team is to enable cutting-edge research at the existing facility and to realize the future accelerator facility FAIR in international collaboration.
Jörg Blaurock is looking forward to his second term with a lot of energy: "I am very pleased about the trust placed in me and the opportunity to continue to advance and shape the FAIR project." He cites solid, reliable and efficient project implementation and the on-going continuation of execution work as important goals on the way to realizing FAIR.
In the recent years, Jörg Blaurock led the FAIR project, one of the world's largest construction projects for science, through numerous challenging development processes, always keeping in view the special requirements of this extraordinary large construction site. Great progress was made in the north construction field and important stages were completed. The focus was on excavation work, concrete and structural work for crucial buildings such as the large ring accelerator SIS100, the central transfer building and the first experiment for the FAIR research program. Even under difficult corona conditions, the conditions for the progress of the work on the construction site were maintained.
In Jörg Blaurock's second term, further major realization steps are moving into the focus, such as the development of the southern construction field and the technical building equipment. The global high-tech component development for the experiments and the accelerator machine, as well as their implementation and assembly in the buildings, are also a central task for the future. The coming years will thus be dominated by further progress in order to expand even more the excellent development.
Before Jörg Blaurock, born in 1964, took up his position at GSI and FAIR, he has been working in international large-scale plant construction for over 20 years, overseeing full planning, delivery, assembly and commissioning of large technical facilities worldwide. He studied mechanical engineering at the Helmut Schmidt University in Hamburg during his career as an officer in the Bundeswehr, where he worked until 1994. He went on to work for large-scale plant construction firms Uhde GmbH and Lurgi GmbH in the turnkey production of petrochemical industrial plants at various international locations. In 2007, he joined Alstom, today General Electric, where he worked in a number of positions – most recently for General Electric Deutschland GmbH in Stuttgart. There, as Managing Director he was responsible for the turnkey delivery of utility steam generators for electricity-generating fossil-fuel power stations. (BP)
]]>The place of origin of the heavy and heaviest elements, which include gold and platinum, has long occupied the scientific community. The U.S. National Research Council had listed this question as one of the eleven biggest unsolved problems in physics in the 21st century. A breakthrough came in August 2017, when a previously never observed astrophysical phenomenon was detected by both gravitational waves and a burst of light (known as a kilonova). Analysis of the gravitational waves showed that the observed event could be identified as the merger of two neutron stars, while the light curve gave evidence for the production of heavy elements in the so-called astrophysical r-process.
The r-process, a sequence of neutron capture reactions and beta decays by extremely neutron-rich nuclei, has been postulated as the origin of the heavy elements for a long time, but now a location where this occurs in the universe is finally known. The identification of neutron star mergers as an astrophysical site of the r-process has thus opened the door to a fascinating new field of scientific research that is attracting considerable global attention. This is one of the reasons why the prestigious scientific journal "Reviews of Modern Physics", published by the American Physical Society, invited a group of experts to comprehensively summarize and evaluate the latest knowledge on the formation of the heavy elements. Among the eight authors are three researchers working at GSI and two others closely associated with GSI/FAIR.
"It was, of course, a great honor to provide a review of this rapidly evolving field of research for ‘Reviews of Modern Physics’. Especially, it was a challenge to present in a balanced way the wide spectrum from astrophysical observations to nuclear and atomic physics laboratory measurements and simulations of such events. I am glad that competent colleagues from the different disciplines supported me with their expertise," says Professor Friedrich-Karl Thielemann, who also conducts research at GSI since his retirement from the University of Basel and who was recently awarded the Karl Schwarzschild Medal of the German Astronomical Society not least for his pioneering work on the r-process.
However, Thielemann also emphasizes that there are still many unresolved questions about the r-process, which the review also addresses. This particularly concerns the nuclear processes that are essential in the fusion of neutron stars as well as in r-process nucleosynthesis. Exciting findings can be expected here once new large-scale accelerator facilities have begun operation. At FAIR, the Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research, which is currently being built at GSI as an international accelerator project, matter can be compressed to extreme densities and temperatures in ultrarelativistic heavy ion collisions and studied under conditions that exist in neutron star mergers just before the transition to a black hole.
"At FAIR, we will also produce many of the exotic nuclei for the first time and measure their properties at the storage rings and detectors available there," says co-author Gabriel Martinez-Pinedo, head of the GSI theory department and professor at TU Darmstadt. Professor Martinez-Pinedo had led with Brian Metzger of Columbia University the team that predicted the kilonova signal as a fingerprint of the r-process several years before it was observed.
Until now, the properties of the short-lived nuclei, which are important in the r-process, had to be modeled theoretically, which is always associated with a certain degree of uncertainty. Another co-author, Professor Michael Wiescher from Notre Dame University, who is connected to GSI through a prestigious Humboldt Research Award, is working on changing this in the future. Together with other researchers, primarily from Goethe University Frankfurt and GSI, Wiescher is developing plans to use the unique storage rings at FAIR to generate important experimental data for the r-process. “I am fascinated by the idea of my colleague Professor René Reifarth from Frankfurt, that the FAIR rings will make it possible to measure neutron captures at short-lived nuclei," Wiescher points to a long-held dream of nuclear astrophysics that could come true at FAIR. The FAIR storage rings also promise first-time access to measuring atomic physics data from heavy element ions, as needed to model the kilonova light curve.
The review article appears in the new volume 93 (February 1, 2021) of “Reviews of Modern Physics". Because of the actuality and complexity of the subject, the editors have allowed the page limit to be significantly exceeded. The text summarizes in 85 pages what is currently known about the formation of the heavy elements by the astrophysical r-process. However, it also shows which questions are still unsolved and what progress can be expected from improved astronomical observations, from computer simulations, and above all from the unique possibilities opened up by the next generation of accelerator facilities in Europe, America, and Asia.
The scientists involved are looking to the future: "When another review article on the r-process will appear in the ‘Reviews of Modern Physics’ in a decade or two, it will probably answer many of today's unanswered questions on the basis of the knowledge now described. But surely, as is typical and fruitful for science, it also will identify new open questions." (BP)
Scientific publication in the journal „Reviews of Modern Physics“
]]>Due to the Corona situation, no public tours with on-site presence on the campus and the viewpoint of the construction site can currently be offered. Therefore, GSI and FAIR want to give all interested persons the opportunity to continue visiting us virtually and interactively with this specially compiled online offer. The new digital format adapts the guided tour offer, which has been in high demand for many years, to new times. A live event is organized, each lasting 90 minutes and offering the opportunity to ask individual questions, answered by the presenters.
After a short introductory lecture, a guided video tour will take the participants to several selected research sites and facilities on campus: Among other things, the participants can visit the 120-meter-long linear accelerator UNILAC or the main control room online and learn a lot about the unique research at GSI and FAIR. There are also interesting facts about the construction of components for the international accelerator center FAIR, currently being built at GSI.
A highlight of the new offer is the online premium place directly at the mega construction site FAIR: From the viewpoint there, participants can enjoy an impressive video panorama of the always-busy construction site and an impressive insight into the future of international cutting-edge research, which will be carried out there. With FAIR, researchers from all over the world will be able to produce and study cosmic matter directly in the laboratory and thus unravel unsolved secrets about the structure and evolution of the universe.
Detailed information on technical requirements and access modalities to participate in the digital discovery tour into the world of GSI and FAIR is available at www.gsi.de/en/besichtigung. Registration for the event dates is not necessary. Up to 500 people can participate. Further questions about the new online offer can be sent by e-mail to besichtigung(at)gsi.de. (BP)
All details about the new online visits
Dates: 12.02.2021, 10:00, 18.02.2021, 15:00 and 23.02.2021, 13:00
]]>A total of nine superconducting single magnets are integrated into the multiplet, and it is a real heavyweight: It is seven meters long, has a diameter of 2.5 meters and weighs over 60 tons (video of the magnet). Accordingly, the delivery to CERN was made by means of a heavy goods transport on a low loader. Following installation in the test stand, the multiplet will be cooled and subjected to extensive testing of operating parameters and magnetic field qualities, which is expected to take about six to nine months. After successful completion of the acceptance tests, the multiplet is to be transported to GSI and prepared for the subsequent tunnel installation as part of a pre-assembly. Until the final installation, the multiplet and also its successors will be temporarily stored.
The multiplets are later used in the Super-FRS to guide and shape the beam to achieve a high-precision particle beam. The Super-FRS of the future FAIR accelerator center is an important component of the overall facility with great discovery potential for science: This part of the accelerator complex is about experiments with extremely rare exotic nuclei in the framework of FAIR’s experimental pillar NUSTAR (Nuclear Structure, Astophysics and Reactions). For this purpose, ions of the heaviest elements are initially accelerated onto a material sample (target) and crushed by the impact. Among the resulting fragments are exotic nuclei, which are sorted out at the Super-FRS and made available for further experiments. With the new separator nuclei up to uranium can be produced at relativistic energies, monoisotopically separated and analyzed. Since this entire process takes only a few hundred nanoseconds, the Super-FRS allows access to very short-lived nuclei.
The multiplets produced in La Spezia, Italy, as well as the subsequent test procedure, are an important contribution (in-kind) of GSI to the FAIR project. GSI is the main German shareholder in the international FAIR GmbH. All superconducting magnets required for the Super-FRS will be tested in the new test facility at CERN in alternating sequence. This includes both the total of 32 multiplett units as well as 24 superconducting dipole magnets, which are needed for deflecting the particle beam. A first short multiplet had already been delivered to CERN in 2019, used for commissioning of the first of a total of three test stands. In the meantime, the acceptance test of the short multiplet was successfully completed despite difficult conditions due to the corona pandemic. Currently, the second test stand is being commissioned with the multiplet in preparation for series testing of all multiplets. From spring of this year, further multiplet deliveries are planned at approximately monthly intervals. (BP/CP)
An international research team succeeded in gaining new insights into the artificially produced superheavy element flerovium, element 114, at the accelerator facilities of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt, Germany. Under the leadership of Lund University in Sweden and with significant participation of Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU) as well as the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM) in Germany and other partners, flerovium was produced and investigated to determine whether it has a closed proton shell. The results suggest that, contrary to expectations, flerovium is not a so-called "magic nucleus". The results were published in the journal Physical Review Letters and additionally highlighted with a synopsis by the American Physical Society.
In the late 1960s, Sven-Gösta Nilsson, then a physics professor at Lund University, and others formulated a theory about the possible existence of still unknown superheavy elements. In the meantime, such elements have been created and many predictions have been confirmed. The discovery of the six new elements 107 to 112 was achieved at GSI in Darmstadt, and further ones up to element 118 are now known as well. Strongly increased half-lives for the superheavy elements due to a "magic" combination of protons and neutrons were also predicted. This occurs when the shells in the nucleus, each holding a certain number of protons and neutrons, are completely filled. "Flerovium, element 114, was also predicted to have such a completed, 'magic' proton shell structure. If this were true, flerovium would lie at the center of the so-called 'island of stability’, an area of the chart of nuclides where the superheavy elements should have particularly long lifetimes due to the shell closures," explains Professor Dirk Rudolph of Lund University, who is the spokesperson of the international experiment.
Nilsson's theories inspired the international collaboration led by the Lund group to investigate whether flerovium nuclei indeed exhibit the predicted magical properties. Their experiments, performed at the UNILAC accelerator at GSI in Darmstadt in the framework of the FAIR Phase 0 experimental program, lasted 18 days. Every second, four trillion calcium-48 nuclei with 20 protons were accelerated to ten percent of the speed of light. They irradiated a thin foil containing rare plutonium-244 with 94 protons to produce atomic nuclei of flerovium, which has 114 protons, by nuclear fusion. This so-called target was produced at the Department of Chemistry at JGU, using, plutonium provided, among others, by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, USA. Strong magnets of the GSI recoil separator TASCA separated the flerovium nuclei from the intense calcium ion beam; subsequently they were registered in a detector setup specifically developed in Lund for this experiment.
The detector measured the radioactive decay of 30 flerovium nuclei — i.e., the emission of nuclear fragments of flerovium — with high efficiency and accuracy. By precisely analyzing these fragments and their emission times, the team was able to determine unusual decay channels of flerovium nuclei that could not be reconciled with its originally predicted "magical" properties. "Our study shows that element 114 is no more stable than others in its vicinity. This is a very important piece of the puzzle in the continued search for the center of the coveted island of stability," said Professor Christoph Düllmann, professor of nuclear chemistry at JGU and head of the research groups at GSI and HIM.
The new results will be of great benefit to science. Instead of continuing to search for the center of the island of stability in the region of element 114, even heavier ones like the as yet undiscovered element 120, will now move into the spotlight. (CP)
Scientists are able to selectively knockout nucleons and preformed nuclear clusters from atomic nuclei using high-energy proton beams. In an experiment performed at the Research Center for Nuclear Physics (RCNP) in Osaka in Japan, the existence of preformed helium nuclei at the surface of several tin isotopes could be identified in a reaction. The results confirm a theory, which predicts the formation of helium clusters in low-density nuclear matter and at the surface of heavy nuclei. A research team, lead by scientists from TU Darmstadt and the GSI Helmholtz Center for Heavy-Ion Research, and from the RIKEN Nishina Center for Accelerator-Based Science, discuss the new findings in a contribution to the latest issue of the journal “Science”.
The strong interaction binds neutrons and protons together to atomic nuclei. The knowledge of properties of nuclei and their theoretical description is basis for our understanding of nuclear matter and the development of the universe. Laboratory-based studies of reactions between atomic nuclei provide means to explore nuclear properties. These experiments allow to test and verify theories that describe properties of extended nuclear matter at different conditions, as present, for instance, in neutron stars in the universe.
Several theories predict the formation of nuclear clusters like helium nuclei in dilute nuclear matter. This effect is expected to occur at densities significantly lower than saturation density of nuclear matter, as present in the inner part of heavy nuclei. A theory developed in Darmstadt by Dr. Stefan Typel predicts that such a condensation of helium nuclei should also occur at the surface of heavy nuclei. Goal of the experiment, which is presented in the latest issue of “Science”, was the verification of this prediction.
The present experiment bombarded tin isotopes with high-energy protons and detected and identified the scattered protons as well as knocked-out helium nuclei. Dr. Junki Tanaka and Dr. Yang Zaihong could demonstrate that the reaction occurs as a direct “quasi-elastic” scattering of the protons off preformed helium nuclei in the surface of tin nuclei. The extracted cross sections for different tin isotopes reveal a decrease of the formation probability with the neutron excess of the nuclei, which impressively confirms the theoretical prediction.
This new finding, which has far-reaching consequences for our understanding of nuclei and nuclear matter, will now be studied in more detail in experimental programs planned at RCNP, and in inverse kinematics at RIKEN and the new FAIR facility at GSI, where also unstable heavy neutron-rich nuclei are accessible. (CP)
Novel calculations have enabled the study of nearly 700 isotopes between helium and iron, showing which nuclei can exist and which cannot. In an article published in Physical Review Letters, scientists from TU Darmstadt, the University of Washington, the Canadian laboratory TRIUMF, and the University of Mainz report how they simulated for the first time using innovative theoretical methods a large region of the chart of nuclides based on the theory of the strong interaction. The ExtreMe Matter Institure EMMI of GSI and TU Darmstadt is also involved in the research efforts.
Atomic nuclei are held together by the strong interaction between neutrons and protons. About ten percent of all known nuclei are stable. Starting from these stable isotopes, nuclei become increasingly unstable as neutrons are added or removed, until neutrons can no longer bind to the nucleus and “drip” out. This limit of existence, the so-called neutron “dripline”, has so far been discovered experimentally only for light elements up to neon. Understanding the neutron dripline and the structure of neutron-rich nuclei also plays a key role in the research program for the future accelerator facility FAIR at the GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research in Darmstadt.
In a new study, “Ab Initio Limits of Nuclei,” published in the journal Physical Review Letters as an Editors‘ Suggestion with an accompanying synopsis in APS Physics, EMMI Professor Achim Schwenk of TU Darmstadt and a Max Planck Fellow at the MPI for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg, together with scientists from the University of Washington, TRIUMF and the University of Mainz, succeeded in calculating the limits of atomic nuclei using innovative theoretical methods up to medium-mass nuclei. The results are a treasure trove of information about possible new isotopes and provide a roadmap for nuclear physicists to verify them.
The new study is not the first attempt to theoretically explore the extremely neutron-rich region of the nuclear landscape. Previous studies used density functional theory to predict bound isotopes between helium and the heavy elements. Professor Schwenk and colleagues, on the other hand, explored the chart of nuclides for the first time based on ab initio nuclear theory. Starting from microscopic two- and three-body interactions, they solved the many-particle Schrödinger equation to simulate the properties of atomic nuclei from helium to iron. They accomplished this by using a new ab initio many-body method – the In-Medium Similarity Renormalization Group –, combined with an extension that can handle partially filled orbitals to reliably determine all nuclei.
Starting from two- and three-nucleon interactions based on the strong interaction, quantum chromodynamics, the researchers calculated the ground-state energies of nearly 700 isotopes. The results are consistent with previous measurements and serve as the basis for determining the location of the neutron and proton driplines. Comparisons with experimental mass measurements and a statistical analysis enabled the determination of theoretical uncertainties for their predictions, such as for the separation energies of nuclei and thus also for the probability that an isotope is bound or does not exist (see figure).
The new study is considered a milestone in understanding how the chart of nuclides and the structure of nuclei emerges from the strong interaction. This is a key question of the DFG-funded Collaborative Research Center 1245 “Nuclei: From Fundamental Interactions to Structure and Stars” at the TU Darmstadt, within which this research was conducted. Next, the scientists want to extend their calculations to heavier elements in order to advance the input for the simulation of the synthesis of heavy elements. This proceeds in neutron-rich environments in the direction of the neutron dripline and occurs in nature when neutron stars merge or in extreme supernovae. (TUD/CP)
One of the biggest milestones of recent times is the development of the southern construction site. Despite the corona pandemic, construction work there could start after the awarding of the contract for excavation and shell construction for the first part in the southern area. The construction work includes the shell constructions for six buildings and a unique experimental facility – the Superconducting Fragment Separator (Super FRS). It will focus on research topics concerning the nuclear structure and interactions of extremely rare, exotic particles.
Meanwhile, the shell construction for the heart of the future facility, the 1.1-kilometer ring accelerator SIS100, is progressing steadily. The excavation work for the entire length of the tunnel is completed. The central transfer building is expanding over several floors. It is the most complex building of the facility, up to 17 meters deep and 20 meters high, and the central hub for the facility’s beamline. The civil underground work is also completed and the structural engineering is in full progress.
Furthermore, the foundation and walls for the future experiment CBM are completed. CBM is one of the four research pillars of the FAIR accelerator facility. The focus is on the investigation of highly compressed baryonic matter, as it exists in neutron stars and in the center of supernova explosions. An important step is reached in the central connection of the future accelerator FAIR and the existing facilities of GSI. As planned, a crucial connecting piece was delivered by heavy-duty transport. The 4.5-ton steel component was put in with a mobile crane. It will provide sealing the connection between GSI and FAIR.
To fill the newly constructed buildings with life, another important task gets increasingly into focus: the assembly of the accelerator machine. Regarding the development and manufacturing of high-tech components for FAIR, series production is already completed in some parts, while in others this is about to happen. A specially installed planning group will prepare this next phase in project realization, while the accelerator structures and buildings on the FAIR construction site continue to take shape. Up-to-date drone footage will continue to accompany this substantial progress also in the future. (BP)
The fast acceleration time of the SIS100 is a major difference compared to other superconducting synchrotrons, in particular the large collider synchrotrons, whose acceleration ramp typically takes several minutes. To enable this, SIS100 is equipped with a large number of high-frequency accelerator units. For the initial commissioning, 14 cavities were planned and ordered for the acceleration of the heavy ions; in the final configuration, 20 cavities will be needed. In addition to the radio-frequency systems for beam acceleration, SIS100 has another nine cavities for compression of the accelerated ion pulses and four other special systems. The latter are used on the one hand to stabilize the beam at high intensities and on the other hand to create radiofrequency barriers that enclose a rectangular beam pulse prior to extraction. With this equipment of high-frequency systems, the straight lines of SIS100 are more like a linear accelerator than a synchrotron.
The design and construction of the accelerating cavities was contracted to RI Research Instruments GmbH. A design phase, in which RI worked closely with specialists from GSI's Ring RF department, was followed by the production and acceptance of the first-of-series system. Based on the results of these activities, manufacturing of the 13 series systems, consisting of cavities and power amplifiers, started last fall. At the same time, the associated power supply units were produced in Switzerland by RI's cooperation partner, Ampegon Power Electronics AG, now part of the Aretè & Cocchi Technology Group.
In the beginning of December, the final components for the SIS100 acceleration system were delivered by RI. As a result, all components of the procurement — 14 cavities and power amplifiers each from RI and 14 power supply units from Ampegon — have now arrived at GSI/FAIR. Together with the "low level RF", the electronic system for control and synchronization, they form the acceleration system of the SIS100 synchrotron, which can generate a total peak acceleration voltage of 280 000 volts at the ceramic gaps of the cavities.
Production and acceptance testing faced unexpected challenges in early 2020 due to the corona pandemic, but thanks to shift work, flexible customization, and, most importantly, close cooperation among the teams at GSI/FAIR, RI, and Ampegon, the activities were successfully completed despite the difficult circumstances. In addition to the completion of the series production of the superconducting dipole modules, another important milestone for the construction of the SIS100 synchrotron has thus been reached. (CP)
]]>Professor Akito Arima contributed significantly to the development of the research landscape in Japan as a nuclear physicist and as a politician and held a lot of important positions over many years. During his term as RIKEN President, he focused on intensifying RIKEN's international relations. During this time, the long-standing, successful cooperation between GSI and RIKEN was significantly deepened through his support.
In addition to his work at RIKEN, he also served as president of the University of Tokyo, president of the Japan Association of National Universities, Minister of Education, and Minister of State for Science and Technology. In these various roles, he made great contributions to the development of science and technology. He received numerous prizes and awards for his services. Additionally, he was a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Besides his outstanding achievements in science and science policy making, Akito Arima was also a highly respected authority in haiku, the traditional Japanese poetry. (LW)
]]>Ivan Miskun's PhD thesis on "A Novel Method for the Measurement of Half-Lives and Decay Branching Ratios of Exotic Nuclei with the FRS Ion Catcher" was carried out at the University of Giessen in the research group of Professor Christoph Scheidenberger. The key element of this novel application is a so-called gas-filled stopping cell, which — this is the new development — is used as an ion trap with different storage times for the exotic nuclei produced and separated at the GSI fragment separator FRS.
The exotic nuclei are stopped in the gas-filled stopping cell of the FRS ion trap and stored for a certain variable period of time ranging from a few milliseconds to a few seconds. If during this time the unstable nuclei decay into different daughter nuclides in the ground state or into their excited levels, these are also stored and can subsequently be detected, identified (by highly accurate determination of their respective nuclear binding energies) and their intensity ratios be determined together with the remaining parent nuclei using a multireflection time-of-flight mass spectrometer. Metastable excited states (isomers) can also be detected and their excitation energies be precisely measured.
In his dissertation, Dr. Miskun verified that the method works reliably on several known examples, and furthermore he was able to determine the branching ratios for the energetically possible decay channels. This novel method can be used to determine a wide range of data that play a role in astrophysical nucleosynthesis processes, especially in the r-process in which fast neutron capture reactions in supernova explosions or neutron star mergers form all elements above iron up to the heaviest chemical elements within a few seconds.
GSI has a long-standing partnership with Pfeiffer Vacuum GmbH, producer of vacuum technology and pumps. Vacuum solutions from Pfeiffer Vacuum have been successfully used in GSI's facilities for decades. The annual FAIR-GSI PhD Award honors the best PhD thesis completed during the previous year.
Eligible for nominations are dissertations that were financially supported by GSI as part of its strategic partnerships with the universities of Darmstadt, Frankfurt, Giessen, Heidelberg, Jena, and Mainz, or through the research and development program. In the framework of the Graduate School HGS-HIRe (Helmholtz Graduate School for Hadron and Ion Research), more than 300 PhD students currently perform research for their PhD theses on topics closely related to GSI and FAIR. (CP)
]]>The Visiting Scientist Fellowship for Associate Professors will allow Danyal Winters to conduct research in Professor Xinwen Ma's group at the Institute of Modern Physics (IMP, Lanzhou) within 2021 to 2022. The prestigious award under the President's International Fellowship Initiative (PIFI) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) is a special funding program to enable talented foreign researchers to engage in scientific exchange and research collaboration in China.
Danyal Winters is the deputy head of the storage rings department at GSI and FAIR, work package leader "SIS100 laser cooling pilot facility" and work group coordinator "laser cooling" of the SPARC collaboration (APPA). At IMP, he will extend his research in the field of laser cooling and fluorescence diagnosis of stored relativistic ions at the Cooler Storage Ring (CSRe). He will use new detector and laser systems developed in the long-standing collaboration between IMP and GSI together with other groups at German universities (Darmstadt, Dresden, Münster). The FAIR project is also strengthened by this research exchange: further developments in laser cooling are significant for the FAIR accelerator SIS100 and the SPARC collaboration, of which the Chinese researchers are also active members. (LW)
]]>The Czech Republic is a partner state of the FAIR project and joined FAIR as an "Aspirant Partner" in spring 2019. At that time, the partnership could already build on a long-standing and very good working cooperation between Czech research institutions and GSI/FAIR. Czech scientists are involved, for example, in the large detector HADES as well as in nuclear astrophysics and are active in all four FAIR research pillars, including CBM. Here, they are significantly contributing to research, development and construction of the PSD detector (Projectile Spectator Detector), which is part of the experimental setup of CBM.
The Compressed Baryonic Matter (CBM) experiment is one of the key experiments at FAIR and aims to explore the QCD phase diagram in the region of high baryon densities. The focus is on the investigation of highly compressed nuclear matter, as it exists in neutron stars and in the center of supernova explosions, with unprecedented precision and over a very wide density range. The Projectile Spectator Detector (PSD) serves for measuring the geometry of heavy ion collisions at the CBM experiment. The now delivered component, the manipulator, is the movable part of this detector.
PSD will be able to detect particles from the interaction of relativistic heavy ions with a target. Therefore, it will be located at a distance of about 8 to 12 meters from the interaction point around beam pipe. As the beam pipe is movable, also the detector has to be movable in several directions as well as able to rotate in the range of several degrees. The weight of PSD is about 25 tons, so it was a demanding task to design and build a corresponding support frame, the PSD manipulator.
The Czech team successfully achieved this complex requirement. The manipulator of PSD now allows horizontal and vertical movement with the precision of millimeters as well as rotation of the whole PSD detector. After installation, it will be able to support about 25 tons of calorimeter modules. After successful testing, the detector part is stored at GSI/FAIR until installation in the CBM cave. (BP)
]]>With the publication "Unveiling the strong interaction among hadrons at the LHC" the ALICE collaboration presents interesting new findings about hadrons and their interactions. Hadrons are composite particles made of two or three quarks bound together by the strong interaction, which is mediated by gluons. This interaction also acts between hadrons, binding nucleons (protons and neutrons) together inside atomic nuclei. One of the biggest challenges in nuclear physics today is understanding the strong interaction between hadrons with different quark content from first principles, that is, starting from the strong interaction between the hadrons’ constituent quarks and gluons.
Calculations known as lattice quantum chromodynamics (QCD) can be used to determine the interaction from first principles, but these calculations provide reliable predictions only for hadrons containing heavy quarks, such as hyperons, which have one or more strange quarks. In the past, these interactions were studied by colliding hadrons together in scattering experiments, but these experiments are difficult to perform with unstable (i.e. rapidly decaying) hadrons such as hyperons. This difficulty has so far prevented a meaningful comparison between measurements and theory for hadron–hadron interactions involving hyperons.
Enter the new study from the collaboration behind ALICE, one of the main experiments at the LHC. The study shows how a technique based on measuring the momentum difference between hadrons produced in proton–proton collisions at the LHC can be used to reveal the dynamics of the strong interaction between hyperons and nucleons, potentially for any pair of hadrons. The technique is called femtoscopy because it allows the investigation of spatial scales close to 1 femtometre (10−15 metres) – about the size of a hadron and the spatial range of the strong-force action.
This method has previously allowed the ALICE team to study interactions involving the Lambda (Λ) and Sigma (Σ) hyperons, which contain one strange quark plus two light quarks, as well as the Xi (Ξ) hyperon, which is composed of two strange quarks plus one light quark. In the new study, the team used the technique to uncover with high precision the interaction between a proton and the rarest of the hyperons, the Omega (Ω) hyperon, which contains three strange quarks.
“The precise determination of the strong interaction for all types of hyperons was unexpected,” says ALICE physicist Laura Fabbietti, professor at the Technical University of Munich“. This can be explained by three factors: the fact that the LHC can produce hadrons with strange quarks in abundance, the ability of the femtoscopy technique to probe the short-range nature of the strong interaction, and the excellent capabilities of the ALICE detector to identify particles and measure their momenta”.
The nuclear physicist Professor Peter Braun-Munzinger, Scientific Director of the ExtreMe Matter Institute EMMI at GSI and longstanding chair of the collaboration board of ALICE, is significantly involved in the current investigations. He also emphasizes the importance of the now published research: “Out findings open the door to a new chapter in hadron physics, and with the factor 100 increase in statistics for the coming Run3 and Run4 at the LHC many new investigations will be possible”.
The relationship between GSI and ALICE is traditionally very close: GSI's research department ALICE shares responsibility for the operation of ALICE's two largest detector systems. The Time Projection Chamber (TPC) and the Transition Radiation Detector (TRD) were designed and built with significant contribution of GSI’s ALICE department and Detector Laboratory. Currently, GSI gives an essential contribution to the ALICE upgrade program, specifically in the TPC project and in the development of the new Online-Offline (O2) software framework. To do this, GSI’s ALICE department, Detector Laboratory and IT department work closely together. GSI scientists have several leading roles in data analysis and in the physics program of ALICE. GSI scientist and professor at Heidelberg University, Silvia Masciocchi currently chairs the ALICE Collaboration Board.
“Our new measurement allows for a comparison with predictions from lattice QCD calculations and provides a solid testbed for further theoretical work,” says ALICE spokesperson Dr. Luciano Musa. “Data from the next LHC runs should give us access to any hadron pair”. He concludes: “ALICE has opened a new avenue for nuclear physics at the LHC – one that involves all types of quarks”. (CERN/BP)
He was a renowned researcher in the fields of thermal physics, shock waves, and plasma physics, with a particular focus on energy generation. As such, he held a lot of important positions in Russia, e.g., as director of the Institute of High-Temperature Physics, Research Minister and member and president of the Russian Academy of Sciences. At the same time, he fostered international relations and received many international awards and recognitions. For his contribution to the partnership with German universities, the Max-Planck society and the Helmholtz association, he received the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany in 2006 and among the honorary PhDs he received one was awarded to him by the University of Frankfurt. Despite his workload, he was a regular visitor and supporter of GSI/FAIR and served on its committees for a long period.
Vladimir Fortov was a key figure in our scientific field, a warm-hearted and reliable partner for GSI/FAIR and a good friend. We will miss him very much! (GSI/FAIR)
]]>The very good collaboration between GSI and JINR has a long tradition and includes science and technology at the existing accelerator and experimental facilities of both partners as well as research and development activities for the two accelerator centers FAIR and NICA, currently being built at GSI in Darmstadt and at JINR in Dubna. The new school shall cover the current and future scientific programs and its high quality offer is addressed to young participants from all member states of GSI/FAIR and JINR/NICA.
The school is organized alternately once a year for a period of 10 to 14 days in Germany or Russia or one of the FAIR or JINR member states. It offers 40 to 50 PhD students the unique opportunity to immerse themselves in the research areas and technological developments at FAIR/GSI and JINR, especially in the topics Hadron and Nuclear Physics, Atomic Physics, Plasma Physics, Materials Research, Biophysics and Radiation Medicine, Accelerator Physics, Detector Research and Development, Micro/Nano-Electronics, Information Technology and High-Performance Computing and more. Thus, the young scientists will learn about the entire scientific and technological scope of the research programs pursued at FAIR/GSI and JINR.
Professor Paolo Giubellino was enthusiastic about the new cooperation and underlined the importance of scientific education: "The school will offer excellent opportunities and open up promising new perspectives. That is essential. Because the students from today are the FAIR scientists of tomorrow. With our new offer, we will attract the researchers of the future. Moreover, the new offer will further strengthen the close and very good cooperation between the two institutes in Darmstadt and Dubna".
The "International FAIR/GSI-JINR School" benefits from the experience of both institutions with such offers, for example the „joint Helmholtz-Rosatom Schools dedicated to FAIR physics“ and several „International FAIR-Schools“. The new project will bring together excellent young students and familiarize them with FAIR/GSI and JINR research and technologies. As the experiences from the existing offers show, students and lecturers highly appreciate this multidisciplinary structure.
The International FAIR/GSI-JINR School combines excellent pedagogical lectures given by international GSI, FAIR, and JINR experts with workshop sessions where the students will solve problems and tackle projects in the presence of the lecturers. Participants are selected based on individual applications and recommendation letters by their scientific supervisors. The focus will lie also on getting a good mix of nationalities in order to foster consistently more international collaboration. The offer aims at PhD students, who will be able to gain concentrated experience in small groups with direct feedback from their supervisors and will get a full overview far beyond their own field of research.
Professor Giubellino stressed, “This, together with the very open discussion culture of the event, leads to discussions across the border of research groups, disciplines and countries. We jointly promote new talents, bring together young people from all over the world and even in COVID times go forward in a focused way building the future”.
In their agreement, the two partner institutions emphasize, “Especially in today’s environment of a more and more global world, the competence to discuss, collaborate and cooperate within international teams will become increasingly more important. The community of scientists always has been on the forefront of global partnership and will continue to do so”. The "International Joint FAIR/GSI-JINR School" will make an important contribution to this. (BP)
]]>As a prelude, Professor Thomas Walther of the Technical University of Darmstadt with his lecture “Das ‚Quanten‘ in Quantenkryptographie – na und?” will report on the use of quantum mechanical effects as a component of cryptographic procedures. Further lectures in the first half of 2021 will then focus on space: Astronaut Thomas Reiter (ESA) will report on the exploration of space. So not only the "universe in the laboratory" in the experiments at FAIR, GSI and at ALICE at the research center CERN, but also the moon and gravitational waves will be the subject of the lectures. A short topical excursion leads into the cold and to superconductivity for FAIR's accelerator magnets.
The lectures start at 2 p. m., further information about access and the course of the event can be found on the event website at www.gsi.de/wfa
The lecture series “Wissenschaft für Alle” is aimed at all persons interested in current science and research. The lectures report on research and developments at GSI and FAIR, but also on current topics from other fields of science and technology. The aim of the series is to prepare and present the scientific processes in a way that is understandable for laypersons in order to make the research accessible to a broad public. The lectures are held by GSI and FAIR staff members or by external speakers from universities and research institutes. (CP)
Website of lecture series "Wissenschaft für Alle" (German)
The PANDA Collaboration has awarded the Theory PhD Prize for the second time in order to honor the best theory dissertation written in connection with the PANDA Experiment and its science program. PANDA will be one of the key experiments of the future accelerator center FAIR. The experiment focuses on antimatter research as well as on various topics related to the weak and the strong force, exotic states of matter, and the structure of hadrons. More than 450 scientists from 18 countries currently work in the PANDA Collaboration. In his dissertation, Dr. Woss developed and then applied state-of-the-art lattice QCD methods to determine precisely the properties and interactions of hadronic resonances - a very important topic for the PANDA physics program. Candidates for the Prize are nominated by their doctoral advisors.
In addition to being directly related to the PANDA Experiment, the nominees’ doctoral degrees must have received a rating of “very good” or better. Up to three candidates are shortlisted for the award and can present their dissertations at the PANDA Collaboration meeting. The winner is chosen by a committee that is appointed for this task by the PANDA Collaboration. The PANDA Collaboration awards the Theory PhD Prize to specifically honor students’ contributions to the PANDA project and to highlight the importance of cooperation with theory groups. (BP)
]]>30 science locations, including GSI and FAIR, have joined forces to form the Netzwerk Teilchenwelt (engl. Network Particle World). For this year's tenth anniversary of the network, the participating research institutions combined a particularly large number of events and presented the entire spectrum of research — from Higgs particles and neutrinos to black holes and supernovae as gigantic particle catapults.
GSI and FAIR participated in an online Masterclass on November 5 and 6 to analyze measurement data from particle collisions of the ALICE experiment. Seven students of the AG MINT-Zentrum at Schuldorf Bergstraße took part in the virtual event. In addition to data analysis, the program included an exchange with other Masterclass groups via video conference as well as a virtual tour of the ALICE experimental site. ALICE is one of CERN's four large-scale experiments and in particular investigates heavy-ion collisions of lead atomic nuclei. From the very beginning GSI has played a major role in the construction and operation of ALICE.
About 200 researchers are active in Netzwerk Teilchenwelt. Their aim is to inspire young people and teachers with their enthusiasm for particle physics and to get them excited about MINT subjects. To this end, they offer project days in schools, student laboratories or museums throughout the year. As particle physicists, the young people can spend a day analyzing real data from CERN, tracking down particles from outer space or discussing the origins and structure of the universe with scientists. Workshops and project weeks for particularly interested students take place at CERN in Geneva and at research institutes in Germany.
The “Week of the Particle World” is part of the anniversary program of the German Physical Society (DPG). The world's largest physics society is the patron of Netzwerk Teilchenwelt and this year is looking back on 175 years of activity. The “Week of the Particle World” is supported by the Wilhelm and Else Heraeus Foundation.
Netzwerk Teilchenwelt is funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) as part of the project KONTAKT (Communication, Attraction of Young Scientists and Participation of the General Public in Knowledge in the Field of Smallest Particles). The project management is at the TU Dresden. (Netzwerk Teilchenwelt/CP)
In her dissertation at DKFZ Heidelberg, Dr. Alina Bendinger established various imaging techniques to characterize the oxygenation status in experimental tumors and to quantify their response to irradiation with carbon ions in comparison to photons. The oxygen supply of tumors is of great importance, since an oxygen deficiency, which often prevails in tumors, makes the cancer resistant to radiation therapy. Dr. Bendinger has contributed decisive methodological improvements. For example, she has extended the evaluation of photoacoustic imaging from a two-dimensional to a three-dimensional procedure. This allows a substantially improved characterization of the heterogeneity of oxygen supply in tumors. In addition, she has developed a new method to improve the dynamic, contrast-agent-enhanced magnetic resonance imaging and validated it with extensive simulations. The results obtained with the new imaging methods have also been validated by extensive histological examinations.
In her doctoral thesis, Dr. Giorgia Meschini has developed sophisticated, model-based strategies for the analysis of respiration-induced movements in particle therapy. These movements can lead to undesired distortions of the dose distribution, which need to be taken into account in treatment planning and compensated by appropriate mitigation procedures. For this purpose, Dr. Meschini used the time-resolved 4D magnetic resonance imaging (4D-MRI) method to convert movement information into virtual 4D computed tomography (4D-CT) data using a special procedure. The 4D-CT is the basis for the precise determination of the range of ion beams inside the body during the various phases of respiration or movement. Furthermore, she has developed modeling approaches that allow the estimation of respiratory movements even at times that are not explicitly captured by the imaging procedures. This allows in particular the analysis of irregular respiratory processes. Finally, Dr. Meschini used these approaches to investigate the effects of respiratory movement on dose distribution and proposed an improved definition of the target volume, which leads to a greater robustness of irradiation plans with respect to movement artifacts.
The prize money is 1500 Euro each. The promotion of young scientists in the field of tumor therapy with ion beams has meanwhile been continuing for many years, and the award, named after Professor Christoph Schmelzer, the co-founder and first Scientific Director of GSI, was presented for the 22nd time. The topics of the award-winning theses are of fundamental importance for the further development of ion beam therapy and often find their way into clinical application.
The Association for the Promotion of Tumor Therapy supports research activities in the field of tumor therapy with heavy ions with the aim of improving the treatment of tumors and making it available to general patient care. At the accelerator facility at GSI, more than 400 patients with tumors in the head and neck area were treated with ion beams as part of a pilot project from 1997 to 2008. The cure rates of this method are sometimes over 90 percent and the side effects are very low. The success of the pilot project led to the establishment of clinical ion beam therapy centers in Heidelberg and Marburg, where patients are now regularly treated with heavy ions. (BP)
Association for the Promotion of Tumor Therapy with Heavy Ions e.V.
]]>On four dates this year, the participants attended the lectures of “Saturday Morning Physics” via video conference. Today, they had the opportunity to learn more abut the facilities and research at GSI and to gain an insight into the construction of components and buildings for the future international research facility FAIR. After a short introductory lecture, they were taken via a guided video tour to the linear accelerator UNILAC, the main control room, the heavy ion synchrotron SIS18, the storage ring ESR, the tumor therapy and the large-scale experiment HADES. There was also a virtual visit to the test facility for superconducting FAIR magnets and to the viewpoint of the FAIR construction site. A drone flight over the construction site rounded off the event. Questions and comments could be submitted via a chat function and answered live, which was very well received by the students.
The event series “Saturday Morning Physics” is a project of the Physics Faculty of the TU Darmstadt. It takes place annually and aims to strengthen the interest of young people in physics. In lectures and experiments on consecutive Saturdays, the students learn about current developments in physics research at the university. Those who take part in all events receive the “Saturday Morning Physics” diploma. GSI has been one of the sponsors and supporters of the project since the start of the event series. (CP)
Dr. Jan Rothhardt intensively conducts research in applications of these laser systems and was able to show both mathematically and experimentally for the first time that efficient conversion into the XUV spectral range is also possible with high-power lasers of high pulse repetition frequency. The XUV sources developed by him were already successfully used for high-resolution lensless imaging processes. In addition to applications in nanotechnology, these methods in future should also be able to track ultra-fast processes on the nanoscale, which are the basis of future data memories.
Furthermore, the new XUV sources will enable worldwide unique laser spectroscopy experiments on heavy ion storage rings. Quantum electrodynamics (QED), relativistic effects, but also nuclear properties and ultrafast processes are at the center of these interdisciplinary experiments. First pioneering experiments were already realized at the CRYRING in Darmstadt. CRYRING is one of the storage rings in the unique portfolio of traps and storage facilities for heavy ions of the future accelerator center FAIR, currently under construction at GSI.
Dr. Rothhardt studied physics in Jena and received his doctorate in 2011. Since 2014, the internationally renowned laser physicist is leader of a junior research group at the Helmholtz Institute Jena and author and co-author of almost 70 publications in scientific journals. He regularly receives excellent student evaluations for his lectures and seminars at the Friedrich Schiller University Jena. In addition, he is engaged in inspiring school students for laser technology with a special experimental lecture at schools.
In memory of Nobel Prize winner Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen, who was a professor in Giessen from 1879 to 1888, Justus Liebig University Giessen (JLU) has been awarding the renowned Röntgen Prize since 1960. It is endowed with prize money of € 15,000, which is jointly donated by Pfeiffer Vacuum and the Ludwig Schunk Foundation. This year there will be a "hands-on" prize for the first time: To mark the Röntgen Year, JLU and the founders initiated the production of a miniature of the famous Gießen Röntgen monument.
JLU traditionally gives the Röntgen Prize winners the opportunity to present their research area in a public lecture event on the eve of the Academic Ceremony. Due to the corona pandemic, the prizewinner will not travel to Gießen this year. The Röntgen lecture with the title "High-resolution lensless microscopy with extreme ultraviolet radiation" will take place on Thursday, November 26, 2020, as a Webex stream. At the digital academic ceremony on the following Friday, November 27, Dr. Rothhardt will be connected via video. (BP)
Röntgen lecture (digital): Thursday, November 26, 2020, 6 p.m. via Webex Meeting identification number/access code: 174 043 9232, Meeting passwort: uvUbY3Fqz53
Akademic ceremony with award ceremony (digital): Friday, November 27, 2020, 10.30 a.m. via Livestream
]]>For less than one picosecond (one trillionth of a second), the PHELIX laser shines its extremely intense light pulse onto a very thin gold foil. This is enough to eject about one trillion hydrogen nuclei (protons), which are only slightly attached to the gold, from the back-surface of the foil, and accelerate them to high energies. "Such a large number of protons in such a short period of time cannot be achieved with standard acceleration techniques," explains Pascal Boller, who is researching laser acceleration in the GSI research department Plasma Physics/PHELIX as part of his graduate studies. "With this technology, completely new research areas can be opened that were previously inaccessible".
These include the generation of nuclear fission reactions. For this purpose, the researchers let the freshly generated fast protons impinge on uranium material samples. Uranium was chosen as a case study material because of its large reaction cross-section and the availability of published data for benchmarking purposes. The samples have to be close to the proton production to guarantee a maximum yield of reactions. The protons generated by the PHELIX laser are fast enough to induce the fission of uranium nuclei into smaller fission products, which remain then to be identified and measured. However, the laser impact has unwanted side effects: It generates a strong electromagnetic pulse and a gammy-ray flash that interfere with the sensitive measuring instruments used for this detection.
At this stage, the researchers are assisted by the expertise of another GSI research group. For the chemical investigation of superheavy elements, a transport system has been in use for quite some time that can transport the desired particles over long distances from the reaction area to the detector. The reaction chamber is flushed through by a gas which — in the case of fission experiments — carries the fission products with it and, within only a few seconds, transports them via small plastic tubes to the measuring apparatus, which is now several meters away. In this way, generation and measurement can be spatially separated and interference can be prevented.
For the first time, it was possible in the experiments to combine the two techniques and thus to generate a variety of cesium, xenon and iodine isotopes via the fission of uranium, to reliably identify them via their emitted gamma radiation and to observe their short life time. This provides a methodology for studying fission reactions in high-density plasma-state matter. Comparable conditions can be found, for example, in space inside stars, stellar explosions or neutron star mergers. "Understanding the reaction processes of nuclei interacting with each other in plasma can give us insights into the origin of atomic nuclei, the so-called nucleosynthesis, in our universe. Nucleosynthesis processes such as s-process or r-process take place in exactly such media," explains Boller. "The role fission reactions play in these processes has not yet been researched in detail. Here, the laser-accelerated protons can provide new information".
Further measurements with the methods are planned for future experiments of the PHELIX laser at GSI as well as at other research centers around the world. The investigation of highly dense matter with ion and laser beams will also be one of the topics pursued at the future research facility FAIR. FAIR is currently being built at GSI in international cooperation. With its motto "The Universe in the Laboratory", it is intended to reproduce conditions as they occur in astrophysical environments on Earth, thus expanding the knowledge about our cosmos. (CP)
These days, symbolic desks can be seen at various locations in the Darmstadt-Dieburg district as part of the campaign "Your story counts - Letters against violence against women". They encourage people who experienced violence against women and girls to write down their story. On the campus of GSI and FAIR a desk with a mailbox is located until 18 December 2020. "We want to create awareness that violence against women happens everywhere and at all times and that behind every experience of violence there is an individual story and thus also a fate. The desk should attract attention and sharpen the view for everyday aggression and violence," says the equal opportunities committee of GSI and FAIR.
The campaign is supported by Frauen helfen Frauen e.V., the women's home Notwaende and "Mäander - individuelle Jugendhilfe". The project was inspired by the action "Cartas de Mujeres" from Quito in Ecuador, where many thousands of women addressed politics with letters and messages. The letters received at the desks in Darmstadt-Dieburg are treated in strict confidence and are only read and evaluated by employees of the project cooperation. For Women's Day 2021, the results are to be brought to public space through art initiatives. Ideas and demands to politicians are to be passed on to the local political committees. The goal is to reach as many people as possible with the campaign "Your story counts" and to initiate changes. (LW)
"Your story counts" (German only)
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Treatment plans for radiotherapy are calculated with special software. So-called phantoms are used to verify the plans. They can consist simply of water or be prepared cell cultures which are irradiated under the same conditions under which the therapy is to be performed on humans. Subsequently, it is checked how many of the cells have survived where in the cultures. This allows to assess whether the treatment plan has been optimized in the best possible way. In research, they are especially relevant to test new treatment planning strategies or optimizations before they are applied in the clinical environment. Until now, phantoms from monolayered cell cultures have been used for this purpose. The new technique makes it possible to irradiate three-dimensional cell volumes.
“Instead of allowing the cells to grow flat, we place them into three-dimensional containers. For this we use multiwell plates, a standard accessory from laboratory supplies, with 96 wells — these are the small indentations that are on the plates,” explains Dea Aulia Kartini, who is in charge of the experiment. “They are first filled with a layer of a substance called Matrigel, then with an added cell and Matrigel mixture, and then sealed again with another layer of Matrigel. In this way we make sure that there really is a volume of cells inside”. Kartini, who originally comes from Indonesia and is studying in Thailand, is currently writing her PhD thesis and this is her third visit to GSI and FAIR in the framework of the GET_INvolved Programme. The program promotes international exchange for students and researchers and supports their education and career.
“Our experiments show that the new phantoms work flawlessly and could improve the verification of treatment plans in the future", Kartini adds. Further experiments with 3D phantoms are planned in the near future both at GSI and in cooperation with the Marburger Ionenstrahl-Therapiezentrum MIT.
The publication also features the name of Gianmarco Camazzola, who came to GSI and FAIR in 2019 as part of the Summer Student Program, where he spent eight weeks gaining insight into the research of the Biophysics Department. The Summer Student Program is aimed at international students before graduation and allows them to get a taste of the research at GSI and FAIR independently from the universities. During his stay, he mainly worked on software modeling for the experiments at the 3D phantoms. Currently he has also returned to the GSI/FAIR campus within the GET_INvolved Programme. The publication clearly shows the success and the importance of the student and scientific exchange programs, which give the participants an early insight and entry into the research community. (CP)
Physicist Walter Ikegami Andersson received the prize of €200 and a certificate for his dissertation titled "Exploring the Merits and Challenges of Hyperon Physics with PANDA at FAIR". His doctoral advisor was Professor Dr. Karin Schönning from the Uppsala University.
The Panda Collaboration has awarded the PhD Prize once per year since 2013 in order to honor the best dissertation written in connection with the PANDA experiment. PANDA will be one of the key experiments of the future accelerator center FAIR. The experiment focuses on antimatter research as well as on various topics related to the weak and the strong force, exotic states of matter, and the structure of hadrons. More than 450 scientists from 18 countries currently work in the PANDA Collaboration. In his dissertation, Dr. Andersson studied the production and study of hyperons - baryons with at least one strange quark - which is an important research program at the PANDA detector, which is being built at the FAIR accelerator facility.
Candidates for the PhD Prize are nominated by their doctoral advisors. In addition to being directly related to the PANDA Experiment, the nominees’ doctoral degrees must have received a rating of “very good” or better. Up to three candidates are shortlisted for the award and can present their dissertations at the PANDA Collaboration meeting. The winner is chosen by a committee that is appointed for this task by the PANDA Collaboration. The PANDA Collaboration awards the PhD Prize to specifically honor students’ contributions to the PANDA project. (BP)
]]>Even though the results are only preclinical and the way to clinical application is still long, the current findings point into a promising direction: It was shown that carbon ions, as used in the cancer therapy developed at GSI, can be very effective when used in combination with specific molecules, called checkpoint blockers, that stimulate the immune system against the tumor metastases.
The aim of the published research work was to compare the efficacy of conventional radiation therapy (high-energy X-rays) and carbon ion therapy in combination with immunotherapy. The immune system plays an important role in the prevention of cancer. Usually, it recognizes degenerated cells and can “sort them out". At the same time, it is equipped with highly complex control mechanisms to avoid overreactions. This is exactly what cancer cells can sometimes use to their advantage and to down-regulate immune surveillance. They disappear from the radar, so to speak. Immunotherapy can reactivate the immune system in the fight against cancer. It is now frequently used for advanced malignancies and metastatic patients, but unfortunately is effective only in some tumor types.
In the other cases, conventional radiation therapy is added as a second component, which under certain conditions can release such brakes on the immune system. The radiation-induced triggering of an immune response and its amplification by immunotherapy can lead to good results especially in the control of metastases, such as a slowdown of growth. But only parts of the patients respond to this combination of therapies.
Can radiotherapy with carbon ions, which was developed very successfully at GSI and is now in clinical application in Heidelberg and Marburg and in other nine centers worldwide, for certain types of tumors, open up new perspectives and help to control metastasis? It is possible that this form of therapy is more immunogenic, i.e. it could trigger an even stronger immune response than conventional radiation therapy and, together with immunotherapy, might result in more patients responding to this therapy combination. Based on such considerations, the team with lead author Dr. Alexander Helm (GSI) in the current experiment, conducted at the accelerator in Chiba, Japan, for the first time has directly compared carbon ions with conventional X-rays in a mouse model.
In the control of the primary tumor (here osteosarcoma, a bone tumor), carbon ions and X-rays, each combined with immunotherapy, produced similar results. However, when looking at the growth of metastases, the results show that metastases are significantly reduced if the primary tumor is treated with carbon ion radiation and a following immunotherapy. The researchers were able to demonstrate that carbon ions plus immunotherapy is more effective in controlling lung metastases than both therapies alone and more effective than X-rays plus immunotherapy.
In order to better assess this potential, further research has to be conducted and finally, together with international partners, the application in clinical studies must be tested. Professor Marco Durante, head of the GSI Biophysics Research Department, explained the future research: “At GSI/FAIR, the focus of our research is on understanding the cellular and molecular mechanisms that trigger a strong immune response. The goal is to answer the central question: How should irradiation be applied to achieve the most efficient, the best immune response in the fight against cancer.”
The possibilities of combining cutting-edge molecular biology with high-energy heavy ion physics at the GSI/FAIR campus and the future accelerator center FAIR promise unique scientific knowledge. The Scientific Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, emphasized "The present results show the great potential of carbon ion therapy, which is far from being exhausted. Together with our national and international partners, we will continue to conduct research on this highly relevant topic in the coming years. The first stage of the FAIR experimental program, FAIR Phase 0, already offers outstanding opportunities in this field". (BP)
Scientific publication in the International Journal of Radiation Oncology, Biology, Physics
]]>Although the current focus is still on the procurement of accelerator components, the first important steps towards machine assembly are currently being taken. The SIS100/SIS18 project group, consisting of the work package leaders, representatives of international providers and the subproject management, had placed their latest three-day closed meeting under the motto "From production to installation". Representatives of the new subproject "Site Management SMG" were also involved with the aim of jointly preparing the next phase of the project realization.
In which sequences should the installation of the machine take place? What is the best sequence for assembling the accelerator components? How will the heavy parts be moved to their correct position in the new buildings? These are just a few of the questions to be answered with high precision. The focus is on the production of ready-to-install assemblies, the construction and testing of a complete SIS100 unit cell consisting of two dipole, two quadrupole and several correction magnets, the development of transport and lifting equipment and the consideration of technology-specific boundary conditions when defining installation sequences. In addition, other important milestones such as the completion of the technical building services (TGA), the completion of central facilities, the delivery dates and the readiness for installation of all accelerator components must be included in the planning.
Special attention is given to cryogenics. The ring accelerator SIS100 requires superconducting magnets to guide the extremely fast particles. Superconductivity can only be achieved with sophisticated cryotechnology: It has to constantly maintain a cryogenic temperature of -268.6 °C throughout the SIS100 ring system, which is required for operation.
The installation of such cryogenic systems, cryomagnetic modules and local cryogenics requires special quality assurance measures. European directives must be complied with, for example the Pressure Equipment Directive, which is applied to numerous work steps.
Therefore, the recent meeting of the project group and the new subproject also discussed ways to efficiently exploit the extended installation phase of cryogenic systems by starting the hardware commissioning of warm systems in parallel. Efficient planning for the installation and commissioning of the individual technical systems is a precondition for timely cold commissioning, as well as for the commissioning of the main power supply in conjunction with the then superconducting magnetic chain.
Overall, these complex plans are driven by a decisive goal: the realization of a first pilot beam through SIS100, the heart of the future FAIR accelerator center. (BP)
]]>Although the experimental program had to be restricted from March 2020 onwards due to the corona pandemic, operation could be partially continued under strict regulations according with the official requirements. Approximately two thirds of the planned experiments could be conducted. Scientists from all over the world, who usually come to the campus for the experiments, were no longer able to travel from that date. However, they supported the research program and the GSI/FAIR staff on site with advice and assistance remotely wherever possible.
In addition to the GSI facilities UNILAC (linear accelerator), SIS18 (ring accelerator), FRS (fragment separator) and ESR (experimental storage ring) as well as the existing experiment setups and the Petawatt high energy laser PHELIX, FAIR developments and detectors, measuring apparatus and other high-tech facilites specially manufactured for FAIR could already be used. Additionally, the commissioning of the first FAIR storage ring CRYRING has progressed to the point, where it is now ready for scientific experiments. Thus, the current FAIR Phase 0 scientific program already represents a major step towards future research at FAIR.
The experiments dealt with topics from a wide range of scientific disciplines, from medicine and materials research to the properties of superheavy elements and the complex structure of short-lived isotopes that play a role in element synthesis in the universe.
In a biophysics experiment, for example, it was shown for the first time that it is possible to use carbon beams to create conditions that are necessary for a so-called FLASH therapy of tumors. In FLASH therapy, a very high dose is applied in a very short time (high dose rate). Studies with proton beams have shown that this technique reduces damage to healthy tissue while maintaining the same level of effectiveness. Until now, FLASH therapy has only been applicable using electron and proton accelerators. Thanks to the improvements at the GSI accelerator facility as part of the preparations for FAIR, the necessary dose rate of five billion ions per 200 milliseconds can now also be achieved for carbon.
Another field of research that benefits from the increased intensities of the GSI accelerators is the study of isotopes that play a role in the synthesis of elements in the universe. Light nuclei up to iron are produced by fusion reactions in stars, heavy elements possibly in explosions of massive stars at the end of their evolution (supernova explosions) or in the collision of neutron stars, extremely compact objects that unite the mass of up to two suns in a radius of a few kilometers. The actual synthesis of elements takes place via nuclear reactions of a multitude of mostly unstable nuclei along specific reaction paths. In a dedicated experiment, extremely neutron-rich nuclei were studied that could not be produced in an accelerator laboratory until now. Isotopes with mass numbers around 200 near the magic neutron number N=126 play a crucial role in the synthesis of even heavier nuclei. Several isotopes in this range have been detected for the first time and their properties determined, among them possibly 200-tungsten. This would be the first time that such a heavy nucleus could be produced in the laboratory, which is directly on one of the element synthesis pathways.
Another experiment with a similar objective was conducted at the Experimental Storage Ring ESR using the entire accelerator chain of UNILAC, SIS18 and FRS. The importance of the bound beta decay of thallium in element formation processes has been emphasized in many scientific publications, and has now been measured for the first time.
The investigation of superheavy elements has been part of GSI's scientific portfolio for many years. In the nuclear reaction of 48Ca+244Pu (calcium and plutonium), among others, two flerovium isotopes are produced: 288Fl and 289Fl. Flerovium is an atomic nucleus with atomic number Z=114 and was first produced in 1999 in a research laboratory in Dubna. However, its nuclear structure is not yet fully understood, so the TASCA setup at GSI was used for the first time to measure alpha and photon emissions of flerovium isotopes in coincidence. In this experiment as many Flerovium isotopes were detected as in all experiments since the first detection of this nucleus.
While heavy nuclei are produced in stars, stellar explosions and the laboratory by nuclear reactions, on dust particles complex molecules are produced from simple organic ones by cosmic rays and are subsequently destroyed again. In an experiment of materials research, it could be shown that these destruction processes can be temperature-dependent and that higher temperatures possibly lead to a longer lifetime of complex molecules under the influence of cosmic radiation.
This is only a small excerpt of the scientific findings of the past experimental period. All in all, the "FAIR Phase 0" program allows a forward-looking combination of important tests of FAIR instrumentation on the one hand and high-quality experiments on the other. In this way, outstanding scientific results can be achieved and the FAIR community can be further developed. On the way to the commissioning of the FAIR accelerator center, further regular experimental periods at the existing and continuously modernized facilities are planned for the coming years. (BP/CP/YL)
]]>This year's result of team GSI/FAIR once again is a clear improvement on the very successful results of the last years: Already in 2019, the cyclists could reach the first place with also 142 participants and 35,049 covered kilometers. In 2018, there were 102 cyclists in the team, who had covered 25,766 kilometers, taking second place.
Traditionally, the winning prizes for the best teams and individual cyclists are presented by Barbara Akdeniz, head of the environment department of Darmstadt, during the bike action day on the market square in Darmstadt. Due to Corona, the event was cancelled this year.
More than 1980 people in 117 teams took part in the 21-day campaign in May and June. Overall, the previous year's result was significantly exceeded in Darmstadt: The participants covered a total of 420,000 kilometers, thus avoiding 62 tonnes of CO2 compared with driving a car. Environment department head Akdeniz expressed her delight that so many citizens took part in city cycling: “Our decision to run the city cycling this year in spring was a very conscious one. In addition to the possibility of being able to promote climate protection, quality of life and the mobility turnaround by participating in city cycling, cycling in times of Corona is also ideal for staying physically and mentally fit – of course within the scope of the currently valid regulations” (BP)
In the context of an international network funded by the European Union, scientists at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU) and GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung (GSI) are participating in the education of young postgraduate students in the fields of nuclear and atomic physics and nuclear chemistry. The goal of this Innovative Training Network (ITN) on Laser Ionization and Spectroscopy of Actinide Elements (LISA) is to decipher the structure of actinides, i.e., the heavy, mostly short-lived elements at the bottom of the periodic table, and thus put in place the prerequisite for their future use in biomedical physics, in nuclear applications, and for environmental monitoring. Members of the consortium are some of the world's leading experts in fundamental atomic and nuclear physics and nuclear chemistry. The EU is supporting the LISA project for a period of four years with a total funding worth EUR 4 million.
LISA is coordinated by the CERN research center. As for Mainz University, Professor Christoph Düllmann and Professor Klaus Wendt are involved as is Professor Michael Block at GSI. "Of the 15 early-stage researchers being funded, six are expected to obtain their doctorates at JGU. We thus play a significant role within the new LISA network," said Professor Klaus Wendt. "Thanks to the highly effective collaboration between our nuclear chemistry and physics disciplines here at JGU with the Helmholtz Institute Mainz in the field of actinide research we are also expecting interesting and important results here." Wendt himself will supervise three doctoral students. This is the second time he has become involved in an EU training network.
EU Innovative Training Network (ITN) involving many national partners
In addition to the universities in Mainz, Hanover, Jena, Gothenburg in Sweden, and Leuven in Belgium, major research institutions such as CERN, GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung (GSI) in Darmstadt, the heavy ion accelerator Grand Accélérateur National d'Ions Lourds (GANIL) in France, and the accelerator facility in Jyväskylä in Finland are also participating in the ITN. There are also two commercial partners based in Kassel and Glasgow. Moreover, there are 12 other partner organizations from Canada all the way to Japan, who can contact the doctoral students for scientific exchange.
In the initial phase, Professor Christoph Düllmann's group at the JGU Department of Chemistry is to chemically purify exotic actinide isotopes that are available in sufficient quantities and are adequately stable. "We will develop techniques to then convert them to a form optimized for the intended experiments within the LISA network in Jyväskylä and at GANIL, also in Mainz and at GSI," explained Düllmann, head of the joint Superheavy Element Chemistry Group of JGU, GSI, and the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM).
At GSI in Darmstadt, Professor Michael Block's group will be employing laser spectroscopy to study the heaviest actinides. These can only be produced artificially and are generally very short-lived. With the help of lasers, the optical excitation of energy levels in the elements' atomic shells will be measured in detail in order to determine their atomic and nuclear properties. "The ITN is an optimal research environment for doctoral candidates to systematically and comprehensively study these exotic actinides," said Block. The first candidate has already started her work at GSI this summer.
Manufacture and analysis of actinides using novel laser technologies
Uranium and plutonium are probably the best known actinides, but curium, einsteinium, fermium, and mendelevium also belong to this group of radioactive elements. They all are usually extremely unstable and at present can only be produced synthetically in research reactors or particle accelerators. Due to their short-lived nature, they still provide science with major puzzles. Researching them should therefore improve our understanding of their atomic and nuclear properties. Building on this, the LISA network intends to develop new laser technologies to be able to create and investigate actinides for the development of innovative applications. LISA will promote the coherent and symbiotic collaboration between the participants, which is intended to continue after the end of the project.
Due to the on-going coronavirus crisis, the doctoral students from abroad will not yet be able to begin their research in Germany. It is expected that one doctoral student from Poland and another doctoral student from Mexico, as well as candidates from Canada, UK, and the USA, who are all to be supervised in Mainz, will be able to start in late fall 2020. The team is currently planning an academic training session for all 15 doctoral students and other guests in Mainz in the fall of 2021. (JL)
]]>GSI and FAIR employees can get a copy at the foyer or at the reception in Borsigstraße. If you want to order the DIN-A2-sized calendar from FAIR and GSI, please contact gsi-kalender(at)gsi.de (Data Protection) directly via e-mail and receive the calendar by post. Please include the following information: your name, your address and the number of calendars you wish to order. We kindly ask for your understanding that because of the limited quantity a maximum of three calendars can be sent per request (while stocks last). (JL)
]]>The ELEMENTS project combines the strong research forces of several international leading institutions. Besides the Goethe University Frankfurt as consortium leader the TU Darmstadt, the University of Gießen and the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt are also involved.
This network gives the scientists access to unique conditions: expertise in gravitational physics and in the physics of nuclear reactions as well as infrastructure such as the accelerator facilities in Darmstadt - the accelerator center FAIR currently under construction at GSI and the S-DALINAC electron accelerator at the TU in the Institute of Nuclear Physics. In addition, the physicists want to close a gap with ELEMENTS.
As one of the main measures, the project is seeking to establish a joint Alexander von Humboldt Professorship at the universities in Frankfurt and Darmstadt. This professorship is to be dedicated to the astronomical observation of processes in and around neutron stars, a field of research that is lacking in Hesse to date and is very close to the research work honored with this year's Nobel Prize.
ELEMENTS will study neutron stars, the barely visible little brothers of black holes. They are formed after a star has burned out when it was not massive enough to be compressed into a black hole by its own gravitational pressure after its end. Neutron stars, like black holes, are the cause of extreme space-time curvature, and when neutron stars or black holes merge, detectable gravitational waves are created.
Because of their cosmic effects and extreme conditions, both phenomena are the focus of research. However, unlike black holes, neutron stars also allow glimpses into their interior and they are also "productive". For example, neutron star mergers are visible as kilonovae in the sky and are the only known objects in the universe that produce the heaviest chemical elements through nuclear reactions under extreme conditions.
The ELEMENTS project investigates the dynamics in the fusion of two neutron stars and and in this context also examines the gravitational field, nuclear matter and - the main topic of the physicists at GSI/FAIR and the TU Darmstadt - the heavy chemical elements that are created in the process. For example, the luminosity of a kilonova was successfully predicted a few years ago by physicists working in Darmstadt.
For ELEMENTS, the research consortium has applied to the state of Hesse for funding under the one-time funding line for cluster projects. This funding line is intended to provide project-related support for internationally competitive research fields at universities and university networks in order to further raise their profile and prepare them for a successful application in the next round of the excellence strategy. (TUD/BP)
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But under which conditions does a black hole actually form? This is the central question of a study lead by the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt within an international collaboration. Using computer simulations, the scientists focus on a particular process to form black holes namely the merging of two neutron stars (simulation movie).
Neutron stars consists of highly compressed dense matter. The mass of one and a half solar masses is squeezed to the size of just a few kilometers. This corresponds to similar or even higher densities than in the inner of atomic nuclei. If two neutron stars merge, the matter is additionally compressed during the collision. This brings the merger remnant on the brink to collapse to a black hole. Black holes are the most compact objects in the universe, even light cannot escape, so these objects cannot be observed directly.
"The critical parameter is the total mass of the neutron stars. If it exceeds a certain threshold the collapse to a black hole is inevitable" summarizes Dr. Andreas Bauswein from the GSI theory department. However, the exact threshold mass depends on the properties of highly dense nuclear matter. In detail these properties of high-density matter are still not completely understood, which is why research labs like GSI collide atomic nuclei - like a neutron star merger but on a much smaller scale. In fact, the heavy-ion collisions lead to very similar conditions as mergers of neutron stars. Based on theoretical developments and physical heavy-ion experiments, it is possible to compute certain models of neutron star matter, so-call equations of state.
Employing numerous of these equations of state, the new study calculated the threshold mass for black-hole formation. If neutron star matter or nuclear matter, respectively, is easily compressible - if the equation of state is "soft" - already the merger a relatively light neutron stars leads to the formation of a black hole. If nuclear matter is "stiffer" and less compressible, the remnant is stabilized against the so-called gravitational collapse and a massive rotating neutron star remnant forms from the collision. Hence, the threshold mass for collapse itself informs about properties of high-density matter. The new study revealed furthermore that the threshold to collapse may even clarify whether during the collision nucleon dissolve into their constituents, the quarks.
"We are very excited about this results because we expect that future observations can reveal the threshold mass" adds Professor Nikolaos Stergioulas of the department of physics of the Aristotle University Thessaloniki in Greece. Just a few years ago a neutron star merger was observed for the first time by measuring gravitational waves from the collision. Telescopes also found the "electromagnetic counterpart" and detected light from the merger event. If a black hole is directly formed during the collision, the optical emission of the merger is pretty dim. Thus, the observational data indicates if a black hole was created. At the same time the gravitational-wave signal carries information about the total mass of the system. The more massive the stars the stronger is the gravitational-wave signal, which thus allows determining the threshold mass.
While gravitational-wave detectors and telescopes wait for the next neutron star mergers, the course is being set in Darmstadt for knowledge that is even more detailed. The new accelerator facility FAIR, currently under construction at GSI, will create conditions, which are even more similar to those in neutron star mergers. Finally, only the combination of astronomical observations, computer simulations and heavy-ion experiments can settle the questions about the fundamental building blocks of matter and their properties, and, by this, they will also clarify how the collapse to a black hole occurs. (CP/BP)
Gaining a better understanding of the limiting factors for the existence of stable, superheavy elements is a decade-old quest of chemistry and physics. Superheavy elements, as are called the chemical elements with atomic numbers greater than 103, do not occur in nature and are produced artificially with particle accelerators. They vanish within seconds. A team of scientists from GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung Darmstadt, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU), Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM) and the University of Jyväskylä, Finland, led by Dr. Jadambaa Khuyagbaatar from GSI and HIM, has provided new insights into the fission processes in those exotic nuclei and for this, has produced the hitherto unknown nucleus mendelevium-244. The experiments were part of "FAIR Phase 0", the first stage of the FAIR experimental program. The results have now been published in the journal "Physical Review Letters".
Heavy and superheavy nuclei are increasingly unstable against the fission process, in which the nucleus splits into two lighter fragments. This is due to the ever-stronger Coulomb repulsion between the large number of positively charged protons in such nuclei, and is one of the main limitations for the existence of stable superheavy nuclei.
The nuclear fission process was discovered more than 80 years ago and is being studied intensely to this day. Most experimental data on the spontaneous fission are for nuclei with even numbers of protons and neutrons – called “even-even nuclei”. Even-even nuclei consist entirely of proton and neutron pairs and their fission properties are rather well describable by theoretical models. In nuclei with an odd number of either neutrons or protons, a hindrance of the fission process when compared to the properties of even-even nuclei has been observed and traced back to the influence of such a single, unpaired constituent in the nucleus.
However, the fission hindrance in “odd-odd nuclei”, containing both, an odd number of protons and an odd number of neutrons, is less well known. Available experimental data indicate that the spontaneous fission process in such nuclei is greatly hindered, even more so than in nuclei with only one odd-numbered type of constituents.
Once the fission probability is most reduced, other radioactive decay modes like alpha decay or beta decay become probable. In beta decay, one proton transforms into a neutron (or vice versa) and, accordingly, odd-odd nuclei turn into even-even nuclei, which typically have a high fission probability. Accordingly, if a fission activity is observed in experiments on the production of an odd-odd nucleus, it is often difficult to identify whether fission occurred in the odd-odd nucleus, or not rather started from the even-even beta-decay daughter, which can then undergo beta-delayed fission. Recently, Dr. Jadambaa Khuyagbaatar from GSI and HIM predicted that this beta-delayed fission process may be very relevant for the heaviest nuclei and – in fact – may be one of the main decay modes of beta-decaying superheavy nuclei.
In superheavy nuclei, which are exceedingly difficult to be produced experimentally, beta-decay has not yet been observed conclusively. For instance, in the case of the heaviest element produced at GSI Darmstadt, tennessine (element 117), only two atoms of the odd-odd nucleus tennessine-294 were observed in an experiment that lasted about one month. This small production rates limit the verification and detailed study of the beta-decay delayed fission process. Still, new experimental data to shed light on this process are best gained in exotic nuclei, like those which have an extremely unbalanced ratio of protons to neutrons. For this, the team from GSI, JGU, HIM and University of Jyväskylä has produced the hitherto unknown nucleus mendelevium-244, an odd-odd nucleus consisting of 101 protons and 143 neutrons.
The theoretical estimate suggests that beta decay of this nucleus will be followed by fission in about one out of five cases. Due to the large energy release of the fission process, this can be detected with high sensitivity, whereas beta decays are more difficult to measure. The researchers used an intense beam of titanium-50 available at GSI’s UNILAC accelerator to irradiate a gold target. The reaction products of titanium and gold nuclei were separated in the Transactinide Separator and Chemistry TASCA, which guided mendelevium nuclei into a silicon detector suitable to register the implantation of the nuclei as well as their subsequent decay.
A first part of the studies, performed in 2018, led to the observation of seven atoms of mendelevium-244. In 2020, the researchers used a lower titanium-50 beam energy, which is insufficient to lead to mendelevium-244 production. Indeed, signals like those assigned to mendelevium-244 in the 2018 study were absent in this part of the data set, corroborating the proper assignment of the 2018 data and confirming the discovery of the new isotope.
All of the seven registered atomic nuclei underwent alpha decay, i.e., the emission of a helium-4 nucleus, which led to the daughter isotope einsteinium-240, discovered four years ago by a preceding experiment carried out at the University of Jyväskylä. Beta decay was not observed, which allows establishing an upper limit on this decay mode of 14 percent. If the 20 percent fission probability of all beta-decaying nuclei were correct, the total probability for beta delayed fission would be at most 2.8 percent and its observation would necessitate the production of substantially more mendelevium-244 atoms than in this discovery experiment.
In addition to the alpha-decaying mendelevium-244, the researchers found signals of short-lived fission events with unexpected characteristics concerning their number, production probability, and half-life. Their origin cannot currently be pinpointed exactly, and is in fact not readily explicable with current knowledge of the production and decay of isotopes in the region of mendelevium-244. This motivates follow-up studies to get more detailed data, which will help shed further light on the fission process in odd-odd nuclei. (BP)
For his research at the boundary of nuclear physics and astronomy, Friedrich-Karl Thielemann receives the Karl Schwarzschild Medal, the most prestigious prize in Germany in the field of astronomy and astrophysics. Since 2018, Thielemann has been a guest scientist at GSI after his retirement and continues his award-winning research on the origin of the elements in the universe in collaboration with his theory colleagues. This work is of great importance for the future experimental program at FAIR and already for the ongoing FAIR Phase 0 program.
His theoretical efforts, combined with comparison to experiments and observations, had a huge impact on the understanding of stellar explosions. In his many outstanding theoretical contributions, he predicted nuclear cross sections and reaction rates of nuclei across the nuclear chart, including highly unstable ones. During his more than 40-year career, he achieved a full circle from nuclear input to studies of stellar evolution and explosions, the formation of heavy elements and the resulting chemical evolution of galaxies. Friedrich-Karl Thielemann excelled in providing the basis for the most extreme events in the universe from type Ia supernovae, novae and X-ray bursts, core-collapse supernovae and hypernovae to neutron star mergers. Thielemann’s dedication to unravel the origin of the elements in the universe led to professional positions he held around the globe. Being emeritus professor in the field of cosmology and particle physics at the University of Basel, he continues his research also as a guest scientist at the GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research in Darmstadt. Paolo Giubellino, scientific managing director of GSI and FAIR, expressed his delight at this recognition for Thielemann: “We are thrilled that this prestigious prize goes to a towering figure in Nuclear Astrophysics who has honoured our center by choosing it as his home institution in these years as Emeritus. He is an extremely active scientist, who actively collaborates with the other nuclear astrophysicists on campus, both theorists and experimentalists. It is a great asset for us, with great impact on one of the key FAIR research programs”. Thielemann is member of the German Astronomical Society since 1978. (AG/LW)
]]>Nuclear clocks could make our time measurement even more accurate than atomic clocks. The key to this lies in thorium-229, an atomic nucleus whose lowest excited state has very low energy. A research team from the Kirchhoff Institute for Physics at the University of Heidelberg, TU Wien, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU), the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM), and GSI Helmholtzzentrum in Darmstadt has now succeeded in measuring this low energy. Using an extremely accurate detector, it was possible to detect the tiny temperature increase due to the energy released during the de-excitation of the atomic nucleus. This brings the realization of a nuclear clock a big step closer.
In radioactive decay, atomic nuclei spontaneously re-arrange, eject some part of their building blocks, and transform into a nucleus of a different atom. In this process, the new "daughter atom" usually has internally stored energy that is released in the form of gamma rays. The energies of these rays are characteristic for each type of nucleus – just like fingerprints. Researchers learn a lot about atomic nuclei by characterizing these gamma-ray fingerprints.
Back in 1976, L. A. Kroger and C. W. Reich investigated the decay of uranium-233, which is an artificial nucleus of uranium that decays to thorium-229 by emitting an alpha-particle; this is immediately followed by the emission of characteristic gamma-rays that occur in distinct and generally well-understood patterns. Kroger and Reich, however, registered an anomaly: one gamma-ray that was predicted by all nuclear theories was missing in the measured signals. The best explanation was that the internal energy stored in the lowest nuclear excitation of thorium-229 was too low to be observed by the detectors. Over the following decades, many attempts were made to observe this low-energy gamma-ray without success, constraining it to ever-lower energies.
New perspectives for constructing an atomic clock
Nowadays, we know that the lowest excited-energy state of the thorium-229 nucleus, called an isomer state, is located at the lowest known energy among all nuclei, at an energy that is orders of magnitudes lower than usual excitation energies. Consequently, the energy of the associated gamma-ray is so low that it is placed in the ultraviolet region of the electromagnetic spectrum rather than in the typical gamma-ray region. This leads to the unique situation that the opposite process of the de-excitation by the emission of this "ultraviolet gamma-ray", namely the excitation of the lower state is possible by shining ultraviolet light onto the nucleus. It is the only nuclear system that could be excited with "table-top" laser light. This opens up exciting prospects, including the construction of a "nuclear" clock, in which time is measured by oscillations of the nucleus between these two states. The precision of such a clock is predicted to be better than that of the best current atomic clocks, which rely on oscillations between states in the electron shell, which is more susceptible to external perturbations than the 10.000 times smaller nucleus.
The key problem is, though, that the energy of the isomer state is not yet known with sufficient precision to know which ultraviolet light is needed to stimulate the oscillation. A consortium of researchers from Heidelberg, Vienna, Mainz, and Darmstadt have now repeated the iconic gamma spectroscopy measurement of Kroger and Reich, but using a highly advanced state-of-the-art gamma spectrometer, designed explicitly for registering rays of such low energy.
Cool studies give the highest precision
For this, the research team of Professor Christian Enss and Dr. Andreas Fleischmann at the Kirchhoff Institute for Physics at the University of Heidelberg developed a magnetic microcalorimeter named maXs30. This detector is cooled to minus 273 degrees Celsius and measures the minuscule temperature rise that occurs when a gamma-ray is absorbed. The temperature increase leads to a change in the detector's magnetic properties, which is then converted into an electric signal using SQUID magnetometers similar to those that are commonly used in magnetic resonance tomography. The maXs30 detector has unprecedented energy resolution and gain linearity; still, it took about 12 weeks of continuous measurement to obtain the gamma-ray spectrum with sufficient precision.
To make this challenging measurement possible, the team of Professor Christoph Düllmann in Mainz and Darmstadt produced a special sample of uranium-233. First, they chemically removed all decay daughter products that had built up over time before the sample was used. They also removed unwanted radioisotopes, the decay of which leads to an unwanted background in the measured data. Then they designed a source geometry and sample container that led to minimum interference of the weak signals on their way from the sample to the maXs30 calorimeters. These steps were required for the success of the measurement because only one in 10,000 decay processes produces a signal that is useful for the determination of the isomer energy. The measurement produced the most precise gamma-ray spectrum of uranium-233 to thorium-229 decay to date. The team of Professor Thorsten Schumm at TU Wien, together with the Heidelberg team, employed four different schemes to derive the energy of the isomer state from this data. The most precise one yielded a value of 8.10(17) electronvolts, which corresponds to light of a wavelength of 153.1(32) nanometers, with the number in parentheses indicating the uncertainty of the last digits. This measurement paves the way for a direct laser excitation of the thorium-229 isomer. (LW)
Physics Viewpoint “Ticking Toward a Nuclear Clock”
Energy spectrum -"Magnetic micro-calorimeter raw data"
Originalveröffentlichung: Measurement of the 229Th Isomer Energy with a Magnetic Microcalorimeter
]]>Almudena Arcones receives the election as APS-Fellow "for seminal contributions in astro- and nuclear physics, especially to the understanding of heavy elements creation in supernovae, neutron star mergers, and their associated kilonova”. The research focus of the physicist, who is an associate professor for theoretical astrophysics at the Technische Universität Darmstadt, includes core-collapse supernovae and neutron star mergers as astrophysical sites of the r-process.
Almudena Arcones conducted research at the Max Planck Institut für Astrophysik in Garching from 2004 to 2007 and received her doctorate from the Technische Universität München in 2007. From 2007 to 2010 she worked as a postdoctoral fellow at GSI and the Institut für Kernphysik (SFB 634) at the Technische Universität Darmstadt. Subsequently, she conducted research in the Department of Physics at the University of Basel until 2012. From 2012 to 2016 she was assistant professor for theoretical astrophysics at the Technische Universität Darmstadt, where she has been working as associate professor since 2016. From 2012 to 2017 she was group leader of a Helmholtz Young Investigator Group at GSI.
Almudena Arcones has already received several important awards, including the ERC-Starting Grant of the European Research Council 2016. Her topic was "The origin of heavy elements: a nuclear physics and astrophysics challenge”. The prize enabled her and her team to carry out new investigations on the origin of the elements in stars. As theoretical work, these simulations on element synthesis will also be important and pioneering for experimental research at the future accelerator center FAIR, which is currently being built at GSI.
The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, was enthusiastic about the honoring of Almudena Arcones: "The election as APS Fellow is a very prestigious award and a special honor, expressing the respect of scientists from the same professional environment. I am glad about the peers’ great appreciation for Almudena Arcones and her work, which also makes an outstanding contribution to current and future research at GSI and FAIR".
The APS is one of the most important physics societies worldwide. It was founded in 1899 and today has more than 55 000 members worldwide. It is divided into numerous specialist groups covering all areas of physical research. APS members attain the status of a Fellow on the basis of a precisely defined nomination and evaluation process. Each year, the APS elects no more than one half of one percent of the society’s membership as fellow. (BP)
]]>The Georg Forster Research Award honors researchers from developing and transition countries who have earned international recognition for their research and seek to solve development-related issues. The award winners are nominated by German experts and invited to establish or expand collaborative projects with them. Valued at €60,000 each, the Georg Forster Research Awards are financed by the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development.
Omar Azzaroni studied chemistry at the National University La Plata UNLP (Universidad Nacional de La Plata) in Argentina, receiving his PhD in 2004. His postdoctoral studies were carried out at the University of Cambridge in UK (2004– 2006) and the Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research in Mainz (2007). He was then appointed as Max Planck Partner Group leader from 2009 until 2013. Max Planck Partner Groups are an instrument in the joint promotion of junior scientists with countries interested in strengthening their research through international cooperation. Contacts to GSI have existed for many years, mainly through working with GSI scientist Dr. Eugenia Toimil-Molares.
From 2012 to 2015, Omar Azzaroni has served as Vice-Director of the Institute for Theoretical and Applied Physical-Chemical Research INIFTA (Instituto de Investigaciones Fisicoquímicas Teóricas y Aplicadas). He is currently a fellow of the Argentinean National Council of Scientific and Technological Research CONICET and head of the Soft Matter Laboratory of INIFTA. He has also been Adjunct Professor of Physical Chemistry at the University La Plata since 2009. His research interests include solid-state nanopores, nanostructured hybrid interfaces, supra- and macromolecular materials science and nanotechnology.
During his stay at the GSI and FAIR campus, Omar Azzaroni will work together with his colleagues from the GSI materials research department and use nanopores that are produced by irradiating polymer films with high-energy heavy ions. The head of the department, Professor Christina Trautmann, emphasizes in her laudatio of the laureate: “Professor Omar Azzaroni has made pioneering contributions by combining polymer science, surface chemistry and nanotechnology.” Based on his chemistry expertise, he developed polymer brushes of designed composition, structure, and functionality such as responsiveness to temperature.
Omar Azzaroni will focus on the fabrication of nanodevices with chemical and biological sensor properties through the modification of nanochannels with molecular systems. He will integrate soft-matter based responsive building blocks into solid-state nanopores. The aim is to develop intelligent nanosystems that can recognize chemically or physically triggered environmental changes and adjust e.g. the pore diameter as a function of temperature. This smart materials-based nanotechnology has great innovative potential and could open up new applications in the future, for example in drug delivery, biosensing or energy conversion. (BP)
]]>The guests were welcomed by Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Dr Ulrich Breuer, Administrative Managing Director, and Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director.
The guests enjoyed presentations and a guided tour, giving them comprehensive insights into current and planned research activities at the FAIR facilities. State Secretary Lukas was impressed by the achievements of GSI, by the outstanding activities carried out as part of the current “FAIR Phase 0” program and by the promising scientific prospects that will emerge once FAIR becomes operational: “Fundamental scientific research forms a crucial foundation for development and progress in a society. Supporting such research is therefore a key priority of the Federal Ministry of Education and Research. Today, I have seen for myself what excellent, cutting-edge research is being done here at GSI and the compelling scientific potential of the future FAIR facilities.”
The unique possibilities of FAIR and future challenges were also the focus of a tour of the existing accelerator facility. Young researchers and responsible scientists at various parts of the facility gave the guests insight into their work, including the experimental storage ring ESR, the medical radiation unit of the biophysics department, the large-scale experiments R3B and HADES as well as the high-performance computer center Green IT Cube. Summarizing his visit State Secretary Lukas stressed, “I am particularly impressed by the high level of expertise and the enthusiasm shown by the young researchers I met during the visit for their work at GSI.”
At the international accelerator center FAIR, which is being built at GSI, extreme forms of matter that usually only exist in neutron stars, supernovae, stars or large gas planets are to be produced and researched in the lab. FAIR will thus investigate "the universe in the laboratory". FAIR's future research work will build on the successful research at GSI. Scientists from all over the world will use the different areas of GSI and FAIR to carry out unique experiments and obtain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe.
The experimental storage ring ESR, for example, enables the storage and (beam) cooling of highly charged ions and exotic nuclei. The stored ion beams will be used with the highest levels of quality and precision for unique experiments testing the fundamentals law of physics and opening the door to studying key astrophysical processes. Storage ring physics is one of the unique features of GSI and FAIR.
At the medical radiation unit, where cancer patients were successfully treated with ion beams for the first time in Europe in 1997, future research will focus on technical and radiobiological advancements in ion beam therapy and on space research. This will include assessments of radiation exposure during long-term space missions in collaboration with the European Space Agency.
Within the R3B experiment, which was set up for FAIR by an international collaboration and is already active now in the "FAIR Phase 0" research program, reaction experiments with high-energy exotic nuclei are conducted. These experiments are important for understanding the origin of the heavy elements in the universe such as gold.
The HADES detector (Hi Acceptance Di-Electron Spectrometer) for FAIR is also already operational and is used to study high-energy nuclear collisions. HADES will allow scientists to understand the properties of hot, highly compressed nuclear matter as it is produced in the universe, for example, when neutron stars collide.
The Green IT Cube is a very powerful and energy-efficient high-performance computer center, the only one in Germany awarded the Blauer Engel certificate for environmental friendliness. It was designed as the central IT center for the storage and analysis of the huge amounts of data that will be generated by the FAIR experiments. (BP)
]]>Niedermayer works at the Institute for Particle Acceleration and Electromagnetic Fields (TEMF) in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology at the Technical University of Darmstadt. There he is part of the group of Professor Oliver Boine-Frankenheim, head of the GSI accelerator physics department. In his doctoral thesis, Uwe Niedermayer also carried out simulation calculations for the design of the ring accelerator SIS100, the heart of the FAIR accelerator center currently being built at GSI.
The prize is awarded to Uwe Niedermayer for his outstanding scientific achievements during his doctorate and initial research phase. An acceleration scheme he conceived is regarded as one of the most important breakthroughs on the way to a novel laser-driven, dielectric electron accelerator on a microchip. At the same time, Niedermayer's research makes important contributions in the field of high-temperature thin-film superconductors for the design study of the Future Circular Collider (FCC) planned at CERN in Geneva.
"With his work, Uwe Niedermayer has already acquired an international reputation and high esteem after a relatively short research phase. His activities lead us to expect further outstanding research results in the near future," is stated in the appreciation. The research prize, awarded by the DPG und its Arbeitskreis Beschleunigerphysik (AKBP), is intended to promote accelerator physics as an independent field of research in Germany and is awarded to young researchers at German universities or research institutions whose doctoral thesis was completed no more than five years ago and who have distinguished themselves through outstanding, original and independent research contributions.
The prize was presented at the DPG's machine learning seminar in the physics center in Bad Honnef. During the event, the expertise with accelerators in Darmstadt was honoured even one more time by an award ceremony: Dr. Bernhard Franzke received the Horst Klein Prize of the DPG Arbeitskreis Beschleunigerphysik, which is aimed at internationally renowned scientists who have distinguished themselves through outstanding achievements of great significance and high originality. The prize had been awarded to him in spring (as reported), but could not be presented at that time. Bernhard Franzke has been a leading accelerator physicist at GSI for many years and was significantly involved in the construction and development of UNILAC, the ESR and many experiments. In the years 2000 until 2005 he played an important role in developing the concept of the storage rings at FAIR. (BP)
]]>Prof. Geissel receives the award for his many years of successful studies with short-lived nuclei and the investigation of their properties. Together with the Polish scientists Prof. Dr. Zygmunt Patyk (National Center for Nuclear Research, Świerk-Warsaw) and Prof. Dr. Marek Pfützner (University of Warsaw) he realized pioneering experiments with the GSI fragment separator FRS. Together with Prof. Patyk and his research group, he was able for the first time to perform highly accurate mass measurements of exotic nuclei that were produced, separated at FRS and cooled in the storage ring ESR. The collaboration with Prof. Pfützner and his research group also resulted in many publications of worldwide acclaim, of which the discovery of numerous new isotopes and two-proton radioactivity are particularly outstanding. With a total of 276 isotopes discovered, Prof. Geissel has held the world record since 2012.
"This award naturally also represents an international recognition of the scientific work of the entire research group at the FRS and FRS-ESR", said Prof. Geissel. "I would also like to take this opportunity to thank my former teachers, Professors Heinz Ewald, Ulrich Mosel, Gottfried Münzenberg, Werner Scheid and Herrmann Wollnik, who showed me the way to ion research". In connection with the award, further research work of the international German-Polish collaboration is planned to be carried out until 2023. Japanese scientists are also involved in this. The first experiments were already successfully carried out at the FRS in spring of this year. Further research work at the accelerator facility FAIR in Darmstadt and at the Japanese research center RIKEN should form the basis for further scientific successes in the near future.
The two Polish institutions involved - the National Center for Nuclear Research and the University of Warsaw - are members of the Super-FRS Experiment Collaboration and thus belong to the NUSTAR (NUclear STructure Astro-physics and Reactions) activity at FAIR. Stays of Prof. Geissel with lectures are also planned at the University of Warsaw and the National Center for Nuclear Research in Warsaw, since the education and motivation of young physics students is a major concern of all participating institutions.
The Foundation for Polish Science annually awards prizes for works in various scientific disciplines. This year, in addition to Prof. Geissel, a scientist from the field of biomineralogy and a scientist from the field of history are honored. (JL)
This news is based on a press release of Justus-Liebig-Universität Gießen
]]>High-precision measurements of the mass of the deuteron, the nucleus of heavy hydrogen, provide new insights into the reliability of fundamental quantities in atomic and nuclear physics. This is reported in the journal "Nature" by a collaboration led by the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics Heidelberg, Germany, and partners from the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, the GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research Darmstadt and the Helmholtz Institute Mainz, Germany. Thus, data directly related to the atomic mass standard, are now available for hydrogen H, deuterium D and the molecule HD, which the scientists have also reweighed.
The masses of both atomic nuclei and electrons influence numerous properties of atoms and molecules, for example their spectra, i.e., which light colours they absorb or emit. Physicists like values of these masses to be as accurate as possible, because only with their knowledge precise calculations using atomic physics are possible for these spectra. Calculations are then confronted to direct measurements, which, for example, allows drawing conclusions about the reliability of basic physical theories.
Hydrogen and its isotopes are of particular interest in this context, because their simple electron shell with only a single electron allows extremely precise calculations and thus very sensitive tests of fundamental physical theories. Furthermore, the mass of the deuteron can also be used to derive the mass of the neutron – the second component of atomic nuclei besides the proton. After having already precisely weighed the electron and the proton, the nucleus of the ordinary hydrogen atom, in recent years, researchers around Klaus Blaum and Sven Sturm from the MPI for Nuclear Physics have now also put the deuteron, the nucleus of heavy hydrogen consisting of a proton and a neutron, and the HD+ molecular ion on the "precision scale". Since deuterium is rare and is usually easily replaced by the much more common normal hydrogen, Christoph Düllmann's research group in Mainz produced a tailor-made deuterium sample that fits the used apparatus perfectly.
Penning traps have proven to be the best precision scales for ions. In such a trap, single charged particles can be trapped for a long time with the help of electric and magnetic fields. The trapped particle performs a characteristic motion in the trap, which is described by a frequency. This frequency depends on the mass of the trapped particle – heavier particles oscillate more slowly than lighter ones. If two different, individual ions are measured one after the other in the same trap, the ratio of the masses can be determined exactly – similar to a classical mechanical beam balance.
The mass standard for atoms is the carbon isotope 12C, which by definition weighs 12 atomic mass units. "Our Penning trap apparatus called LIONTRAP is located in a superconducting magnet in nearly perfect vacuum at a temperature of about 4 degrees above absolute zero (–269°C). We prepared a deuteron (D+) and a carbon ion (12C6+) in the apparatus, alternately transferred one of them from its storage trap to the precision trap located between the storage traps and measured its movement with highest precision," says Sascha Rau, who carried out the measurements in the context of his PhD, explaining the measuring principle. "The ratio of the frequencies of both ions obtained in this way directly gives the mass of the deuteron in atomic units." So, the carbon ion acts as a reference weight on the "beam balance".
When evaluating the measurement data, the physicists had to consider very carefully the influence of many unavoidable systematic effects. As a result, they obtained the mass of the deuteron as 2.013553212535(17) atomic units, with the number in parentheses indicating the uncertainty of the last digits. The mass of the hydrogen molecular ion HD+, determined by the same method, is 3.021378241561(61) atomic units.
The new value for the mass of the deuteron is the most accurate ever measured, but is significantly smaller than the tabulated reference value. "To validate our result, we calculated the mass of HD+ with this value and with the masses of the proton and the electron previously measured by us, as well as the known binding energy. The result is in excellent agreement with our directly measured value. In addition, the mass ratio of deuteron to proton derived from our data fits very well with the value directly measured by another group," says Sven Sturm with satisfaction. This consistency of the data underpins the used measurement methodology and suggests that the reference values should be corrected. In addition, the new data considerably reduces the discrepancies that previously existed among the masses of light nuclei. However, in order to fully resolve these discrepancies, further high-precision mass measurements – directly in atomic units – of super-heavy hydrogen (tritium) and of light helium are required. (MPIK/CP/BP)
Press release on the website of Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics
Accompanying article in the category "News and Views" in the journal Nature
]]>Cavities or cavity resonators are central elements of accelerators. Therein, strong electromagnetic fields oscillate, transferring their energy to the particles flying along the tube axis. To improve electrical conductivity, the surfaces are copper-plated. At GSI and FAIR, the Electroplating Department is responsible for coating the tanks and components of the particle accelerators with a layer of high-gloss copper from inside. The task of electroplating is challenging, the demands on surface quality are high.
Currently, the Alvarez accelerator structure, a section of GSI-UNILAC, has to be replaced for future top performance so that FAIR can deliver the planned high beam quality. One of the critical points in this upgrade is the copper plating of particularly large cavity sections. This is a challenge that was last faced at GSI more than 20 years ago. Nevertheless, the GSI Electroplating Department has now succeeded in demonstrating its ability to copperplate a cavity of this size on the very first attempt. Thus, a very crucial aspect of the Alvarez replacement has been addressed and positively solved.
The electroplating facility, which has developed in the course of the accelerator expansion on the GSI and FAIR campus, is unique. It allows high-polish copper plating of metal surfaces such as steel and stainless steel up to 200 micrometers thickness. It is above all the size of the elements to be copper-plated that makes the plant exceptional. Even a crane is used during maneuvering to move the heavy components back and forth between the various cleaning and coating baths. Elements can be copper-plated up to a maximum length of 2.5 meters and a diameter of up to 2.5 meters. (BP)
]]>In addition to looking back at our history, we look to the future: to our experiments of FAIR Phase 0, to new FAIR components and to the awarding of ERC grants to our researchers. In this issue we are particularly pleased to introduce our new Administrative Managing Director, Dr. Ulrich Breuer. We also report on the meeting of international element discoverers, merging neutron stars, star collisions at 800 billion °C, other research highlights and much more.
We’ve taken our anniversary as an opportunity to give our magazine a new style. In this new look, we will continue to keep you up to date about the progress achieved by our research programs and the construction of FAIR as well as current events on our campus. (CP)
Download of "target" – Issue 18, August 2020 (PDF, 12 MB)
Download of Special Supplement: Corona, August 2020 (PDF, 3 MB)
Marco Durante is an internationally recognized expert in the field of radiation biology and medical physics. He is being awarded the prize for his significant contributions to the optimization of therapy with heavy ions and for his studies on radiation protection in space. "This award is a great honour for me. As a student, I read the Failla Award paper by Cornelius Tobias (Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory), the father of heavy ion therapy, on heavy ions in therapy and space research, and I became enthusiastic about that topic. After 37 years from Tobias, spending my whole scientific career on that very topic, that same award comes to me. The award actually recognizes the research of my team at GSI/FAIR over the past years. It is the result of the work of the whole Biophysics Department", Professor Durante reacted to the news from RRS. "The prize is an enormous incentive for us to continue our research at GSI and in the future at the FAIR facility, with the Biophysics Collaboration, at the highest level.“
Professor Paolo Giubellino, scientific director of GSI and FAIR, is delighted about the award: "I am extremely pleased that the outstanding research achievements of Marco Durante and his team have received the recognition they deserve with the Failla award, the most important worldwide in this field. The work of Marco Durante and his team is a prime example of how basic research and applications can come together at an interdisciplinary research center and underlines the excellence of scientific research at GSI and FAIR".
The prestigious award is named after the scientist Gioacchino Failla, former president of RRS and one of its founding fathers. It is awarded annually to an outstanding member of the radiation research community who has made significant contributions in the fields of radiation science. The handover of the prize money of $2000 and an accompanying medal usually takes place during the annual meeting of the RRS. It is the highest award of RRS, established in 1963 and has been received only by a few Europeans, including a single researcher working in Germany (Herwig Paretzke in 2007). Due to the corona pandemic, the RRS is organising its annual meeting virtually this year, so that the prize is delivered in advance. During the online event in October 2020 Durante will deliver his Failla lecture.
Marco Durante is head of the GSI Biophysics Research Department and professor at the TU Darmstadt Department of Physics, Institute of Condensed Matter of Physics. He studied physics and got his PhD at the University Federico II in Italy. His post doc positions took him to the NASA Johnson Space Center in Texas and to the National Institute of Radiological Sciences in Japan. During his studies, he specialized in charged particle therapy, cosmic radiation, radiation cytogenetics and radiation biophysics. He has received numerous awards for his research, including the Galileo Galilei prize from the European Federation of Organizations for Medical Physics (EFOMP), the Timoffeeff-Ressovsky award of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS), the Warren Sinclair award of the US National Council of Radiation Protection (NCRP), the IBA-Europhysics Prize of the European Physical Society (EPS) and the Bacq & Alexander award of the European Radiation Research Society (ERRS). He has recently been awarded an ERC advanced grant. (JL)
Does life exist only on earth? How did the universe we live in come into being? And what holds matter together at its core? Researchers at the Bergische Universität Wuppertal are getting to the bottom of these questions using various large-scale experiments. The astroparticle physicists receive funding for their research from the Federal Ministry of Science and Research, the Federal Ministry of Economics and Energy, represented by the project management organizations DLR and PT-DESY (Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron), and the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung.
For their projects, the Wuppertal researchers, led by astroparticle physicists Professor Dr. Karl-Heinz Kampert and Professor Dr. Klaus Helbing, will get a total of around two million euros in funding. Several major projects are associated with this.
A mission to the outer solar system will investigate whether life has developed there. As part of a project initiated by the German Aerospace Center (DLR), researchers at the University of Wuppertal are developing new techniques for radar-based navigation in the ice. These methods are to be used on a possible mission to the icy moon Europa.
In the galaxy beyond our solar system, supernovae, i.e. massive stars, play an important role in the origin of the chemical elements that make life possible for us. Which forces are present and how does matter behave under extreme conditions, existing for example inside neutron stars? The researchers involved in the CBM experiment are investigating these questions. The experiment for Compressed Baryonic Matter (CBM) is currently being realized within the FAIR project. It is one of the four major research pillars of the future accelerator center FAIR, which is being built at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt. This will enable researchers to study processes in neutron stars with unprecedented precision and over a very wide range of densities.
Another project deals with high-energy particles from huge galaxies far away from the Milky Way. How do they reach these extreme energies and how do they get to Earth over millions of years through the extra-galactic magnetic fields? To gain new insights, the various particles are measured with the Pierre Auger Observatory on Earth and compared with cosmological simulations. The detection of photons that travel these huge distances also provides important information on the space-time structure.
Our present universe consists mainly of matter and not of antimatter. The reasons for this dominance are still completely unknown. A key to understanding this could be the so-called "ghost particle" neutrino. The KATRIN experiment (KArlsruhe TRItium Neutrino Experiment) aims to determine the mass of the neutrino, which could be a key to this mystery. Particles that interact with the neutrinos as so-called "dark matter" could also be detected in this framework.
The neutrino has also been used in astronomy and cosmology for several years. With the IceCube telescope, located directly at the South Pole in Antarctica, Wuppertal researchers are looking for particles that are thought to have been emitted shortly after the Big Bang. From their characteristics, the processes during the formation of the universe can be reconstructed. Work is currently underway on an upgrade for this particle detector. The Wuppertal scientists are working with international colleagues to develop new sensors for this purpose. (BUW/BP)
]]>The guests were welcomed by Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Dr. Ulrich Breuer, Administrative Managing Director, and Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director. Furthermore, the head of the IT department at GSI and FAIR, Dr. Thorsten Kollegger, the head of technology transfer, Dr. Tobias Engert, and Carola Pomplun from the press and public relations department were also participating for GSI and FAIR.
Central topic of Patrick Burghardt's visit was sustainable digitalization. Here, the energy-efficient Green IT Cube offers huge scientific and technological as well as economic potential. During presentations and a guided tour of the Green IT Cube, the State Secretary used the opportunity to obtain comprehensive information about the high-performance data center and its infrastructure and expressed great interest in the very promising prospects. The subsequent discussions also focused on exploring potential cooperation and joint objectives for research, development and use of Green IT technology.
The Green IT Cube on the GSI/FAIR campus provides enormous computing capacities for experiments at the accelerator facilities of GSI and, in the future, FAIR. It is one of the most capable scientific computing centers in the world. At the same time, it sets standards in IT technology and energy saving: Thanks to a special cooling system, it is particularly energy- and cost-efficient. Therefore, the energy required for cooling is less than seven percent of the electrical power used for computing. In conventional data centers with air cooling, this relation amounts to 30 up to 100 percent. The Green IT Cube has already received numerous awards, including recently the Blue Angel, the eco label of the German government.
After visiting the Green IT Cube, the guests had the opportunity to inform themselves about the current status of the FAIR construction project and to take a look at the progress on the 20-hectare construction site: from the completed sections for the central ring accelerator SIS100 and the transfer building to the excavation pit for the first of the future experimental caves. (BP)
]]>Superheavy elements are intriguing nuclear and atomic quantum systems that challenge experimental probing as they do not occur in nature and, when synthesized, vanish within seconds. Pushing the forefront atomic physics research to these elements requires breakthrough developments towards fast atomic spectroscopy techniques with extreme sensitivity. A joint effort within the European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation program and led by Dr. Mustapha Laatiaoui from Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU) and at the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM), a branch of GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, culminated in an optical spectroscopy proposal: The so-called Laser Resonance Chromatography (LRC) should enable such investigations even at minute production quantities. The proposal has recently been published in two articles in Physical Review Letters and Physical Review A.
Superheavy elements (SHEs) are found at the bottom part of the periodic table of elements. They represent a fertile ground for the development of understanding on how such exotic atoms can exist and work when an overwhelming number of electrons in atomic shells and protons and neutrons in the nucleus come together. Insights into their electronic structure can be obtained from optical spectroscopy experiments unveiling element-specific emission spectra. These spectra are powerful benchmarks for modern atomic-model calculations and could be useful, for example, when it comes to searching for traces of even heavier elements, which might be created in neutron-star merger events.
Although SHEs have been discovered decades ago, their investigation by optical spectroscopy tools lack far behind the synthesis. This is because they are produced at extremely low rates at which traditional methods simply do not work. So far, optical spectroscopy ends at nobelium, element 102 in the periodic table. "Current techniques are at the limit of what is feasible," explained Laatiaoui. From the next heavier element on, the physicochemical properties change abruptly and impede providing samples in suitable atomic states."
Together with research colleagues, the physicist has therefore developed the new LRC approach in optical spectroscopy. This combines element selectivity and spectral precision of laser spectroscopy with ion-mobility mass spectrometry and merges the benefits of a high sensitivity with the "simplicity" of optical probing as in laser-induced fluorescence spectroscopy. Its key idea is to detect the products of resonant optical excitations not on the basis of fluorescent light as usual, but based on their characteristic drift time to a particle detector.
In their theoretical work, the researchers focused on singly charged lawrencium, element 103, and on its lighter chemical homolog. But the concept offers unparalleled access to laser spectroscopy of many other monoatomic ions across the periodic table, in particular of the transition metals including the high-temperature refractory metals and elements beyond lawrencium. Other ionic species like triply-charged thorium shall be within reach of the LRC approach as well. Moreover, the method enables to optimize signal-to-noise ratios and thus to ease ion mobility spectrometry, state-selected ion chemistry, and other applications.
Dr. Mustapha Laatiaoui came to Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz and the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM) in February 2018. In late 2018, he received an ERC Consolidator Grant from the European Research Council (ERC), one of the European Union's most valuable funding grants, for his research into the heaviest elements using laser spectroscopy and ion mobility spectroscopy. The current publications also included work that Laatiaoui had previously carried out at GSI in Darmstadt and at KU Leuven in Belgium.
This work was conducted in cooperation with Alexei A. Buchachenko from the Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology and the Institute of Problems of Chemical Physics, both in Moscow, Russia, and Larry A. Viehland from Chatham University, Pittsburgh, USA. (CP)
Several important stages in the construction process can be seen in the picture slider: The tunnel for the SIS100 accelerator ring is under construction, and the transfer building is growing out of the ground. The first experimental cave, the building for the Compressed Baryonic Matter Experiment (CBM) is also taking shape. Viewers can compare the FAIR construction site in 2018 and 2020 themselves.
The drone images were taken during the regular overflights during which the drone videos are recorded to document the construction site. All drone videos can be found here.
FAIR, the Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research, is one of the largest research projects worldwide. FAIR will be used to create and study matter in the laboratory that otherwise only occurs in the universe. Scientists from all over the world expect new insights into the structure of matter and the development of the universe, from the Big Bang to the present day. (LW)
]]>In addition to information on scientific activities and the current status of the FAIR project, a tour of the FAIR construction site was part of the program. During a walking tour Marcus Bühl was provided with insights into the existing accelerator and research facilities on the GSI and FAIR campus. He visited the test facility for superconducting accelerator magnets, where high-tech components for FAIR are examined, the Experimental Storage Ring ESR, the therapy unit for tumor treatment using carbon ions as well as the large detector HADES and the high-performance data center Green IT Cube.
]]>In large research infrastructures such as GSI, which has maintained strong international collaborations since its foundation, or the FAIR project, which is supported by several countries, cooperation with different people and cultures has long been part of everyday life. In this way, knowledge and know-how from all over the world can be brought together for research and high-tech developments in order to achieve the best results. The basis for this is now written down in the Helmholtz guideline in order to create the framework conditions for reflecting diversity and inclusion in the processes, structures and conditions of the center.
The starting point is a simple insight: people are diverse. The current 40,000 employees of the Helmholtz Association and, of course, the approximately 1450 employees of GSI and FAIR differ from each other in many ways: in their personal life plan or personal life situation, their gender, their world view, their biography and origins, their abilities and inclinations, their external appearance and many other aspects. The Helmholtz members recognize this sum of human differences, which is optionally referred to as "diversity" or "variety", as an irrefutable fact.
Inclusion is understood to mean the active shaping of the organizational culture in order to take all persons into account and to give them equal opportunities for influence, participation and individual development. Successful inclusion is demonstrated by the fact that the people who work in and with the centers experience an atmosphere of respect and fairness, appreciation and belonging, security and openness, and are convinced that they can fully develop their talents and grow personally. (CP)
Thomas Friedrich investigates how to describe the effect of radiation on cells and tissue as a function of their physical properties such as type of radiation, dose and energy. His habilitation thesis particularly focuses on the description and prediction of the increased effect of ion beams. This is an important aspect especially in tumor therapy with charged particles. His contributions in this area are concerned with the development of a corresponding mathematical formalism, and generally with methods and strategies for evaluating and testing such models.
Based on the "Local Effect Model" developed at GSI and used in particle therapy since years, it was possible to demonstrate the consistency of the developed modelling approaches by applying them to other types of radiation. For this purpose, it was demonstrated that various radiation effects can be described and predicted according to different irradiation scenarios using a uniform concept. This covers a wide range of sorts of ions and particle energies – from almost stopping particles to very fast particles with high energies. Those energies will be provided with unprecedented possibilities by the future accelerator center FAIR, currently being built at GSI.
The methods and results of Thomas Friedrich's award-winning research work are also a contribution to translational research at the border between experimental and clinical science. He thus connects basic research and clinical application of research results.
Thomas Friedrich studied at the Technical University of Darmstadt and received his doctorate from the Institute of Nuclear Physics. In 2008, he joined GSI as a postdoc in the Biophysics Department. Since then he has been working in the field of biophysical modelling for the prediction of radiation effects. Since 2015 he has been working here as a Senior Scientist. He has already received numerous scholarships and awards for his research, including the Young Scientist Award of the German Society for Biological Radiation Research. In addition to his research activities at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum, Thomas Friedrich teaches as a lecturer at the TU Darmstadt’s Department of Physics, where he offers basic lectures in Physics as well as advanced courses in the field of radiation biophysics. He also supervises bachelor, master and doctoral theses.
Together with Thomas Friedrich, the radiation oncologist Dr. Constantinos Zamboglou from the University Hospital in Freiburg is awarded the Holthusen Prize 2020. He is involved in preclinical and clinical studies on the implementation of special imaging techniques in the treatment planning of patients with prostate cancer. (BP)
The Green IT Cube was built at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt and was financed with funds from the German Federal Government and the State of Hesse via Helmholtz investments in further expansion. The concept allows the realization and the particularly efficient operation of computer centers for large-scale research facilities, such as the international accelerator facility FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) being built at GSI.
"The Green IT Cube is an exceptionally energy-efficient data center because the energy required for cooling the computers is very low compared to conventional data centers," explained Dr. Helmut Kreiser, who is head of the data centers on the GSI/FAIR campus. "The Green IT Cube cools its computers with an innovative air and water method. As a result, the energy required for cooling is less than seven percent of the electrical power used for computing, instead of 30 up to 100 percent as is the case in conventional data centers with air cooling".
The effective cooling technology allows a space-saving placement of the computers in the Green IT Cube. In a cube-shaped building measuring 27 x 30 x 22 cubic meters, 768 computer racks in total can be arranged closely together on six floors. At present, two of the six floors are equipped with a maximum cooling power of four megawatts. In the final stage the Green IT Cube will be able to reach a cooling power of twelve megawatts. Due to saving energy and space, it is very cost-efficient. In addition, the waste heat of the Green IT Cube’s servers is already being used to heat a modern office and canteen building on the GSI/FAIR campus.
The technology was developed by Professor Volker Lindenstruth from Goethe University Frankfurt and at that time head of GSI-IT, and Professor Horst Stöcker, also from Goethe University and at that time Scientific Managing Director of GSI, in cooperation with the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS). The powerful concept has already won several awards for innovation and environmental friendliness.
"We are very happy and of course proud to receive such a well-known and renowned label as the Blue Angel for our data center," said Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of FAIR and GSI. "The technology for the cooling system is not only an example of the competence and the inventive spirit of our scientists, but also of the potential of a research center like ours to contribute to improving even already established technology in terms of sustainability and efficiency. Pursuing and expanding this potential is a major concern of our research at GSI and FAIR".
Scientists use the Green IT Cube to perform simulations and develop detectors for FAIR. They also analyze measurement data recorded in experiments at the accelerator facilities at GSI and, in the future, FAIR, to gain fundamental insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe. To this end, the Green IT Cube will be equipped in the long term with computer systems that meet the scientists' requirements in terms of computing power, storage capacity and access speed.
For over 40 years, the Blue Angel has been the environmental label of the German Federal Government and an orientation for sustainable purchasing. Independent and credible, it sets demanding standards for environmentally friendly products and services. The Blue Angel guarantees that products and services awarded with it meet high requirements of environmental, health and usage properties. The entire life cycle must always be taken into account in the assessment. For each product group, criteria are developed which products and services labelled with the Blue Angel must fulfil. To reflect technical developments, the German Environment Agency reviews the criteria every three to four years. In this way companies are required to make their products increasingly environmentally friendly. The Green IT Cube is the first data center to receive the eco label of the German government on the basis of the criteria changed in 2019. (CP)
CRYRING is a facility for storing highly charged heavy ions at low beam energy. With its high vacuum, the storage ring is particularly suitable for storing and cooling the ions at low energies. With low-energy ions, experiments of the highest precision, but also in a previously unattained regime of slow, adiabatic collisions are possible, allowing us to gain new insights into atomic, astrophysical and nuclear physics processes.
The recommissioning of CRYRING was started in 2015. In 2017, ion beams could be stored for the first time, initially from a local source. In recent years, work has been carried out on the optimization of the ring operation, beam cooling and diagnosis, the new FAIR control system and the experimental infrastructure. Commissioning is now nearing completion and has progressed so far that the facility is ready to serve scientific experiments.
Various experiments by scientific users with international participation were already planned for this spring at the CRYRING. However, due to the corona pandemic they had to be cancelled for the time being and postponed to future operating periods. Nevertheless, work continued on the full commissioning of the facility. This involved not only transporting highly charged, heavy lead ions (beryllium-like Pb78+ and later also Pb82+ with completely removed electron shell) from the GSI linear accelerator UNILAC via the ring accelerator SIS-18 and the experimental storage ring ESR to CRYRING, but also storing, cooling and using them for tests of the experimental infrastructure. The lifetimes and electron cooling of the stored beams were in line with previous estimates.
In the first tests, X-ray detectors at the so-called electron cooler registered the characteristic X-ray spectrum of the highly charged heavy ions, which is of particular interest for the fundamental understanding of the electromagnetic force in extremely strong fields (quantum electrodynamics). Ions stored in the CRYRING fly through a cold, dense cloud of electrons of the same speed in the electron cooler, which is primarily used for beam cooling. A secondary side effect is that also a small fraction of the ions capture an electron from the cloud and release the energy gained in this process as X-rays. Researchers can use this radiation to study quantum electrodynamics.
Due to the twelve-sided geometry of the CRYRING, the X-ray detectors can be placed in an ideal position exactly on the axis in front of and behind the ion beam and yet very close to the interaction area with the cooling electrons. This largely eliminates uncertainties in the observation angle caused by the Doppler shift. The low beam energy of the stored ions already helps to reduce this shift per se, so that X-ray spectra can be recorded with unprecedented precision and clarity.
For the future, it is planned to reschedule the experiments that could currently not be conducted due to COVID-19 as soon as possible. Furthermore, a completion of the commissioning is planned. For this purpose, the extraction process will be implemented, which will allow the cooled, slowed-down ions to be removed from the ring and enable material and biophysical experiments with solid targets. (CP)
Two prominent X-ray emission lines of highly charged iron have puzzled astrophysicists for decades: their measured and calculated brightness ratios always disagree. This hinders good determinations of plasma temperatures and densities. New, careful high-precision measurements, together with top-level calculations now exclude all hitherto proposed explanations for this discrepancy, and thus deepen the problem. Researchers from the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung Darmstadt and the Helmholtz Institute Jena (HIJ), a branch of GSI, are also involved in the investigations. The results are now published in the prestigious “Physical Review Letters” journal.
Hot astrophysical plasmas fill the intergalactic space, and brightly shine in stellar coronae, active galactic nuclei, and supernova remnants. They contain charged atoms (ions) that emit X-rays observable by satellite-borne instruments. Astrophysicists need their spectral lines to derive parameters such as plasma temperatures or elemental abundancies. Two of the brightest X-ray lines arise from iron atoms that have lost 16 of their 26 electrons, Fe16+ ions – also known in astrophysics as Fe XVII. Iron is rather abundant in the universe; it lets stars similar to our Sun burn their hydrogen fuel very slowly for billions of years by nearly stopping the energy flowing as radiation from the fiery fusion core to the, in comparison only mildly hot, stellar surface.
For more than forty years, X-ray astronomers have been bothered by a serious problem with the two key Fe16+ lines: the ratio of their measured intensities significantly disagrees with theoretical predictions. This also holds for laboratory measurements, but uncertainties in experiment and theory have been too large for settling the issue.
An international team of 32 researchers led by groups from the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics (MPIK) and the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center has just published the outcome of its renewed massive effort to resolve this discrepancy. They have performed both the highest-resolution measurements thus far reported, and several top-level quantum-theoretical calculations.
Steffen Kühn, PhD student at MPIK and responsible for the setup, describes the effort: “To resonantly excite highly charged iron ions, we continuously generate them with our compact mobile electron beam ion trap (PolarX-EBIT) and irradiate them with X-rays from the PETRA III synchrotron at DESY. We find resonance with the lines by scanning the synchrotron energy over the range where they should appear and observing the fluorescence light. To handle the experimental data flow, we had colleagues from 19 institutions working at DESY, and painstakingly analysing and cross-checking results for more than one year.”
To make sure that everything is consistent, the researchers combined three different measurement procedures to determine the intensity ratio of the two Fe16+ lines, dubbed 3C and 3D. First, overall scans revealed line positions, widths and intensities. Second, the experimentalists set the energy of the X-ray photons to match the peak fluorescence yield while cyclically turning the photon beam off and on to get rid of the strong background. Third, they scanned the lines again, but using the on-off trick at the same time in order to reduce instrumental effects. “This way, we could derive the presently most accurate value of the brightness ratio, and this with ten times higher spectral resolution than earlier work”, states Chintan Shah, NASA postdoctoral fellow. “And the properties of the PETRA III beam avoided possible non-linear effects depending on the flux of synchrotron photons that may have affected earlier measurements”, adds Sven Bernitt, researcher at the Helmholtz Institute Jena and one of the project leaders, who is working in the group of Thomas Stöhlker, HIJ Director and Deputy Research Director of GSI and FAIR. Remarkably, the resulting intensity ratio confirms earlier astrophysical and laboratory measurements with much reduced uncertainty.
Theory teams around Natalia Oreshkina at the MPIK, from Australia, USA and Russia applied three independent very-large-scale relativistic quantum-theoretical methods, letting clusters of hundreds of processors run hot for weeks. This computational marathon delivered concordant results at high numerical precision. However, while the calculated energy difference between the two lines agrees well with the measured value, the intensity ratio clearly departs from the experimental result. “There are no other known quantum-mechanical effects or numerical uncertainties to consider within our approaches”, emphasizes Marianna Safronova, professor at the University of Delaware.
Thus, the cause for the discrepancy between the experimental and theoretical intensity ratios of the 3C and 3D lines of Fe16+ remains puzzling, since also all effects that could perturb the measurements were as far as possible suppressed, and the remaining uncertainty understood. As a consequence, astrophysical parameters derived on the basis of X-ray line intensities are, to some degree, uncertain. While this is unsatisfactory, “the new accurate experimental result may be immediately used to empirically correct the astrophysical models”, recommends Maurice Leutenegger, also a NASA researcher. “Upcoming space missions with advanced X-ray instrumentation, such as ESA's Athena X-ray Observatory, will soon start sending an incredible stream of high-resolution data to ground, and we have to be prepared to understand it and squeeze the maximum value from those billion-dollar investments.” (MPI/BP)
Scientific publication in the journal Physical Review Letters
Press release of the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics, Heidelberg
]]>The prize for the best thesis of 2018 was awarded to Hanna Malygina from the University of Frankfurt. In her final thesis entitled "Hit reconstruction for the Silicon Tracking System of the CBM experiment" she developed algorithms for the Silicon Tracking System (STS), where particle tracks can be measured with high efficiency and good momentum resolution. A model of the detector response was designed and implemented into the CBM software framework.
Ievgenii Kres from the University of Wuppertal was awarded the thesis prize 2019 for his work entitled "Optimization of the CBM-RICH detector geometry and its use for the reconstruction of neutral mesons using conversion method". He developed an optimized geometry for the RICH detector and was able to show that the new geometry leads to improved performance in the identification of dileptons.
Since 2015, the PhD prize has been awarded by the CBM collaboration for the best dissertation of a year produced in the CBM experiment. An international committee consisting of scientists from the collaboration selects the prize winners. The award is intended to particularly acknowledge the contribution of PhD students to the CBM project and is endowed with a prize money of 500€.
The CBM experiment is one of the key experiments at the future Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (FAIR). It focuses on the investigation of high-density nuclear matter, as it exists in neutron stars and in the core of supernova explosions. More than 400 researchers from 66 institutes and 13 countries work together in the collaboration. (JL)
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One of the goals of the German-Russian Roadmap is to expand cooperation at major research infrastructures in Russia. One of the projects identified for this is the instrumentation and scientific usage of the future accelerator complex NICA (Nuclotron-based Ion Collider fAcility), currently being built in Dubna at JINR. The German contributions to this cooperation are financed by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and handled by GSI. For this purpose, a cooperation agreement between JINR and GSI has been worked out, which has a total volume of about 20 million Euros. It was signed in early February in Moscow during the "Helmholtz Winter Talks 2020", a traditional event for the exchange of views between decision-makers from politics, science and society in Russia and Germany.
The agreement on technical cooperation between GSI and JINR consists of several subprojects: coordination and technical follow-up, stochastic cooling for the NICA collider, silicon tracking system for the NICA experiment BM@N as well as read-out electronics and data acquisition for this experiment, research and development for the superconducting high intensity ion injector Linacs@JINR and finally beam diagnostics and LLRF electronics for linear accelerators. As the next step, the details of these six subprojects are currently being worked out.
Professor Paolo Giubellino, who signed the agreement together with Professor Vladimir Kekelidze, JINR Vice-Director for the NICA science project, said: "I am very pleased about the new cooperation, which can build on an already existing, very solid foundation between our two institutes". The collaboration between GSI and JINR has a long tradition and includes both research at the existing accelerator and experimental facilities of both partners as well as research and development activities for future research infrastructures such as the two accelerator centers FAIR and NICA, which are currently being built at GSI in Darmstadt and at JINR in Dubna. "The agreement offers excellent opportunities to further strengthen our cooperation in the future and to open up promising new perspectives in research and technological innovation”. (BP)
]]>As one of the first employees, Dr. Bernhard Franzke started his career at GSI already in 1969. Prior to that, he had studied physics at the University of Heidelberg where he also received his doctorate. During the development and construction of the linear accelerator UNILAC, he made decisive contributions to its optimization. He also developed an ultra-high vacuum technology, which was indispensable for the upcoming accelerator projects at GSI.
During the first upgrade of GSI, Bernhard Franzke was involved in the conceptual design of the ring accelerator SIS18, the experimental storage ring ESR and the fragment separator FRS. As project manager he was mainly responsible for the development and construction of the ESR, an innovative facility which contributes in an essential way to the uniqueness of GSI now and FAIR in the future. His ultra-high vacuum technology made it possible to decelerate heavy ions in the ESR to low energies at high intensities – a unique property of the ESR that was important for many experiments and is indispensable for future operation in combination with CRYRING. Bernhard Franzke's many years of commitment as group leader of the ESR and head of the accelerator division as well as his developments in accelerator physics and technology contributed decisively to the success of the ESR. Bernhard Franzke was also involved in the first design of the FAIR facility. He led the conceptual design of the storage rings for FAIR. He retired in 2005, but is still active as a consultant.
The Horst Klein Prize, named after the physicist Prof. Dr. Horst Klein (1931-2012), is awarded annually by the Frankfurt Physical Society, the Department of Physics at Goethe University Frankfurt and the Working Group Accelerator Physics (AKBP) of the German Physical Society. The Horst Klein Research Prize is aimed at internationally renowned scientists who have distinguished themselves through outstanding achievements of great significance and high originality. The prize is endowed with 5,000 euros. It is offered by the Goethe University of Frankfurt, the Fückstiftung, Professors Schempp and Schmidt-Böcking, as well as Pfeiffer Vacuum. The official award ceremony, which was to take place during this year's spring meeting of the German Physical Society, has been postponed due to the corona pandemic.
]]>The FAIR ring accelerator is supplied by the existing GSI accelerator facilities, which serve as injectors. Since the facility accelerates ions – charged atomic nuclei – of all elements from hydrogen to uranium, the cavities must be particularly variable in producing the acceleration frequencies. They generate a radiofrequency field that can accelerate the ions up to 99% of the speed of light. By manipulating the frequency, the ions in the ring can, for example, be packed into different numbers of bunches – suitable for the experiment to be performed with them after acceleration.
The order for the production of the 14 cavities is executed by RI together with Ampegon Power Electronics AG as subcontractor and has now resulted in a successful technology transfer of the ferrite-loaded cavity. RI will build two such acceleration systems for a heavy ion cancer therapy machine for a first industrial customer in the USA.
RI is convinced by the design and concept of the state-of-the-art accelerator system and is thankful for the trust GSI has shown RI, enabling the company to offer this concept to other industrial customers. (CP)
]]>This major contract in a three-digit million euro range was awarded to the consortium of the companies Züblin and Strabag in Germany. The construction work include the shell constructions for six buildings and a unique experimental facility – the Superconducting Fragment Separator (Super FRS).
Following the construction work already underway in the northern area for the future experiment CBM, one of the four central pillars of the FAIR research program, the construction of a further decisive research area with outstanding discovery potential for science is being started now. The Super FRS will focus on research topics concerning the nuclear structure and interactions of extremely rare, exotic particles. These new isotopes will be produced with highest intensities, separated at the Super FRS and will be made available for world unique experiments to study cosmic matter in the laboratory.
In order to realize this outstanding research infrastructure, the award package also includes the shell construction for further experimental and supply buildings as well as for transfer lines for the beams. The Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Jörg Blaurock, emphasized: “With the current contract, we are implementing a further building block of our award strategy, which is customized for the mega-project FAIR, in accordance with our planning. Now the second large construction area in the south of the FAIR site and further parts of the high-tech production are moving into focus on our way to the realization of FAIR. We will also continue with our already established integrated overall planning in close cooperation with our partners in planning and execution."
Simultaneously and closely coordinated with the progress on the construction site, the development and production of the corresponding high-tech components continues, items which are required in particular for the Super FRS. For example, these include special high-performance power converters and superconducting magnet units that later will be used in the Super FRS for beam correction to achieve a high-precision particle beam.
The FAIR project is one of the world’s biggest construction projects for international cutting-edge research. In total, the highly complex FAIR accelerator facility will comprise more than 20 structures on a site of approximately 150,000 square meters. Around two million cubic meters of soil will be moved and 600,000 cubic meters of concrete and 65,000 tons of reinforcing steel will be used for the construction project. Scientists from all over the world will use FAIR to gain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe with outstanding experiments. (BP)
]]>Four projects are currently being developed to exploit the possibilities of GSI and FAIR research in the corona crisis and to expand the fundamental knowledge about the virus. The researchers are working on contributions to the development of vaccines as well as on therapeutic low-dose irradiation options for pneumonia caused by SARS-CoV-2. Other projects aim at the development of faster and optimized virus detection and at the possibility of producing improved viral filtration masks.
As always, GSI/FAIR actively cooperates with other research centers: one of the measures involves collaboration with the Helmholtz-Zentrum für Infektionsforschung (HZI) in Braunschweig, another is in cooperation with the University Hospitals in Frankfurt and Erlangen. The other two projects are developed in cooperation with universities in the USA and Argentina as well as the University Hospital Gießen-Marburg and the company TransMIT GmbH in Gießen.
Overview of the four specific projects:
In order to develop vaccines using inactivated viruses, researchers need methods that inactivate the virus while causing as little damage to its structure as possible — in particular the viral envelope that is the key to the immune response. In past years, the inactivation of viruses for vaccine development has been carried out with conventional gamma radiation. However, the use of high doses of gamma rays inevitably leads to damage of the structural-and membrane-associated proteins of the virus that should be recognized by the immune system following vaccination to promote efficient protection. The new project therefore plans to irradiate influenza and SARS-CoV-2 viruses with high-energy heavy ions. Energetic ions are able to inactivate the virus by inducing breaks in the viral RNA with only a few passages in the envelope, thus minimizing membrane damage. The resulting viruses will then be examined at the HZI in Braunschweig for their ability to promote the formation of virus-binding and neutralizing antibodies after vaccination.
In a preclinical study, GSI researchers plan to examine whether pneumonia caused by SARS-CoV-2 can be treated with low-dose radiation. Partners are the University Hospitals in Frankfurt and Erlangen. For this purpose, the anti-inflammatory effects in the lung will be compared under two alternative conditions: One is the use of a typical low-dose X-ray radiation, as it has already been administered in the past for the treatment of pneumonia, the other is the use of an increased radon activity compared to the environmental activity. The scientists hope to gain insights into the stage of the disease at which this might be a suitable approach. It is also important to find a balance between the desired anti-inflammatory effect in the lungs and undesired immunosuppressive, systemic effects of the radiation. In this way, mild exposure to radon could be used as a moderate immunomodulator.
GSI is working together with international partners on the development of highly sensitive sensors based on nanopores. These sensors have the potential to detect viruses such as SARS-CoV-2 selectively and quickly. For this purpose, a membrane with a single nanopore provides excellent detection conditions. At the GSI accelerator facility, polymer foils are irradiated with individual ions. Chemical etching of a single ion track creates a single nanopore whose geometry and diameter can be adjusted very precisely. In cooperation with external groups, the surface of the nanopores is specifically functionalized in order to monitor the transport of specific particles, molecules or even viruses through the nanopore. Sensors based on nanopores have the potential for high sensitivity and fast detection response. Together with the collaboration partners, opportunities are currently being investigated to support research projects for the detection of viruses such as SARS-CoV-2 or specific filtration processes using the track-etched GSI membranes.
In this project it is planned to use track-etched nanopores to develop safe respiratory protection filters and thus improve breathing masks. At GSI, corresponding polymer foils with monodisperse and oriented nanopores are produced by ion irradiation and subsequent chemical track-etching. The diameter of the pores can be tailored exactly to size. With an adjustable diameter up to 20 nanometers, such nanopores are significantly smaller than the size of the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. The radiation process at the GSI accelerator facility also allows the number of nanopores to be precisely adjusted (up to about 10 billion per cm2). Together with the collaboration partners, GSI scientists are currently discussing possibilities to investigate the suitability and optimal parameters of track-etched membranes as filters for respiratory masks. Respiratory masks optimized in this way could provide better protection against a virus infection in pandemic situations. (BP/IP)
]]>Within the framework of the cooperation, FAIR and European XFEL intend to share and promote their best practices, knowledge and results, for example by organizing joint scientific and technical events such as workshops or seminars. An exchange is planned both in administrative and organizational areas such as the cost structure or dealing with scientific users, and in the scientific environment through joint research and development projects or the secondment of personnel.
In the MoU, both partners acknowledge the importance of cooperation between Big Science projects in administration and technology as a key factor increasing competitiveness in the development of both social and economic systems and for the improvement of living standards in them. By strengthening cooperation, the MoU aims to exploit synergies in industrial cooperation and to support the achievement of scientific and technological results that promote technological innovation and socio-economic developments.
"With the Memorandum of Understanding, we are opening up new opportunities for fruitful cooperation between European XFEL and FAIR on many different levels. We look forward to joint activities and a lively exchange of ideas among colleagues," Professor Paolo Giubellino explained. Jörg Blaurock added: "In addition to the administrative and scientific collaboration, at FAIR, the promotion of the technological side through technology transfer and industrial cooperation is a major concern. Here we want to identify synergies with European XFEL and exploit our joint potential."
European XFEL Managing Director Professor Robert Feidenhans’l said: “European XFEL and FAIR are both international state-of-the-art research facilities serving a broad scientific community. We have a lot of common experiences and research interests and we are very much looking forward to collaborating more closely with our colleagues at FAIR to explore how we can combine our knowledge to advance and enrich international science.”
The agreement will be valid for a period of five years, with the option of an extension for further five years. GSI and FAIR already have a long-standing connection with European XFEL as well as with its founding laboratory and German shareholder, the Deutsches Elektronensynchrotron DESY, which, like GSI, belongs to the Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft Deutscher Forschungszentren. (CP)
The grants are funding and acknowledgment in equal measure: They are awarded exclusively on the basis of the scientific excellence of the projects submitted and are aimed at established researchers from all disciplines whose highly innovative projects go considerably beyond the current state of the art and open up new areas of research. They are endowed with a maximum of 2.5 million euros each over a period of five years.
Marco Durante is Head of the GSI Biophysics Research Department and professor at the TU Darmstadt Department of Physics, Institute of Condensed Matter of Physics. He is an internationally recognized expert in the fields of radiation biology and medical physics, especially for therapy with heavy ions and radioprotection in space. He made important scientific progress in the field of biodosimetry of charged particles, optimization of particle therapy, and shielding of heavy ions in space.
In his new project entitled "Biomedical Applications of Radioactive ion Beams (BARB)", Marco Durante intends to further develop tumor treatment with charged particle therapy. “Particle therapy is rapidly growing and is potentially the most effective and precise radiotherapy technique. However, range uncertainty and poor image guidance limit its applications. Improving accuracy is the key to broadening the applicability of particle therapy", explained Marco Durante. This could also allow better treatment of smaller metastases or tumors close to critical structures, and to small targets in non-cancer diseases, such as ventricular ablations in cardiac arrhythmia.
The new idea is to use the same beam for treatment and for imaging during treatment. Radioactive ion beams are the ideal tool, but their intensity is not yet sufficient for therapeutic applications. Only cutting-edge facilities such as FAIR and the "FAIR Phase 0" experimental program underway at GSI/FAIR can generate such intense beams. Marco Durante explained: “With FAIR-phase-0 high-intensity beams of short-lived isotopes of carbon and oxygen nuclei will be used to enable simultaneous treatment and visualization. This can significantly reduce the range uncertainty and further advance the applicability of particle therapy.” The beam will be visualized in the target position using an innovative Gamma-PET detector that will be built by Prof. Katia Parodi at LMU Munich, partner and beneficiary of the BARB project. “BARB is an experiment showing the enormous potential of FAIR. It is indeed a collaboration between the APPA and NUSTAR pillars of the FAIR project”, said Marco Durante.
Marco Durante studied physics and got his PhD at the University Federico II in Italy. His post doc positions took him to the NASA Johnson Space Center in Texas and to the National Institute of Radiological Sciences in Japan. During his studies, he specialized in charged particle therapy, cosmic radiation, radiation cytogenetics and radiation biophysics. He has received numerous awards for his research, including the Galileo Galilei prize from the European Federation of Organizations for Medical Physics, the IBA Europhysics Prize of the European Physical Society (EPS) and the Bacq & Alexander award of the European Radiation Research Society (ERRS).
More about Professor Marco Durante's research
Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo is Head of the GSI Theory Research Department, professor at the Theory Center of the Institute for Nuclear Physics (Department of physics, TU Darmstadt) and principal investigator of the SFB 1245 “Nuclei: From Fundamental Interactions to Structure and Stars”. He is recognized internationally as an expert in the field of the nucleosynthesis of chemical elements in stars. He was a co-leader of the international collaboration that predicted in 2010 that the synthesis of heavy elements in a neutron star merger leads to a characteristic electromagnetic signal named kilonova. In 2017, space and ground observatories were actually able to detect the predicted electromagnetic signal after the merger of two neutron stars.
In his new project, entitled "Probing r-process nucleosynthesis through its electromagnetic signatures (KILONOVA)" Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo will further develop these approaches. He explained: „The project aims to answer one of the fundamental questions in physics: How and where are the heavy elements from iron to uranium made by the r-process?”
The confirmation of the theoretical predictions on the origin of heavy elements through the observation of gravitational waves of a neutron star merger in combination with characteristic electromagnetic signals in 2017 had provided the sensational first direct indication that r-process elements are produced during neutron star mergers. “Additional events are expected to be detected in the following years. To fully exploit such opportunities it is fundamental to combine an improved description of the exotic neutron-rich nuclei involved in the r-process with sophisticated astrophysical simulations to provide accurate prediction of r-process nucleosynthesis yields and their electromagnetic signals”, explained Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo. These predictions could then be confronted with observations. “Together with the unique experimental capabilities of the GSI/FAIR facility, it constitutes a unique opportunity to advance our understanding of r-process nucleosynthesis.”
Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo studied physics and received his PhD from the Autonomous University of Madrid. He specialized in nuclear structure as well as nuclear astrophysics. As a postdoc, he gained experience at the California Institute of Technology in the USA, followed by research stays of several years at the Aarhus University in Denmark and the University of Basel in Switzerland. His research on the nucleosynthesis of chemical elements in stars has received multiple recognition, including the "Gustav Hertz Preis" of the German Physical Society (DPG) “for the discovery of a new nucleosynthesis process: The νp-process”.
More about Professor Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo's research
The two research colleagues Marco Durante and Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo also emphasized: “We are grateful to the European Research Council for giving us a great opportunity with its funding and we look forward to working together in our respective teams. Our aim is to go significantly beyond the current state of research with our projects and to open up new, forward-looking areas of research. The future accelerator center FAIR and the already existing experimental program are central building blocks for this and will enable us to do so many pioneering things".
The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino emphasized: "It is a fantastic achievement. I am extremely pleased about the recognition of these outstanding scientists who, with their innovative projects and their commitment, are tackling important challenges in nuclear physics and medical physics. The grants demonstrate the outstanding quality of scientific research at GSI and FAIR. They go to two of our flagship fields: nuclear astrophysics and biomedical applications of nuclear physics. In addition, the grants underline the outstanding research perspectives opened by our FAIR phase-0 program. With FAIR, we will be able to further expand the prospects of such groundbreaking research and enable important pioneering achievements.”
GSI and FAIR are also thrilled about the award of another ERC Advanced Grant to Professor Beatriz Jurado from the Centre Etudes Nucléaires de Bordeaux Gradignan (CENBG), part of the French National Centre for Scientific Research CNRS. The experimental part of the project will be performed at GSI/FAIR.
Beatriz Jurado has been closely associated with GSI and FAIR for a long time through her nuclear physics research. Her main research areas are low-energy nuclear physics, nuclear reactions and fission. Already her doctoral thesis, which she defended at the University of Santiago de Compostela, was realized at the GSI's fragment separator FRS. She is also involved in the NUSTAR collaboration, one of the four major research pillars of FAIR, as a member of the Resource Board and was, among other things, a guest at GSI as “Visiting Professor” of the ExtreMe Matter Institute EMMI.
In her EU-funded project entitled “Nuclear rEaCTions At storage Rings (NECTAR)” she wants to further advance the measuring capabilities in nuclear physics research. Her goal is to develop a new methodology to indirectly infer neutron-induced cross sections of unstable nuclei. These cross sections are essential for nuclear astrophysics, since most of the heavy elements in the Universe are produced by neutron-induced reactions in stars, and also for applications in nuclear technology. Her work is an experimental specification of the project of Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo.
“However, their measurement is very complicated as both projectile and target are radioactive. We will overcome these limitations by producing the nuclei formed in the neutron-induced reactions of interest with surrogate reactions involving radioactive heavy-ion beams and stable, light target nuclei. We will measure the decay probabilities for fission, neutron and gamma-ray emission of the nuclei produced by the surrogate reaction”, explained Beatriz Jurado. These probabilities provide precious information to constrain models and will enable much more accurate predictions of the desired neutron cross sections.
The experimental part of Beatriz Jurado´s project will be realized at the accelerator facility on the GSI/FAIR campus as part of FAIR Phase 0, using the storage rings ESR and CRYRING. Beatriz Jurado described: “The storage rings of GSI/FAIR are unique devices where revolving ion beams of outstanding quality repeatedly interact with ultra-thin, windowless gas-jet targets. We will take advantage of these exceptional features to measure decay probabilities of many unstable nuclei with unrivalled precision”.
Professor Paolo Giubellino is very delighted with the execution of the NECTAR project at the GSI/FAIR facility: “This underlines once more the attractiveness of our laboratory for the international research community and the quality of our research infrastructures already during FAIR Phase 0. We are very pleased that a renowned scientist like Beatriz Jurado will join us for her experimental research. This is also a great recognition for us".
The President of the European Research Council (ERC), Professor Mauro Ferrari, commented: “I am glad to announce a new round of ERC grants that will back cutting-edge, exploratory research, set to help Europe and the world to be better equipped for what the future may hold. That’s the role of blue sky research. These senior research stars will cut new ground in a broad range of fields, including the area of health. I wish them all the best in this endeavour and, at this time of crisis, let me pay tribute to the heroic and invaluable work of the scientific community as a whole.” (BP/IP)
For example, one can click through a selection of very special artistic impressions that were created during a visit of the group "Urban Sketchers Rhein-Main" at GSI and FAIR. More than 30 members of the group, which is part of an international network of artists, spent a day sketching and painting on campus in January. The result are numerous extraordinary views of our particle accelerators and experimental stations.
The mega construction project FAIR, one of the largest construction projects for research worldwide, can also be visited virtually. Visitors can fly over the FAIR construction site by drone flight, get to know its extraordinary dimensions and, for the first time, even dive into the large ring tunnel that will form the heart of the future accelerator center. In addition, a long-term drone lapse video was created using a new filming technique that shows the development of an entire year: With the help of GPS, several videos were superimposed, so that one can see the construction grow as if from one piece right before the eyes of the viewer, making the progress particularly tangible.
Furthermore, there is the opportunity delve into our history, for example to travel back in time by photo slider on the GSI and FAIR homepage: an interactive past-today-show in which the images virtually overlap and thereby illustrate how things used to look like on campus in the past and how they look like today. The results provide interesting insights, for example into the linear accelerator, the control room or the experimental halls.
An even more detailed tour through half a century is offered by the digital GSI timeline where highlights of the GSI history are presented. Users can click their way through 50 years of GSI, and take a look into the future of FAIR. Also the great scientific achievements such as the discovery of six new chemical elements or the development of a new type of tumor therapy using ion beams can be found there.
The main task of GSI and FAIR is to carry out cutting-edge research and to use the accelerator facilities to gain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe. A science film shows how scientists from all over the world can explore the universe in our laboratory.
If you want to take a virtual walk through the research facilities of GSI and FAIR and to stand directly next to the particle accelerators and detectors, it is best to get out your mobile phone to watch our 360° video in an optimized way. The exciting video was produced for the planetarium show "Dimensions - Once upon reality" at the Bochum Planetarium.
On all these digital and virtual routes, our guests are therefore still welcome to visit our research facilities and take a look at the FAIR construction site. Furthermore, GSI and FAIR of course offer the possibility to keep up to date and to stay in contact with us online on our homepage and on our social media channels. (BP)
]]>Together with the Scientific Managing Director Professor Paolo Giubellino and the Technical Managing Director Jörg Blaurock, Dr. Ulrich Breuer will constitute the joint management team of GSI and FAIR. He succeeds Ursula Weyrich, who has changed to the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) in Heidelberg as Administrative Director.
“GSI has been a synonym for cutting-edge research with worldwide reputation for decades, and with the future accelerator center FAIR, the international dimensions of research will be expanded in a future-oriented manner. I am looking forward to this responsible task and the opportunity to foster this development", says Dr. Ulrich Breuer. “I am very grateful for the trust placed in me.” He names as the most important goals a solid financial and personnel planning as well as the effective support of science with customized infrastructural and administrative conditions.
His two management colleagues, Professor Paolo Giubellino and Jörg Blaurock, are also looking forward to future cooperation in the management team and emphasize: “Dr. Breuer knows the profession very well and for a long time. He brings with him a broad knowledge of science management as well as of the administrative leadership of large research institutions." The aim is to conduct top-level research at the existing facility and to realize the future accelerator facility FAIR in international cooperation. “The decision in favor of Dr. Breuer is an excellent choice. With his many years of experience we will continue to successfully shape the future of GSI and FAIR together.”
Dr. Ulrich Breuer studied physics and received his doctorate at the Rheinisch-Westfälische Technische Hochschule (RWTH) Aachen. His professional career began in 1991 at the Forschungszentrum Jülich. There he first worked as assistant to the Chairman of the Board of Directors and then in leading positions for many years.
In 2005, he changed to the Hahn-Meitner-Institut Berlin as Administrative Director, where he accompanied the merger with the Berliner Elektronenspeicherring-Gesellschaft für Synchrotronstrahlung (BESSY) and the foundation of the Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin. He operated as its Administrative Director from 2009 to 2011.
From 2012 to 2017, he worked as Vice President Economics and Finance of the Karlsruher Institut für Technologie (KIT). Subsequently he held the position of the Administrative Director at the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf.
Until the end of June 2020, Dr. Breuer will continue in his current position at the HZDR in addition to his functions at GSI and FAIR. (BP)
]]>Dr. Clémentine Santamaria received the Young Scientist Award and the GENCO Membership for her milestone achievements to answer long-standing questions of the evolution of shell structure far from stability and her striking expertise in both nuclear spectroscopy and nuclear reactions. Prior to her current postdoctoral position at Berkeley, she worked at the Japanese research center RIKEN and the National Superconducting Cyclotron Laboratory, USA, among others.
The GENCO Membership was awarded to:
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Darmstadt isn’t just home to Merck’s global headquarters, it is a global science, technology and innovation hub. In fact, in 2019, it was again ranked as Germany’s No.1 “City of the Future” in terms of scientific innovation. In retrospect then, it’s no surprise that the recent Applied Quantum Conference was hosted by a collaborative syndicate of large science-focused organizations based in Darmstadt: the Operations Centre of the European Space Agency (ESA/ ESOC); the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung and the Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (GSI/FAIR); and Merck, a vibrant science and technology company with more than 350 years of history. The conference focus was to discuss the coming paradigm shift in quantum technology. More specifically, the event aimed to identify quantum solutions to current and future needs, connect communities and facilitate interactions to foster future productive collaborations and solutions.
Quantum mechanics in physics is fundamentally about how molecules, atoms, or sub-atomic particles behave. Over the years, such particles have been observed to act in ways which are highly unexpected and difficult to explain using the established laws of classical physics. As a result, there are currently close to 20 different philosophical interpretations of what quantum behavior is, all valid in their respective applications. Companies like Merck are interested in quantum behavior as it applies in an industrial context. This includes how it can be used to approach challenges in Performance Materials, Life Science and Healthcare.
Specifically, it is hoped that Quantum Computing can address the limitations of traditional “digital”, computational methods and machine learning currently used to identify potential new materials and drugs, and their interaction with so-called drug targets. These methods are highly computationally intensive, if not impossible, and often rely on huge datasets to train the models. One promise of quantum computing is that it will significantly accelerate this process using so-called “qubits” instead of the traditional 0s and 1s of binary digital computing. A qubit can best be described as a vector pointing to a point on the surface of a sphere. Rotations of this vector and interactions with other vectors according to the laws of quantum mechanics can be used as encode calculations on quantum objects. However, it is currently neither clear how to use the algorithms for most real problems, nor possible to test the calculations because hardware with sufficient qubits does not yet exist. Nevertheless, the first interesting approaches for “quantum enhanced” computing are on the horizon.
It’s within this context that Darmstadt-based science leaders ESA/ESOC, GSI/FAIR and Merck organized the Applied Quantum Conference. Held on February 4, 2020, it brought together very different sectors that are at the same time very similar in terms of the problems they face and are trying to solve.
“The first Applied Quantum Conference was extremely successful in bringing together experts for the application of quantum computing to many real-world challenges from different sectors. Exchanging the gained experiences showed several commonalities and unveiled the potential for common approaches to further increase the utilization of quantum computing. At GSI and the future international FAIR accelerator facility, which is currently under construction, we look forward to intensifying the existing collaboration with ESA and Merck in this and other fields,” said Dr. Tobias Engert, co-organizer and head of the Technology Transfer of GSI and FAIR.
The conference attracted a panel of highly distinguished speakers from Merck, ESA/ESOC and GSI/FAIR. In addition, top universities presented the very latest progress from their labs, and a select group of startups and established international firms demonstrated products and results at the very cutting edge of this technology landscape.
The Applied Quantum Conference was a spectacular collaborative showcase for a branch of scientific endeavor that could shape the progress of the 21st century. The three organizers, ESA/ESOC, GSI/FAIR and Merck are very much looking forward to all the follow up activities that have been identified. (Merck/CP)
From March 2 to 6, 2020, the 38th HADES Collaboration Meeting will take place at the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR) with more than 80 participants from more than 20 institutes in nine European countries. At the meeting, the scientists will discuss the status of the HADES detector system for the planned use at the international accelerator FAIR and a roadmap for future measurements.
The international accelerator center FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) is currently being built at GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt and is one of the largest research projects worldwide. Here, scientists from all over the world want to create matter in the laboratory that otherwise only occurs in the depth of space. They expect new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe from the Big Bang to the present.
One piece of the puzzle on the way and at the same time a major challenge for modern particle physics is to explain the origin of the masses of important components of matter. So-called hadrons (protons and neutrons) combine 99 percent of the mass of luminous matter in the universe. The same applies to our natural environment, in which protons and neutrons are largely bound in nuclei. To understand the phenomenon of the "mass of hadrons", scientists use different methods. One way is to study the decay products of particularly suitable hadrons in the environment of strongly interacting matter. These elementary particles, grouped together as vector mesons, are created in the collisions of heavy ions. However, scientists can also produce them in the laboratory by bombarding nuclei with elementary particles. Thus, nuclear physicists create strongly interacting matter with up to three times the nuclear density, at temperatures equivalent to 50,000 times the temperature inside the sun.
The vector mesons produced in this way decay, among other things, into so-called lepton pairs, which are e. g. composed of electrons and positrons. But this is a relatively rare process. This is why the researchers need special detectors. This is where HADES (High Acceptance Di-Electron Spectrometer) comes in. The detector is installed at GSI and calibrated to those electron-positron pairs that leave the surrounding strongly interacting matter almost undisturbed, thus providing direct access to the original mass of their initial hadrons.
HADES was developed in an international collaboration at the heavy ion synchrotron SIS18 at GSI, which has now been running for 25 years. The lively cooperation of around 100 scientists has resulted in an intensive transfer of knowledge in the field of particle physics — from Monte Carlo simulations and detector construction to fast front-end electronics and data analysis — which also benefits HZDR and has already manifested in almost 250 scientific publications.
The HZDR is extensively involved in HADES: Alone 12 of the 24 drift chamber detectors were manufactured in the HZDR detector laboratory, now the multifunctional laboratory. They are the centerpiece, which allows the precise measurement of the momenta of charged reaction products from the heavy ion impact. The results enable investigations of the equation of state of hot dense matter, comparable to the state in neutron stars. In this way, researchers obtain an unaltered view of the interior of highly compressed nuclear matter. At their meeting, the experts want to discuss previous results and future measurements at the heavy ion synchrotron SIS18 at GSI in the framework of the "FAIR Phase 0" research program and at the FAIR ring accelerator SIS100. (HZDR/CP)
For the radiation experiments at the accelerator facility on the GSI and FAIR campus in Darmstadt, high-energy ion beams, which are also characteristic of cosmic radiation in space, were used and combined with modern microscopy techniques. The investigations were carried out as part of the first stage of the FAIR experimental program, "FAIR Phase 0". The team of the GSI Biophysics Department has now published its results in the journal "Scientific Reports", which is edited by the Nature Publishing Group and which covers all areas of the natural sciences.
At the specially developed measuring station at the accelerator, the scientists irradiated established human cell cultures with heavy ions that cause double-strand breaks and thus damage the genetic information (DNA). During and immediately after irradiation, the research team was able to closely observe the dynamic processes of the induction of the damage and the subsequent repair processes in the genetically damaged cells using so-called "live cell imaging" on a specially constructed microscope directly at the accelerator beamline. For this purpose, the proteins responsible for repair in the cell were provided with fluorescent dyes so that they were visible under the microscope. The remote controlled arrangement made it possible to observe the protein dynamics in the cell core seamlessly and without interruption from the damage track to the biological response of the cell and to record it visually on film.
Particularly valuable for new fundamental insights into the repair processes in human cells is the possibility of using high energetic heavy ion beams to simultaneously generate simple and clustered DNA damage in the same cell and to investigate this damage in real time, which was previously possible only separately. In such a distribution of damage, many DNA double-strand breaks are concentrated along a densely ionizing damage path and only single, simple damages are off track. The researchers were thus able to observe parallel how the same cell reacts to complex damages and to single damages.
The results of the measurements show differences in this damage response: The DNA repair proteins seem to be recruited faster to the clustered damage than to the individual DNA damage outside the ion track. On the other hand, the delayed repair there seems to be faster and less difficult. Thus, the results clearly demonstrate the impact of the quality of DNA lesion on the dynamics of early radiation response and repair and indicate that simple and clustered DNA damage should be treated separately when assessing radiation effects.
Most precise fundamental knowledge about repair processes in cells also helps scientists to better understand the development of cancer. If DNA damage is repaired incorrectly, i.e. the repair of double-strand breaks does not function properly, the risk of cancer increases. The high-energy heavy ion radiation also corresponds to the cosmic radiation that astronauts are confronted with during long-term missions, for example to Mars. Therefore, research as carried out by GSI Biophysics is important for the most accurate and differentiated biological risk assessment in space travel.
The head of GSI Biophysics Department, Professor Marco Durante, stressed: "These are very innovative studies, only made possible by the high energies available in FAIR phase 0. By combining cutting-edge molecular biology with high-energy heavy ion physics, we were able to gain highly interesting knowledge, and the new technologies also enabled us to deliver outstanding visual research results".
The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, was also very pleased with these exciting results of the first stage of the FAIR experimental program and emphasized: “At the future accelerator center FAIR, which is currently being built at GSI, these possibilities will even be considerably expanded. FAIR will allow experiments with an even wider range of particle intensities and energies and will be able to simulate the composition of cosmic radiation with a precision that no other accelerator facility will be able to match”. (BP)
This patent now paves the way for the commercialization of the pioneering technology developed by Professor Volker Lindenstruth, Professor Horst Stöcker and Alexander Hauser of e3c. Together with parallel patents outside Europe, the invention can now be put to economic use throughout the world. The team has already received enquiries from various countries for the construction of such large data centres.
The data center is thus becoming an important export commodity “made in Hessen”. This success is also thanks to Innovectis, Goethe University’s own transfer agency, and its managing director Dr Martin Raditsch, the driving force behind the invention’s commercialization, as well as the GSI departments Technology Transfer headed by Tobias Engert and Patents headed by Michael Geier. The successful commercialization of the patents is a perfect example of collaboration between a university and a major research facility in Hessen.
NDC Data Centers GmbH, a Munich-based company, has obtained the rights to market the green technology in data center construction projects around the globe and is thus also making a major contribution to the careful handling of our energy resources against the backdrop of global digitalization.
The basis for these activities is the visionary concept of a significantly optimized cooling system for large data centers with the highest possible level of energy efficiency, which was developed by Volker Lindenstruth, Professor for High-Performance Computing Architecture at Goethe University and former head of the Scientific IT Department at GSI. On the basis of his concept, large data centers and commercial IT systems can today be operated with up to 50 percent less primary energy consumption in comparison to conventional data centers.
The technology has been in use for years and is being continuously improved: The first data center of this type was Goethe University’s own, which was set up in the Infraserv industrial park. Another very large data center, the Green IT Cube, was built by the GSI Helmholtzzentrum in Darmstadt and financed from funds provided by the German federal government and the Federal State of Hessen via Helmholtz expansion investments. The concept enables the realization and particularly efficient operation of data centers for large-scale research facilities such as FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research), which is currently being set up at the GSI. Later, the Green IT Cube will be the central data center for FAIR, one of the largest projects worldwide in support of research. Moreover, the waste heat from the servers in the Green IT Cube is already being used today to heat a modern office and canteen building on the GSI campus.
Apart from the high energy savings associated with the use of this new technology, the construction of such data centers is also extraordinarily cost-efficient, thus minimizing procurement and operating costs: An expedient coupling of ecology and economy.
Lindenstruth’s supercomputers have received several awards for their energy-efficient concept in recent years. At the end of 2014, one of his computers ranked first place in the global listing of the most energy-efficient supercomputers, thanks to its greatly optimized computer architecture.
Goethe University’s success in the area of green IT is also spurring on its current application, together with Mainz, Kaiserslautern and Saarbrücken, to host one of the new National High-Performance Computing Centers. Thanks to the optimized computer architecture based on the Hessian green IT approach, considerably more computing power could be made available to users at the same cost. Goethe University would therefore be an ideal location for one of the new centers.
Angela Dorn, Hessen’s Minister of Science, says: “My sincere congratulations to Professor Lindenstruth and his team. I’m especially pleased that this success has been accomplished in a field close to my heart: The energy turnaround to which green IT can make a very important contribution. I’m also very happy that we as the Federal State of Hessen have contributed to this success. The first supercomputer in which Professor Lindenstruth used his energy-saving technology was the LOEWE-CSC at Goethe University’s data centre in the Infraserv industrial park. Hessen’s Ministry of Science supported this investment with a total of almost € 2 million in the shape of both direct funding as well as from the LOEWE programme. We’re therefore today harvesting together the fruits of this funding and the LOEWE programme launched in 2008.”
Professor Birgitta Wolff, President of Goethe University, says: “Just as in Goethe’s days it made no sense to harness more and more horses in front of a stagecoach in order to increase the speed, so today we are facing a fundamental paradigm shift in IT. Back then, the railroad was the answer to the problem of speed. Today, the smart IT sector has a huge sustainability and energy problem. To satisfy its enormous hunger for data, our IT-based society requires new energy concepts for supercomputers that drastically reduce power consumption. Volker Lindenstruth from Goethe University has developed such a solution. Its successful patenting with the support of our subsidiary Innovectis is a major step in the right direction: The dissemination and commercialization of this truly smart technology.”
Professor Volker Lindenstruth, Professor for High-Performance Computing Architecture at Goethe University, says: “Our successful patent registration is a milestone for the further global commercialization of our “Green IT” approach. We’ve already received enquiries for it from various regions worldwide. This gives our work a further boost, the more so since with NDC we now have a strong business partner at our side to help with the practical steps.”
Professor Karlheinz Langanke, Research Director of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung and FAIR – Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research in Europe, says: “The Green IT Cube high-performance computing center at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum is an outstanding example of how practical and usable know-how and developments evolve out of basic research. The Green IT Cube was developed for enormous volumes of measurement data from scientific research: It provides the highest computing capacities required and is at the same time extraordinarily energy-efficient and space-saving.”
Markus Bodenmeier, NDC co-founder and partner: “With the help of the innovations created by Professor Volker Lindenstruth from Goethe University and by the GSI, NDC Data Centers GmbH builds the most energy-efficient and resource-friendly data centers. In so doing, we can guarantee over the long term the benefits offered by the exponential growth of digitalization. We’re in keeping here with the current trend – all major cloud operators are at present keeping a very close eye on the impact of their activities on the environment.”
Dr Martin Raditsch, Managing Director of Innovectis GmbH, a subsidiary of Goethe University explains: “The application in practice of this technology is a very nice example of how results from basic research at the University and their transfer lead to technological solutions for societal challenges. Through our technology, the advancing digitalization of industry and society can be accomplished in a far more energy-saving way.”
Dr Tobias Engert, Director of the Technology Transfer Department at GSI, is very pleased about the invention’s success: “The cooling concept of the Green IT Cube at GSI is based on an innovative idea for the reduction of energy costs, and together with Innovectis we’ve now been able to successfully market it to NDC. Equipped with an innovative cooling system, the Green IT Cube meets the high requirements of optimum energy efficiency coupled with the highest possible computing power, and it will later become the central data centre for the new accelerator FAIR – Facility for Antiproton an Ion Research. The commercialization of the patents is certainly one of the most important examples of technology transfer from GSI into industry.” His colleague Michael Geier, Director of the Patents Department, adds: “The sale of the patents to NDC corroborates how important it is to protect new technical solutions developed at research facilities such as GSI through patents. Such patents are a deciding factor for technology transfer into industry, through which income is generated that then flows back into research.” (GU/JL)
Following a talk that gave an overview of the facility, the young visitors were taken on a tour of the particle accelerators and experimental stations at the FAIR and GSI campus. They got a close-up look at the progress on the FAIR construction site and the development of the magnets for the FAIR accelerator facility at the magnet test facility. The young talents were particularly fascinated by the research activities relating to the discovery and investigation of chemical elements. The visit was rounded off by a panel discussion with GSI scientist Thomas Neff from the theory department who had likewise participated in the Chemistry Olympiad as a student. “Being curious and asking questions are two important prerequisites that help scientists obtain new finding in the course of basic research,” says Thomas Neff, giving the students deep insight into the everyday life of researchers at a research center.
The young talents from the senior high school classes passed a selection process to qualify for a multi-day seminar in Darmstadt. In addition to chemical analyses and solving exercises, the excursion to FAIR and GSI is an integral part of the seminar. “FAIR and GSI impressed our young scientists, stimulating their investigative spirit and sparking their desire to learn. The excursion inspires further reflection and many intensive discussions”, says Uta Purgahn, State Commissioner of IChO Thuringia, underlining the importance of the excursion. (JL)
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The quadrupole doublet module consists of two superconducting quadrupole units manufactured by the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR) in Dubna, Russia, and several cryogenic components provided by GSI (such as beam position monitors, ion catcher and thin wall quadrupole chambers). Beside of the integration of the quadrupole module, Bilfinger Noell is also in charge of the manufacturing of the cryostat vessel, the common girder, the thermal shield and other parts.
Before integrating the components, the cold mass – i.e. the part of the magnets to be cooled – needs to be assembled and installed on two common girders. The high-precision positioning of the cold mass required for this is accomplished with special suspension rods, similar to that of the dipole magnets. Overall, the high degree of integration is one of the major challenges of the SIS100 quadrupole modules. The integration of two quadrupole units in one cryostat is a design that deviates from other accelerator facilities.
The advantage of this novel design is that it enables a compact design of the FAIR ring accelerator SIS100, also allows the application of innovative technologies such as cryogenic ion catchers and provides ion-optical advantages. Since this technology has not been realized elsewhere before, the first cold test of the delivered module at its final operating temperature of -270 degrees was a particularly exciting moment for the project team and of great importance for the SIS100 project.
The first cold test was conducted at GSI Series Test Facility for superconducting accelerator magnets (STF). The result: The common girder showed a linear shrinkage but no significant lateral movement of the position of the quadrupole units. The experimental verification of this expected behaviour of the girder at thermal cycling was an important step for the whole SIS100 project. In the coming weeks and months, the module will be evaluated carefully. This will include high-voltage insulation tests and geometrical measurements, investigations on the thermo-mechanical stress and power tests with the main- and correction magnets.
The test program will be accompanied by experts from the Italian National Nuclear Physics Institute (INFN, Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare). Further tests, the SATs (Site Acceptance Tests) of the entire series of quadrupole modules, will be conducted at the facility in Salerno, Italy, later. In the second half of 2019, various contractual agreements were concluded with the INFN and the University of Salerno. (BP)
]]>Big Science Business Forum 2020 will be the second edition of the single one-stop shop for European companies and other stakeholders to learn about Europe’s Big Science organisations’ future investments and procurements worth 38,400 million of euros. Following the success of the first edition, which took place in 2018 in Copenhagen, the forum will again offer businesses the chance to learn about business opportunities in the coming years, within a wide range of business areas and technologies.
They are given the opportunity to meet representatives from Europe’s Big Science organisations (like FAIR) and their key suppliers and technology experts, network and establish long lasting partnerships, showcase their expertise and potential for the Big Science market by participating in the open exhibition area and get insight in how businesses can interplay with the Big Science market. (CP)
During their visit to the research campus, Dr. Ingo Peter, head of public relations at GSI and FAIR, first gave the more than 30 artists an overview of current research projects and the international accelerator center FAIR currently under construction at GSI. Afterwards, there was time for exciting discoveries and hunting for motifs around the existing accelerator facilities, experimental setups, high-tech components and the platform, which provides a wide view of the mega construction site for FAIR and the large ring accelerator, the heart of the future facility.
The "Urban Sketchers" were offered numerous outstanding motifs, from the big picture to the aesthetic high-tech detail. At the end of their visit, the group had a wide range of artworks in front of them – extraordinary, precisely observed and realized with very individual handwritings. As stated in the Manifesto of the "Sketchers", the illustrators, whether professional artists or enthusiastic amateurs, publish their drawings and information about their activities online via blogs and social media channels. (BP)
Starting with introductory presentations about the existing GSI accelerators, experiments and successes, as well as the FAIR project, the guests then took a look at the development of the construction during a subsequent bus tour of the FAIR construction site. A guided tour through the GSI facilities followed, where they were informed about the medical applications of ion beams and the large detector HADES.
GSI and FAIR have a close and long standing collaboration with Italy and its manifold research institutions. The Italian science community is involved in several of the FAIR experiments. High-ranking Italian scientists participate in many of the scientific committees associated with FAIR and GSI. Additionally, Italy supplies technology for FAIR, e.g. magnet prototypes and cold testing of superconducting quadrupole modules for the SIS100 ring accelerator. (CP)
]]>The MoU concerning the collaboration on nuclear and accelerator sciences and technologies and other scientific domains of mutual interest has been signed between the GSI/FAIR, represented by its Scientific Managing Director Professor Paolo Giubellino, the University of Salerno, represented by its Rector Professor Vincenzo Loia, and the Department of Physics. represented by its Director Professor Salvatore De Pasquale. The ceremony has been held at the University Campus in Fisciano with the presence of Professor. Luca Lista, Director of the section of Napoli of the Italian National Nuclear Physics Institute (Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare, INFN).
This collaboration will start soon with activities at the University of Salerno in the framework of cryogenic testing of superconducting magnet modules for SIS100, the large FAIR ring accelerator currently under construction. In this framework mutual exchange of researchers and students is foreseen to improve the mutual knowledge in the field of cryogenic facilities devoted to superconducting magnets for particle accelerator.
“This will be only the first step for a wider cooperation on the development of several technologies in the field of nuclear physics´”, the parties jointly announced. (BP)
]]>It is an exotic atomic nucleus that lies further outside the proton dripline than has ever been observed before: Potassium-31 is extremely short-lived with a half-life below nanoseconds, but the sheer existence of the atomic nucleus is a new record. In physics, the proton dripline marks a boundary beyond which we find the unbound atomic nuclei. Due to the unbalanced ratio of neutrons and protons, they can hardly exist and decay very quickly. Potassium-31 is four neutrons far outside this dripline. An atomic nucleus that remote from the proton dripline has never been observed before.
The exotic isotope of potassium was produced by the particle accelerator facility on the GSI/FAIR campus. The ring accelerator SIS18 and the fragment separator (FRS) in combination provided a secondary particle beam of argon-31 which again was shot at a beryllium target. In this way, the research team succeeded in producing potassium-31. Daria Kostyleva, who is currently working on her PhD thesis at GSI, FAIR and the University of Gießen, analyzed the data from the fragment separator experiment and carried out simulations. "We haven't reached the border between unbound systems and chaotic nuclear matter yet," she says. "There could be atomic nuclei that are up to seven neutrons away from the proton dripline. We want to test whether the main nuclear structure principles still apply there."
These chaotic systems could be found in the future at the new FAIR particle accelerator facility. The detectors with which the discovery was made are part of the experiment program of the Super fragment-separator (Super-FRS) which will be operated at FAIR and is part of the large-scale experimental collaboration NUSTAR. Thanks to FAIR's much more intense particle beam and the higher energies that can be achieved, scientists expect to discover many new isotopes. The experiments studying remote proton-unbound systems are being carried out within the EXPERT collaboration (EXotic Particle Emission and Radioactivity by Tracking) of Super-FRS. Scientists from GSI and FAIR, the University of Gießen, the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in Dubna (Russia), the Silesian University in Opava (Czech Republic) and the University of Warsaw (Poland) are involved in the EXPERT experiments. (LW)
Original Publication: https://journals.aps.org/prl/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevLett.123.092502
]]>For six years, the HADES collaboration planned the large-scale detector HADES, which was put into operation in 2001 with beams from the GSI ring accelerator SIS18. HADES stands for High Acceptance Di-Electron Spectrometer and consists of different detector systems with about 100,000 individual measuring cells as well as a superconducting magnet for deflecting charged particles. The special design of HADES makes it possible to measure particles with very high precision, and also to detect very rare particles.
During the latest data taking campaign, HADES produced up to one gigabyte of data per second. In order to find out more about the structure of neutrons and protons and thus answer the question of the origin of mass, researchers study electron-positron pairs, whose tracks have to be identified in the huge amount of data. In this way, the HADES detector system, which is as high as a house, provides researchers with exciting insights into what happens when two heavy nuclei collide at relativistic energies. In the laboratory, HADES allows them to track down the microscopic properties of extreme states of matter, e.g. as they occur inside neutron stars. Further highlights of HADES research with heavy-ion collisions are the generation of strangeness and the microscopic properties of dense nuclear matter.
Only recently, the measurement setup was significantly upgraded. The 4.5 meters high and 4.5 meters wide Electromagnetic Calorimeter (ECAL) was installed behind the previous detector in recent months. It contains 16 tons of lead glass, which will enable scientists to also directly detect photons in the future instead of using their conversion process. By measuring the photons, neutral mesons can now also be detected, and electromagnetic decays of hyperons can be investigated.
In the future, HADES will become an important part of the experimental program for the investigation of compressed nuclear matter CBM at the international accelerator facility FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research), which is currently being built at GSI. Researchers will be able to investigate processes in neutron stars with unprecedented precision and over a very wide density range. (CP)
The long-standing cooperation between the institutions were the key topics of the introductory presentation and of a group discussion. TU Darmstadt, and FAIR and GSI have had a close connection for many years and have cooperated successfully in many fields. The combination of teaching, research, and an excellent research infrastructure forms the basis for the many successful projects.
During a tour of the research facility, scientists working closely with TU Darmstadt explained their research projects. Tetyana Galatyuk, Professor at the Institute of Nuclear Physics at TU Darmstadt and Senior Scientist of HADES and CBM at GSI, discussed the scientific objectives of the large-scale detector HADES. Vincent Bagnoud, Adjunct Professor at the Nuclear Physics department of TU Darmstadt and Head of the Plasma Physics department at GSI, presented the high-energy laser PHELIX and the running experiments. Christian Graeff, Leader of the Medical Physics group and Vice Scientific Head of the Biophysics division, provided an insight into the medical research on cancer therapy facilities. Professor Ralph Bruder had the opportunity to inform himself about the progress of the FAIR construction site from the visitors’ platform and to visit the cryogenic test bench for superconducting magnets. The visit ended with an expert discussion with Dorothee Sommer. (JL)
]]>Neben einem Vortrag zur Untersuchung der kosmischen Strahlung bei GSI und FAIR gelang es des Weiteren, Thomas Reiter von der European Space Agency ESA, der als Astronaut mehrere Flüge ins All unternommen hat, für einen Vortrag zu gewinnen. Beiträge zu Stadtentwicklung für die Wissenschaft, Quantenkryptografie und supraleitender Magnettechnik am zukünftigen FAIR-Beschleuniger runden das Programm ab.
Die Vortragsreihe "Wissenschaft für Alle" richtet sich an alle an aktueller Wissenschaft und Forschung interessierten Personen. In den Vorträgen wird über die Forschung und Entwicklungen an GSI und FAIR berichtet, aber auch über aktuelle Themen aus anderen Wissenschafts- und Technikfeldern.
Ziel der Reihe ist es, die wissenschaftlichen Vorgänge für Laien verständlich aufzubereiten und darzustellen, um so die Forschung einem breiten Publikum zugänglich zu machen. Die Vorträge werden von GSI- und FAIR-Mitarbeitern oder von externen Rednern aus Universitäten und Forschungsinstituten gehalten.
Die Vorträge finden im großen gemeinsamen Hörsaal der Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (FAIR) und des GSI Helmholtzzentrums für Schwerionenforschung, Planckstraße 1, 64291 Darmstadt, statt. Der Eintritt ist frei, eine Anmeldung ist nicht erforderlich. Externe Teilnehmer werden gebeten, für den Einlass ein Ausweisdokument bereitzuhalten. (CP)
Stars have different evolutionary paths depending on their mass. Low-mass stars such as the Sun will eventually become white dwarfs. Massive stars, on the other hand, finish with a spectacular explosion known as a supernova, leaving either a neutron star or a black hole behind. The fate of both low- and high-mass stars is well understood but the situation for intermediate-mass stars, which weigh between seven and eleven times as much as the Sun, has remained unclear. This is surprising since intermediate-mass stars are prevalent in our Galaxy.
“The final fate of intermediate-mass stars depends on a tiny detail, namely, how readily the isotope neon-20 captures electrons in the stellar core. Depending on this electron capture rate, the star will be either disrupted in a thermonuclear explosion or it will collapse to form a neutron star,” explains Professor Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo of GSI’s research department Theory and the Institut für Kernphysik, TU Darmstadt. Professor Karlheinz Langanke, Research Director of GSI and FAIR, adds: “This work started when we realized that a strongly suppressed, and hence previously ignored and experimentally unknown, transition between the ground states of neon-20 and fluorine-20 was a key piece of information needed to determine the electron capture rate in intermediate mass stars.” By a combination of precise measurements of the beta-decay of fluorine-20 and theoretical calculations, an international collaboration of physicists with participation from GSI and TU Darmstadt, has now succeeded in determining this important rate. The experiment took place under conditions far more peaceful than those found in stars, namely at the Accelerator Laboratory of the University of Jyväskylä. The measurements showed a surprisingly strong transition between the ground states of neon-20 and fluorine-20 that leads to electron capture in neon-20 occurring at lower density than previously believed. For the star, this implies that, in contrast to previous assumptions, it is more likely to be disrupted by a thermonuclear explosion than to collapse into a neutron star. “It is amazing to find out that a single transition can have such a strong impact on the evolution of a big object like a star,” says Dag Fahlin Strömberg, who, as a PhD student at TU Darmstadt, was responsible for large parts of project’s simulations.
Since thermonuclear explosions eject much more material than those triggered by gravitational collapse, the results have implications for galactic chemical evolution. The ejected material is rich in titanium-50, chromium-54, and iron-60. Therefore, the unusual titanium and chromium isotopic ratios found in some meteorites, and the discovery of iron-60 in deep-sea sediments could be produced by intermediate-mass stars and indicate that these have exploded in our galactic neighbourhood in the distant (billions of years) and not so distant (millions of years) past.
In the light of these new findings the most probable fate of intermediate-mass stars seems to be a thermonuclear explosion, producing a subluminous type Ia supernova and a special type of white dwarf star known as an oxygen-neon-iron white dwarf. The (non-)detection of such white dwarfs in the future would provide important insights into the explosion mechanism. Another open question is the role played by convection — the bulk movement of material in the interior of the star — in the explosion.
At existing and future accelerator centres like the international FAIR project (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) currently under construction at GSI, new not yet investigated isotopes and their properties can be investigated. Thus, scientists continue to bring the universe into the laboratory to answer the unsolved questions about our cosmos. (CP)
Following introductory presentations about the facility, the guests took a bus tour to the FAIR construction site to take a look at the rapidly developing construction progress. In a guided tour of the existing GSI facilities they learned more e.g. about the superconducting FAIR magnets and their testing, the detector laboratory, the ion sources, the discovery and investigation of superheavy elements, as well as the medical applications of ion beams for cancer therapy. They were also able to meet and discuss with Italian members of staff currently working for GSI and FAIR on campus.
INFN and GSI/FAIR are linked by long standing and very cordial cooperation. A large Italian scientific community participates in several of the FAIR experiments, and INFN will put a series of complex magnet systems, so-called quadrupole modules, for the large FAIR ring accelerator SIS100 through extensive cold testing and thus make an important contribution to the FAIR project. (CP)
]]>A trained lawyer, Ursula Weyrich, has been the first joint Administrative Managing Director of GSI and FAIR since 2014 and was previously a founding board member of the German Centre for Neurodegenerative Diseases in Bonn. Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, and Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, as well as the GSI Supervisory Board and the FAIR Council thanked Ursula Weyrich for her great commitment and expert work: "GSI and FAIR have developed very successfully during Ursula Weyrich's term of office. Her guiding principle as Administrative Managing Director was to provide frame conditions which allows the GSI/FAIR campus as well as the research operations with the successful launch of the FAIR research program FAIR Phase 0 and the FAIR construction project to unfold.”
During her period in office, for example the new office and canteen building was constructed, the construction for the new car park has begun and the planning for the FAIR Control Center has been started. In addition to the conventional administrative tasks and the strategic campus development, Ursula Weyrich has set the course for a unified overall organization structure for GSI und FAIR. In addition, there were organizational changes in the administration and the infrastructure divisions as well as in the target-oriented development of the overall planning of the project’s financial requirements.
As an expert for administration and finance at GSI and FAIR, Ursula Weyrich with these solid structures has provided an important foundation for the very positive evaluation of the FAIR project, which was presented by a high-ranking international expert committee last year. (BP/IP)
]]>The ExtreMe Matter Institute (EMMI) with its research groups at Technical University of Darmstadt and the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung will participate in a new network of networks for nuclear astrophysics research. The US National Science Foundation (NSF) awarded a $2 million grant to the Joint Institute for Nuclear Astrophysics — Center for the Evolution of the Elements (JINA-CEE), led by Michigan State University (MSU), to create the new International Research Network for Nuclear Astrophysics (IReNA).
In total, IReNA unites five research collaborations: Besides EMMI, the European Network “Chemical Elements as Tracers of the Evolution of the Cosmos” (ChETEC), the Collaborative Research Center “The Milky Way System”, the Japan Forum of Nuclear Astrophysics UKAKUREN, and the international Nucleosynthesis Grid collaboration (NuGRID) will be members.
IReNA is composed of seven Universities as core institutions in the United States, and also includes 62 associated institutions in 17 countries. The combined infrastructure and research capabilities available to IReNA scientists will accelerate the understanding of the origin of chemical elements and the nature of dense nuclear matter.
In the current age of multimessenger astronomy, extreme astrophysical environments like supernovae and neutron star mergers are studied through gravitational waves, visible light, infrared, X-rays, gamma-rays, radio waves and neutrinos. IReNA comes as a timely boost for the nuclear astrophysics community. The amount and range of nuclear and astrophysics data and expertise needed to answer open questions about the universe cannot be obtained by a single country. IReNA creates the necessary communication channels and collaborative structures. Together, IReNA scientists will have access to a variety of accelerators, astronomical observatories, experimental equipment, data, and computer codes.
IReNA will also create exchange programs, innovative workshops, and retreats that will foster network communication and training of the next generation of scientists.
“This is an innovative approach to science. It is also a unique opportunity for young researchers to train across disciplines, and gives them experience working with large teams.” said Hendrik Schatz, JINA-CEE and IReNA director.
The ExtreMe Matter Institute EMMI at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt, Germany, was founded in 2008 as a network of German and international partner institutions, among them JINA-CEE. The new IReNA network includes several research groups at TU Darmstadt and GSI as a part of EMMI. EMMI is dedicated to fostering interdisciplinary research on matter under extreme conditions of temperature and density. More than 400 scientists at the 13 partner institutions of EMMI study various forms of strongly coupled matter in extreme conditions, including the hottest, coldest and densest matter in the universe. Surprisingly, these very different forms of matter are connected by common concepts in their theoretical description. EMMI also acts as a think tank for the strategy of future experiments, for example at the FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) accelerator facility currently under construction at GSI.
The NSF grant is part of the Accelerating Research through International Network-to-Network Collaborations (AccelNet) program. AccelNet is designed to accelerate the process of scientific discovery and prepare the next generation of U.S. researchers for multiteam international collaborations. The AccelNet program supports strategic linkages among U.S. research networks and complementary networks abroad that will leverage research and educational resources to tackle grand scientific challenges that require significant coordinated international efforts. (CP)
It was a historic day, that Wednesday 50 years ago, when Federal Science Minister Hans Leussink and Hessian Minister President Albert Osswald signed the decisive contract for the founding of GSI in Bonn. The federal government and the state of Hesse agreed to jointly build and operate a heavy ion accelerator in Darmstadt: the beginning of the Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung.
GSI has been carrying out cutting-edge research for 50 years now, and the FAIR project is currently shaping the future. With the future accelerator center FAIR, the international dimensions of research will be significantly expanded once more. People from all over the world will be able to conduct world class research on the Darmstadt campus for decades and to explore the universe in the laboratory. Many activities in the anniversary year therefore span from history to the future. For the anniversary day, there is the opportunity to travel back in time by photo slider on the GSI and FAIR homepage: an interactive past-today-show in which the images virtually overlap and thereby illustrate how things used to look like on campus in the past and how they look like today. The results provide exciting insights, for example into the linear accelerator, the control room or the experimental halls.
An even more detailed tour through half a century is offered by the digital GSI timeline where highlights of the GSI history are presented. Users can click their way through 50 years of GSI, and take a look into the future of FAIR. The great scientific achievements such as the discovery of six new chemical elements or the development of a new type of tumor therapy using ion beams can be found as well as the most important milestones for FAIR, from the international agreement for the worldwide unique project to the completion of the first shell constructions for the large FAIR ring accelerator.
The successes of GSI in these 50 years are based on the knowledge, passion and creativity of its staff members. Many of them have taken an active part in the anniversary year events, e.g. they chose their favorite photo in the campaign "50 years, 50 pictures" or sent their very personal memories of their time at GSI as short stories. The most interesting anecdotes and the favorite photographic moments can currently be seen in a public exhibition on campus.
To round off the diverse anniversary activities, next spring there will be a festive event for the employees and the scientific community, where representatives from politics, universities and partners from international scientific collaborations will also participate. (BP)
An overview of the information offers, activities and special editions around the anniversary can be found here.
]]>The workshop started with the annual meeting of the CSE, followed by two days of plenary talks, a poster session and an industrial exhibition concerning various aspects of cryogenics. A total of 121 attendees and 17 industrial exhibitors attended the workshop. While the majority of attendees were European, there was significant attendance from China and North America as well. The program consisted of 18 talks and 19 posters. The contents included descriptions of engineering designs as well as fundamental research in cryogenics and superconductivity. Speakers, among other things, for example reported on the cryo-technology of the ESS, of FAIR and of the Chinese accelerator HIAF, about high-temperature superconductors or about the relevance of cryogenics in experimental cosmology. Also a tour of the European Spallation Source, currently under construction in Lund, was included in the activities. (CP)
Scientists have reached a new frontier in our understanding of pulsars, the dense, whirling remains of exploded stars, thanks to NASA’s Neutron star Interior Composition Explorer (NICER). This X-ray instrument aboard the International Space Station has produced the first precise and dependable measurements of both a pulsar’s size and its mass, as well as the first surface map of one of these mysterious objects. The ExtreMe Matter Institure EMMI of GSI and Technical University Darmstadt is also involved in the research efforts.
The pulsar in question, J0030+0451 (J0030 for short), lies in an isolated region of space 1,100 light-years away in the constellation Pisces. While measuring the pulsar's heft and proportions, NICER revealed that the shapes and locations of million-degree “hot spots” on the pulsar’s surface are much stranger than generally thought. “From its perch on the space station, NICER is revolutionizing our understanding of pulsars,” said Paul Hertz, astrophysics division director at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “Pulsars were discovered more than 50 years ago as beacons of stars that have collapsed into dense cores, behaving unlike anything we see on Earth. With NICER we can probe the nature of these dense remnants in ways that seemed impossible until now.”
Scientists from the TU Darmstadt and EMMI have provided the expertise for understanding the impact of the NICER observations for the equation of state of dense matter. A series of papers analyzing NICER’s observations of J0030 appears in a focus issue of The Astrophysical Journal Letters and is now available online..
When a massive star dies, it runs out of fuel, collapses under its own weight and explodes as a supernova. These stellar deaths can leave behind neutron stars, which pack more mass than our Sun into a sphere roughly as wide as the greater area of Darmstadt. Pulsars, which are one class of neutron star, spin up to hundreds of times each second and sweep beams of energy toward us with every rotation. J0030 revolves 205 times per second.
For decades, scientists have been trying to figure out exactly how pulsars work. In the simplest model, a pulsar has a powerful magnetic field shaped much like a household bar magnet. The field is so strong it rips particles from the pulsar’s surface and accelerates them. Some particles follow the magnetic field and strike the opposite side, heating the surface and creating hot spots at the magnetic poles. The whole pulsar glows faintly in X-rays, but the hot spots are brighter. As the object spins, these spots sweep in and out of view like the beams of a lighthouse, producing extremely regular variations in the object’s X-ray brightness. NICER measures the arrival of each X-ray from a pulsar to better than a hundred nanoseconds, a precision about 20 times greater than previously available, so scientists can take advantage of this effect for the first time.
Using NICER observations from July 2017 to December 2018, two groups of scientists mapped J0030’s hot spots using independent methods and converged on similar results for its mass and size. A team led by the University of Amsterdam, determined the pulsar is around 1.3 times the Sun’s mass and 15.8 miles (25.4 kilometers) across. A second team found J0030 is about 1.4 times the Sun’s mass and slightly larger, about 16.2 miles (26 kilometers) wide.
“It’s remarkable, and also very reassuring, that the two teams achieved such similar sizes, masses and hot spot patterns for J0030 using different modeling approaches,” said Zaven Arzoumanian, NICER science lead at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. “It tells us NICER is on the right path to help us answer an enduring question in astrophysics: What form does matter take in the ultra-dense cores of neutron stars?”
Together with the NICER collaboration Svenja Greif, Kai Hebeler, and EMMI-Professor Achim Schwenk from TU Darmstadt investigated the implications of these new measurements for the properties of dense matter. “It is exciting to see that the new NICER results are consistent with our understanding of strong interactions in atomic nuclei,” said Svenja Greif, whose recent doctoral dissertation within the DFG (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft) funded Collaborative Research Center 1245 on nuclear structure physics and nuclear astrophysics laid the ground-work for the modelling of dense matter in neutron star interiors. In the future, more precise measurements from the NICER mission in combination with improved microscopic calculations thus promises to significantly improve our understanding of the densest matter in the Universe. (CP)
After a guided tour of the GSI/FAIR campus Madhusudan R. Nandineni got an overview in talks followed by discussions about the Indian participation in FAIR and about the FAIR/GSI talent programme for Indian researchers and students, the GET_INvolved Programme India. Two other talks focussed on the more specific research topics of biomedicine and biophysics as well as material and nanoscience. Subsequently, the science attaché had the opportunity to meet and discuss with young Indian scientists currently working at GSI and FAIR.
Dr Madhusudan Reddy Nandineni holds a Ph.D. in genetics. Subsequent to his Doctoral work, he joined the department of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry at Yale University School of Medicine. Before his deputation to the Embassy of India in Berlin he was head of the Genomics & Profiling Applications department in the Centre for DNA fingerprinting and Diagnostics (CDFD) in Hyderabad, India. (mbe)
]]>If you want to order the DIN A2 sized calendar from FAIR and GSI, please contact gsi-kalender(at)gsi.de (Data Protection) directly by e-mail and receive the calendar by post. Be sure to mention the following information: your name, your address and the number of calendars (maximum three) you wish to order. GSI and FAIR employees can get a copy at the foyer or at the reception in Borsigstraße.
We ask for your understanding that because of to the limited edition only a maximum of three calendars can be sent per request (while supplies last). (BP)
]]>GSI as an institute of element discoverers has played a major role in the further development of the periodic table: In experiments at the GSI accelerator facility, research groups led by Professor Peter Armbruster, Professor Gottfried Münzenberg and Professor Sigurd Hofmann succeeded in discovering the six elements 107 to 112. Furthermore, under group leadership of Dr. Matthias Schädel, the first chemical classifications of some of these elements were carried out. GSI also succeeded in producing elements 113 to 117 and thus confirming initial discoveries from Japan and Russia.
One highlight of the closing ceremony in Tokyo focused on the topic "Creation of superheavy elements". Scientists who produced and discovered superheavy elements appeared on stage to celebrate the completion of the seventh row of the periodic table. GSI was represented by Dr. Alexander Yakushev for element 107 (bohrium), Professor Christoph Düllmann for element 108 (hassium), Professor Michael Block for element 109 (meitnerium), Professor Karlheinz Langanke for element 110 (darmstadtium), Dr. Dieter Ackermann for element 111 (roentgenium), and Dr. Jadambaa Khuyagbaatar for element 112 (copernicium). In addition,
speeches were be given by prominent scientists from the laboratories that contributed largely to the discoveries. Research Director Professor Karlheinz Langanke presented GSI and FAIR.
From the very beginning, the internationality of GSI, which celebrates its 50th anniversary this year, has been very important: All elements were discovered in transnational collaborative efforts within the research teams. With the construction of the international accelerator center FAIR this success story is currently being continued and further intensified. With the FAIR facility, scientists from all over the will be able to study the universe in the lab to address fundamental problems such as the origin of heavy elements in the universe or the structure of neutron stars, but also to advance applications from material sciences to medicine. (BP)
As part of the new EU project CREMLINplus (Connecting Russian and European Measures for Large-scale Research Infrastructures - plus), FAIR GmbH is receiving three million euros in funding for cooperation between the FAIR experiment CBM (Compressed Baryonic Matter) and the experiments on the future NICA collider at JINR.
CREMLINplus, which will be launched at the beginning of 2020, will provide additional funding of 2.6 million euros over a period of four years for a further eleven institutes of the CBM collaboration from seven countries.
The joint development of silicon track detectors, the design of ultra-fast, self-triggered data acquisition systems, the development of software packages for online event selection and data analysis, as well as the construction of target chambers, extremely thin beam pipes and calorimeters for event characterization will be supported.
In another work package, the next generation of ultra-thin silicon pixel sensors (MAPS - Monolithic Active Pixel Sensors) is being developed under the direction of the GSI detector laboratory. These silicon pixel detectors make it possible to measure the experiment traces locally with higher accuracy. Very good spatial resolution is required for identification, especially for special particles seldom produced in collisions.
GSI and FAIR can contribute their competence and many years of experience in the fields of detector technologies, front-end electronics, data acquisition as well as simulations and data analysis.
In addition to the cooperation between CBM and NICA, CREMLINplus also supports the cooperation of European research infrastructures in the field of neutron research, research with synchrotron beams and lasers, as well as in particle physics with the respective Russian megascience projects (PIK, USSR, EXCELS and SCT).
The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, was very pleased with the funding: "GSI and FAIR were once again able to underline their excellence through their success in competitive funding processes. CREMLINplus will further advance the latest technologies, which are crucial for the success of research at future accelerator facilities, and demonstrates the added value of cooperation among major research facilities. The strong international perspective of the project is important for top-level research, which is based on lively cooperation across national borders." (BP)
]]>This year, the "Giersch Award for an Outstanding Doctoral Thesis", worth 6000 euros each, was presented to six young researchers for their completed dissertations who have demonstrated their exceptional scientific talent: Julian Kahlbow, Kristian Lars König und Steffen Georg Weber (all TU Darmstadt) as well as Moritz Greif, Hanna Malygina und Pierre Moreau (all Goethe University Frankfurt ).
Another 24 promising young researchers, currently in the doctoral phase at universities in the region, were awarded a "Giersch Excellence Grant" of 2500 euros each: Esther Bartsch, Patrick Huhn, Daniel Koser, Osnan Maragoto Maragoto Rodriguez, Anton Motornenko, Christian Michael Reisinger, Olga Soloveva, Jan Staudenmaier, Lukas Weih, Michael Wondrak, Frédéric Kornas, Phillip Imgram, Jacob Lee, Sajjad Hussain Mirza, Franziska Papenfuß, Marius Peck, Tabea Pfuhl, Niels Schlusser, Pascal Simon, Martin Jakob Steil, Kshitij Agarwal, Raphael Haas, Daria Kostyleva and Sêro Zähter.
The young scientists were chosen by a selection committee consisting of expert representatives of the Goethe University Frankfurt and the Technische Universität Darmstadt and chaired by Professor Henner Büsching.
The Helmholtz Graduate School for Hadron and Ion Research "HGS-HIRe for FAIR" is a joint endeavor of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, the universities at Darmstadt, Frankfurt, Giessen, Heidelberg and Mainz together with FIAS to promote and support structured PhD education for research associated with GSI and FAIR. Currently, within this framework more than 300 doctoral students are working on their dissertations with a connection to GSI and FAIR. (BP)
During their visit, the students were also able to learn about materials research and research at the experimental storage ring ESR, to get to know the target laboratory and the cryo test facility for superconducting magnets and to take a closer look at the current progress on the FAIR construction site.
"Saturday Morning Physics" is a project of the physics department of the TU Darmstadt. The series of lectures is held annually and aims to increase the interest of young people in physics. In lectures and experiments on six consecutive Saturdays the high-school students learn about the latest developments in physical research at the university. Those who take part in all six courses receive the "Saturday Morning Physics" diploma. The visit to FAIR and GSI takes place as an excursion within the series. GSI has been one of the sponsors and supporters of this project since the start. (BP)
The Robert Wichard-Pohl Prize is awarded for “outstanding contributions to physics that have a special impact on other disciplines in science and technology as well as for outstanding achievements in the dissemination of scientific knowledge in teaching, instruction and didactics of physics”. In its explanatory statement, the DPG emphasized Jürgen Kluges “groundbreaking experiments and precision measurements in the field of atomic and nuclear physics”. "He not only proved himself to be a brilliant researcher, but also a motivating teacher. His creative societal commitment has also been reflected in the establishment of symposia for students."
Jürgen Kluge studied physics at the University of Bonn and the University of Heidelberg, where he received his doctorate in 1970. As postdoc, he worked at the European Nuclear Research Center CERN, where he used optical spectroscopy to investigate the characteristics of short-lived low-neutron mercury isotopes at the on-line isotope separator ISOLDE. In 1972 he became an assistant in experimental physics at the University of Mainz, where he was habilitated in 1975. He was appointed Professor of Physics at the Universities of Mainz (1978) and Heidelberg (1994).
Since the 1980s, Jürgen Kluge has been closely connected to GSI, from 1989 to 1992 as vice-chairman of the program committee, as an experimenter using the linear accelerator UNICAL, since 1994 as head of the atomic physics division and from 1999 to 2005 as research director of GSI. At CERN from 1983 to 1984 he was spokesman of the ISOLDE collaboration and from 1985 to 1987 head of the ISOLDE physics group as well as from 1984 to 1987 and from 2000 to 2004 member of the program committee PSCC respective INTC.
With his scientific work, Jürgen Kluge has achieved outstanding results in the field of optical spectroscopy and mass spectroscopy. He is regarded a pioneer in the development of high-resolution Penning traps for mass spectrometry of unstable nuclei at accelerators and developed new techniques for storing, cooling and studying radionuclides and highly charged ions. Together with his students from the University of Mainz he built the ISOLTRAP experiment at ISOLDE in 1985, which pioneered similar facilities at Argonne National Laboratory, USA, National Superconducting Laboratory, USA, TRIUMF, Canada, in Jyväslylä, Finland, and also TRIGATRAP at the reactor in Mainz and SHIPTRAP at GSI, which allows spectroscopy on the heaviest elements and which he proposed in 1988. In 1994, he initiated an innovative trap experiment at the University of Mainz to measure the magnetic moment of the electron of a single stored hydrogen-like 12C-Ion. This led to a more precise determination of the electron mass and to the proposal to build HITRAP behind the storage ring ESR at GSI. With this unique experimental facility for highly precise experiments on highly charged ions up to U91+, measurements for testing quantum electrodynamics in extremely strong electromagnetic fields are to be carried out.
For his outstanding research work, the experimental atomic and nuclear physicist already received numerous awards, namely 1990 the Helmholtz Prize for his work on trace analysis with lasers, 2005 he became a fellow of the American Physical Society, 2006 he was awarded the Lise-Meitner Prize of the European Physical Society, 2008 the IUPAP Senior Scientist Medal in Fundamental Metrology and 2013 the G.N. Flerov Prize. (BP)
]]>The welcoming addresses for the 21st Christoph Schmelzer Award were given by Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, and Professor Gerhard Kraft, founder and former division head of GSI Biophysics, and Dr. Hartmut Eickhoff, Chairman of the Board of the Association, welcomed the participants. Prof. Dr. Dr. Jürgen Debus, Director of the Department of Radiology at the University Hospital of Heidelberg gave the keynote speech. He reported on long-term experiences in radiation therapy with heavy ions and on current study results.
In her dissertation at the TU Dresden, Dr. Sonja Schellhammer studied imaging using magnetic resonance tomography (MRT) during treatment with proton beams. The long-term goal of this combination is a more precise localization of the tumor volume. At the Institute for Radiooncology (OncoRay) of the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf, the world's first magnetic resonance scanner integrated into a proton beam guidance was constructed in 2017. Schellhammer's work entitled "Technical Feasibility of MR-Integrated Proton Therapy: Beam Deflection and Image Quality" analyzes both the effect of the MRT magnetic fields on the proton beam and the effect of the proton beam guidance on the quality of the resulting MRT image.
Dr. Sebastian Meyer studied for his dissertation whether ion beam computed tomography instead of X-ray computed tomography has potential for clinical use and which different detector systems and ion species would be suitable. For this purpose, he simulated CT images that can be obtained using protons, helium and carbon ion beams. In his doctoral thesis entitled "On the Clinical Potential of Ion Computed Tomography with Different Detector Systems and Ion Species", he also evaluated the integration of these images into tumor treatment planning and the resulting improvement in irradiation accuracy.
The prize money is 1500 Euro each. This award, now in its 21st year, represents a long-term continuity in the promotion of young talents in the field of ion beam tumor therapy. The topics of the scientific work are of fundamental importance for the further development of ion beam therapy, since the results of the award-winning work often find their way into clinical application. The award is named after Professor Christoph Schmelzer, co-founder and first Scientific Managing Director of GSI. The GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung where heavy ion therapy was developed to clinical maturity in Germany in the 1990s traditionally provides the appropriate setting for the annual ceremony.
The Association for the Promotion of Tumor Therapy supports research activities in the field of tumor therapy with heavy ions with the aim of improving the treatment of tumors and providing general patient care. At the accelerator facility at GSI, more than 400 patients with tumors in the head and neck area were treated with ion beams as part of a pilot project from 1997 to 2008. The cure rates of this method are in some cases over 90 percent and the side effects are very low. The success of the pilot project led to the establishment of clinical ion beam therapy centers in Heidelberg and Marburg, where patients are now routinely treated with heavy ions. (LW)
Association for the Promotion of Tumor Therapy with Heavy Ions e.V.
]]>The visit of the politicians was part of an information tour to several computer centers in the state of Hesse. Hessian Parliament Representative Martina Feldmayer is deputy chairwoman of the parliamentary group Bündnis 90/DieGrünen, spokeswoman for environmental and climate policy and a member of the parliamentary committee for the environment, climate protection, agriculture and consumer protection as well as the main committee. Member of the Hessian State Parliament Kaya Kinkel is spokeswoman for energy and economic policy and deputy chairwoman of the parliamentary committee for digital affairs and data protection and member of the parliamentary committee for economic affairs, energy, transport and housing. Ursula auf der Heide is member of the town council of Frankfurt and deputy chairwoman of the parliamentary group Bündnis 90/Die Grünen in the council. She is also a member of the city's committees for environment and sports as well as for economic affairs and women.
The "Green IT Cube" on the GSI/FAIR campus is one of the most capable scientific computing centers in the world. At the same time, it sets standards in IT technology and energy saving: Thanks to a special cooling system, it is particularly energy- and cost-efficient. Instead of air, the computers are cooled with water. Therefore, the energy required for cooling is less than seven percent of the electrical power used for computing. In conventional data centers with air cooling, this relation amounts to 30 up to 100 percent. The innovative cooling system also enables a compact and space-saving design. Scientists use the "Green IT Cube" at GSI and FAIR to carry out simulations and develop detectors for FAIR. They also evaluate measurement data from experiments at the accelerator facilities of GSI and FAIR.
After visiting the "Green IT Cube", the guests had the opportunity to inform themselves about the current status of the FAIR construction project and to view the ongoing work on the 20-hectare construction site, from the completed sections for the central ring accelerator SIS100 to the excavation pit for the first of the future large-scale experiments. (BP)
]]>A study that takes a novel approach to the search for dark matter has been performed by the BASE Collaboration at CERN working together with a team at the PRISMA+ Cluster of Excellence at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU). For the first time the researchers are exploring how dark matter influences antimatter instead of standard matter. Their findings are now published in the latest edition of eminent scientific journal Nature.
They are the results of research undertaken by scientists at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt, Japan’s RIKEN research center, the Max Planck Institute of Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg (MPIK) and the National Metrology Institute Braunschweig (PTB), working jointly in the Max Planck-RIKEN-PTB Center for Time, Constants and Fundamental Symmetries, as well as scientists from CERN, the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU), the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM), the University of Tokyo, and the Leibniz University Hannover.
"To date, scientists have always conducted high-precision experiments at low energies using matter-based samples in the hope of finding a link to dark matter," explains Dr. Christian Smorra, the lead author of the study. Currently working at Japan’s RIKEN research institute, he intends to use an ERC Starting Grant to establish a work group at JGU’s Institute of Physics. "Now we’ve decided to search explicitly for interactions between dark matter and antimatter. It is generally assumed that interactions of dark matter will be symmetric for particles and antiparticles. Our study seeks to determine whether this is really the case."
The project’s participants in fact see a double benefit in this approach: Little is known at this point about the microscopic characteristics of dark matter. At present one much-discussed possible component of dark matter is what is known as ALPs (axion-like particles). Moreover, the standard model of particle physics offers no explanation of why there is apparently so much more matter than antimatter in our universe. "Through our experiments, we hope to find clues that could provide a link between these two aspects," notes Dr. Yevgeny Stadnik, who participated in the study as part of a Humboldt Fellowship at HIM. "Possible asymmetrical interactions of this kind have not yet been explored, neither at the theoretical nor at the experimental level. Our current research work is taking a first real step in that direction."
The scientists are focusing their attention on one single antiproton that has been captured in a special device known as a Penning trap. The particle was produced by scientists using the Antiproton Decelerator (AD) at CERN, the world’s only research institution capable of generating low-energy antiprotons. The scientists then stored and experimented with the antiprotons created there using the BASE Collaboration’s trap system.
An antiproton has both a charge and a spin. Within a magnetic field, the spin precesses around the magnetic field lines at a constant, highly specific rate – known as the Larmor or spin precession frequency. "This means we can detect the presence of dark matter as it influences this frequency," says Christian Smorra. "For this purpose, we assume that potential dark matter particles act in the same way as a classical field with a specific wavelength. The waves produced by dark matter pass continuously through our experiment and thus have a periodic effect on the spin precession frequency of the antiproton that would otherwise be expected to remain constant."
Using their experimental set-up, the researchers have already explored a specific frequency range but without success - no evidence pointing to the influence of dark matter has come to light to date. "We've not yet been able to identify any significant and periodic changes to the antiproton’s spin precession frequency using our current measurement concept," explains Stefan Ulmer, spokesperson of the BASE Collaboration at CERN. "But we have managed to achieve levels of sensitivity as much as five orders of magnitude greater than those employed for observations related to astrophysics. As a result, we can now redefine the upper limit for the strength of any potential interactions between dark matter and antimatter based on the levels of sensitivity we’ve managed to accomplish."
The current project in effect merged the efforts of two research groups. The BASE Collaboration at CERN has a long and successful history of research into the fundamental properties of antiprotons, while the group led by Prof. Dmitry Budker, a researcher at the PRISMA+ Cluster of Excellence at JGU and HIM, is very active in the search for dark matter and provided important interpretive input to the study. "We determined that there is a great deal of overlap in our research and this resulted in the idea for this new approach in the search for dark matter," points out Dmitry Budker.
Going forward, the scientists hope to further enhance the precision of measurement of antiproton spin precession frequency – an essential requirement if the antimatter-based search for dark matter is to prove successful. In this connection, a team headed by Prof. Jochen Walz at the Institute of Physics at JGU, working in collaboration with MPIK and RIKEN, is developing new methods for cooling protons and antiprotons, while a group of scientists from PTB Braunschweig, the Leibniz University Hannover, and RIKEN is implementing methods for quantum logic based antiproton-spin-state readout. A variety of other promising and similar antiparticle-related studies also beckon, for example, using positrons and antimuons. (JGU/BP)
Scientific publication in Nature (Englisch)
Dr. Silke Griese received the prize for her dissertation titled „Cluster-Jet Targets for the PANDA-, MAGIX-, and CryoFlash-Experiments at Hadron-, Lepton-, and Laser-Facilities“. Her doctoral advisor was Professor Alfons Khoukaz from the Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität in Münster. The award was presented by the spokesman of the Panda Collaboration, Klaus Peters from GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung.
The Panda Collaboration has awarded the PhD Prize once per year since 2013 in order to honor the best dissertation written in connection with the Panda Experiment. Panda will be one of the key experiments of the future accelerator center FAIR. The experiment focuses on antimatter research as well as on various topics related to the weak and the strong force, exotic states of matter, and the structure of hadrons. More than 500 scientists from 20 countries currently work in the Panda Collaboration. In her dissertation, Dr. Silke Grieser studied various aspects of Cluster Jets in order to produce an abundant number of exotic particles within the Panda detector, which is being built at the FAIR accelerator facility.
Candidates for the PhD Prize are nominated by their doctoral advisors. In addition to being directly related to the Panda Experiment, the nominees’ doctoral degrees must have received a rating of “very good” or better. Up to three candidates are shortlisted for the award and can present their dissertations at the Panda Collaboration meeting. The winner is chosen by a committee that is appointed for this task by the Panda Collaboration. The Panda Collaboration awards the PhD Prize to specifically honor students’ contributions to the Panda project. (BP)
]]>"GSI looks back on an impressive history with numerous scientific discoveries and, at the same time, with the construction of the international FAIR accelerator, into an eventful future that will lead us to many more highlights," said Professor Langanke. "The photos in the exhibition show just how appealing and aesthetic research can be visually. The memories give an insight into the work characterized by esteem and cooperation here on campus and, of course, also in an international environment. Our goal is to uphold these values also in the future."
The exhibition shows the ten favorite pictures chosen by staff and outsiders as large-format photo prints. Nearly 500 people took the opportunity to select their favorites from a total of 50 historical and current photos of the accelerators and experimental facilities. The photos presented are the ten with the most votes. In addition to images of detectors and accelerator components, the most frequently selected photos also include more unusual motifs, such as an autumnal impression of the campus or the visit of a Star Wars costume club.
In addition, a selection of twelve illustrated GSI memories will be presented on posters. The contributions were submitted by former and current employees as well as scientific guests from previous years. In a partly serious and partly humorous way, they portray events, encounters, successes and the overarching cooperation in the various fields of work on the campus and thus represent a lived culture of scientific exchange and joint commitment.
The exhibition will take place in the foyer of the Konferenz- und Bürogebäude West (KBW) on the GSI/FAIR Campus, Planckstraße 1, 64291 Darmstadt, Germany, and will be open from November 15 to December 20, 2019 from Monday to Friday between 10 am and 4 pm. External guests are requested to bring an identification document with them for admission to the campus. (CP)
The research work for his thesis "Laser-Based High-Voltage Metrology with ppm Accuracy" was carried out by Kristian König in the research group of Professor Wilfried Nörtershäuser at the Technical University Darmstadt. The precise measurement of high voltages of several 10,000 volts is necessary in many areas of technology. Precision experiments in physics sometimes require accuracies down to one millionth of the measured voltage (1 ppm = 1 part per million). Kristian König has succeeded in measuring such voltages with the aid of a laser. He achieved this by accelerating ions (positively charged atoms) with the voltage to be measured and then measuring the influence of velocity on the "color" (frequency) of the light emitted by the ions. This method makes use of the Doppler effect which is known from daily life: If an ambulance with a siren approaches the observer at high speed, he hears a much higher tone than if the car were stationary. If the ambulance moves away, the sound becomes lower. If the pitch (frequency) is measured and the pitch of the resting siren is known, the speed of the ambulance can be calculated. Exactly the same happens with the light that atoms or ions emit in flight. This optical Doppler effect can be determined with extreme precision using lasers if the properties of the ion beam and the laser beam are controlled extremely well. Kristian König has constructed a setup enabling him to measure voltages to an accuracy of 5 ppm using this method. This accuracy is 20 times higher than what had been reached ever before with this technique. Such precise measurements are needed, for example, to determine the velocity of ions in the storage rings at GSI and at the future FAIR facility, and thus are crucial for a variety of precision experiments.
Pfeiffer Vacuum and GSI have a long-standing partnership. Vacuum solutions from Pfeiffer Vacuum have been used successfully in experimental setups at GSI for decades.
The annual FAIR-GSI PhD Award honors the best doctoral dissertation completed during the previous year. Eligible for nominations are dissertations that were financially supported by GSI as part of its strategic partnerships with the universities of Darmstadt, Frankfurt, Giessen, Heidelberg, Jena, and Mainz, or through the research and development program. In the framework of the Graduate School HGS-HIRe (Helmholtz Graduate School for Hadron and Ion Research), more than 300 PhD students currently perform research for their doctoral dissertations on topics closely related to GSI and FAIR. (CP)
]]>The successful cooperation between GSI/FAIR and the IKP in science, accelerator technology and the FAIR project has existed for a long time and was a solid foundation for the contents of the workshop. The focus was on the topic "accelerators", from planning and implementation to operation as well as the associated technology and interfaces. The 30 different projects recorded during the event cover a wide range and are now described in concrete terms with milestones, deadlines and resources. Thematically, they range from the existing FAIR subprojects for the high-energy storage ring HESR and the research pillar PANDA to other subprojects such as the Collector Ring (Beam Cooling) or Commons (vacuum, beam diagnosis and power supply units) and the desired future cooperation in the fields of installation, commissioning and operation of the accelerator facilities.
A total of 50 people took part in the two-day workshop, about half of them came from Jülich, from the Institute Division "Large-scale nuclear physics facilities". One of them was Dr. Ralf Gebel, its acting director. The guests were welcomed by Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR. In addition to the joint workshop, a visit to the FAIR construction site was also scheduled, including the completed sections of the central ring accelerator SIS100. In addition, the event offered participants the opportunity to exchange ideas intensively and fostered mutual understanding.
Now another event follows. This time the workshop focuses on cooperation topics in research and experiments.(BP)
]]>The new photopoint symbolizes cutting-edge research, which is world-leading and at the same time rooted in the region, and, as a further piece of the mosaic, sharpens the profile of Darmstadt as a city of science. The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, and the Lord Mayor of Darmstadt, Jochen Partsch, jointly opened the event. Professor Sigurd Hofmann, head of the discovery team of the element darmstadtium, gave a review of the history around the first production of element 110. The anniversary of the darmstadtium's first production also coincides with the International Year of the Periodic Table proclaimed by the United Nations: 2019 marks the 150th anniversary of the discovery of the Periodic Table.
The photopoint shows the decisive steps of the chemical element darmstadtium: discovery on November 9, 1994, official recognition by IUPAC (International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry) on August 15, 2003, naming ceremony on December 2, 2003. In addition, the decay chain of the element is depicted, the measurement of which allows the identification of the element.
To produce darmstadtium, nickel nuclei in a particle accelerator are shot with a speed of around 30,000 kilometers per second onto an extremely thin lead foil. When the two atomic nuclei merge, the element darmstadtium is formed. GSI also succeeded in discovering five other chemical elements: bohrium, hassium, meitnerium, roentgenium and copernicium. So, thanks to GSI, also the state of Hesse is the only German federal state to be honored in the periodic table.
In addition to all the reviews, the hashtag #UniverseInTheLab at the photopoint indicates the future: With the international accelerator center FAIR, currently under construction at GSI, scientists will be able to study the universe in the laboratory to address fundamental questions such as the origin of the chemical elements and the evolution of the universe.
The photopoint is 2.5 meters high, 1.2 meters wide and stands on a small platform. The arrangement also includes a 40-centimetre luminous cube to symbolize the element darmstadtium, which is very tiny in physical reality and only exists for a fraction of a second. The guests in the congress center can set themselves in scene in this photographic backdrop and eternalize themselves with a lot of imagination – an exciting piece of science to touch. The resulting photos can be published under the hashtag #UniverseInTheLab. (BP)
About GSI/FAIR:
The GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt operates one of the world's leading particle accelerator facilities for research. Researchers from all over the world use the facility for experiments to gain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe. In addition, they develop new applications in medicine and technology. The new Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research FAIR is currently being built in international cooperation. It is one of the largest research projects worldwide. Around 3,000 scientists from all over the world can conduct cutting-edge research at FAIR.
About the science and congress center "darmstadtium":
Whether for international conventions, meetings, product launches, annual general meetings or trade fairs, the Congress Centre Darmstadt provides excellent conditions for all kinds of events. Sustainability and the exceptional and awarded IT infrastructure make it Germany's fastest congress center with a 20Gbit/s redundant internet connection. It is situated in the heart of the city and has a direct connection to Frankfurt International Airport every 30 minutes.
]]>In a series of lectures, the participants learned more about the science at GSI during FAIR Phase 0, about the progress in the construction of the FAIR accelerators and detectors, and about the future research possibilities at FAIR. The FAIR-relevant efforts of the partner universities in Darmstadt and Frankfurt were also presented. The board also took a look at the FAIR progress from the FAIR viewpoint onto the construction site.
The European Physical Society is an association of 42 European physical societies. Founded in 1968, the scientific society represents over 100,000 physicists in Europe. Its headquarters are in Mulhouse, France. With over 62,000 members, the German Physical Society is the largest member of the EPS. Its purpose is the organization of conferences and the promotion of scientific exchange. (CP)
]]>For the first time, astronomers have identified a chemical element that was freshly formed by the merging of two neutron stars. The underlying mechanism, called the r-process – also known as rapid neutron capture – is considered to be the origin of large quantities of elements heavier than iron. This discovery sheds new light on the mystery of the environments in which this r-process takes place. The team of astronomers, also including scientists of FAIR and GSI, has now unequivocally demonstrated that the fusion of two neutron stars creates the conditions for this process and acts as a reactor in which new elements are bred.
The origin of heavy elements such as gold, lead and uranium has not yet been fully clarified. The lightest elements – hydrogen and helium – were already formed in significant quantities with the Big Bang. Nuclear fusion in the cores of stars is also a well-established source of atoms in the mass range from helium to iron.
For the production of heavier atoms, scientists suspect a process that attaches free neutrons to already existing building blocks. The fast variant of this mechanism is the so-called r-process (r stands for rapid) or fast neutron capture. At present, research is being carried out to determine which objects might be sites where this reaction takes place. Possible candidates so far are a rare type of supernova explosions and the merging of dense stellar remnants like binary neutron stars.
An international group of astronomers with substantial participation of Camilla Juul Hansen from the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy (MPIA) in Heidelberg has now discovered the signature of the element strontium, which was formed by the r-process during an explosive fusion of two neutron stars. With on average 88 nucleons, of which 38 are protons, it is heavier than iron. Professor Almudena Arcones and Privatdozent Andreas Bauswein were also involved in the publication in the scientific journal Nature. In addition to their activities in the research department for theoretical physics at FAIR and GSI, they are also active at the Technical University of Darmstadt and at the University of Heidelberg, both partner universities of FAIR and GSI. They provided valuable estimates for the publication. The process and characteristics of the r-process are among the important research questions to be investigated at the future FAIR accelerator facility currently under construction in Darmstadt.
The explosive merger produced a raging expansion shell moving with 20% to 30% of the speed of light. It consists of newly formed matter, of which strontium alone amounts to about five Earth masses (1 Earth mass = 6·1024 kg). Thus, for the first time, the researchers provide clear evidence that such a collision provides the conditions for the r-process in which heavy elements form. Besides, this is the first empirical confirmation that neutron stars consist of neutrons.
The r-process is truly rapid. Per second, more than 10²² neutrons flow through an area of one square centimetre. The beta decay transforms some of the accumulated neutrons into protons, emitting one electron and one antineutrino each. The special aspect about this mechanism is that the neutrons combine to form large compounds faster than the newly formed conglomerates break up again. In this way, even heavy elements can grow from individual neutrons within less than a second.
Using the Very Large Telescope (VLT) of the European Southern Observatory (ESO), scientists obtained spectra following the spectacular discovery of the gravitational wave signal GW170817 in August 2017. In addition to a gamma-ray burst, the kilonova AT2017gfo, an afterglow in visible light due to radioactive processes, which faded within a few days after an initial sharp increase in brightness, occurred at the same location. The first analysis of the spectra in 2017 by another group of researchers did not yield a clear result about the composition of the reaction products.
Dr. Hansen and her colleagues based their re-evaluation on creating synthetic spectra and modelling the observed spectra, which were recorded over four days at intervals of one day each. The spectra indicate an object with an initial temperature of about 3700 K (approx. 3400 °C), which faded and cooled in the following days. The brightness deficits at wavelengths of 350 and 850 nm are conspicuous. These are like fingerprints of the element that absorbs light at these parts of the spectrum.
Taking into account the blue shift of these absorption lines caused by the Doppler effect the expansion following the merger event produces, the research group calculated spectra of a large number of atoms using three increasingly complex methods. Since these methods all yielded consistent results, the final conclusion is robust. It turned out that only strontium generated by the r-process is able to explain the positions and strength of the absorption features in the spectra.
“The results of this work are an important step in deciphering the nucleosynthesis of heavy elements and their cosmic sources,” Hansen concludes. “This was only possible by combining the new discipline of gravitational wave astronomy with precise spectroscopy of electromagnetic radiation. These new methods give hope for further ground-breaking insights into the nature of the r-process.” (CP)
The 34. CBM collaboration meeting was preceded by further sessions at the end of September: These included the “CBM Software School”, a “Students Day” and a workshop "FAIR and CBM – Prospects and Challenges" at University of Gauhati in Guwahati. Indian scientists are strongly involved in the CBM experiment and play a primary role: India provides a major in-kind contribution to CBM, which is the GEM and RPC tracking chambers for the muon detection system. In total 13 Indian institutions participate in the design of the muon system, perform feasibility studies and build twelve large-area detector stations.
An essential intermediate goal on the way to the realization of the CBM experiment is the successful commissioning of the miniCBM experiment at GSI/SIS18, which was one of the key points of the discussions. The director of the Bose-Institute, Professor Uday Bandyopadhyay, also participated in the CBM Collaboration Board Meeting. He expressed his strong interest in the collaboration with FAIR.
Another important item was the appointment of Piotr Gasik as the new CBM Technical Coordinator. Piotr Gasik was coordinating the upgrade of the Time-Projection Chamber (TPC) at the ALICE experiment of the European Nuclear Research Center CERN with GEM based (Gas Electron Multiplier) read-out chambers. Now he coordinates their integration into the experiment at CERN. Piotr Gasik succeeds Walter Müller, who served as Technical Coordinator from the beginning of CBM, i.e. for more than 15 years. At the last evening of the meeting, the participants from Germany and the Indian hosts had a joint get-together with the Consul General of Germany in Kolkata, Dr. Michael Feiner. (BP)
]]>Exactly 150 years ago, the Russian chemist Dmitri Mendeleev published an order for the chemical elements which has been retained to this day: the periodic table of elements. On the occasion of the anniversary, GSI and FAIR, the laboratory of the element discoverers, illuminate the history of the discovery of the elements.
According to IUPAC (International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry), the periodic table is one of the most outstanding achievements of science, containing the essence of chemistry, physics and biology. It is a unique tool that has enabled scientists to predict the structure and properties of matter on Earth and throughout the universe.
Experiments at the GSI accelerator facility in Darmstadt enabled scientists to discover six new elements, amongst them the elements darmstadtium and hassium, in honor of the city and the land of the laboratory.
The history of element discovery (YouTube)
The worldwide unique building project for science could be presented to the industrial sector with a lot of exciting news and was met with great interest by the visitors. Potential contractors and bidding syndicates for the upcoming work on the FAIR construction site actively took advantage of opportunities to hold direct and comprehensive talks about the construction plans for FAIR and find out about possible participation.
At present, the FAIR realization project has a large order volume related to the complex area of technical building services. There are numerous tenders and contracts to be awarded, for example for ventilation systems, sanitation, safety technology and electrical engineering. In addition, in the field of construction contracts, the focus is now shifting to the second major construction area in addition to construction area North with the central FAIR ring accelerator, which is in the process of realization. The current issue is the awarding of contracts for the extended shell construction on construction area south.
In-depth talks at the trade fair stand, a whole series of very focused one-on-one discussions and the acquisition of numerous new contacts with experts contributed to the fact that participation in the 2019 trade fair can be regarded as a success. The presence of many relevant players from the construction sector on the days of the fair also provided an excellent opportunity to further enhance the FAIR project profile in the construction industry. The expert discussions confirmed once again that a custom-made megaproject such as FAIR can be very attractive is for a construction company’s portfolio due to its unique selling points.
The proven partnership with the science city of Darmstadt was continued this year. The FAIR project had its own presentation at the Darmstadt stand, which was featured as part of the Frankfurt Rhine-Main metropolitan area. With around 45,000 visitors and exhibitors from more than 40 countries, the Expo Real trade fair is one of Europe’s most important get-togethers for the real estate, construction, and location marketing sectors. (BP)
]]>Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, and Professor Karlheinz Langanke, Research Director of FAIR and GSI, welcomed the group and informed them about the scientific goals and the status of realization of the FAIR project in a talk followed by a discussion. Afterwards they accompanied the guests to the FAIR construction site, where the Korean group took a look at the FAIR construction progress. An introduction to the technical challenges and scientific capabilities of the FAIR ring accelerator SIS100 and a tour of the testing facility for superconducting FAIR magnets lead by Dr. Peter Spiller, head of the subproject SIS100, were also part of the day's program. (CP)
]]>The visit was part of a closed meeting of "Renew Europe" in Frankfurt, during which information tours to international top locations were also undertaken. On the GSI and FAIR campus, the more than 100 European political visitors gained insights into the scientific successes and current status of the FAIR project, one of the largest construction projects for cutting-edge research worldwide and at the same time a strong pillar of the German and European research landscape in global competition. The FAIR and GSI management provided background information and offered a compact overview of science, structural and technical progress, and the development at the site in the heart of the Rhine-Main region.
The FAIR project is rated by experts as a top international science project for decades, offering world class opportunities and outstanding potential for groundbreaking discoveries. The social contribution of the megaproject FAIR is also significant. FAIR makes value contributions to society on many levels, whether as a driver of innovation, provider of highly qualified jobs and in education of young scientists and engineers or in the development of new medical applications.
The program for the guests also included a visit to the GSI campus and the FAIR construction site. They visited the test facility for superconducting accelerator magnets (Series Test Facility, STF), where high-tech components for FAIR are examined. During a tour of the FAIR site, they were also able to take a close view on the ongoing work on the 20-hectare site, from the completed shell construction of the tunnel segments for the large ring accelerator SIS100 up to the excavation pit for the first of the future large-scale experiments.
The “Renew Europe” group is one of the political groups of the European Parliament. It unites several liberal and centrist parties, including from the German-speaking countries amongst others the FDP with five deputies and the Freie Wähler with two deputies. (BP)
]]>The main focus was on specialized engineers and technicians with different emphasis, for example electrical or mechanical engineering, but also on technicians and IT specialists. Young professionals were just as much in demand as those with many years of professional experience.
There was a great demand at the FAIR and GSI booth, numerous participants took the opportunity to enter into direct dialogue with the contact persons of FAIR and GSI and inquire in detail about job profiles and career opportunities. There was also extensive information on the FAIR project, one of the largest construction projects for research worldwide, which was also presented at the central forum of the career fair as part of a company pitch.
The first applications were already received on the day of the trade fair itself, and the response via the regular application process and unsolicited applications in the following period has been great. The repeated presence at the VDI career fair is thus an important building block in the recruitment of specialized experts in the engineering disciplines. (BP)
More information on working at FAIR and GSI and current vacancies can be found here.
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After careful selection, the best proposal award was granted to Dr. Emiliano Bolesani from the Hannover Medical School (Germany) who will generate heart organoids and expose them to heavy ions to assess the risk of cardiovascular disease in spaceflight. Second best proposal was about microbiology, in particular the irradiation of arctic ice to isolate radioresistant microorganisms that could be present on the icy moons of Jupiter and Saturn. The experiment was proposed by Dr. Ligia Fonseca Coelho from IST in Lisbon (Portugal). The project ranked third was about hibernation and radiation resistance, and was proposed by Dr. Timna Hitrec from the University of Bologna (Italy). The ESA-FAIR panel found all the proposals outstanding. It is planned to submit them officially to the Program Advisory Committee to apply for implementation within the IBER program. IBER is funded by ESA to study biological effects of space radiation at GSI.
The ESA-FAIR Summer School included lecturers from GSI, ESA and other European institutes such as DLR (German Aerospace Center), SCK-CEN (Belgium) and the Technical University of Darmstadt. The second edition of the school is slated for September 2020 in Darmstadt. (LW)
Our first place with a total of 87 votes is a picture by photographer Thomas Ernsting showing the large-scale detector FOPI. For high-energy research with the particle accelerator SIS18, which can bring heavy ions up to 90 percent of the speed of light, new detectors were put into operation in the 1990s, including FOPI (4Pi) — a detector that covers almost the entire solid angle. The aim of FOPI was to investigate the hot, dense nuclear matter that is produced for a very short time during a high-energy heavy ion collision. It expands explosively and emits newly produced particles. FOPI was designed by an international collaboration of 13 institutes and operated at GSI until a few years ago.
The photo on place 2 with 77 votes was taken by Christian Grau. It was produced on the occasion of our Open House in 2017 and shows a girl looking through an accelerator structure of our linear accelerator UNILAC. With 11,000 visitors, the Open House was the largest event in the history of GSI and FAIR. Place 3 with 63 votes, also by Thomas Ernsting, opens a view into our large-scale detector HADES. HADES (High Acceptance Di-Electron Spectrometer) is used to investigate hot, dense nuclear matter, among other things to answer the question of mass. It is not yet clear why a proton has significantly more mass than its individual components. HADES will continue to be used at FAIR as a component of the CBM detector for the investigation of compressed nuclear matter.
The ten winners of the GSI coffee cups "The Universe in the Lab" from our prize draw have been notified of their prize via e-mail. (CP)
]]>After the welcome address by the Director of the Helmholtz Institute Jena, Professor Thomas Stöhlker, the Minister for Economy, Science and Digital Society of the State of Thuringia, Wolfgang Tiefensee, and the Minister for Infrastructure and Agriculture, Birgit Keller, passed on their greetings. On behalf of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung spoke Research Director Professor Karlheinz Langanke, and Professor Georg Pohnert, Vice President of Research, spoke on behalf of the Friedrich Schiller University Jena.
The Thuringian Ministry of Infrastructure had announced an architectural competition for the new research building. The winner was a regional office: The jury unanimously selected the design of the "Osterwold°Schmidt EXP!ANDER Architekten" office in Weimar, which had submitted the plans jointly with Impuls Landschaftsarchitektur Jena. The four-storey, cube-shaped building with a floor area of around 240 square meters connects to the target laboratory in the basement. As link to the existing institute building, an interlocking gate is planned.
The construction period for the new building, which will be erected on a slope on a federal state property within the university site, will be approximately two years. The state of Thuringia is financing the construction project and has scheduled eight million euros for it in its state budget.
With the additional institute building, the infrastructural conditions for cutting-edge research, which has been carried out at the HI-Jena since the institute was founded ten years ago, will be further improved. The institute's research activities focus on the physics occurring at the border between conventional particle-acceleration technology and the fast-evolving field of laser-induced particle acceleration. The HI-Jena offers outstanding research in the field of coupling of intense photon fields and the supporting development of appropriate instrumentation. In addition, the Helmholtz Institute Jena will further expand and strengthen the close connection between the university and the large-scale research facility GSI with the international accelerator center FAIR, which is currently being built here.
Around 100 employees and associated scientists in ten working groups are currently working at the HI-Jena. There is also an own research school (“Research School of Advanced Photon Science”) with around 60 doctoral students. In addition, the successful acquisition of third-party funding and regional networking – for example through cooperation and collaboration with the Fraunhofer Institute for Optics and Precision Engineering and the Leibniz Institute of Photonic Technology – have increased steadily. (BP)
]]>The testing of the superconducting dipole magnets at the test facility at GSI is ongoing since September 2017, when the first magnet was delivered. Subsequently, series production had been launched at Bilfinger Noell in Würzburg. In total 110 dipole magnets will be produced, 108 will be installed in the ring accelerator tunnel and two more are spare ones. The dipoles, that will mainly be needed for deflecting the particle beam, make up more than a quarter of all 415 fast ramped superconducting magnets utilized in the SIS100.
Each of the dipole magnets, which weight about three tons and are three meter long, is subjected to a comprehensive test program: The quality control of the production as well as the factory acceptance test at normal ambient conditions are performed in Würzburg, while an extended test program, at both ambient and cryogenic conditions (Site Acceptance Test, SAT), is being conducted at the GSI test facility.
The almost 700 square meter test facility, which was especially built at GSI, is equipped with a cryogenic plant with a local liquid helium distribution system to cool the magnets on the operational temperature of 4.5K (i.e. 4.5 degrees Celsius above absolute zero, which is about -273 degrees Celsius). In addition, two 20-kiloampere power supply units enable to perform functionality tests on the magnets. The duration of the regular SAT program for a single magnet is approximately four weeks. The successful testing campaign is the result of the joint work of more than 30 colleagues from various GSI departments.
The goal of the acceptance and functionality tests is to verify the production quality regarding the specified parameters, qualifying the magnets for the operation in the SIS100 accelerator and acquire the data required for machine control. (BP)
]]>50 years of GSI are also 50 years full of impressive research results, advanced experiments, new technologies and important decisions. We have compiled the highlights from the history of GSI. The timeline "50 Years GSI" gives an overview of the milestones that have shaped the history of the research institute. Join us on a journey through time, click your way through 50 years of top research at GSI and take a look at the promising future of FAIR. (LW)
This year's result of team GSI once again is a clear improvement on the very successful last years: In 2018 there were 102 cyclists in the GSI team who had covered 25,766 kilometers and reached second place. In 2017, a team of 67 cyclists with more than 15,000 kilometers already achieved first place.
The winning prizes for the best teams and individual cyclists were awarded during the Bicycle Action Day on the market square in Darmstadt by Barbara Akdeniz, head of the environmental department. The prizes for the winning teams were vouchers for a joint visit to the climbing forest in order to strengthen the team spirit.
Over 1400 people in 85 teams took part in the 21-day campaign in May and June. During this period, they covered a total of 285,809 kilometers, thus avoiding 41 tonnes of CO2 compared with driving a car. "I am delighted that so many cyclists have again taken part in city cycling and have thus set an example for the high significance of cycling in Darmstadt," explained environmental department head Akdeniz during the award ceremony. In the coming year, the city of Darmstadt wants to participate in city cycling again. (BP)
Website of the campaign City Cycling
Website of the City of Darmstadt (in German)
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Researching cosmic radiation and their effects on humans, electronics and materials is a decisive contribution to the future of human spaceflight, so that astronauts and satellites in space are provided with the best protection during the exploration of our solar system. Furthermore, it also contributes to detailed knowledge about the risks of radiation exposure on Earth.
The Summer School will be held at ESA´s European Space Operations Centre ESOC as well as at the GSI/FAIR campus in Darmstadt in order to train students in basic heavy ion biophysics for space applications, e.g. space radiation detection, monitoring and protection.
The Summer School's top-class scientific program, opened by Thomas Reiter, ESA Interagency Coordinator, and Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, includes lectures from experts in the field, site visits to facilities in Darmstadt and practical training and research opportunities at GSI/FAIR. The participants commute between the two locations ESOC and GSI/FAIR Campus. Among other things, there will be the opportunity to discuss the radiation risk during life and work in space with Marco Durante, Director of the GSI Biophysics Department. At the GSI and FAIR accelerator facilities, the students have the opportunity to participate in experiments and learn more about the research fields of radiation biology, electronic components, materials research, shielding materials and instrument calibration. At the end of the ESA-FAIR Radiation Summer School, participants will take written exams and carry out teamwork, which will be evaluated and rated by the lecturers.
The establishment of the Summer School is a direct result of the close cooperation between ESA and FAIR on cosmic radiation research. The existing GSI accelerator facility already is the only one in Europe that can generate all of the ion beams that occur in our solar system, which range from the lightest one, hydrogen, to the heaviest, uranium. The research opportunities will be expanded even further by the future FAIR accelerator center: FAIR will enable researchers to conduct experiments with an even wider spectrum of particle energies and intensities, and to simulate the composition of cosmic radiation with a precision that no other accelerator facility will be able to match. The proximity to the European Space Operations Centre ESOC in Darmstadt in addition creates ideal conditions for local cooperation in one of the key research fields of the future. (BP)
Main goal of the Beam Instrumentation department is to inspect the ion beam with highest precision. The key feature is high-end measurement technology for ion beams, which is applied to detect all relevant beam parameters, such as beam position or intensity and their temporal evolution. Only through high-precision measurements provided to the operating team, both, accelerator and ion beam, can be further optimized.
An important pre-requisite to carry out nuclear physics experiments at GSI and FAIR efficiently, is the provision of ion beams with constant intensity during slow extraction of the accelerated ions from SIS18. The slow extraction process reacts very sensitive on perturbations, like e.g. small fluctuations of the magnet currents. Since many years these perturbations are the subject of detailed experimental studies, as well as investigations based on particle dynamics simulations, with the goal to efficiently suppress the perturbations. In the past two years, Dr. Rahul Singh carried out a number of measurements to pinpoint the source of the fluctuations in the so-called spill-structure in the millisecond regime and to model the influence of the magnet power supplies on beam quality.
In a joint effort, Dr. Rahul Singh and the team of experts successfully developed a novel technique to improve the spill-structure and immediately implemented the system during the beamtime. The new technique allowed for smoothing out the spill-structure. In particular, the HADES experiment benefited instantaneously from the technical improvement by a 45% increased event statistics in the previous experiment campaign.
The technology developed by the team is very promising for the future and will not only increase the efficiency for many physics experiments at SIS18, but also at the large SIS100 accelerator ring of the future FAIR accelerator center. (BP)
]]>The European Space Agency (ESA) signed a Memorandum of Understanding with FAIR in February 2018 to use the accelerator facilities for space radiation protection. The current plans for moon exploration, already planned in 2024, make this experiments urgent to understand the space radiation risk and find appropriate countermeasures. Within the Memorandum of Understanding, ESA is funding the Investigations on Biological Effects of Radiation (IBER) program that supports European investigators to perform radiobiology experiments at GSI and FAIR on space radiation protection.
Physicists have measured the energy associated with the decay of a metastable state of the thorium-229 nucleus. This is a significant step on the way to a nuclear clock which will be far more precise than the best of today’s atomic timekeepers.
Modern atomic clocks are the most accurate measurement tools currently available. The best current instruments deviate by just one second in 30 billion years. However, even this extraordinary level of precision can be improved upon. Indeed, a clock based on an excited nuclear state of thorium-229 should make it possible to enhance timing accuracy by another order of magnitude. Now a research team led by LMU physicist Peter Thirolf, in collaboration with colleagues at the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg, the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, Helmholtz Institute Mainz, the University of Bonn and the Technical University of Vienna has taken an important step towards such a clock. Indeed, the new study is featured on the title page of the leading journal Nature. In the paper, the authors report that they have succeeded in quantifying the energy released by the decay of the excited thorium-229 nucleus, which is an essential prerequisite for the realization of a thorium-based nuclear clock.
Clock generators are oscillations in the atomic nucleus
Unlike current atomic clocks, which make use of oscillations in the outer electron shells of atoms, nuclear clocks employ oscillations within the nucleus as their timekeeper. In both cases, the oscillations are the product of transitions between defined energy levels, which can be excited by laser light of a specific wavelength. Typically, the energies required to excite oscillations in the vast majority of atomic nuclei are orders of magnitude higher than those required to stimulate transitions in the orbital shells of electrons – which precludes the use of conventional lasers for this purpose. However, there is only one viable candidate for the development of a nuclear clock – the thorium-229 nucleus. Its excited state is located at an energy that is by far the lowest of any state found in the approximately 3800 currently known atomic nuclei. Irradiation with UV light, which is within the capability of lasers now available, is sufficient to populate this excited state.
However, up to now, the precise energy required to generate the excited thorium-229 has remained unknown. “To induce the nuclear transition, the wavelength of the laser light must be tuned to match the transition energy exactly. We have now succeeded in measuring this precisely for the first time,” says Benedict Seiferle, lead author of the new paper.
Uranium-233 sources as suppliers of excited thorium-229
For these measurements, carried out at LMU, the authors of the study made use of the doubly charged thorium-229 cation. Sources providing this cation in the excited nuclear state were developed in Mainz. “Uranium-233 was chemically purified and subsequently deposited on titanium-covered silicon wafers using an electrochemical method. This yields homogeneous thin films. Uranium-233 undergoes alpha decay, producing thorium-229. Thorium-229 recoils from the thin film due to the energy released in the alpha decay, hence entering into a dedicated ion trap developed at LMU in which thorium-229 cations are recovered,” Christoph Düllmann, chemist at GSI Helmholtzzentrum, University Mainz and HIM, describes the process. The excited state of the cation has a lifetime of hours. This is relatively long for an excited nuclear state and is crucial for the future development of the clock, but it hampers measurement of the decay energy. “This long lifetime means that decay to the ground state occurs only rarely. As measurement of this decay was the goal of our experiment, we exploited the fact that decay occurs rapidly when the cations are given the opportunity to collect the missing electrons,” says Seiferle.
To provide electrons, Seiferle and colleagues guided the ions through a layer of graphene. On its way through this layer, each ion picks up two electrons and emerges as a neutral atom on the other side. Thanks to this controlled neutralization step, the excited state then decays to the ground state within a few microseconds. The neutralized atoms expel an electron from an outer atomic shell, thus generating a positively charged thorium-229 ion. The kinetic energy of the free electron depends on the excitation energy of the nuclear state and is determined using an electron spectrometer. However, this energy is only a fraction of the energy used to generate the excited nuclear state. The rest remains in the thorium-229, which renders the interpretation of the resulting spectra complex. To get around this problem, the authors based at the Max-Planck Institute for Theoretical Physics in Heidelberg calculated the spectra to be expected. With the aid of these predictions, and in collaboration with their colleagues in Vienna and Bonn, the team in Munich was then able to determine the energy actually associated with the decay of the excited nuclear state.
Nucleus excitation by laser beams with a wavelength of 150 nanometers possible
The result indicates that the thorium-229 nucleus can be excited to this level by irradiation with laser light at a wavelength . Now lasers specifically designed to emit in this wavelength range can be constructed. This step will bring the first nuclear clock a great deal closer to practical realization. The researchers believe that a thorium-based nuclear clock will open up new avenues in the basic sciences, but will also find many applications, which only become possible on the basis of extremely precise measurements in the time domain.
The current results opens the way for new research prospects at the FAIR accelerator facility currently being built at GSI. Professor Thomas Stöhlker, Vice Director of Research and head of the Atomic Physics division at GSI, says: „This refined energy value opens up future research opportunities at the FAIR storage rings, allowing for precision studies of thorium-229 and its isomer at highest charge states via di-electronic recombination.“ (LMU/CP/JL)
Scientific publication in Nature
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In addition to the wide range of information, it was also possible to simulate playfully the production of the element Darmstadtium on an accelerator model. In experiments at the GSI accelerator facility, scientists succeeded in discovering a total of six new elements. One of them is the Darmstadtium. The Science and Congress Center was named after this one.
The commitment during the “Tag der Vereine” is a further component of the good cooperation between GSI and the Darmstadtium Congress Center: With the discovery of the element Darmstadtium, GSI is not only eponymous for the Science and Congress Center, but was also one of the event partners of the “Tag der Vereine”. In addition, both jointly published a new periodic table of the elements as teaching material for schools, an important tool for chemistry lessons. GSI and Darmstadtium are giving out the periodic table to schools free of charge (for as long as stocks last). Teachers can order copies for their school classes. (Shipping within Germany.) (BP)
]]>The Collaboration Board is the highest body overseeing the work of the ALICE collaboration. It considers all issues, policies, decisions and recommendations relevant to the construction, maintenance, operation and upgrading of the ALICE experiment, as well as any issues related to the analysis and publication of information or data taken during experiments with the ALICE set-up.
"It is a great honor for me to be elected as Chair by the Collaboration Board. I am very thankful for the very large support and the trust the Collaboration puts in me," explained Silvia Masciocchi after the election. "I look forward to the many tasks and challenges that this responsible position brings with it. ALICE is going through a very exciting and very challenging phase: While we are still publishing many physics results from the first two periods of LHC running (from 2009 to 2018), we are currently upgrading most of the experimental apparatus and software framework. From 2021 onwards, ALICE will record heavy-ion collisions at the unprecedented rate of 50 kilohertz in continuous readout mode. The Collaboration faces ambitious and intense work in order to ensure that ALICE will be ready for a successful data taking starting in 2021, which will allow a significantly extended physics program. I am looking forward to steering the efforts of the whole collaboration through the Collaboration Board in the next exciting years. Also, in this way GSI continues to have a leading and essential role in the success of ALICE.”
Silvia Masciocchi studied physics in Milan, Italy. After completing her PhD at the University of Heidelberg, she worked at the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg, the Max Planck Institute for Physics in Munich and the Deutsches Elektronensynchrotron DESY in Hamburg. In 2006, she joined GSI in the research department ALICE, which she has also headed since 2011. In 2017, she was appointed Professor at the University of Heidelberg.
From the beginning, GSI has played a leading role in the construction and scientific program of ALICE. GSI's research department ALICE shares responsibility for the operation of ALICE's two largest detector systems. The Time Projection Chamber (TPC) and the Transition Radiation Detector (TRD) were designed and built with significant contribution of GSI’s ALICE department and Detector Laboratory. Currently, GSI gives an essential contribution to the ALICE upgrade program, specifically in the TPC project and in the development of the new Online-Offline (O2) software framework. To do this, GSI’s ALICE department, Detector Laboratory and IT department work closely together. GSI scientists have several leading roles in data analysis and in the physics program of ALICE. (cp)
]]>The Test Infrastructure and Accelerator Research Area (TIARA) is a dedicated structure, the purpose of which is to exchange expertise and to facilitate and support the setting-up of joint research and development programs and education and training activities in the field of accelerator science and technology in Europe. The TIARA activities includes among other things the provision of scientific and technical guidance and advice for cooperative research and development (R&D) toward future accelerator science and technology.
TIARA is coordinated by Roy Aleksan from the French Atomic Energy and Alternative Energies Commission CEA with support in managing the major EU funded programs by Maurizio Vretenar from the European Organization for Nuclear Research CERN. The local organization of the meeting at GSI has been performed by the subproject SIS100/SIS18. One reason to meet at GSI-/FAIR campus was to inform the international experts on the status of the FAIR project. One point of the agenda was a visit to the FAIR construction site, accompanied by a presentation of Peter Spiller and Niels Pyka on the status of the FAIR project. A personnel decision was also to be made. The committee has elected Eugenio Nappi as new chair of the TIARA council. (BP)
There are currently 118 elements listed in the periodic table. 92 of them occur naturally on Earth. The search for further new elements is conducted using particle accelerators. To produce elements, researchers collide an ion beam consisting of atomic nuclei of one element with a material sample of another element. In the fusion of the atomic nuclei of both elements a new, heavy element can be produced. The recognition and inclusion of a new element in the periodic table takes place as soon as the discovery has been confirmed. Heavy elements produced in this way are unstable, i.e. they decay within a short time. Unresolved research questions in this field include, for example, how heavy elements are formed, whether heavier elements can have longer lifetimes again due to their special nuclear configuration (known as the island of stability) and which chemical and physical properties the heavy elements have.
Professors Peter Armbruster and Gottfried Münzenberg, who held leading positions in the production of elements 107 to 112 (bohrium, hassium, meitnerium, darmstadtium, roentgenium and copernicium) at the GSI Helmhotzzentrum during their active research careers, are present at the conference. Professor Yuri Oganessian is also on site. He is an element discoverer from Russia and currently the only living person an element is named after: element 118, Oganesson. He was head of the discovery team of Elements 114 to 118 (flerovium, moscovium, livermorium, tennessine and oganesson) at the Flerov Laboratory of the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, JINR in Dubna, Russia. Dr. Kouji Morimoto from Japan of the RIKEN Nishina Center for Accelerator-Based Science, who was a member of the element 113 discovery team, attends as well. The current heads of GSI, the Flerov Laboratory and the RIKEN Nishina Center, where the respective elements were discovered, also participate in the conference.
“Research on the heavy elements is an incredibly exciting field, there are many unanswered questions,” explained Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI, as well as the new international research facility FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) being built in Darmstadt. “Where do the elements come from? How are they produced in explosions of stars and other stellar events? We would like to elicit answers to these questions from the cosmos with the help of our accelerator facilities. The investigation of the heaviest elements will continue to play a very important role in the future of our laboratory. The FAIR facility, which is currently being built at GSI in Darmstadt in international cooperation, offers new opportunities to bring the universe into the laboratory.”
Professor Sergey Dmitriev, Director of the Flerov Laboratory of Nuclear Reactions (FLNR) said at the congress: “Priority experiments on the synthesis of new superheavy elements — flerovium (114), moscovium (115), livermorium (116), tennessine (117), oganesson (118) — were carried out at the FLNR using the U400 accelerator. Further progress required the construction of a superheavy-element factory at FLNR whose key facility is the DC280 cyclotron with the ion beam intensity an order of magnitude higher than that achieved to date. The commissioning of the factory will allow experiments on the synthesis of the elements 119 and 120 and will significantly expand the work on the study of nuclear and chemical properties of superheavy elements."
In Japan, the search for new elements also continues: “Since December 2018, we run ‘119th element search’ experiment using one of the five cyclotrons in the RIKEN RI Beam Factory. At the end of 2019, our linear accelerator will be equipped with newly-built super conducting cavities and ready to synthesize new elements with higher beam intensity. We will run both experiments in parallel as long as resource permits. We will continue these experiments until somebody, hopefully RIKEN, finds the 119th element,” Hideto En’yo, head of the RIKEN Nishina Center, described the current research goals.
A total of 120 researchers from 19 countries and 4 continents take part in the TAN conference. During the conference week, they discussed the current results and perspectives of research on the so-called transactinides, the namesakes of the TAN conference series. This refers to the elements starting with the atomic number 104 which follow the subgroup of actinides. They are all artificially produced and will be further investigated in the course of research on heavy elements. “We are trying to determine their chemical properties, for example” explained Professor Christoph Düllmann, co-organizer of the TAN, professor at the University of Mainz and head of the GSI and HIM research departments on the chemistry of heavy elements. “The elements are sorted into the groups of the periodic table according to their atomic number. Elements with similar chemical properties stand below each other. In the case of new artificial elements, of course a clarification is needed which properties they have, and whether they also belong to these groups, or whether the high nuclear charge in these exotic atoms causes a disruption of the electron shell and thus leads to unexpected chemical properties.”
“We are also investigating the physical properties of the new elements in the same way,” commented Professor Michael Block, another TAN co-organizer and professor in Mainz, who is also head of the GSI and HIM research department on the physics of heavy elements. “For example, the configuration and the energy levels of the nuclear building blocks can be determined by spectroscopic investigations, or high-precision mass measurements of the nuclei can be carried out in order to understand the behavior of the elements in detail and further improve the current nuclear models.”
The TAN Conference takes place in the International Year of the Periodic Table 2019 (IYPT) proclaimed by UNESCO, which celebrates the 150th anniversary of the Periodic Table. In 1869, the Russian chemist Dmitri Mendeleev introduced a system to the elements, which were previously disordered, and made predictions about missing, then unknown elements. He is thus regarded as the father of the periodic table. The conference has a local connection to the physician and chemist Lothar Meyer, who also proposed a corresponding system for the elements. He came from the neighboring village of Varel, south of Wilhelmshaven.
In addition to scientific discourse, a symposium on the occasion of the IYPT with information on the history of the periodic table and the element discoveries, as well as an outlook on the future of research on heavy elements, takes place over the course of the TAN. Representatives of the international organizations IUPAC and IUPAP, responsible for naming the elements, as well as the German Physical Society and the Society of German Chemists are also present. The TAN is one of many examples of successful international cooperation in the world of research. (CP/JL)
]]>India, one of the founding members and shareholders of FAIR GmbH, is participating in the FAIR project with numerous in-kind contributions to the accelerator and several experiments. These include the most modern ultra-stable high-power converters (USHPC) for the FAIR magnets. They are being manufactured by the Electronics Corporation of India Limited (ECIL) in association with Bose Institute of Kolkata with design assistance provided by the Raja Ramanna Centre for Advanced Technology (RRCAT), Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) and Variable Energy Cyclotron Centre (VECC).
In a festive act at the ECIL site in Hyderabad, the first batch of 67 power converters was put on the road to shipment to Germany in the presence of the GSI and FAIR delegations. Jörg Blaurock and ECIL Managing Director Sanjay Chaubey, spoke of an important moment. "This is a special highlight of a ten-year journey in close cooperation with various institutions. We started from scratch and delivered what the nation has expected us to," said Sanjay Chaubey. Jörg Blaurock stressed: "ECIL is an important and reliable partner for us. We have a very successful cooperation. India is making a valuable contribution to the FAIR project with its in-kind deliveries".
In India and on the GSI and FAIR campus, in advance prototypes and first series specimens of the power converters had already successfully undergone extensive quality and performance tests. ECIL will produce a total of about 700 converters for the magnets of the large FAIR ring accelerator SIS100, the High-Energy Beam Transport HEBT and the Superconducting Fragment Separator Super-FRS.
The Electronic Corporation of India ECIL was setup in 1967 under the Indian Department of Atomic Energy with the aim of generating a strong indigenous capability in the field of high-performance electronics. The Institute has been involved already in several high-level international research programs, such as the supply of components for the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) of the European Nuclear Research Centre CERN. (BP)
]]>The research is concerned with the properties of magnetic materials and tailor-made changes to new materials: Two teams of female physicists from the University of Duisburg-Essen (UDE) will receive a total of 2.8 million euros for a period of three years. They are developing new instruments for experiments on particle accelerators. One project will be implemented at the CRYRING ion storage ring at the GSI and FAIR campus in Darmstadt.
At CRYRING, which will also be part of the future accelerator facility FAIR, the researchers under the direction of Professor Marika Schleberger are investigating solids using ion beams. In order to do this, a measuring station on the 17-meter-diameter ring, in which the ions fly from low speeds to a quarter of the speed of light, is being equipped with novel instruments. They are being specially developed by the project partners of the UDE and the University of Gießen. The researchers want to analyze the particles that are released during bombardment with ions in order to answer key questions: How to achieve customized changes in new materials using the targeted removal of individual atoms? In which subunits do biomolecules break under particle bombardment, and can one control this process? How can detection sensitivity be further increased?
The CRYRING is a contribution from Sweden to FAIR, which was transported from Stockholm to GSI. It was initially set up in cooperation with GSI for experiments and machine tests on the existing GSI accelerator facility. The system is planned for long-term use in atomic research with slow antiprotons at the FAIR facility.
Another project, under the direction of Dr. Katharina Ollefs deals with novel, energy-efficient cooling using magnetic materials. The previous systems damage the environment or consume a lot of electricity. Magnetocaloric materials offer an alternative: Their temperature can be altered with the use of a magnetic field. Within the framework the ULMAG project (ULtimate MAGnetic Characterization) that is currently being funded, Ollef’s Team, together with colleagues from the Technical University of Darmstadt, wants to investigate elementary and magnetic properties of materials under exactly the same conditions. The experiments will take place at the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) in Grenoble (France). The ESRF produces x-rays that are 100 billion times more intense than the radiation used in hospitals. “The new device at the synchrotron radiation source tracks minute changes in magnetism and structure with high precision from the direct point of view of the crucial atoms at the same time as the phase transition. From this, we are hoping to achieve groundbreaking new developments in the field of magnetocaloric materials,” explains Ollefs.
Both joint projects are funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research with 1.4 million euros each for a period of three years. (UDE/BP)
]]>The GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung and the future FAIR accelerator center once again took part in the cooperation “Tage der Industriekultur Rhein-Main” and opened their campus and research facilities to the public by appointment. Under the theme “The Universe in the Lab”, guests were able to explore the campus, get information on current research, and find out more about the mega construction project FAIR. The observation platform provided them with a comprehensive overview of the development of one of the largest construction sites for cutting-edge research worldwide. On the 20-hectare building site north-east of the GSI campus is currently being built a fascinating scientific project with accelerator and storage rings, high-tech infrastructure and outstanding experimental opportunities.
At FAIR, matter that usually only exists in the depth of space will be produced in a lab for research. Scientists from all over the world will be able to gain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe from the Big Bang to the present. (BP)
]]>The award is associated a special lecture assigned to the laureate. Marco Durante gave the Schneider Memorial Lecture on August 5 in Galveston. The title of the lecture was "Heavy ions in radiotherapy: Do the improved physical and biological properties translate to better outcome in patients?”
The Martin Schneider Memorial Awards is assigned yearly by the University of Texas to honour the first Chairman of the Radiology Department at UTMB. Schneider headed the department form the foundation in 1948 until his death in 1966. With the awarding to Professor Durante it is the first time that the Schneider Memorial Lecture is delivered by a non-US scientist. The award has been given by the Chair of Radiation Oncology at UTMB, Professor Sandra “Sunny” Hatch. (BP)
]]>The HADES detector system on the GSI and FAIR campus in Darmstadt, as tall as a house, provides researchers with exciting insights into the events of the collision of two heavy nuclei at relativistic energies and – as has now been very successfully done – allows them to track down the microscopic properties of extreme states of matter in the laboratory. The latest results of the HADES collaboration, involving more than 110 scientists from numerous countries, mark an important moment: “The reconstruction of thermal radiation from compressed matter is a milestone in the understanding of cosmics forms of matter. It not only allows to extract the temperature of the system formed in the collision but also provides deep insight into the microscopic structure of matter under such conditions,” says Professor Joachim Stroth, spokesperson of the HADES collaboration, who coordinated the current analyses together with Professor Tetyana Galatyuk. Numerous other scientists from GSI and FAIR were involved in the current publication.
The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, whose research focus is the physics of high-energy heavy ion collisions and the matter produced in them, is already looking forward to the future and to the worldwide unique accelerator center FAIR, which is currently being built at GSI: “HADES will continue to contribute a lot to the exploration of atomic nuclei and their building blocks and will be an important part of FAIR's Compressed Baryonic Matter (CBM) experiment. Among other things, researchers there will be able to investigate processes within neutron stars with unprecedented precision and over a very wide range of densities."
The electromagnetic radiation observed by the HADES detector within the scope of the study now presented is mediated by virtual photons. They exist for an instant and soon decay into a pair of leptons (dilepton), e.g. an electron and a positron. Since leptons do not undergo strong interactions, the dense hadronic medium is nearly transparent to this radiation. Nevertheless, it is produced throughout the whole evolution of the reaction and therefore provides an ideal probe for the microscopic properties of the dense and hot medium created in the collision. From the spectral distribution of the radiation it could be deduced, that the matter must have reached temperatures in excess of 70 megaelectron volt (800 Giga Kelvin) and densities three times nuclear saturation density.
Indeed, the densities and temperatures reached in the collision zone of such heavy-ion reactions resemble the conditions in neutron star merger processes. Since the detection of gravitational waves and electromagnetic radiation emitted from these Giga Novae events in a wide range of the electromagnetic spectrum, it is suggested that such merger events are the cosmic kitchens for the synthesis of heavy nuclei. An important input to respective theoretical investigations is the so-called equation of state of matter under extreme conditions. With heavy-ion reaction experiments at relativistic energies some of the relevant properties are now accessible in the laboratory.
An advantage of detecting virtual photons, in contrast to real photons, is the fact that they carry additional information. This allows reconstructing a Lorentz-invariant quantity, which has the same value independent of the relative velocity of the emitting system with respect to the laboratory frame. Since energy and momentum is conserved throughout the process, this invariant mass is identical to the mass of the hadronic system which has emitted the virtual photon in the first place. Hence, this radiation literally allows to look inside the hot and dense interaction zone.
As a surprising outcome of this HADES experiment it was found, that very likely the photons are produced by so-called vector meson which undergo a strong modification due to the dense environment they are embedded in. The reconstructed invariant mass distribution of the virtual photons, which shows a remarkably smooth exponential falloff, suggests that the mediating mesonic states, the ρ mesons, are actually nearly dissolved in the dense matter. A similar modification of the properties of the ρ vector meson is expected if the spontaneously broken chiral symmetry is restored. The dynamical breaking of this symmetry is a fundamental property of QCD, the theory of the strong interaction, and explains e.g. the existence of the exceptionally light mesons like the pion. The degree of chiral symmetry breaking therefore controls how nucleons are interacting with each other.
The HADES experiment is the first to successfully reconstruct thermal electromagnetic radiation in collision of heavy-ions at energies around 1 A GeV, where the emission of virtual photons with mass of a few hundred MeV/c2 is a truly rare process: About 3 billion Au+Au collisions had to be recorded and analyzed to finally reconstruct 20,000 virtual photons via their decay into a pair of electrons and with masses larger than 200 MeV/c2. (BP)
The politician, who is also member of the Senate of the Helmholtz Association, informed himself about the status of the FAIR construction project, which is one of the largest cutting-edge research projects worldwide, and about previous research successes and the current experiments. After an introductory presentation and opportunity for discussion, he was able to take a close view on the great progress made on the mega construction site FAIR during a tour of the site, from the completed shell construction of the first tunnel segments for the large ring accelerator SIS100 up to the excavation pit for the first of the further large-scale experiments
The visit of Dr. Stefan Kaufmann concluded with a walking tour on the GSI and FAIR Campus, which provided him with an insight into the existing accelerator and research facilities. He visited the test facility for superconducting accelerator magnets, where high-tech components for FAIR are examined, the Experimental Storage Ring ESR and the therapy unit for tumor treatment using carbon ions. It became clear that, in addition to the great construction progress, top research and high-tech developments for the mega-project FAIR are also very active. (BP)
]]>In preparation for this cooperation, the FAIR subproject team SIS100/SIS18 first compared different options and locations. A good basis for this was also a broader Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for scientific cooperation between Germany and Italy. The collaboration agreement now signed by GSI/FAIR and INFN is an important part of the technical acceptance of the quadrupole modules to be integrated at Bilfinger Noell in Würzburg.
The high-tech modules for the large FAIR ring accelerator are the result of a complex international production process: first, custom-made superconducting quadrupole units consisting of various types of focusing and correction magnets are produced in Russia and then sent to Germany. There they are brought together with other components procured by GSI and assembled into complete modules for the FAIR ring accelerator.
More than 80 of these integrated quadrupole modules will then be shipped from Würzburg to the National Facility for Superconducting Systems (NAFASSY) in Salerno, Italy, where they will be tested at the final operating temperature of -270 degrees Celsius on a cryogenic test facility specially converted for this process. Main subject of the cold test are the new subsystems formed at Bilfinger Noell as a result of the integration, such as the electric circuits of the correction magnets, the UHV system (ultra-high vacuum) and the thermomechanical characteristics of the cryostat system itself.
The cooperation at the Salerno site, which is well suited for these tasks due to the already existing technical equipment, is to last for several years until all quadrupole modules for the SIS100 ring accelerator have been manufactured, accepted and stepwise set up in the tunnel on the FAIR construction site. (BP)
]]>In an introductory lecture, Minister Dorn received information on the existing accelerator facilities and experiments of GSI as well as on the previous research successes. She also learned more about the planning and construction progress of the international accelerator center FAIR. During a subsequent bus tour of the FAIR construction site, she was able to see the work for herself. On the FAIR/GSI campus, the visit then led her to the treatment center for tumor therapy with carbon ions and to the large-scale detector HADES. The Minister was very interested in the research results and impressed by the unique scientific possibilities and complexity of the FAIR construction project. The Minister commented on Twitter: "When you can only speak in records and the human imagination reaches its limits — the fascination of particle acceleration during a visit including a tour of the construction site". (CP)
Every year, the Summer Student Program offers participants an insight into research at a particle accelerator facility. Each summer student works in a research group on a small scientific or technical project from ongoing research operations. The topics range from plasma physics and tumor therapy to nuclear and astrophysics. Developments and tests of technical and experimental components for the FAIR accelerator facility, which is currently under construction at GSI, and their future experiments are in focus.
Many students, mainly from European and Asian countries, return to Darmstadt after the Summer Student Program for a master's or doctoral thesis at GSI and FAIR. The Summer Student Program that takes place for the 39th time is organized in cooperation with the graduate school HGS-HIRe. In addition to scientific events, the program also includes barbecues, a football tournament and activities in the region. Accompanying lectures will present the broad research spectrum of GSI and FAIR and the scientific results achieved. The lectures are held in English. They are open to the public and can be attended by anyone interested. (LW)
Bernd Reuther is delegate from the Wesel I district and member of the parliamentary Committee on Transport and Digital Infrastructure, in addition member of the federal state executive of the FDP Nordrhein-Westfalen and district chairman of the FDP Wesel.
After an introductory presentation and opportunity for discussion, Bernd Reuther was able to take a close view on the great progress on the construction site FAIR during a tour of the area, from the completed shell construction of the first tunnel segments for the large ring accelerator SIS100 and the work for the central transfer building up to the excavation pit for the further large-scale experiment CBM.
The visit to the test facility for superconducting accelerator magnets, where high-tech components for FAIR are tested, was also on the agenda. It became clear that, in addition to the great progress in construction, the high-tech developments for the mega-project FAIR are already in full swing. (BP)
]]>Claudia Fournier, who leads the research field "Immune system and tissue radiobiology” at GSI, was member of the German delegation for the annual meeting of UNSCEAR. The United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation (UNSCEAR), set up by resolution of the United Nations, publishes reports, which provide a scientific basis for the recommendations of the ICRP (International Commission on Radiological Protection) on radiological protection concerning ionizing radiation. (BP)
]]>In addition to talks with the scientists from FAIR and GSI, Oganessian also held the traditional Tuesday Colloquium. On the occasion of the 150th anniversary of the Periodic Table of the Elements, he spoke in front of a full auditorium about its development and in particular about the efforts to expand it by producing superheavy elements. Numerous questions showed the great interest of the audience in the topic. Oganessian has been in friendly scientific contact with FAIR and GSI since the establishment of GSI in the 1970s. Especially in the efforts to generate new chemical elements, there has been and still is a lively exchange between the researchers at FAIR/GSI and at JINR.
In addition to the synthesis and description of the heavy elements, Oganessian's work focuses on the development of ion accelerators and methods for investigating nuclear reactions. He developed new ideas for the production of the elements 102 to 118 and successfully implemented them in the discovery of many new elements. The element with the atomic number 118 was last detected by his research group in October 2006. Ten years later, in 2016 the name Oganesson (chemical symbol Og) was proposed by the participating research groups for this element and, subsequently, officially awarded. Following Glenn T. Seaborg, Oganessian is thus only the second human after whom an element was named during his lifetime. (CP)
In an introductory lecture followed by a discussion, Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, Ursula Weyrich, Administrative Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, and Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, provided information on the research at the existing GSI facilities as well as on the objectives and status of the FAIR project. During a tour of the FAIR construction site, the guests were afterwards able to see the progress of construction and, in particular, take a look at the work on the transfer building and the tunnel segments.
Subsequently, they visited the test stand for the superconducting magnets of the FAIR ring accelerator SIS100 on the FAIR/GSI campus, which are cooled down to minus 269°C during operation. At the large-scale detector HADES, they were informed about the detector technology and the research carried out on the measuring setup. Special attention was paid to the complex data acquisition, storage and analysis of large amounts of measurement data. (cp)
]]>We will give away ten of our coffee mugs "Das Universum im Labor" in a prize draw among all entries (shipping only to Germany). The photos with the most votes will be presented in an internal photo exhibition in the KBW foyer at the end of the year, as well as published via our website and our social media channels.
The campaign runs until August 31, 2019. Find all information, the conditions of participation and the entry form at www.gsi.de/en/lieblingsbild.
We are looking forward to your selection. (cp)
]]>Following a presentation on GSI and the future FAIR accelerator center, they, among other topics, exchanged views on the strategic goals for FAIR and GSI. Afterwards, a tour of the existing research facilities and the FAIR construction site was part of the program.
During the bus tour of the FAIR construction site, Ayse Asar was able to personally inspect the work on the 20-hectare site, for example the first tunnel sections for the main ring accelerator SIS100, the ongoing work for the transfer building, the central node for the beamlines, and the excavation pit for the future large-scale experiment CBM. During the subsequent tour of the test facility for the superconducting magnets of the FAIR ring accelerator SIS100, it was visible that the high-tech developments for the mega-project FAIR are already in full swing. (LW)
]]>In order to network, coordinate and strengthen future biophysical research at FAIR and other large accelerator facilities, the first meeting of the International Biophysics Collaboration took place at GSI and FAIR. The participants were welcomed by Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Karlheinz Langanke, Research Director of GSI and FAIR, and Professor Marco Durante, Head of the Biophysics Department.
“We are proud of the success of this first meeting of the new international biophysics collaboration,” said Giubellino. “FAIR will open up new opportunities for experimentation for the international biophysics community with particularly high energies and intensities. The numerous and active participation in the meeting shows how important the FAIR Phase 0 Research Program, which has already begun, is in view of the later unique research opportunities in FAIR which is currently under construction. As a user facility, our mission is to offer scientists the opportunity for excellent research, and the response of the international scientific community is the most direct measure of the quality of our work.”
“We are thrilled of the community's great interest in the first meeting of the International Biophysics Collaboration,” says Durante. “Participants have arrived from 27 countries in all 5 continents. The beginning of the FAIR experiments with FAIR Phase 0 is the occasion for us to establish a solid collaboration from the already existing cooperation of the user groups. FAIR offers completely new opportunities for biology, medicine and space research. The other new facilities that are currently being built in Europe, Asia and the USA also want to develop research programs in biomedical applications, and therefore they knit together in the FAIR Collaboration. We jointly want to develop new cooperative research programs and tools for the future.”
One of the first speakers was astronaut Reinhold Ewald: “For a mission to Mars, research is still needed in many areas. How, for example, do the vitamins in astronaut food change when exposed to space radiation for a long time? As an astronaut, I would only get into the rocket if all the biological and physiochemical systems had been tested under conditions that were as real as possible on earth. It seems that this will be possible with FAIR,” said Ewald, who is also a professor at the Institute of Space Systems at the University of Stuttgart.
The speakers included Professor Gerhard Kraft, who introduced carbon ion therapy in Europe and founded the Biophysics Department at GSI; Professor Thomas Haberer, scientific and technical director at the Heidelberg Ion Beam Therapy Center (HIT); and Professor Jürgen Debus, medical director of the Department of Radiation Oncology and Radiation Therapy and Scientific-medical manager at HIT. “We want to continue the long-term cooperation with GSI also in regards of FAIR research,” said Debus. “Both biophysics and accelerator physics offer new technologies that are of interest for clinical application. The large and international response to the first meeting of the International Biophysics Collaboration demonstrates the potential of biomedical applications of ion beams and speaks in favor of the new collaboration.”
The international guests saw the meeting as a chance for new ideas and cooperation. Prof. Vincenzo Patera from the University of Rome, elected spokesperson of the Collaboration, said: “In the field of biophysics we need a comprehensive network to facilitate the exchange of information, the joint application for funding and to offer more flexibility for students. In that regard the International Biophysics Collaboration could play an important role and could improve the coordination of the various smaller research groups.”
The collaboration is supposed to support the cooperation beyond FAIR and to include experiments at other new accelerator facilities (NICA, RAON, FRIB, SPIRAL2, SPES, SEEIIST, ELI). Dr. Sanja Damjanovic, Minister of Science of Montenegro, presented one of the newly planned facilities during the conference, the South East European International Institute for Sustainable Technologies (SEEIIST): „SEEIIST is a facility for tumor therapy and biomedical research which is supposed to be equally used for patient treatment and for research. Our aim is offering a regional possibility for excellent research to students and scientists of all countries from Slovenia to Greece.”
The meeting of the International Biophysics Collaboration is planned to take place regularly in the future. (LW)
Link to the paper on Physics Reports: Durante M., Golubev A., Park W.-Y., Trautmann C., Applied nuclear physics at the new high-energy particle accelerator facilities. Phys. Rep. 800 (2919) 1-38
]]>“I feel very honored and pleased to be a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences”, says Blaum. He got nominated for the physics class of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences because of his excellent scientific achievements and his international reputation. "This is a personal award, but it can be considered as award for the performance of my entire department at the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics," says Blaum. "It is only due to the outstanding achievements of my team, which does excellent scientific work, that we are among the world leaders in our field of research. This was the basis for my award. I therefore accept it on behalf of my entire research group."
The election took place at the General Meeting of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in Stockholm in February 2019. In the FAIR-GSI Joint Scientific Council there are now two members of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences: Eva Lindroth, Professor at the Stockholm University, also is a member.
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences was founded in 1739 and is an independent non-governmental organization, whose overall objective is to promote the sciences and strengthen their influence in society. It enhances the status of science in society by drawing attention to key social issues, examining them in scientific terms and communicating the results, and joins in cooperation on global issues, with the aim of being an international scientific proponent of sustainable development. The Academy consists of approximately 460 Swedish and 175 foreign members, who together represent the country’s foremost expertise in the sciences.
Klaus Blaum studied physics at the Johannes Gutenberg-University in Mainz (Germany). After receiving his PhD, he worked as PostDoc for the “GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung” (Darmstadt, Germany) at the European Organization for Nuclear Research CERN in Geneva, Switzerland. From 2004 to 2007, he was leader of a Helmholtz Research Group in Mainz (Germany), where he habilitated in 2006. At the age of only 35 years, he was appointed as Director of the division “Stored and cooled ions” at the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg and as Professor and faculty member of the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the Ruprecht-Karls-University Heidelberg. For his groundbreaking research, he was awarded numerous prestigious prizes, among others the Mattauch-Herzog-Price 2005 of the German Society for Mass Spectrometry, the G.N. Flerov-Prize in 2013 and the 2016 Lise-Meitner-Award of the Gothenburg Physics Centre. In 2008, he was nominated Fellow of the American Physical Society. (LW)
]]>Christoph Meyer used the visit to Darmstadt to inform himself personally about the progress of the mega project FAIR and to visit the construction site. The tour included a look at the first completed shell construction sections for the large SIS100 ring accelerator, the construction activities for the central transfer building and the excavation pit for the future large-scale experiment CBM. Information was also provided on the FAIR project organization and construction site logistics.
Afterwards, Christoph Meyer, who was accompanied by his team member Marcel Schwemmlein, was able to gain insights into the existing research facilities during a guided tour on the GSI and FAIR campus. For example he visited the test facility for superconducting magnets for the accelerator ring SIS100 as well as the experimental storage ring ESR and the large detector HADES. The treatment unit for tumor therapy with carbon ions was also part of the visit. (LW)
]]>Physicists at the University of Jena have developed a new method for producing plasma, enabling them to deal with some of the problems that stand in the way of this extremely difficult process. The three classic physical states – solid, liquid and gaseous – can be observed in any normal kitchen, for example when you bring an ice cube to the boil. But if you heat material even further, so that the atoms of a substance collide and the electrons separate from them, then another state is reached: plasma. More than 99 per cent of material in space is present in this form, inside stars for instance. It is therefore no wonder that physicists are keen to study such material. Unfortunately, creating and studying plasmas on Earth using the high temperature and pressure that exist inside stars is extremely challenging for various reasons. A team of physicists under participations of GSI and the Helmholtz Institute Jena, once o GSI's branches, has now managed to solve some of these problems at Friedrich Schiller University Jena, and they have reported on their results in the renowned research journal ‘Physical Review X’.
“To heat material in such a way that plasma is formed, we need correspondingly high energy. We generally use light in the form of a large laser to do this,” explains Christian Spielmann of the University of Jena. “However, this light has to be very short-pulsed, so that the material does not immediately expand when it has reached the appropriate temperature, but holds together as dense plasma for a brief period.” There is a problem with this experimental setup, though: “When the laser beam hits the sample, plasma is created. However, it almost immediately starts to act like a mirror and reflects a large part of the incoming energy, which therefore fails to penetrate the matter fully. The longer the wavelength of the laser pulse, the more critical the problem,” says Zhanna Samsonova, who played a leading role in the project.
To avoid this mirror effect, the researchers in Jena used samples made of silicon wires. The diameter of such wires – a few hundred nanometres – is smaller than the wavelength of around four micrometres of the incoming light. “We were the first to use a laser with such a long wavelength for the creation of plasma,” says Spielmann. “The light penetrates between the wires in the sample and heats them from all sides, so that for a few picoseconds, a significantly larger volume of plasma is created than if the laser is reflected. Around 70 per cent of the energy manages to penetrate the sample.” Furthermore, thanks to the short laser pulses, the heated material exists slightly longer before it expands. Finally, using X-ray spectroscopy, researchers can retrieve valuable information about the state of the material.
“With our method, it is possible to achieve new maximum values for temperature and density in a laboratory,” says Spielmann. With a temperature of around 10 million Kelvin, the plasma is far hotter than material on the surface of the Sun, for example. Spielmann also mentions the cooperation partners in the project. For the laser experiments, the Jena scientists used a facility at the Vienna University of Technology; the samples come from the National Metrology Institute of Germany in Braunschweig; and computer simulations for confirming the findings come from colleagues in Darmstadt and Düsseldorf.
The Jena team’s results are a ground-breaking success, offering a completely new approach to plasma research. Theories on the state of plasma can be verified through experiments and subsequent computer simulations. This will enable researchers to understand cosmological processes better. In addition, the scientists are carrying out valuable preparatory work for the installation of large-scale apparatus. For example, the international particle accelerator, ‘Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research’ (FAIR), is currently being set up in Darmstadt and should become operational around 2025. Thanks to the new information, it will be possible to select specific areas that merit closer examination look. (FSU/CP)
Durante will join the Task Group 115 on Risk and Dose Assessment for Radiological Protection of Astronauts. The goal is to provide recommendations for the space agencies (including NASA, ESA, JAXA, Canadian, Russian and Chinese space agencies) on dose limits for astronauts in exploratory-class missions. At the moment different space agencies apply different career or mission-specifc limits, making an international mission to moon and Mars almost impossible. (cp)
The origin of mass, the properties of the building blocks of matter and their interaction in the formation of our universe — several research groups of the Physics Institutes at Justus Liebig University Giessen (JLU) are dealing with fundamental questions such as these. The German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) is funding their research on these topics with a total of around six million euros as part of several joint research projects.
Atomic and subatomic particles and their interactions are the focus of the BMBF Collaborative Research Program "Physics of the Smallest Particles". The program is embedded in the BMBF framework program ErUM (Erforschung von Universum und Materie). Working groups at the JLU and at other German universities are involved in research on the physics of the smallest particles at the national and international large-scale research institutions (co-financed) by the BMBF.
The working groups from the JLU Physics Institutes are particularly involved in the international research facility FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) currently under construction near Darmstadt, where in the near future state-of-the-art high-performance particle accelerators, ion storage rings and particle detectors will provide novel, high-precision insights into the structure and behavior of elementary particles and matter under the most extreme conditions. Such very high temperatures or pressures occurred shortly after the Big Bang or during stellar explosions and collisions of neutron stars. The Giessen working groups will receive around 5.3 million euros from the BMBF's Collaborative Research Program "Physics of the Smallest Particles" until the middle of 2021 for setting up and conducting experiments at FAIR and for theoretical investigations.
With a further 0.7 million euros, the BMBF is funding Giessen’s contributions to the Japanese BELLE-II experiment, where exotic elementary particles are produced and studied, and to the ATLAS experiment at the world's largest particle accelerator, the LHC, at the international research center CERN in Geneva.
The research program at FAIR consists of the four pillars APPA (Atomic and Plasma Physics and Applications), CBM (Compressed Baryonic Matter), NUSTAR (Nuclear Structure, Astrophysics and Reactions) and PANDA (Antiproton Annihilation in Darmstadt). Giessen Physics is active in all four research pillars.
As part of APPA, the Atomic and Molecular Physics Working Group (I. Physikalisches Institut, Prof. Dr. Stefan Schippers) is developing an intensive electron beam for precision measurements of heavy ions in the FAIR ion storage ring CRYRING for the highly accurate verification of quantum theoretical predictions. In addition, they coordinate the network of all German university groups involved in APPA.
The investigation of nuclei far from stability is expedited in NUSTAR, where Giessen Physics is involved with the working group of Prof. Dr. Christoph Scheidenberger (II. Physikalisches Institut) and builds high-precision detectors.
For the PANDA experiment, which will measure exotic hadronic states with worldwide unique precision, Giessen Physics is involved with two working groups in the development and construction of three subdetectors. The group around Prof. Dr. Kai-Thomas Brinkmann (II. Physikalisches Institut) builds the electromagnetic calorimeter and a micro-vertex detector, the group around Prof. Dr. Michael Düren (II. Physikalisches Institut) a special DISC-DIRC detector.
The CBM experiment will investigate high-density matter, similar to matter produced in the collision of neutron stars or black holes. Here, the group of Prof. Dr. Claudia Höhne (II. Physical Institute) develops and builds a RICH detector, for aspects concerning special materials there is a cooperation with Prof. Dr. Michael Dürr (Institute for Applied Physics). Part of this RICH development is already being used in the current HADES detector at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt.
The strong commitment to the construction of detectors at FAIR is rounded off by Giessen's participation in other research facilities worldwide, such as CERN (ATLAS experiment, Prof. Dr. Michael Düren, AR Dr. Hasko Stenzel) in Switzerland, or KEK (BELLE-II experiment, Prof. Dr. Claudia Höhne, PD Dr. Jens-Sören Lange) in Japan.
Based on the theory of strong interaction, the groups of Prof. Dr. Christian Fischer, PD Dr. Bernd-Jochen Schaefer and Prof. Dr. Lorenz von Smekal at the Institute of Theoretical Physics calculate the properties of hadrons and hadronic matter under extreme conditions using modern numerical methods and complex simulations in order to make theoretical predictions for the PANDA and CBM experiments. (JLU/CP)
Press release of the Justus Liebig University Gießen (German)
]]>The Bose Institute in Kolkata, acting as the Indian shareholder of the FAIR GmbH, was an important part of the visit. Giubellino met the new Director of Bose Institute Professor Uday Bandyopadhyay, who took over from Professor Sibaji Raha (chair of the FAIR Joint Scientific Council and representative of the Indian Council delegation), discussing the current status of the FAIR project and informing him about the steady progress in the four experimental pillars of FAIR. The meeting in Kolkata continued in a conversation with Subhasis Chattopadhyay, the program director of the Bose Institute’s Indo-FAIR Coordination Centre, and Professor Sanjay Ghosh of Bose Institute about in-kind contracting issues. Subsequently, Giubellino held a talk about FAIR at the University of Kolkata.
The delegation also visited the Electronics Corporation of India Ltd. (ECIL) located in Secunderabad (near Hyderabad). The company, as one of India’s providers for FAIR, produces around 750 power converters for magnets of the High-Energy Beam Transport (HEBT), the SIS100 ring accelerator and the Superconducting Fragment Separator (Super-FRS). The delegation inspected the testing laboratory for the power converters and a large number of finalized components on site ready for delivery to FAIR, and discussed the continuation of the successful cooperation.
In addition to the exchange with the FAIR partners, the opening ceremony of the scientific exhibition "Vigyan Samagam" (engl. congression of science) was part of the program. In the framework of the exhibition, Giubellino also met with Indian authorities, including a discussion with Professor Ashutosh Sharma, Secretary of the Department of Science and Technology (DST), and Dr. Kamlesh Nilkanth Vyas, Secretary of the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE). Another highlight of Giubellino's foray in Mumbai was a meeting with Professor Krishnaswamy VijayRaghavan, the Principal Scientific Advisor to the Government of India. He was very supportive of India's involvement in FAIR and readily accepted to visit FAIR at an early convenient date.
The touring exhibition will be shown in several major Indian cities, providing information about large international science projects in which India is involved. It contains a section about FAIR and the Indian contribution to the project featuring also components of detectors and accelerators. In total, more than 25 Indian science organizations and seven Indian industrial partners are collaborating with FAIR. Vigyan Samagam is planned to continue at Mumbai until 7 July 2019 and then moves through India to several other locations: Bengaluru from 29 July to 28 September 2019, Kolkata from 4 November to 31 December 2019 and finally to Delhi from 21 January 2020 to 20 March 2020. Each location will see a speech at the opening ceremony by one of the FAIR directors. (cp)
"Our hard work over the institute's first ten years has created a lasting basis that will ensure we continue to make outstanding progress in future. We have succeeded in our aims not only of proposing and establishing the first Helmholtz Institute in Germany as a cooperation between GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt and Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz but also of constructing a state-of-the-art research building," said Professor Kurt Aulenbacher, Director of HIM. "It was the appeal of our infrastructure, in particular, that helped to attract a group of leading researchers to come to Mainz. The research program, which was initially both narrowly focused and extremely ambitious, is now being managed by these first researchers and their teams with the fertile results we have seen so far," the HIM Director stated.
Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, commented on the tenth anniversary of the Helmholtz-Institut Mainz: "HIM is one of the two Helmholtz institutes in which GSI is participating and which strengthen our user community and lead to unique opportunities. The foundation ten years ago was a decisive step with which we placed our already very good cooperation on a solid institutional basis which allows to optimally combine the competences of the Mainz University and GSI to produce world class scientific results. At the same time, this is also an extremely important building block for the excellent research that we can conduct at the international accelerator center FAIR. Such connections bring researchers from all over the world together and enable extremely fruitful collaborations".
In 2009, the Helmholtz Institute Mainz was the first of today nine Helmholtz Association institutes to be founded on the initiative of the German federal government. The intention was to extend the long-standing partnership between GSI in Darmstadt and Mainz University and to promote the university’s profile in this field of research. As is usual for projects of this kind, the HIM is financed by the federal government (90 percent) and the state of Rhineland-Palatinate (10 percent). In addition, JGU makes available its technical infrastructure, scientific and technical staff as well as operating resources. The HIM has a total annual budget of approximately EUR 11 million.
"Helmholtz institutes are a valuable instrument for establishing long-term strategic partnerships between a Helmholtz Center, a university, and, occasionally, other partners," said Professor Otmar D. Wiestler, President of the Helmholtz Association. "They create an excellent basis for close cooperation in a pioneering field of research in which both partners complement each other. This makes them an attractive destination for top researchers from all over the world. Founded in June 2009, the HIM was the first Helmholtz institute in Germany. Ever since, the GSI Helmholtzzentrum network on the Gutenberg Campus in Mainz was making a name for itself as a pioneer in research into the strong interaction."
The Rhineland-Palatinate Minister of Science, Professor Konrad Wolf, also endorses this new model of cooperation between Helmholtz centers and universities: "Thanks to the achievements it has already attained in the field of fundamental physics, the Helmholtz Institute Mainz has become an internationally recognized and prominent facility in the Rhineland-Palatinate research landscape. It has clearly demonstrated just how profitable cooperation between centers of the Helmholtz Association and Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz can be."
"Establishing the Helmholtz Institute on the Gutenberg Campus has provided sustainable enhancement of our groundbreaking research in nuclear physics and nuclear chemistry," emphasized Professor Georg Krausch, President of Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz. "In its role as an influential strategic partner in JGU's Cluster of Excellence on Precision Physics, Fundamental Interactions and Structure of Matter, or PRISMA+, the Helmholtz Institute Mainz is reinforcing our research profile both nationally and internationally."
The Helmholtz Institute Mainz is currently concentrating on the strong interaction, which is the mechanism responsible for the strong nuclear force, one of the four fundamental forces of nature. To shed light on the subject from differing perspectives, the HIM is divided into six research sections. Some of these are dedicated to current and future experiments, chiefly at GSI and FAIR, one of the largest research projects in the world. Other HIM sections are focused on developing new accelerator technologies and working on testing and refining prevailing theories using supercomputers.
The strong force binds quarks and also neutrons and protons, the basic building blocks of the atomic nucleus, together. Researchers at the Helmholtz Institute Mainz are investigating the properties of mesons, i.e., short-lived particles composed of quarks. They are analyzing the structure of the proton and studying the properties of superheavy atomic nuclei. Furthermore, they are hunting for new, hypothetical particles beyond the Standard Model of particle physics and developing new theoretical models and future accelerator technologies.
In 2010, the HIM had a total of 25 personnel, now it counts 135 employees from 16 different nations. These talented individuals and the high-quality infrastructure are the essential resources to generate the anticipated exceptional research results.
Many research projects, often in international alliances, have been successfully completed over the past ten years, while contributions have been made to other projects:
Researchers in Mainz have a high-tech infrastructure at their disposal. In 2017, for instance, a new Structure, Symmetry, and Stability of Matter and Antimatter institute building of 8,000 square meters was inaugurated, with a state-of-the-art laser and chemistry laboratory and a clean room for assembling and preparing superconducting accelerator modules.
Since 2016, the state government of Rhineland-Palatinate, the federal government, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, and the HIM have invested a total of EUR 10.6 million in the new high-performance supercomputer MogonII/HIMsterII, which allows complex computational simulations.
The supercomputer is located in the new computer center in the HIM research building and is operated jointly by the JGU Center for Data Processing and the HIM. Thanks to its total computing power of two petaflops, researchers at the HIM and JGU now have access to the fastest high-performance computer presently installed at a German university. (JL/HIM)
]]>Recently, a delegation with Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, and representatives of the FAIR project lead as well as the subprojects ring accelerator SIS100/SIS18 and fragment separator Super-FRS visited the Wroclaw University for Science and Technology (WUST) in Poland. The delegation, which also included subproject managers Peter Spiller (SIS100/SIS18) and Haik Simon (Super-FRS) as well as work package managers Thomas Eisel and Felix Wamers, met with representatives of the Polish FAIR shareholder, the University of Wroclaw, to which Majka Zbigniew belonged, as well as the top management of the executing Wroclaw company Kriosystem. The kickoff meeting marked the start of the important phase of series production of bypass lines for the SIS100.
The bypass lines that are arranged around the entire ring ensure the transport of the cryogenic agent (liquid helium, LHe) past warmer accelerator components such as high-frequency systems, injection systems or extraction systems and serve to bypass these room-temperature devices in the straight sections of the SIS100. In this way, they constantly guarantee the cold of -268.6 °C required for the operation of the superconducting magnets in the entire ring system and are thus an essential part of the SIS100 local cryogenics system.
Beside the LHe process lines, the bypass lines contain the most important magnet bus bar system (consisting of three quadrupole- and one dipole circuit). In comparison to standard LHe transfer lines, they create major technical challenges. According to a design of WUST University, which was responsible for the design, Kriosystem has already manufactured and delivered the first of a series (FoS, First of Series) of bypass lines, which was successfully tested and accepted at GSI in Darmstadt after careful SAT tests (Site Acceptance Tests). With the signed manufacturing contract between the provider WUST and the company Kriosystem, the series production of 27 such bypass lines will now be launched.
In addition to these bypass lines, two more major technical systems of the highly specialized SIS100 cryogenics will be designed and manufactured as a Polish inkind contribution: The "lead boxes", chambers with terminals for feeding electricity into the cryogenic system, provide the link between the room-temperature water-cooled copper cables and the superconducting Nuclotron cables of the cryomagnetic system. The inkind contract for these lead boxes has already been signed and the design could meanwhile be completed. For the so-called "feed boxes" the content of the inkind contract has already been agreed and the final signature process has been launched.
Another important Polish FAIR contribution is planned for the superconducting fragment separator (Super-FRS) for the local cryogenics system. In order to be able to sign the corresponding inkind contract on short term, a steering group has been established to finalize the definition of the contractual scope of this contribution and to implement technical simplifications, proposed by the responsible team at WUST and GSI. (BP)
]]>Protecting people in space from cosmic radiation is a major challenge for space exploration. Harmful effects of space radiation pose a serious health risk to astronauts, especially in future long-term missions. Such radiation effects must be considered and minimized both in the design phase of spaceships and in mission planning. The weight that can be taken on board a spacecraft is yet another limiting factor. New materials which offer an improved shielding performance and lighter weight are in demand. That’s especially true when it comes to deep-space missions where radiation is even more intense than in the near-Earth orbit.
The international team of scientists has been working together in this area. Aside from the GSI Helmholtzzentrum the researchers are from the Institute of Medical Physics and Radiation Protection at the the Mittelhessen University of Applied Sciences in Giessen, from the Trento Institute for Fundamental Physics and Applications (TIFPA) in Povo, the Physics Department at the University of Trento in Povo, the Department of Applied Science and Technology at the Politecnico di Torino in Turin as well as from the Physics and Chemistry Departments and NIS (Center for Nanostructured Interfaces and Surfaces) at the University of Torino in Turin. Thales Alenia Space in Turin is also a part of the team. The company manages for the European Space Agency ESA the ROSSINI project for the optimization of radiation protection for astronauts, a long-term joint research project by ESA and GSI.
The team’s objective: to identify suitable shielding materials which are better than the well-proven standard solution hard polyethylene which is currently used for radiation protection on Earth, for example, or in the sleeping areas of the near-Earth International Space Station ISS . Due to the high hydrogen content of hydrides, lithium hydride was chosen as a promising starting point for further studies.
The investigations were carried out mainly at the accelerator facility on the GSI and FAIR campus in Darmstadt where particle radiation which is prevalent in outer space can be generated and made available for experiments. In its experiments, the research team evaluated the shielding performance of lithium hydride among other things using measurements with high-energy carbon rays. Accurate data could also be provided for benchmarking Monte Carlo simulations. Such simulations are used for risk estimation in studies without particle accelerators to obtain a statistical overview of radiation effects.
The recently published studies suggest that lithium hydride might be a good candidate as a shielding material. The Head of the GSI Department of Biophysics, Professor Marco Durante, summarizes: “Initial experimental results suggest that lithium hydride is appropriate in improving radiation protection for people over a long-term space mission.” Lithium hydride could therefore be an effective strategy in protecting people when it comes to long-term exploration of the solar system. “It could be the right material to go to Mars.”
Dr. Christoph Schuy, experiment supervisor, also considers the lithium hydride compounds to be promising. However, the researchers and engineers still have a number of tasks ahead of them, such as the precise determination of neutron production cross sections at high energies or the safe coating of the material.
While it offers a glimpse into the future, additional experiments at higher energies and with heavier ions are needed to fully assess the shielding ability of lithium hydride and other promising lithium compounds. The potential emergence of secondary radiation must also be investigated as well as a possible secondary benefit of shielding material such as in lithium-hydride-based batteries in spacecraft. Professor Durante explains: "We now have to test complex, realistic structures that simulate the real spacecraft walls, including lithium hydride. These tests started in February as part of the FAIR Phase 0 experimental program and are funded by the ESA-ROSSINI3 project".
ESA and GSI have been working together successfully on several research projects for years. At the future FAIR Accelerator Center which is currently being built at GSI, these possibilities will be considerably expanded upon: FAIR will facilitate experiments with an even wider range of particle energies and intensities and can simulate the composition of cosmic radiation more accurately than any other accelerator facility. ESA and FAIR agreed to work closer together and signed a collaborative agreement on cosmic radiation research just over a year ago. (BP)
The periodic table of elements is an important tool in chemistry lessons where it gives students a well-grounded comprehension of the structure of atoms and the properties of the chemical elements. All known chemical elements are included in this table. Each box represents an element and, in addition to its name, contains its chemical symbol and properties. Since it was drawn up 150 years ago, the periodic table has continued to develop, and today it lists 118 elements. The currently published version of the periodic table incorporates the latest IUPAC data and standards and is intended to be a learning aid for intermediate school levels.
With the discovery of six chemical elements, GSI Helmholtzzentrum has made a significant contribution to expanding the periodic table. The bohrium to copernicium elements were first discovered in experiments at GSI. A new element was created through fusing two atomic nuclei to form a new, much larger and heavier atomic nucleus. To do so, a particle collider was used to bombard the layer of an atomic nuclei of one element with the atomic nuclei of a second element at extremely high speeds. If the atomic nuclei hit one another in the center, they can fuse into a new atomic nucleus. One element discovered this way is darmstadtium, named after the city of Darmstadt, where it was discovered. At the same time, it also gave its name to the Darmstadtium Science and Congress Center.
Darmstadtium is a state-of-the-art congress center that focuses on the needs of future generations. It is well-known in Germany and Europe for sustainability and excellent information technology. As a pioneer in the connectivity revolution, it offers first-class in-house Internet access for conferences and congresses at the level of a major provider.
Darmstadtium and GSI Helmholtzzentrum are closely connected through the element names and their national and international standing. This is why the project partners have jointly published the periodic table as teaching material for chemistry lessons. With a clear and informative design and practical A4 format, the periodic table will be made available to schools. In addition to traditional data such as the atomic number, element symbol, electronegativity and melting and boiling points, it also contains information about both project partners. The surface of the sheet has been given a special coating. It protects the paper from dust, damp and other contamination. Furthermore, the matt surface of the coating absorbs annoying light reflections during the lessons.
GSI and Darmstadtium are giving out the periodic table to schools free of charge (for as long as stocks last). Teachers can order copies for their school classes. (Shipping within Germany.) (JL)
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Deuteron is the atomic nucleus of deuterium (“heavy hydrogen”). Deuterons play a role in nuclear fusion reactions in stars. “Like snowballs in hell” is how some researchers describe the fact that light nuclei like deuterons are recognizable in the quark-gluon plasma. In actuality, the high temperatures of the fireballs emanating from the collisions should melt the nuclei into their subatomic constituents though that’s not exactly what they seem to do. Elfner, Oliinychenko and his colleagues are now proposing a microscopic mechanism that could explain why the nuclei don’t disappear.
They start from an already existing qualitative explanation for the observation of these nuclei. This proposal postulates that the light nuclei created in the fireball are destroyed by high temperatures and are recreated over and over again by flying protons and neutrons as the fireball cools down. The microscopic mechanisms behind this scenario were unclear up until now. This is where Elfner, Oliinychenko and colleagues started and set about finding the mechanism by analyzing a series of reactions that could form deuterons. They identified a possible reaction in which protons and neutrons form deuterons in the presence of pions or quark-antiquark pairs. The pions could serve as a kind of catalyst for reactions between protons and neutrons, thereby enabling the stable production of deuterons in high-energy nuclear collisions.
The team simulated similar conditions to a CERN experiment recently conducted by the ALICE collaboration that accurately characterized collisional light nuclei. Then the comparison followed: the calculated deuteron yield and energy spectra were consistent with ALICE observations. The conclusion: if Elfner, Oliinychenko and the team’s idea is correct, it should also explain the formation of other observed nuclei such as tritons.
The authors now plan to review this possibility in upcoming calculations and to further substantiate their findings. In addition, they’re considering how to conduct further studies at lower radiation energies. Such considerations are also relevant for the HADES experiment at GSI and for the CBM experiment at the future FAIR Accelerator Center currently being developed at GSI. The topic of Elfner, Oliinychenko and the group is also presented in Bari, Italy, at this year's "Strangeness in Quark Matter" conference, one of the largest conferences in this field of research. (BP)
ROSE is a novel system for measuring four-dimensional (4D) transversal ion beam emittance. This is the volume occupied by an ion beam in the transversal phase space. Knowledge and manipulation of the ion beam emittance in the accelerator are relevant for improving the beam quality. Previously, only the horizontal and vertical projections of the 4D phase space could be measured for heavy ion beams with energies above 100 kilo-electron volts per nucleon. These measurements lack information on the coupling of the planes, since they represent only a shadow image of the actual volume in the phase space. Researchers Dr. Michael Maier and Dr. Chen Xiao of GSI's accelerator division developed the rotatable emittance measurement system ROSE at GSI to overcome this limitation. As a result, operators of heavy-ion accelerator systems will now have a universal measuring tool available to them for the first time that will enable measurement of the couplings between the planes. This allows a considerably more efficient tuning of the accelerator systems.
Maier describes his invention as follows: “In addition to the capability of a complete 4D measurement of the transversal beam emittance, the rotatability of the system allows one measurement plane to be spared, since all spatial directions can be approached from a single device. Since the rotary drive is significantly cheaper than the electronics required for a complete extra measurement plane, this reduces the costs of the emittance measurement system.”
The software package to be developed in the funded project and integrated into the overall ROSE system is intended to combine the four necessary and hitherto separate sub-functions of planning, controling, measuring and evaluating the 4D emittance measurement for the first time. In the project, this software and the previously developed components, the ROSE detector and the ‘Robomat’ electronic control system (previously also funded by the WIPANO project of the German Ministry of Economic Affairs and Energy), will be brought together to form a prototype of the complete 4D ROSE emittance system. Outside the project, the prototype will be tested at GSI in routine operation, optimized jointly with NTG, and finally marketed by NTG as a complete system. The prototype used in routine operation at GSI will also serve as a demonstrator for NTG.
“For users, the clear advantages are a shorter measurement time, less dependence on highly qualified personnel for planning and carrying out the measurement, the possibility of directly correcting the beam at a later stage and the possible minimization of installation and operating costs for the accelerator system,” explains Martina Bauer, who oversees the ROSE project as part of the GSI technology transfer, describing the benefits of the new technology. “Both in functional and economic terms, ROSE is superior to the greater part of the 2D emitter measuring systems currently available. ROSE may generally replace these when they are updated, or may be used directly in new accelerator systems. In Germany at least ten research institutes and a number of companies are now working with systems compatible with ROSE. According to the cooperation partner NTG there are more than 100 interested institutions across Europe in the fields mentioned above, while in particular the Asian market offers a far greater potential.”
Forecasts anticipate a global market share of approximately 20% and a significant increase in sales of 250% in the field of beam diagnostics, with a correspondingly significant positive effect on the employment of dedicated personnel by NTG. In addition, ROSE emittance measurements will enable many new research projects in the field of accelerator physics to be carried out. Especially with regard to the large-scale FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) project and the scientific experiments planned in relation to it, the technical possibilities now opened up by ROSE are a key element for meeting the requirements of the new and world-wide unique accelerator facility currently under construction at GSI in Darmstadt.(cp)
]]>In addition to general IPPOG-related topics, the agenda included information on the ongoing FAIR/GSI research, the public relations activities on site, a panel discussion, working groups and demos of educational kits by CAEN. Furthermore, participants took part in a tour of the facilities and the viewing platform of the FAIR construction site. On the occasion of the meeting, a so-called Masterclass for the children of staff members was held. The young people, under professional supervision of scientists, autonomously analyzed and interpreted recent data of the ALICE experiment located at the European research center CERN. IPPOG offers Masterclasses worldwide in cooperation with 250 research institutions that reach out to about 15,000 school-children in 55 countries. The IPPOG steering group approved and will include in the next year’s program the new Masterclass on particle therapy developed in a cooperation of GSI, CERN and Deutsches Krebsforschungszentrum (DKFZ) in Heidelberg.
IPPOG is a network of scientists, science educators and communication specialists working across the globe in informal science education and outreach for particle physics and fundamental research in general. IPPOG brings new discoveries to young people and conveys to the public that the beauty of nature is indeed becoming understandable from the interactions of its most fundamental parts. Recently, IPPOG has also focused on applications for society, which was reflected by the contributions of FAIR and GSI. The IPPOG collaboration currently comprises 30 members: 24 countries, five experiments and CERN as an international laboratory, as well as several candidates for membership. (cp)
This new masterclass was proposed towards enriching the program of the well-established International Physics Masterclasses (IMC), an educational outreach activity and flagship project of the International Particle Physics Outreach Group (IPPOG). The program currently reaches out to approx. 15,000 school children around the world with about 225 institutes from 55 participating countries in 2018. The aim of the pilot Masterclass session was to explore the students’ interest in the subject of particle therapy, as well as to get feedback from participants before presenting the new package to the IMC steering group during the spring IPPOG meeting in May at FAIR and GSI. More specifically, the theme of this new masterclass was chosen with the aim to highlight benefits for society from fundamental research, focusing on medical applications and related questions. The Particle Therapy Masterclass allows participants to get a hands-on experience of the actual techniques employed by researchers for treatment of cancer tumors using x-rays, protons or carbon ions, in a realistic way. The professional research software toolkit matRad developed by the DKFZ has been used in this Masterclass.
The alpha testing phase of the program was done at GSI in February 2019 and comments from the students were implemented in the program’s next version. Subsequently, following the pattern of any typical masterclass day, the involved institutes organized the local details of the event with schools of their area and also worked out a plan for the presentation of results and discussion during the common video conference at the end of the hands-on session. Each institute adapted the exact program of the masterclasses to the local needs, e.g. language or program details, in order to make it as attractive as possible to the participants. Comments from the participants, as well as from observing PhD students and scientists, were recorded and will be taken into consideration as the project moves to its next phase.
During the video-conference discussion of results, the enthusiasm and interest of the students were obvious, as well as their understanding of the presented topics. The local organizers who contributed in preparing and performing the event in all three institutes expressed their satisfaction but also their motivation and commitment to continue. The team work among colleagues of all three institutes contributes in preparing the next generation of scientists, but also in strengthening bonds among the involved institutes developing this project.
The successful pilot session has set the basis, and already several other institutes have declared interest to join. In addition to its impact in the framework of IMC, it has a great potential that can be explored and applied to enhance awareness of public, trigger interest and engage the next generation of scientists, promote education and training in related fields, and make clear the benefits of science and international collaborative spirit for society.
It is not a coincidence that the involved institutes in this pilot project are leading institutes for fundamental research but also renowned for important contributions in the field of medical applications. At GSI, where carbon ion therapy for cancer was pioneered in the 1990s, participants had the chance to visit the medical treatment facility where approx. 450 patients were treated for the first time. At Heidelberg, a visit of the HIT ion therapy center, built following the research results of GSI, had a strong impact particularly since it included a group photo next to the impressive gantry. At CERN, participants were excited about the visit to the Antiproton Decelerator and learning about antimatter and its use in PET scanners. They were also informed that CERN was the home of the open source design study of particle therapy facilities (PIMMS), which became the basis for the construction of two therapy centers in Europe, CNAO in Italy and MedAustron in Austria. It was only natural then to hear their question “What next?”.
Overall, the event was very successful and highly appreciated by the students, their teachers and families. (yf/cp)
After a welcoming address by the Scientific Managing Director of FAIR and GSI Professor Paolo Giubellino, the Technical Director of FAIR and GSI Jörg Blaurock and Dr. Ingo Peter, Head of Press and Public Relations, gave an overview of the research highlights to date and the plans for the future at the international FAIR accelerator facility as well as the fields of technology in which work is being carried out both in research and in infrastructure.
During the subsequent tour, the guests visited the FAIR viewing platform to gain an overview of the progress on the construction site. In cryotechnology, they learned more about the superconducting magnets, which must be cooled to minus 269°C for operation at FAIR. They also had the opportunity to inspect the main control room of the facility, the linear accelerator UNILAC and the experimental storage ring ESR. At the medical irradiation facility of the biophysics research department, the participants were informed about tumor therapy with carbon ions. A visit to the large detector HADES and the particularly energy-efficient high-performance computing center Green IT Cube rounded off the tour.
During the following lunch, the guests were able to connect with the technology experts of FAIR and GSI via an in-house exhibition. Representatives from technology transfer, biophysics, materials research, cryotechnology, electronics, IT and laser technology were available for discussions, could establish contacts and sound out cooperation possibilities. During the afternoon, the group also visited ESA's mission control, ESOC in Darmstadt. The day ended with a joint dinner where Professor Marco Durante, Head of GSI Biophysics, informed the participants about the effects of cosmic radiation on the human body and tumor therapy with ion beams in an accompanying lecture.
The event is part of the long-standing and very successful cooperation between GSI/FAIR and ESA. GSI/FAIR support ESA in the investigation of cosmic rays. To learn more about the effects of cosmic rays on humans, electronics and materials is one of the crucial questions of the future in astronautical and robotic spaceflight.
The BVMW represents the interests of medium-sized German industry. Its aim is to strengthen the competitiveness of companies and thus to secure the future viability of German SMEs. The Wirtschaftssenat, to which the BVMW appoints the members, is made up of around 230 business personalities who represent the services provided by small and medium-sized enterprises for our country. (cp)
Erasmus+ is the European Union's programme to foster education, training, youth and sport in Europe. Erasmus+ supports, for example, traineeships and internships abroad for students currently enrolled in higher education institutions in programme countries at Bachelor and Master level as well as for doctoral candidates. These opportunities are also open to recent graduates.
The GET_INvolved programme provides international students and early stage researchers with opportunities to perform internships, traineeships and early-stage research experience in order to get involved in the international FAIR acclerator project while receiving scientific and technical training.
So far, three Polish universities and one Romanian university agreed to become GET_INvolved partners and to list GSI/FAIR as receiving organization for their students: in Poland the Warsaw University of Technology (WUT), the Wrocław University of Science and Technology (WUST) and the Białystok University of Technology (BUT), in Romania the University of Bucharest. (mbe)
Warsaw University of Technology
Wrocław University of Science and Technology
Białystok University of Technology
Beta decay is the main decay channel of atomic nuclei: a conversion of a neutron inside the nucleus into a proton (or vice-versa), which produces a different element with proton number plus (or minus) one. In this way beta decay plays a central role in the synthesis of new elements in our universe. As an interplay of the strong force that binds neutrons and protons inside the nucleus and the weak interaction, beta decay also holds important clues for physics beyond the Standard Model and has been the focus of concentrated efforts in physics since the early 1900s.
However, a puzzle has withstood a first-principle understanding: the beta decay of neutrons bound within nuclei are significantly slower than what would be expected on the basis of decay times of free neutrons. In the past, this systematic discrepancy was taken care of by implementing a constant called ‘quenching’. This workaround was able to reconcile observed beta-decay rates of neutrons inside and outside the nucleus and realigned theoretical models with experimental measurements.
“For a long time, we have lacked a fundamental understanding of nuclear beta decay,” said EMMI professor Achim Schwenk from TU Darmstadt, who is part of the collaboration. “In complex microscopic computations we now demonstrated for the first time that strong correlations in the nucleus as well as the strong interaction with another neutron or proton slow down beta decay inside the nucleus. Such interaction effects are predicted in effective field theories of the strong and weak interactions.”
To demonstrate this, the theoretical physicists systematically calculated beta decays for a variety of light and medium-mass nuclei, starting from a nucleus with only three nucleons up to tin-100 with 50 protons and 50 neutrons. The beta decay of tin-100 was first observed at GSI in the year 2012. The results of the collaboration were in very good agreement with experimental data and demonstrate that the quenching factor is not needed when both the strong and weak interaction effects are considered consistently.
The advances in taking the weak interaction with single neutrons and protons to large atomic nuclei have been made possible by theoretical developments of effective field theory, as well as by great progress in many-body theory and powerful supercomputing capabilities.
In addition to a better understanding of beta decays for the synthesis of heavy elements in supernovae and neutron star mergers, the researchers also hope to gain new insights into double-beta decays, in particular neutrino-less double-beta decay, where an analogous quenching puzzle exists. (cp)
Peer reviewers assess manuscripts to ensure they are suitable for publication in APS journals, and thus help to keep the standards of the journals at a high level. This often also helps authors improve the quality and readability of their articles. This year, the APS has selected 143 “Outstanding Referees” from a pool of around 71,000 active reviewers. The honorees come from 29 different countries including the USA, the United Kingdom, Canada, France, and Germany. The quality, quantity, and timely submission of the reviews are decisive factors in selecting an Outstanding Referee. Professor Hans Feldmeier is now also a member of this outstanding group.
Professor Hans Feldmeier studied physics in Darmstadt and earned his doctorate from the Technical University (TU) in Darmstadt in 1974. Subsequently he went to the Oak Ridge National Lab in the US state of Tennessee as a postdoc and later returned to the TU Darmstadt, where he qualified as a lecturer in theoretical physics in 1981. After spending two years as a Heisenberg Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg he came GSI. Feldmeier took over an extraordinary professorship at the TU Darmstadt and became a leading scientist at GSI. From 2009 until 2013 he was the head of the GSI Theory department, of which he still is a member. The main subjects of his research include theoretical nuclear physics, nuclear structure, and nuclear astrophysics. (BP)
]]>René Röspel is delegate from the Hagen - Ennepe-Ruhrkreis I district and member of the parliamentary Committee on Education, Research and Technology Assessment. He is also member of the Senate of the Helmholtz Association. Dr. Jens Zimmermann comes from the election district of Odenwald and is member of the Finance Committee and the Digital Agenda Committee of the Bundestag. The two politicians were accompanied by Anne Marquardt, SPD Member of the town council of Darmstadt and office manager of Jens Zimmermann.
After an introductory presentation and opportunity for discussion, the visitors were able to take a close view on the great progress on the mega construction site FAIR during a tour of the construction site, from the completed shell construction of the first tunnel segment for the large ring accelerator SIS100 to the excavation pit for the central transfer building. Information was also provided on the FAIR project organization and construction site logistics.
The visit concluded with a guided tour, which provided the politicians with insights into the existing research facilities on the GSI and FAIR campus. The also significant progress made with the components of the FAIR accelerator machine and the experiments was presented here. Among others, the guests visited the test facility for superconducting accelerator magnets, where high-tech components for FAIR are tested and the experimental storage ring ESR. The treatment unit for tumor therapy with heavy ions and the Hades experimental setup were also part of the visit. (BP)
]]>The international FAIR School will take place from September 8-13, 2019 in Castiglione della Pescaia in Italy. It will cover all scientific pillars of FAIR, i.e. APPA, CBM, NUSTAR, PANDA, as well as the accelerator complex and computing. As in previous years, the FAIR School will keep the highly successful format of lectures given by international FAIR experts in the morning and workshop sessions in the afternoon where the students will solve problems and tackle projects. It enables young scientists to participate in the international exchange and interaction with their fellow students from the FAIR partner countries.
The topics discussed at this event will cover the full range of FAIR relevant physics, covering fields from Atomic Physics, Plasma Physics, Heavy Ion Physics, Hadron Physics, Accelerator Physics, Nuclear Structure Physics and High Performance Computing. Here it will be made sure that the students also get the opportunity to see the big (global) picture, thus also projects similar to FAIR i.e. NICA and the RHIC Beam Energy Scan will be outlined.
The school will be organized jointly by the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS) – here especially the Frankfurt International Graduate School for Science (FIGSS) – and the FAIR Russia Research Centre (FRRC). Both institutes are renowned within the FAIR community. (BP)
More about the international FAIR School and the application deadline can be found here
]]>The team of high-level external experts was headed by the British physicist Lyndon Evans, who is an expert in the field of particle accelerators and was the project leader for the construction of the large particle accelerator LHC at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research. The committee, which consisted of particle accelerator experts, scientists, and construction project managers, has been assessing the project since November 2018 by means of accurate detail work, partly in subgroups focusing on specific aspects.
The report of the committee of experts has confirmed that the scientific program of FAIR is outstanding at the global level. The group of experts rated the FAIR project as a top international science project for decades, offering world class opportunities and outstanding potential for groundbreaking discoveries.
The experts’ report attests the effective and efficient organizational structures and processes of the project and the campus which have been established and implemented by the management over the recent years. The committee of experts is convinced of the reliable management and the successful realization of FAIR.
The report also includes an assessment of additional costs which confirm the estimates provided by the Management. According to this, the cost estimates are around € 850 million higher than planned for in 2015. With € 550 million, a large part of the additional costs is attributable to civil construction, with the experts seeing cost drivers in the currently strong civil construction market. For the accelerator components, a working group of the FAIR Council has identified an additional requirement of € 215 million. Another € 85 million will be needed for personnel and administrative costs of FAIR GmbH by 2025. In addition, the experts concluded that it would be wise to foresee a contingency of at least 10% for the total construction cost. The experts also confirm that first cutting-edge experiments can be performed at the novel FAIR facility before the end of 2025.
The shareholders have agreed at their latest meeting that until the next Council meeting they will set in motion a political decision on how to handle the additional requirements necessary to realize FAIR in its scientific uniqueness.
The shareholders expressed the wish to make a political decision. The shareholders in the nine partner countries are now invited to discuss with their governments the further steps of the FAIR project and to decide how FAIR will be implemented. (red)
The group which consisted of representatives of the project management team, the scientific and technical council and the works council could descend to the base in 18 meter depth. There they had a close look at the completed, about 25 meter long segment of shell construction for the accelerator and the supply tunnel which run next to each other. With the finalization of the load-bearing parts, the walls and the ceiling structure, the shell construction completion of the first tunnel segment marks an important milestone within the timeline of the entire FAIR project.
At the on-site inspection, the management board with the Scientific Managing Director Professor Paolo Giubellino, the Administrative Managing Director Ursula Weyrich and the Technical Managing Director Jörg Blaurock emphasized the significance of the constructive interaction of all participants. “Today, thanks to the commitment and the effort of our employees we stand here in the first tunnel segment of the FAIR accelerator SIS100”, says Jörg Blaurock. “Our major common goal is the realization of FAIR. Without the everyday dedication as a team it would not be possible to organize and implement such a mega project.”
At numerous locations at the large construction site the continuous progress in realizing the FAIR project is visible: The advancements are for example continuing in the next tunnel segments of the 1100 meter accelerator ring. The concrete pouring work for ground slabs, the walls and the ceiling structure are under way, while in further sections the casings and reinforcements are installed. Also, the construction works for the transfer building are significantly advanced. The transfer building is another crucial building for FAIR that will house the central hub for guiding the facility’s beam. For the experiment sites of FAIR the structural course is set, too, for example the excavation pit of the CBM experiment takes distinct shape. (LW / BP)
]]>The theoretical and experimental studies of the strong interaction, a cornerstone of the Standard Model (SM) of particle physics, is the aim of the research of an active community of about 2500 researchers in Europe. The list of open questions at the frontier of our present knowledge in this field is rich, and include a full understanding of: the tridimensional structure of the proton; the spectroscopy of hadrons and their exotic states; the properties of the hot and dense quark-gluon plasma; precision studies of the SM. These research topics are experimentally studied mostly by particle collisions at low (GeV range) and high (up to 14 TeV) energies, which require continuous developments in state-of-the-art detectors, data acquisition systems, beams and targets, as well as in the underlying theory.
The STRONG-2020 project, a European Integrating Activity for Advanced Community, recently approved by the European Community within the Horizon-2020 – Research and Innovation Framework Programme, is a structured enterprise to address the open questions in the strong interaction studies in theory and experiment, building upon and going beyond the previous Hadron Physics HP, HP2 and HP3 projects in the framework programmes of FP6 and FP7.
STRONG-2020, strongly supported by NuPECC (the Nuclear Physics European Collaboration Committee), brings together many of the European leading research groups and infrastructures presently involved in the forefront research in strong interaction. It provides transnational access to six world-class research infrastructures in Europe, which complement each other in particle beams characteristics (COSY, MAMI, LNF-INFN, ELSA, GSI, CERN) and virtual access to open-source codes and automated/simulation tools. STRONG-2020 fosters the synergy between theoreticians and experimentalists, supporting the activities of the European Centre for Theoretical Studies in Nuclear Physics and Related Areas (ECT*, Trento).
The STRONG-2020 Consortium includes 44 participant institutions, among which are GSI and FAIR, embracing 14 EU Member States, one International EU Interest Organization (CERN) and one EU candidate country (Montenegro). Together with host institutions of other 21 countries, participating in the activities without EU benefits, STRONG-2020 involves research in 36 countries. The project is structured in 32 Work Packages (WP): Project Management and Coordination, Dissemination and Communication, 7 Transnational Access Activities, 2 Virtual Access Activities, 7 Netwoking Activities and 14 Joint Research Activities.
The STRONG-2020 results will have a significant impact in the study of the strong interaction and the SM. The project will also contribute to fundamental research for physics beyond SM, impacting in other scientific sectors, such as astrophysics and theories of strongly coupled complex systems in condensed matter. The tools and methodologies for the new-cutting-edge experiments within STRONG-2020 will provide upgrades to the European Research Infrastructures, enhancing their competitiveness. The developed technologies will also impact in medicine (diagnostic tools, cancer treatment) and industry (line-scan cameras, 3D-magnets technology) and may also lead to advances in computing/machine learning.
STRONG-2020 will promote training and education activities, including students and postdocs, which will bring qualified personnel to the job market, as well as dissemination activities at current state of the art in science communication. (LW)
]]>After the welcome, Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Director of FAIR and GSI, accompanied the two guests on a tour of the FAIR construction site, focusing in particular on the progress of the tunnel construction work for the FAIR ring accelerator SIS100 and for the experiment on compressed nuclear matter CBM.
In a subsequent tour of the existing facility, Professor Norbert Herrmann, who teaches at the Heidelberg University and is spokesperson of the CBM collaboration, explained the large-scale detector HADES and the preparatory setup of miniCBM at GSI. Professor Silvia Masciocchi, also from Heidelberg University and head of the research department ALICE at GSI, gave an insight into the current tasks of the measurement setup located at the European research center CERN in Geneva, Switzerland, in which GSI plays an important role. Professors Yury Litvinov, Heidelberg University, and Thomas Stöhlker, Deputy Research Director of FAIR/GSI, presented the storage rings ESR and CRYRING as well as the experiments in atomic physics. Professor Christina Trautmann, head of the Materials Research department, and Dr. Ulrich Weber and Dr. Walter Tinganelli, group leaders within the Biophysics research department, informed the guests about the efforts of the two disciplines.
After the tour, the rector and dean met with the management and the research representatives for a joint discussion in order to explore further opportunities for cooperation. GSI/FAIR and the of University have been linked in their research work since the foundation of GSI 50 years ago and work closely together through various projects and joint professorships/department heads. (cp)
]]>The nuclear physicist Peter Braun-Munzinger is 72 years old. His work focuses primarily on ultrarelativistic heavy-ion collisions and the resulting quark-gluon plasma. In the period from 1996 to 2011, he was head of the ALICE department at GSI and also held a chair at TU Darmstadt. From the very earliest days of the project, GSI has played a leading role in the construction of ALICE — one of the largest experiments at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research — and in shaping the associated scientific program of research. The prime purpose of ALICE is to investigate the quark-gluon plasma, a state of matter that existed in the first few fractions of a second after the Big Bang.
Professor Braun-Munzinger studied physics at Heidelberg University, where he was awarded a doctorate summa cum laude. As a doctoral candidate, he held a scholarship of the Studienstiftung des Deutschen Volkes, following which he worked as a postdoctoral researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg. In 1976, Braun-Munzinger joined the State University of New York at Stony Brook, where he became a full professor in 1982. After his return to Germany, he served as project manager for the time projection chamber of the ALICE experiment at CERN from 1998 until 2010. He was also chair of the collaboration board of ALICE from 2011 to 2016 and Helmholtz professor at GSI from 2011 to 2014. He has held an honorary chair at Heidelberg University since 2014.
In the periods from 1984 to 1987 and 2000 to 2002, Braun-Munzinger was an editor of Physical Review Letters. Published by the American Physical Society, this is one of the world’s oldest and most renowned academic journals in the field of physics. Braun-Munzinger’s scientific work has attracted numerous awards. In 1994, for example, he was made a fellow of the American Physical Society, and in 2011 a member of the Academia Europaea. In 2014, he was awarded the Lise Meitner Prize and has now, most recently, been awarded the Stern Gerlach Medal for 2019.
Professor Johanna Stachel is likewise linked to GSI via the ALICE experiment. The 64-year-old nuclear and particle physicist is the first woman to receive the Stern Gerlach Medal. Stachel studied chemistry and physics at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, where she was awarded a doctorate summa cum laude. Her work focuses on understanding collisions of atomic nuclei at ultrarelativistic energies. She teaches at Heidelberg University. At CERN in Geneva, she is involved in experiments with the Large Hadron Collider to investigate the quark-gluon plasma and heads the transition radiation detector project at ALICE. She is also spokesperson for the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research’s ALICE research program. From 2012 to 2014, she was President of the DPG. Her work has likewise attracted numerous honors and awards. For example, she is a member of the Leopoldina German National Academy of Sciences and has been awarded the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany and also the Lise Meitner Prize.
Professor Paolo Giubellino, the Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, expressed his delight at the latest honor for Braun-Munzinger and Stachel. “They both have made outstanding contributions to the physics of Heavy Ion collisions,” said Giubellino, who until 2016 was spokesperson for the ALICE experiment. “And I’m very happy that GSI is able to benefit from the great expertise of Professor Peter Braun-Munzinger, as Scientific Director of the ExtreMe Matter Institute EMMI. His work makes a fundamental contribution to the discovery and understanding of new aspects of extreme matter. Furthermore, his scientific work is of enormous importance for the scientific program of the future FAIR facility.”
The Stern Gerlach Medal is the DPG’s highest award for outstanding achievements in the field of experimental physics. It is awarded annually and consists of a handwritten parchment certificate and a gold medal with engravings of the two physicists Otto Stern and Walther Gerlach, who also gave their name to the Stern-Gerlach experiment, a fundamental experiment in physics. (BP)
]]>The cooperation between CERN and GSI provides for the testing of magnets weighing more than 50 tons and to qualify them for operation in the superconducting fragment separator (Super-FRS), which is an important part of the FAIR facility. Precise production of the high-tech components for FAIR isn’t the only decisive step; the testing and quality assurance of the individual parts and magnets is also crucial.
As part of the cooperation, the partners have created a test facility containing three magnet test benches at CERN, where the first tests are starting now. First, the facility will allow for intense endurance tests of the so-called multiplets, which are superconducting magnet units with corrective lenses. Moreover, it will be examined if the magnets behave flawlessly in accordance with high quality standards during operation. The multiplets, each up to seven meters long, will later be used in FAIR's Super-FRS for beam focusing in order to achieve a high-precision particle beam.
The Super-FRS of the future FAIR accelerator center is an important component of the entire facility with great potential for scientific discovery: This part of the accelerator complex will be used for experiments on the fundamental structure of extremely rare exotic nuclei. For these experiments, ions of the heaviest elements will be shot at a target, where they will shatter upon impact. The resulting fragments will include exotic nuclei that the Super-FRS can separate and supply for further experiments. With the new separator, nuclei up to uranium can be produced at relativistic energies and can be separated into pure isotopes. Because this entire process lasts for only a few hundred nanoseconds, the Super-FRS provides researchers access to very short-lived nuclei.
The multiplets, which were manufactured in La Spezia, Italy, as well as the subsequent testing procedure are an important in-kind contribution from GSI to the FAIR project. GSI is the German shareholder of the international FAIR GmbH. All of the superconducting magnets required for the Super-FRS will be tested in alternating sequence in the new test facility at CERN. This includes both the total of 32 multiplet units and 24 superconducting dipole magnets that will be needed for deflecting the particle beam. (BP)
]]>The young people were asked to analyze and interpret data of the ALICE experiment. Under professional supervision of scientists they autonomously analyzed recent data recorded in proton-proton and lead collisions. In the lead collisions a so-called quark-gluon plasma is generated — a state of matter which existed in the universe shortly after the big bang. This plasma undergoes a phase transition back to normal matter in fractions of seconds. The particles produced in the process can give insight into the properties of the quark-gluon plasma.
Two introductory lectures on the quark gluon plasma, held by Masterclass organizer Dr. Ralf Averbeck, and the investigation of heavy ion collisions at the ALICE experiment, held by Michael Habib, put the students in the mood for the analysis. Subsequently, they visited the large-scale experiment HADES, one of the current experiments at the GSI accelerator facility that will also become a part of the future FAIR accelerator. Afterwards they started the data analysis.
The basic idea of the program is to allow the students to work in the same fashion as the scientists. This includes having a videoconference at the end of the day. In a conference connection with groups from the universities in Frankfurt and Münster, as well as CERN they presented and discussed their results.
This year 225 universities and research institutes from 55 countries participate in the International Masterclasses. They are organized by the International Particle Physics Outreach Group (IPPOG). All events in Germany are held in cooperation with the "Netzwerk Teilchenwelt", of which GSI is a member. The nationwide network committed to the communication of particle physics to youngsters and teachers aims to make particle physics accessible to a broader public.
ALICE is one of the four large international experiments at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). It is the experiment specifically designed to investigate collisions of heavy nuclei at high energies. Scientists of GSI and of German universities were involved in the development of new detectors and in the scientific program of ALICE from the beginning. The GSI computing center is an inherent part of the computing grid for data analysis of ALICE. (cp)
The politician and former mayor of the town of Bad Soden am Taunus was able to take a close view on the progress of the mega construction site FAIR during a tour of the construction site, from the continuously progressing shell construction for the SIS100 central ring accelerator to the excavation pit for the CBM experiment, one of the future large-scale experimental caves. Afterwards, Norbert Altenkamp was able to gain insights into the existing research facilities during a guided tour on the GSI and FAIR campus. For example he visited the test facility for superconducting accelerator magnets and the Hades experimental setup. (BP)
]]>The contract has been signed by the managing directors of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, Ursula Weyrich and Jörg Blaurock, as well as by Dr. Petr Lukáš, Director of the NPI. The NPI has been delegated by the Czech Ministry of Education, Youth and Sport to represent the Czech Republic in FAIR and to coordinate the work of the Czech scientific community contributing to FAIR. The partnership is a first step towards a full membership.
"I am extremely pleased that we can warmly welcome the Czech Republic as our new partner state. The partnership can build on a long-standing, very good working collaboration between Czech research institutions and GSI/FAIR. Researchers from the Czech Republic are already making excellent contributions in a variety of scientific and technical fields at GSI and FAIR“, said Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director at GSI and FAIR.
Czech scientists are involved, for example, in the large detector HADES and in nuclear astrophysics as well in as developments and research for the CBM and PANDA experiments. They are active in all four FAIR research pillars, and intend to also contribute to the construction of components for the FAIR accelerators. The commitment of the Czech scientific community to FAIR is growing rapidly: In 2016, 37 scientists from four scientific institutions in the Czech Republic worked on topics related to the FAIR project, this year it will be more than 60 from six different institutions.
„It is a great pleasure for us to become partner of FAIR with its worldwide unique research opportunities. The new agreement paves the way to a strong long-term collaboration between the Czech research community and FAIR. The membership will further intensify relationships of our scientists with GSI and FAIR and create opportunities for an even more fruitful cooperation in areas such as research, education and innovation“, said NPI director Dr. Petr Lukáš.
When signing the agreement, the partners underlined their wish to strengthen sharing of scientific knowledge between the Czech and other European research communities and emphasized the breakthrough value of science to be performed at FAIR.
In addition, the new cooperation once again shows the attractiveness of the FAIR experimental program and the trust of the international research community in the FAIR project. The current signing of the contract has great appeal for encouraging other countries to join the FAIR project with its great scientific and technical significance. (BP)
]]>At the beginning of Girls' Day, the participants were welcomed by Dorothee Sommer, Head of Human Resources. "We strive for equality in all areas of our work," explained Sommer. "Equality begins in childhood, where stereotypes can and should be broken early. We strive to inspire the girls to be enthusiastic about research and technology and motivate them to consider a career choice in this area. We would like to see some of them return to us as employees after training or studies."
Following a tour of the particle accelerator and experiment facilities on the research campus, the girls could gain practical experiences in various technical and scientific working areas at workshops, technical laboratories, and research departments. Many departments had prepared for the girls’ visit by creating a special program, and they provided plenty of support for their young visitors. For example, the girls could try metal work in the mechanical workshops, soldered electronics and or produce material samples, so-called targets, for the irradiation at the accelerator. One of the groups was also given a tour of the construction site of the future FAIR particle accelerator, which will be unequaled anywhere else in the world.
At the end of the day, the girls could look back on an exciting experience during which they had achieved many practical results. All groups presented their results in a large plenum discussion. “We built an instrument to measure temperature. It measures in degree Celsius and in Kelvin,” explained one of the participants. “In this room we have 25 degrees Celsius, that equals 298 Kelvin.” Other teams had produced metallic discs, made a magnet float with liquid nitrogen, controlled bikes for their safety equipment or soldered electronic components. One group analyzed LEDs for their properties, another produced samples made of plaster and x-rayed them.
“We can rely on our enthusiastic employees who live and love their research work. They also pass this enthusiasm on to the girls on Girls' Day,” said organizer Carola Pomplun from the PR department, who is also a physicist. “The demand for participation in our institute is very high. Thanks to the great support of my colleagues, we were able to welcome more girls this year than ever before. Our goal is to inspire them to a career in technology and science."
Girls’Day is a day of action all over Germany. On this day, businesses, universities, and other institutions all over Germany open their doors to schoolgirls from grade 5 and above. The girls learn about courses of study and trained professions in the areas of IT, the skilled trades, the natural sciences, and technology — areas in which women have rarely been employed in the past. (cp)
Since 2011, several MUST students have already benefited from educational training and research experience at GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research and FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research in Europe) in Darmstadt.
The new GET_INvolved agreement now marks the beginning of a dedicated training programme focused on students and researchers from MUST. The programme will support up to four female students and young researchers per year. They will work within research projects, mostly connected with the new nuclear and particle physics research facility FAIR, which is being constructed in Darmstadt.
MUST is committed to excellence. Founded in 2004, the university seeks to impart knowledge and develop skills in women to become professionals, well versed in modern technology and management practices while imbibing social sensitivity and environmental consciousness for the betterment of self and society. MUST was the first institution which sent students to GSI and FAIR in the frame of a pilot project for the by then new GET_INvolved programme.
Prof. Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, said: ”FAIR will offer exciting research opportunities to the next generation of scientists in the whole world and in particular to India, which is the third largest shareholder of FAIR. We are extremely happy that by inviting MUST, we could gain a collaboration partner who specifically educates and promotes talented women and thus contributes to the development of equality between women and men in our scientific field.
Prof. R. K. Shivpuri, Fellow of the National Academy of Science and Director International Relations at MUST, stated: “MUST is very proud to be part of GET_INvolved Programme. We look forward to benefit from dedicated training and research activates together with GSI and FAIR. Engineering students from MUST will now have more opportunities to be trained at world-class facilities, with forefront technologies in an international environment, and gain a project-oriented mind-set early in their career. We hope this will further advance our efforts to promote young women into research and applied sciences." (mbe)
One of the key questions that need to be addressed regarding the future of human spaceflight is how high-energy radiation affects human beings. The detailed investigation of this topic is one of the central tasks to be accomplished in order to provide astronauts with effective protection, but it also contributes to more detailed knowledge about the risks of radiation exposure on earth. Just over a year ago, ESA and FAIR decided to cooperate closely and signed a cooperation agreement on cosmic radiation research. Young researchers can now particularly benefit from this international cooperation: The new Summer School is a direct result of the joint activities of the two partners agreed at the time.
Up to now, the opportunities for students in space radiation research to gain experience and study are limited. This is now going to change. The "ESA-FAIR Radiation Summer School" wants to attract the best international young scientists with an attractive offer and thus also sharpen Darmstadt's profile as a space research location. The Summer School will be held at ESA´s European Space Operations Centre ESOC as well as at the GSI/FAIR campus in order to train students in basic heavy ion biophysics for both terrestrial applications (e.g. medical therapies) and space applications (e.g. space radiation detection, monitoring and protection).
Every year in late summer, 15 Ph.D. students and postdocs from various radiation-related disciplines — such as physics, medicine or biology — can come to Darmstadt. The application phase starts each spring. The offer is aimed primarily to young scientists from ESA Member States, but also beyond. The Summer School's top-class scientific program includes lectures from experts in the field, site visits to facilities in Darmstadt and practical training and research opportunities at GSI/FAIR. The participants can commute between the two locations ESOC and GSI/FAIR Campus. During practical training, the students also have the possibility to continue developing on their own experiment ideas, using available beamtime at GSI accelerators in the framework of the „FAIR Phase 0“ user program.
The existing GSI accelerator facility already is the only one in Europe that can generate all of the ion beams that occur in our solar system, which range from the lightest one, hydrogen, to the heaviest, uranium. The research opportunities will be expanded even further by the future FAIR accelerator center. FAIR will enable researchers to conduct experiments with an even wider spectrum of particle energies and intensities, and to simulate the composition of cosmic radiation with a precision that no other accelerator facility will be able to match.
Professor Marco Durante, Director of the GSI Biophysics Department, is looking forward to the new school: “Radiation is the main hurdle toward the human colonisation of the Solar System. We need to train the young students to tackle this problem. The Biophysics Department is working with ESA since many years to simulate cosmic rays on Earth using our accelerator and to study the effects and the possible countermeasures, such as shielding. The students will gain a tremendous expertise in particle radiation physics and biology. They will be the future leaders in the field, hopefully finding strategies to allow a safe space exploration”.
ESA Interagency Coordinator Thomas Reiter also expects that research on cosmic radiation will benefit from the Summer School and emphasizes: "The Summer School will highlight ESA’s commitment to stimulate the pursuit of education in science, technology, engineering and mathematics disciplines as well as to generate expertise relevant to human spaceflight activities. The ESA-FAIR Radiation Summer School will be unique in the world and is expected to attract large attention from the international research community”. (BP)
The programme aims in creating synergies between the partner institutes GSI and SUT by allowing mobility opportunities for students and young researchers and contribute to the FAIR project in research and development. Moreover, the programme will help building capacities for the research groups that are already collaborating within the framework of the FAIR project.
Within the framework of the GET_INvolved Programme, host laboratory GSI will provide an opportunity to these students with an internship and training programme and research experience opportunities for early-stage researchers to work in all areas of the laboratory on technical or scientific projects related to research at GSI and FAIR. Joint technical and research projects amidst common interests will be identified and proffered to the students and researchers of SUT Thailand.
Applications will be open to students/researchers enrolled in university’s higher education programme or in a Ph.D. programme. For an internship, students usually will stay up to six months, whereas a sandwich Ph.D.-stay for research experience may last one year.
The partner institute SUT was founded in 1990 as the first public, autonomous university in Thailand. It is empowered to govern its own overall administration, receiving regular budget allocations from the government. Over 15,000 students attend now the university, which is organized around seven academic institutes specializing in science, engineering, medicine, nursing, agricultural technology, social technology and dentistry. Thanks to its glowing reputation for education and research, SUT was granted National Research University status by the Thai Government in 2010. The Thailand Research Fund has evaluated the School of Physics, SUT as Excellent since 2008. (mbe)
In the experiment, the researchers first brought the noble gas xenon to high speeds using the GSI accelerator in order to strip off all the electrons of the atomic shell. The leftover atomic nuclei were then fed into the experimental storage ring ESR and slowed down. The xenon nuclei were then induced to interact with hydrogen nuclei at a material sample known as the gas target, which is built into the ring. This resulted in reactions, in which xenon nuclei captured a proton and were transformed into the heavier element caesium – a process that is also expected in astrophysical scenarios.
In the investigation of these phenomena, the researchers are faced by two challenges, as Dr. Jan Glorius from the GSI Atomic Physics research department explains: "The energy interval, in which the reactions are most likely to occur under astrophysical conditions, is known as the Gamow window. Within the Gamow window, the atomic nuclei possess relatively low energies of the order of several megaelectronvolts or less. In other words: they are rather slow and thus difficult to handle in the intensity required. Furthermore, the cross-section, i.e. the probability of an interaction of both partners involved, dramatically decreases with the energy. Until now, it has been hardly possible to create suitable conditions for such reactions in the laboratory. These are the two main reasons for the fact that experimental data in this area – particularly involving heavy nuclei – has been extremely rare."
"For such an experiment a powerful accelerator system, as the chain of linear accelerator UNILAC and ring accelerator SIS at GSI, is required just to provide the heavy reaction partner as a particle beam. Subsequently, a suitable storage ring has to be available to slow down the beam to the energies of the Gamow window, to permanently store it and to facilitate the reaction with the light partner", states Professor Yuri Litvinov, head of the substantially involved ASTRUm research project at GSI, which is funded by the European Union. "In the case of the experiment conducted, we succeeded in demonstrating that the ESR storage ring — although in fact designed for higher energies — can be used for this purpose." In particular, an extremely good vacuum is necessary in the system. Otherwise, the low energy ions would capture electrons from the residual gas in the storage ring at a high rate and thereby would be lost for the experiment.
The scientists have even gone a step further and make use of this actually undesired effect. Interactions also occur between the xenon nuclei and electrons of the hydrogen gas in the target, and these can be identified from the ensuing X-ray radiation. As this atomic process is not only very dominant but also extremely well understood, it is possible to derive from it the number of potential xenon reaction partners that were available for proton capture. Their different, mass-dependent deflection in the magnetic field of the storage ring enables the newly created caesium nuclei behind the target to be separated from the remaining xenon nuclei and to be measured. From the ratio of potential reaction partners and actual reactions, it is possible to determine the probability of proton capture.
"In addition to improving the experimental technique to attain the lower energies of the heavy collision partner, the experiment also provides important restrictions of the hitherto only theoretically predicted reaction rates used to model the formation of elements", states René Reifarth, Professor of Experimental Astrophysics at the Goethe University in Frankfurt and spokesperson of the experiment. "This experiment makes a decisive contribution to furthering our understanding of nucleosynthesis in the cosmos."
As a result of the success of the experiment, further studies of similar reactions are planned in the coming experiment periods at the ESR. In order to better reproduce the conditions existing in astrophysical scenarios, even unstable elements could be created, then sorted out using the GSI fragment separator and fed into the storage ring. A further sign of progress in this research program is the imminent commissioning of the dedicated low-energy storage ring CRYRING, part of the future international particle accelerator FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research), which is currently under construction at GSI. It is particularly suitable for making ion beams available at low energies.
The experiments were conducted within the framework of the SPARC research collaboration (Stored Particles Atomic Physics Research Collaboration), which is part of the FAIR research programme. Equipment used in this project was funded by the Collaborative Research Network of the Federal Ministry of Education and Research. (cp)
With a new technique an aerial time-lapse video was shot which shows the development of a complete year: For this so-called Longterm Dronelapse the same routes across the construction site were flown with a drone in regular intervals. The recorded motion time lapse videos have now been combined to one single video.
Several videos that were taken within one year could be super-imposed thanks to GPS support so that the progress of the construction activities is clearly visible. (LW)
Early-stage researchers from South Africa may soon apply for a scholarship to enable them a research stay of three to six months at GSI/FAIR Campus. The students will work within research projects, mostly connected with the new accelerator facility FAIR, which is being constructed in Darmstadt. In addition, the students will have the opportunity to participate into lectures, symposia and scientific activities on the common campus of GSI and FAIR.
Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, was very pleased about the agreement: “This year, we will celebrate 50 years of our GSI laboratory, which is proud to work in connection with the scientific community all over the world. With our emerging Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research, we are building the foundation for the scientific future in our field, and we seek to inspire young, talented students and scientists from all countries to form the next generation of scientists that will use the exceptional research opportunities FAIR will offer.“
The iThemba Laboratory for Accelerator Based Sciences (iThemba LABS) in South Africa is a multidisciplinary research facility that is based on the development, operation and use of particle accelerators and related research equipment. It is sustained by the South African National Research Foundation (NRF). The facilities provide opportunities for research in subatomic physics, material research, radiobiology, and the research and development of unique radioisotopes for nuclear medicine and industrial applications. In November 2018, the South African Ministry, iThemba LABS and FAIR decided to develop a plan for closer collaboration.
Dr. Clifford Nxomani, Deputy CEO of the South African National Research Foundation, added about the GET_INvolved Agreement: “International collaborations are a key element of promoting science in South Africa. We therefore welcome that talented young researchers now have the opportunity to get trained at one of the top labs in the world. This is an important step towards a closer collaboration of iThemba LABS with the future FAIR facility.”
Dr. Faiҫal Azaiez, Director of iThemba LABS, pointed out: “The education of well-trained scientists is a central mission of iThemba LABS. I am very glad that the agreement with GSI and FAIR allows our young students to get involved with the exciting science at one of the premier accelerator laboratories in the world.“ (mbe)
Dr. Moritz Pascal Reiter received the FAIR GENCO Award for his impressive research achievements in the areas of nuclear astrophysics and nuclear structure physics. He used a multiple-reflection time-of-flight mass spectrometer, which he implemented at the TITAN experiment at the Canadian research facility TRIUMF in Vancouver. It is a game-changer, opening-up multiple new venues for exciting mass measurements, especially on very short-lived nuclei. Already in the first two years of operation, about 200 isotopes could be studied.
The two scientists assigned with the GENCO Membership Award are:
“The terms ‘allure’ and ‘romance’ are not what one would expect in such a technical field," explains Hofmann, who is no longer an active scientist, but continues to support the research community with great enthusiasm in a voluntary capacity. "Already the authors of this report's predecessor, which was published back in 1991, described an element discovery as an event of particular importance. It cannot be compared with discovering a comet or a new kind of beetle as numerous of those findings can still be expected in the future. With elements, however, we know that there can be only a limited number. What we don't know is how many there will be. That makes an element discovery something special, and nothing has changed about that to this day." In this field, Hofmann is an expert, as he belongs to the discoverers of a total of six elements with atomic numbers 107 to 112 which were produced at GSI in Darmstadt and, among others, named after the state of Hesse and the city.
The report gives a definition of exactly what a new element is, and when a discovery is to be classified as such. The decisive criterion here is the proof that the element has a different number of protons in the nucleus than other previously known nuclides. As the newly generated heavy elements are usually unstable, the obvious — though not the only — way is to measure the element's decay chain which ends in known nuclides. Here the new element is directly connected with nuclei that have previously been identified in a so-called genetic relationship.
It is highly probable that the researchers will also produce future elements with the aid of fusion experiments at particle accelerators, as was in fact the case with the latest additions to the periodic table. The technical evidence can be brought using physical or chemical methods. These include, for example, separators, precision mass measurements or measurements of the characteristic x-ray radiation specific to an element. The boundary conditions for a discovery are described in detail in the report. Notes on the systematics of the measurements and measurement errors are also considered.
In case of more than one legitimate claim to the discovery of a new element, according to the criteria, it is crucial who was the first to hand in a contribution on their find to a recognized scientific journal. In other words, it is neither the date of production of the element nor the time of publication of the article that is decisive, but rather the date of submission. Additional assessment of the scientific content may be necessary so that even results published at a later point can potentially lead to a co-discovery.
Two international institutions are responsible for the recognition of an element: The International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) and Physics (IUPAP). Experts evaluate the scientific publications on new elements on the basis of the defined criteria. They grant the right of discovery, which goes hand in hand with permission to name the new element within the framework of the specified naming criteria. An element may only be named after an existing location, a substance property, a mythical term or a scientist.
At present, however, IUPAC and IUPAP are in stand-by position in this respect. Currently all artificially produced elements up to element 118 have been recognized and named. The research community must be patient until a new element is produced or discovered in order to apply the newly established criteria for the first time. "It is very likely that the next elements will be 119 and 120. They are next in line in the periodic table and thus the most likely to be produced," says Hofmann. "We are all curious to see when this will happen." (cp)
Article about criteria for new elements in the scientific journal Chemistry International (Englisch)
]]>The first observation of a neutron star collision in 2017, which was detected by gravitational wave detectors, caused a sensation also in the field of nuclear physics. As predicted by GSI scientists, there were clear indications that heavy atomic nuclei would be produced in these extreme cosmic events. But exactly which nuclei are produced in neutron star collisions is still unclear.
"The luminosity of the neutron star collision reveals which elements are formed during this event," says GSI scientist Professor Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo, who contributed substantially to this publication and also was involved in the predictions on nuclei synthesis in neutron star collisions. "At the event in 2017 we couldn’t observe this as the neutron star collision disappeared behind the sun. That’s why we couldn’t fully observe the light emissions at a crucial stage.” But the next observations of neutron star collisions are expected soon. In order to be able to analyze them, Martínez-Pinedo and his colleagues have made predictions about how the luminosity of the neutron star collision will evolve, depending on which nuclear-physical processes take place during the fusion and which heavy elements are produced.
About one month after the event, there are only about 30 different nuclei left to influence the luminosity, because nuclei with short lifetimes already decayed. Some heavy isotopes dominate the energy output and thus influence the intensity and duration of luminosity, for example Californium-254, followed by Radium-223, Actinium, and lastly, Radium-225. “When telescopes record the next neutron star collision in high resolution, thanks to our model we can probably conclude from the luminosity changes over weeks which heavy elements have been formed and how the nuclear synthesis process unfolds," says Martínez-Pinedo.
The models that are used to predict luminosity and duration contain many nuclear properties that are not yet fully understood. This is where research at the FAIR accelerator facility, which is currently under construction, comes into play. The experiments of the FAIR collaboration NUSTAR are mainly aimed at generating and investigating the heavy nuclei produced by neutron star collisions or supernovae. At FAIR, this can be done in the laboratory with the help of particle accelerators. "With FAIR, we will be able to explore the universe in the laboratory," says Professor Karlheinz Langanke, Research Director of GSI and FAIR. "FAIR will be a unique facility worldwide, allowing researchers to bring the diversity of the universe into the lab to investigate fundamental questions such as the origin of chemical elements in the universe.” (LW)
Original publication: Fingerprints of Heavy-Element Nucleosynthesis in the Late-Time Lightcurves of Kilonovae
]]>The visit took place within the scope of a regional seminar in Darmstadt lasting several days, for which the participants qualified by reaching the second stage of a four-stage selection process for the International Chemistry Olympiad IChO. GSI has been part of the program since last year, and is embedded in the seminar as a regular component on account of the positive feedback it has received. (JL)
Quarks, the smallest building-blocks of matter, never appear alone in nature. They are always tightly bound inside the protons and neutrons. However, neutron stars, weighing as much as the Sun, but being just the size of a city like Frankfurt, possess a core so dense that a transition from neutron matter to quark matter may occur. Physicists refer to this process as a phase transition, similar to the liquid-vapor transition in water. In particular, such a phase transition is in principle possible when merging neutron stars form a very massive meta-stable object with densities exceeding that of atomic nuclei and with temperatures 10,000 times higher than in the Sun's core.
The measurement of gravitational waves emitted by merging neutron stars could serve as a messenger of possible phase transitions in outer space. The phase transition should leave a characteristic signature in the gravitational-wave signal. The research groups from Frankfurt, Darmstadt and Ohio (Goethe University/FIAS/GSI/Kent University) as well as from Darmstadt and Wroclaw (GSI/Wroclaw University) used modern supercomputers to calculate what this signature could look like. For this purpose, they used different theoretical models of the phase transition.
In case a phase transition takes place more after the actual merger, small amounts of quarks will gradually appear throughout the merged object. “With aid of the Einstein equations, we were able to show for the first time that this subtle change in the structure will produce a deviation in the gravitational-wave signal until the newly formed massive neutron star collapses under its own weight to form a black hole,” explains Luciano Rezzolla, who is a professor for theoretical astrophysics at the Goethe University.
In the computer models of Dr. Andreas Bauswein from GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt a phase transition already happens directly after the merger — a core of quark matter forms in the interior of the central object. “We succeeded to show that in this case there will be a distinct shift in the frequency of the gravitational wave signal,” says Bauswein. “Thus, we identified a measurable criterion for a phase transition in gravitational waves of neutron star mergers in the future.”
Not all of the details of the gravitational-wave signal are measurable with current detectors yet. However, they will become observable both with the next generation of detectors, as well as with a merger event relatively close to us. A complementary approach to answer the questions about quark matter is offered by two experiments: By colliding heavy ions at the existing HADES setup at GSI and at the future CBM detector at the Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (FAIR), which is currently under construction at GSI, compressed nuclear matter will be produced. In the collisions, it might be possible to create temperatures and densities that are similar to those in a neutron-star merger. Both methods give new insights into the occurrence of phase transitions in nuclear matter and thus into its fundamental properties. (cp)
On a tour to outstanding sciences labs in Germany, they spent one day at GSI and FAIR, where they got guided tours to the ion sources, the linear accelerator UNILAC, the ring accelerator SIS18, the experimental storage ring ESR, the superconducting magnet testing facility, biophysics laboratories, the ion beam therapy cave and the FAIR construction site. (mbe)
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The chemical elements fermium, mendelevium, nobelium, and lawrencium have the atomic numbers 100 to 103 in the periodic table of the elements. They do not occur naturally on earth, but can be artificially created, in nuclear fusion reactions at particle accelerators, for example. This process features low rates of production — at most a few atoms per second. All are unstable, decaying again within seconds to minutes. This renders studies of their chemical properties difficult, requiring complex experimental investigations of individual atoms.
In the current experiments the scientists looked at the first ionization potentials of the elements. This quantity measures the energy required to remove the least tightly bound electron from the outer shell of a neutral atom. The researchers expected the ionization potential to increase until nobelium is reached, which would correspond to a completely filled electron shell. For the following element, lawrencium, which possesses only a single, less strongly bound electron, a decrease in the ionization potential was expected.
Corresponding values for nobelium and lawrencium were already available from previous experiments. The present work expands the data set to the heaviest four members of the actinide elements, thus completing the data set of 14 elements of the whole actinide series. “The measured values are in agreement with the predictions of current relativistic calculations that were carried out in parallel with the experiment, and with the measurements carried out on nobelium using laser spectroscopy by a further collaboration working at GSI,” explained Professor Christoph Düllmann, head of the Superheavy Elements Chemistry departments at GSI and the Helmholtz Institute Mainz. “With this experiment we were able to unequivocally demonstrate that the actinide series ends with lawrencium, in analogy to the lighter lanthanide series, which is located above the actinides in the periodic table.”
The researchers were able to create and measure the artificial elements at the Tandem accelerator and the attached isotope separator at the Japanese research organization JAEA in Tokai, Japan. The first ionization potentials were determined using a surface ionization process. A gas stream in a Teflon tube carried the elements to a tantalum chamber with a surface heated to up to 3,000°C, where they could be ionized. Comparing the number of atoms fed in with that of ionized atoms provided a value for the efficiency of the ionization, from which the first ionization potential of the elements could be determined.
Research institutes from Germany, the Netherlands, Japan, Israel, and Switzerland participated in this work. (cp)
After the welcome by Dr. Astrid Mannes, the Scientific Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, Professor Paolo Giubellino, the Administrative Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, Ursula Weyrich, and the Technical Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, Jörg Blaurock, presented the FAIR project. In addition, Dr. Ingo Peter, Head of Press and Public Relations department, also introduced details of the topic.
The FAIR accelerator center (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) is one of the world's largest construction projects for cutting edge international research and is currently being built at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt. It will enable scientists from all over the world to explore the universe in the laboratory.
The members of the Bundestag were able to get first-hand information about FAIR and took the opportunity to discuss the unique particle accelerator facility in detail with the FAIR and GSI management. Professor Paolo Giubellino, Ursula Weyrich and Jörg Blaurock answered questions about the current status of the project, provided background information and offered a compact overview of science, structural and technical progress, strategic goals and special challenges and developments at the site in Darmstadt.
The social contribution of the megaproject FAIR was also an important topic. FAIR generates new knowledge for mankind and makes value contributions to society on many levels, whether as a driver of innovation, provider of highly qualified and high quality jobs and in education of young scientists and engineers or in the development of new medical applications and the education of young scientists and engineers. The FAIR and GSI management emphasized: "FAIR will be an important building block for securing the long-term sustainability of Germany as a research location in an international context and at the same time a strong pillar of our research landscape in global competition. A central challenge of modern research is to think ahead over long periods of time. FAIR will not only be built for the coming years, but for the coming decades."
Dr. Astrid Mannes, who has a focus of her work as member of the Bundesausschuss für Bildung, Forschung und Technikfolgenabschätzung (Federal Committee for Education, Research and Technology Assessment), was pleased about the visit of the representatives of the Darmstadt research institution to Berlin. "It is good when research institutions that receive public funding present themselves directly to politicians. In addition, the topics addressed are of great importance. It was therefore valuable and important for the members of parliament present to receive background information on the major scientific project," said the member of the Bundestag. (BP)
]]>The members of the magistrate, headed by the Lord Mayor of Darmstadt, Jochen Partsch, first received an introductory presentation on the research and realization of FAIR. The focus was on current scientific activities and the progress of the FAIR project, which is one of the largest research projects worldwide.
Afterwards a bus tour led over the FAIR construction site in the east of GSI. The construction progress included the shell construction of the large SIS100 ring accelerator and the excavation pits for the transfer building, the central hub for guiding the facility´s beam, and for the CBM experimental site. CBM is one of the four research pillars of the future accelerator center. (BP)
]]>On the subsequent tour through the facility, the participants visited, among other stations, the main control room, the facility for the production of superheavy elements and the treatment facility for tumor therapy with carbon ions. On the viewpoint platform of the FAIR construction site the group gained an overview of the building measures and the progress of the construction works. (cp)
]]>Ion beam therapy is a rapidly developing branch of tumor therapy. Because ions release the largest proportion of their energy at the end of their range, they are good candidates for the effective treatment of deep-seated tumors. In addition, they make it possible to efficiently spare the healthy tissue surrounding the tumor. The tumor therapy with accelerated carbon ions that was developed at GSI is now being used in clinical procedures on a broad scale at institutions including the Heidelberg Ion-Beam Therapy Center (HIT). In current research, scientists are looking to find out which kinds of heavy ions — such as carbon, oxygen or helium ions — are the most effective for specific tumor diseases. For some types of tumors the most effective ions have already been clearly demonstrated; for others, further physical and radiobiological studies are necessary.
This is the area where Sokol is doing her research. Her dissertation, “Oxygen ions as a single and combined modality in radiotherapy,” at the Physics Department of Technische Universität Darmstadt was based on an experimental investigation of the relevant properties of oxygen (16O) ions and an analysis of the possibility of introducing them into clinical practice mainly for the treatment of hypoxic tumors. Many tumors have a poor blood supply and therefore have an oxygen concentration that is lower than normal — a condition known as hypoxia. As a result of their lack of oxygen, these tumors respond poorly to radiotherapy and chemotherapy as well as being predisposed to metastases. In such cases, treatment with oxygen ions could bring progress, due to their specific physical properties, namely an increased linear energy transfer. Sokol’s dissertation presents the first comprehensive description and experimental characterization of oxygen-16 ions from the standpoints of physics and radiation biology, as well as the subsequent treatment planning studies. She carried out this work at GSI and HIT.
Sokol was able to provide the first experimental demonstration that oxygen ions could be more effective than carbon ions in treatments of certain cases of hypoxic tumors. Her comparison of radiotherapy plans with oxygen and with lighter ion beams showed that the use of oxygen ions for hypoxic tumors resulted in optimally uniform target recognition and also in certain cases might lead to the reduction of the radiation damage to normal tissue and critical organs. The recommended use of a tumor therapy with oxygen ions could thus improve therapeutic success for some cases of hypoxic tumors. Dr. Sokol’s dissertation was supported and assessed by Professor Marco Durante, Director of the Biophysics Department at GSI, and Professor Thomas Aumann, head of the Nuclear Reactions Research Division at GSI. (BP)
]]>Nicht nur feiert GSI im Jahr 2019 seinen 50. Geburtstag, und die Mondlandung jährt sich zum 50. Mal. Auch hat die UNESCO das Internationale Jahr des Periodensystems der Elemente für 2019 ausgerufen. Das Jubiläumsprogramm steht daher ganz im Zeichen der bei GSI entdeckten sechs chemischen Elemente – zu jedem GSI-Element wird ein Vortrag über den Namensgeber gehalten. Abgerundet wird das Programm durch den traditionellen Weihnachtsvortrag, der dieses Jahr die wissenschaftlichen Erfolge der 50-jährigen GSI-Geschichte noch einmal Revue passieren lassen wird.
Die Vortragsreihe "Wissenschaft für Alle" richtet sich an alle an aktueller Wissenschaft interessierten Personen. In den Vorträgen wird über die Forschung und Entwicklungen an GSI und FAIR berichtet, aber auch über aktuelle Themen aus anderen Wissenschafts- und Technikfeldern. Ziel der Reihe ist es, die wissenschaftlichen Vorgänge für Laien verständlich aufzubereiten und darzustellen, um so die Forschung einem breiten Publikum zugänglich zu machen. Die Vorträge werden von GSI- und FAIR-Mitarbeitern oder von externen Rednern aus Universitäten und Forschungsinstituten gehalten.
Die Vorträge finden im großen gemeinsamen Hörsaal der Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (FAIR) und des GSI Helmholtzzentrums für Schwerionenforschung, Planckstraße 1, 64291 Darmstadt, statt. Der Eintritt ist frei, eine Anmeldung ist nicht erforderlich. Externe Teilnehmer werden gebeten, für den Einlass ein Ausweisdokument bereitzuhalten. (CP)
On a guided tour of the campus the group visited the control center of the accelerator and the storage ring CRYRING. Also they learned more about the discovery of new elements at the SHIP experiment, the tumor therapy with carbon ions and the large-scale experiment HADES. A view onto the FAIR construction site showed them the progress of the construction works and concluded the tour.
The Hesse frigate belongs to the German Navy and was officially commissioned in Wilhelmshaven in 2006 as the third ship of the Saxony class. She is the godfather ship of the Federal State of Hesse. Many ships and boats of the navy maintain sponsorships to a federal state or to a city. These sponsorships are based on many years of tradition and illustrate the close and friendly relations between communities and politics and the armed forces in Germany. In order to further deepen this friendly connection to the federal state of Hesse, the crew of the frigate is currently travelling through the state to obtain information about culturally, scientifically and industrially outstanding facilities. (cp)
]]>Download of "target" – Issue 17, December 2018 (PDF, 8,2 MB)
During the ceremony, Dr. Saito thanked the Institute for the certificate and promised to further promote and intensify the two research institutes’ scientific cooperation in the future. The three-year guest professorship will include conducting his researches and supervising students and young researchers at the IMP.
After receiving his master degree in physics from the University of Tsukuba in Japan, Takehiko Saito received his doctorate from the Niels Bohr Institute/University of Copenhagen in Denmark in 1999. The subject of his doctoral dissertation was the nuclear structure of A~180 nuclei. He did postdoctoral work at the Brookhaven National Laboratory in the USA and subsequently moved on to the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg and then to GSI in order to conduct research with high-energy rare-isotope beams. From 2006 to 2012 he also headed a Helmholtz Young Investigators Group at GSI and took over a professorship at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz. He is currently the Head of the Hypernuclear Group at GSI, conducts research on exotic hypernuclei, and is working for Nustar, one of the four major experiment pillars of the future FAIR accelerator center. He is also taking on a position as Head Scientist at the RIKEN research institute in Japan since September 2018.
The honor from CAS is also a recognition of the success and significance of the many years of scientific cooperation between the Institute of Modern Physics in Lanzhou and the GSI Helmholtzzentrum in Darmstadt. The partnership between CAS and GSI in the areas of accelerator physics and research fields such as atomic, nuclear, and astrophysics as well as materials research can look back on a long tradition. Both research institutes operate heavy ion accelerators, and both are planning the construction of next-generation accelerators: FAIR in Darmstadt and HIAF in Huizhou. (BP)
]]>"Saturday Morning Physics" is a project of the physics department of the TU Darmstadt. The series of lectures is held annually and aims to increase the interest of young people in physics. In lectures and experiments on seven consecutive Saturdays between autumn and Christmas holidays the high school students learn about the latest developments in physical research at university. Those who take part in six of seven courses receive the "Saturday Morning Physics" diploma. The visit to FAIR and GSI takes place as an excursion within the series. GSI has been one of the sponsors and supporters of this project since the start. (BP)
On the anniversary website we will keep you updated on the planned activities throughout the year:
]]>The jDPG is a working group within in the German Physical Society (DPG). It is organized in 33 regional branches throughout Germany and offers physics students and also interested pupils more than 200 regional, nationwide and international events each year. (cp)
ESCAPE, one out of five EOSC Initiative projects, is due to start in the first quarter of 2019. The European Commission is supporting the ESCAPE project with 16 million euros. Around EUR 1.3 million of this will go to GSI and FAIR - which once again underscores the excellence located here through the successful acquisition of third-party funding. GSI and FAIR can also contribute their competence and experience in data management to ESCAPE. With their expertise in green IT, high-performance computing and scientific computing, they also belong to the key players in this field. One of the most modern and efficient data centers in the world, the Green IT Cube, is already in operation on campus.
A deluge of data is expected in the coming years by the next generation facilities of astronomy and particle physics, including as a core piece the future FAIR accelerator center and its four large experimental pillars CBM, NUSTAR, PANDA and APPA. The million funding boost of the ESCAPE project will help Europe's world-leading research infrastructures work together to find common solutions to their data challenges, their data interoperability, their data access and to accentuate the openness of Fundamental Science research to the full international community, from professionals to the public.
The project is led by the national institute of nuclear and particle physics within CNRS (Centre national de la recherche scientifique), the French public research organisation, with a consortium of 31 partners including European partner institutions, pan-European research organisations, and medium-sized enterprises. Important partners are GSI and FAIR. (BP)
In the future, such accelerator structures could be used at GSI and FAIR for medical research. "For example, such a micro-accelerator structure for electrons is interesting for cell irradiation in biophysics," explained Professor Dr. Oliver Boine-Frankenheim. (JL)
More information:
Press release TU Darmstadt
Original publication in Physical review Letters
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The 166 quadrupole units, which weigh around a ton each, each consist of a superconducting main quadrupole magnet that is combined in a variety of arrangements with superconducting correction magnets (sextupole and steering magnets). Unlike the usual copper cables, superconducting systems don’t pose any resistance to electric currents. To achieve superconductivity, the units are cooled to around -270 degrees Celsius during operation.
The technology for these magnets, which are very important for the FAIR ring accelerator, has been constantly improved over many years in a joint development program. The main features of this optimization were the minimization of the heat input into the cooling system, the quality of the magnetic field, and the mechanical stability of the magnets during rapid changes in current (high ramp rates) and at high repetition rates. The magnets, which make use of a special superconducting cable known as Nuclotron cable, enable extremely high field strength rise rates of up to four tesla per second — much higher than can be achieved by conventional superconducting magnets.
The quadrupole and correction magnets are being constructed at JINR, thereafter they will undergo the comprehensive test program specified in the contract. This program, which will be carried out in Dubna, includes cooling the magnets to their final operating temperature of -270 Grad and testing the tightness of the hydraulic system and the integrity of the electrical circuits and coils. A facility incorporating a cryogenic system was constructed in Dubna for such tests in a joint project between GSI and JINR during the past years.
Once all of the tests have been passed, the quadrupole units will each be released and transported to Germany, where they will be brought together with other components procured by GSI and assembled into complete modules for the SIS100. This integration and manufacture of the quadrupole modules for the SIS100 by the Bilfinger Noell company, who are also manufacturing the superconducting dipoles for the large FAIR ring accelerator — was commissioned as the result of a call for tenders which was concluded at the beginning of the year.
The ratification of the contract and the commissioning of various companies by JINR means that the series production and testing of the SIS100 quadrupole units can now start. In addition, the delegation, which consisted of the Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Jörg Blaurock; the head of SIS100/SIS18 Peter Spiller; the head of the department for superconducting magnets and testing (SCM), Christian Roux; and the department employees Alexander Bleile and Egbert Fischer, in the course of the visit signed an additional framework agreement with JINR over further cooperation between the GSI, FAIR, and JINR in the area of superconducting magnets.
Says Jörg Blaurock: “FAIR is a mega project; we have not yet completed all the assignments. This contract offers several possibilities for further expanding our cooperation in the future. The main areas of our cooperation are the production and testing of magnets, but there are also possibilities for the development of techniques and technologies for our experiments, for example, for the CBM experiment.” (BP)
]]>Dr. Christian Möhler (Heidelberg University), Dr. Patrick Wohlfahrt (TU Dresden), and Tabea Pfuhl (Goethe University Frankfurt) received the awards at a gala ceremony at the GSI campus in Darmstadt on November 22. After a welcoming address by Dr. Dieter Schardt, the Chairman of the Association, and a word of greeting by Gerhard Kraft, the initiator and crucial pioneer of this tumor therapy at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum, the awards were officially presented.
In her master’s thesis at Goethe University Frankfurt, Tabea Pfuhl documented her efforts to precisely measure the dose buildup effects during the penetration of proton beams into tissue or water and to compare this data with simulation calculations.
With the help of a carefully thought-out experimental setup, she succeeded in separating the contribution of the delta electrons and thus determining the dose fractions of the nuclear target fragments, which are otherwise difficult to access experimentally. She conducted the experiments for her investigations at the proton therapy facility in Trento, Italy.
A special aspect of this year’s award is the fact that both of the recipients for doctoral dissertations, Dr. Christian Möhler and Dr. Patrick Wohlfahrt, worked together on the same topic. They conducted comprehensive and pioneering studies in the area of range calculation by means of dual-layer spectral computer tomography. They also successfully translated their findings step by step into clinical applications.
The 20th annual presentation of this award testifies to the association’s long and continuous promotion of young scientists in the field of ion-beam tumor therapy. The topics of these scientific research projects have fundamental significance for the further development of ion therapy, because the results of the award-winning projects are often translated into clinical applications. The awards are named after Professor Christoph Schmelzer, the co-founder and first Scientific Director of GSI. The GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, where heavy ion therapy was developed in Germany to the clinical use stage in the 1990s, traditionally offers an appropriate setting for the annual presentation ceremony.
The Association for the Promotion of Tumor Therapy supports activities conducted within the research project Tumor Therapy with Heavy Ions at GSI, with the goal of improving tumor treatment by refining the system and making it available for general use in patient care. During a pilot project conducted at the accelerator facility at GSI from 1997 to 2008, more than 400 patients with tumors in the head and neck were treated with ion beams. The cure rate of this method has been more than 90 percent in some categories, and the side effects are very slight. At the Heidelberg Ion-Beam Therapy Center (HIT), patients have routinely been treated with heavy ions since 2009. (JL)
]]>Physicist Mustafa Schmidt, 33 worked also for a couple of years in industry before his PhD. The prize of €200 and a certificate was awarded to him for his dissertation titled Particle Identification with the Endcap Disc DIRC for PANDA. His doctoral advisor was Professor Dr. Michael Düren from the Justus Liebig University in Giessen.
The Panda Collaboration has awarded the PhD Prize once per year since 2013 in order to honor the best dissertation written in connection with the Panda Experiment. Panda will be one of the key experiments of the future accelerator center FAIR. The experiment focuses on antimatter research as well as on various topics related to the weak and the strong force, exotic states of matter, and the structure of hadrons. More than 500 scientists from 20 countries currently work in the Panda Collaboration. In his dissertation, Dr. Schmidt studied the Endcap Disc DIRC, a Cherenkov detector that forms one of the main components of the charged particle identification of the Panda detector, which is being built at the FAIR accelerator facility.
Candidates for the PhD Prize are nominated by their doctoral advisors. In addition to being directly related to the Panda Experiment, the nominees’ doctoral degrees must have received a rating of “very good” or better. Up to three candidates are shortlisted for the award and can present their dissertations at the Panda Collaboration meeting. The winner is chosen by a committee that is appointed for this task by the Panda Collaboration. The Panda Collaboration awards the PhD Prize to specifically honor students’ contributions to the Panda project. (BP)
]]>On the subsequent bus tour to the FAIR construction site the Overall Site Manager Harald Hagelskamp, presented the progress of the construction work. Furthermore, the delegation visited the SHIP experiment where the GSI elements 107 to 112 were produced, as well as the treatment facility for tumor therapy with carbon ions. At the storage ring CRYRING, an in-kind contribution of Sweden to FAIR, they were informed in particular about the planned research in atomic physics. Also a visit to to the experiment for exotic nuclei R3B and the GLAD magnet were part of the program. Finally, Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, gave an overview of the details of the FAIR construction in his talk. The day ended with a joint dinner and intense discussions, where the Swedish representatives particularly commended FAIR and GSI for their many young scientists.
The Royal Swedisch Academy of Sciences is the highest scientific institution in Sweden. It aims to further sciences, in particular natural sciences and mathematics. It is located at Swedens capital Stockholm and is world famous for the nomination of the Nobel Prize winners in physics and chemistry, as well as the awarding of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences donated by the Sveriges Riksbank, the central bank of Sweden. The Academy is divided into ten so-called classes, among them also the physics class, which consists of Swedish as well as external members. (cp)
]]>The nuclear physicist Peter Braun-Munzinger, who deals mainly with ultrarelativistic heavy ion collisions and the quark gluon plasma produced in them, headed the ALICE department at GSI from 1996 to 2011 and was also a professor at the TU Darmstadt during this time. From the beginning, GSI has played a leading role in ALICE's construction and scientific program. The main objective of ALICE is to explore how matter in the universe was fractions of a second after the Big Bang. At that time prevailed unimaginably high temperatures and pressures, a so-called quark gluon plasma existed. The quark gluon plasma is generated by collisions of heavy ions at the CERN accelerator LHC and is investigated with the ALICE experiment.
The Stern Gerlach Medal is the DPG's highest award for outstanding achievements in the field of experimental physics. The prize consists of a hand-written parchment certificate and a gold medal with portraits of the two physicists Otto Stern and Walther Gerlach, after whom the Stern-Gerlach experiment is named, a fundamental experiment in physics. (BP)
During the meeting, Professor Paolo Giubellino, the Scientific Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, had the opportunity to present the FAIR project and its science prospects, and to address the possibility of enhanced collaboration between South Africa and GSI/FAIR, which was welcomed by the Minister. The ministry, iThemba LABS and FAIR will now work together to develop a roadmap of collaboration, that might eventually lead to the direct involvement of South Africa in FAIR. South Africa has a strong tradition in nuclear physics and has just approved a major expansion of its facilities at iThemba LABS. It is therefore a partner of great potential for FAIR.
The iThemba Laboratory for Accelerator Based Sciences (iThemba LABS) is a multidisciplinary research facility that is based on the development, operation and use of particle accelerators and related research equipment. iThemba LABS brings together scientists working in the physical, medical and biological sciences. The facilities provide opportunities for research in subatomic physics, material research, radiobiology, and the research and development of unique radioisotopes for nuclear medicine and industrial applications. iThemba LABS have various collaboration agreements and joint training programs with higher education institutions and research laboratories around the world. (cp)
]]>The ALICE group among others assembles twenty new readout detectors for the Time Projection Chamber which is the heart of the ALICE apparatus. After four years of intensive work, the last five detectors were delivered to CERN at the end of October. The production took place in the GSI Detector Laboratory, strongly profiting from – but also helping to further extend – its excellent infrastructure. (OeA)
]]>The Institute of Modern Physics (IMP), Chinese Academy of Sciences nominated Yuri Litvinov for this prize for his outstanding contributions to the development of precision experiments with stored highly-charged ions at the cooler-storage ring (CSRe) in Lanzhou in the province Gansu. The "Dunhuang Prize" is awarded to the foreign experts in areas of science, technology, education, health, economy and management, who have made distinct contributions to the development of Gansu province.
Since its first edition in 1996, 177 foreign experts have received such a prize. Yuri Litvinov is the second GSI scientist receiving this award. In 2004, Otto Klepper was awarded for his contributions in establishing a fruitful collaboration between the GSI and the IMP research divisions.
Yuri Litvinov studied physics in St. Petersburg and is a GSI researcher for nearly 20 years. In 2003 he defended with distinction his PhD thesis at the university of Gießen (doctoral supervisor Professor Hans Geissel). Starting 2009 he spent two years at the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg for his habilitation. Since then Litvinov is actively involved in the APPA/SPARC research activities led by Professor Thomas Stöhlker. Among other tasks at GSI he is the coordinator of the experiments at the experimental storage ring ESR, and since 2012 he is the head of the SPARC Detectors department. Yuri Litvinov, who is also an adjunct professor at the University of Heidelberg, has already received numerous honours for his scientific work. (BP)
]]>The internship of Lilly Schönherr was supervised by Dr. Wolfgang Quint and his colleagues, especially Nils Stallkamp and Davide Racano, from GSI’s atomic physics department. Mainly she worked at the experiments ARTEMIS and HILITE of the ion trap HITRAP, which is connected to the experimental storage ring ESR. Among other things, she built in detectors, tested vacuum components for her leak tightness and equipped a thermic shield with a multi-layered foil during her internship. Also milling in the workshop, the work with electronics and the design of mechanical components with a CAD system was part of her work. Lilly wants to become a physicist after finishing school.
The “Arbeitskreis Schule Wirtschaft Hessen”, a task force to bring together schools and industry in State of Hesse, consists of the seven divisions Fulda, Mittelhessen, Nordhessen, Osthessen, Rhein-Main-Taunus, Südhessen and Wiesbaden-Rheingau-Taunus. The competition is held in six school types. A jury of representatives of schools and companies evaluates the reports taking into account their formal structure, their content, their layout and originality and the overall impression. The winners of all school types on the Hessian state level receive a prize money.
The construction of the particle acceleration center, which is currently being built at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt, has speeded up considerably since the groundbreaking ceremony for the big SIS100 ring accelerator in the summer of 2017. “Just over a year after construction started, we’ve been able to show in Munich where we stand today and how much momentum this project has generated,” said Jörg Blaurock, the Technical Managing Director of FAIR and GSI. After the FAIR presentation at Expo Real, he drew a positive balance. “Because many important players from the construction sector were present, the trade fair gave us an outstanding opportunity to further enhance the FAIR project’s profile in the construction industry and actively present the next steps in our call for tenders for further services,” he added.
At this year’s event, the market continued to show strong interest in the realization of the FAIR project. Potential contractors and bidding syndicates for the upcoming work on the FAIR construction site eagerly took advantage of opportunities to hold direct and comprehensive talks about the construction plans for FAIR and find out about possible participation. “The discussions also showed that a scientific megaproject such as FAIR is an extremely attractive addition to a construction company’s portfolio. We’ve gained important new professional contacts,” said Blaurock, who had cooperated with Michael Ossendorf, Director FAIR Site & Buildings, and Klaus Ringsleben, Chair of the FAIR Building Advisory Committee, to present the currently open FAIR project contracts at the trade fair presence in Munich.
At the moment, the FAIR realization project has a large order volume related to the complex area of technical building services (TBS), which must be installed in coordination with the construction of the particle accelerator. In the process, numerous individual trades have to mesh. “FAIR doesn’t require standard equipment, but rather customized solutions that are both cost-effective and efficient. This is quite a challenge. That’s why we’re cooperating closely with the overall planning team to divide this complex construction project into manageable contract packages that are in line with market conditions,” explained Michael Ossendorf. The calls for tenders for the next TBS packages, including those for ventilation and electrotechnical systems, will begin this year. Plans call for the contract awarding process to take place in 2019.
Klaus Ringsleben is also satisfied with the FAIR trade fair appearance. "We were able to convince with comprehensive, competent information and good preparation and provide detailed information about our scientifically and technically extraordinary construction project. With our appearance at the trade fair, we have made our mark.”
FAIR’s partnership with Darmstadt as a science city has once again paid off. At this year’s trade fair, the FAIR project had its own presentation at the Darmstadt stand, which was featured as part of the Frankfurt Rhine-Main metropolitan area. The Expo Real trade fair attracts around 40,000 visitors each year and is one of Europe’s most important get-togethers for the real estate, construction, and location marketing sectors. (BP)
]]>Johannes, which research areas have you been able to check out so far?
During the first week I observed the experiments with super-heavy elements at SHIPTRAP and TASCA. To begin with, I received lots of information explaining how they work. After that I was allowed to help out. For example, I helped to fill the magnets with liquid nitrogen, make filaments for an experiment, start and stop a series of experiments, and do conversion work. Next, I spent a couple of days with the nuclear spectroscopy group, where I was able to measure the speed of light in an experiment. That was really something special. Right now I’m in the target laboratory, where I’m producing targets made of gold foil.
Which of your internship experiences have really taught you something?
In the nuclear spectroscopy group they only spoke English. My mentor had organized my visit this way on purpose so that I would be challenged — and that was really great! Besides, I was able to really get a sense of how the researchers do their daily work. Starting in October, I’ll be studying physics at the University of Rostock. At some point I’ll have to face the question of whether to pursue a career in industry or in research. Now I’ve already gotten to know one of these options a little bit.
What did you do in your free time?
I lived in the guest house, so I spent most of my time on the campus. Last week the summer students threw their farewell party, and I was there. It was a great party! On the weekend I went to Darmstadt and took a look around. Otherwise in the evenings I skyped with my family or watched movies.
What was the idea that won the “Jugend forscht” special prize for you?
The name of our project was “Why Does the Banana Shot Bend?” The reason why the banana shot in a soccer game bends is the Magnus effect, which is caused by the difference in pressure that results from the rotation of the ball. Together with two friends, I derived a formula for calculating the Magnus effect on spheres and cylinders. My friends, both of whom are computer scientists, wrote a simulation program, and we subsequently compared the results calculated by means of the program with experimental data.
What insights will you be taking home with you after the time you’ve spent here?
A physicist’s daily work is extremely varied. Physicist try out lots of different things, and sometimes they improvise. In addition, they did less calculation and math than I had expected — at least at first glance. Incidentally, I’ll be allowed to take a few of the gold targets that I’m making right now home with me as souvenirs!
(LW)
]]>Dr. Ingo Peter and Carola Pomplun from the Public Relations Department welcomed the guests. During their visit, the participants, among others the state parliamentary candidates from CDU and SPD, Irmgard Klaff-Isselmann und Tim Huß, had also the possibility to form their own impressions of the mega construction site for the future FAIR accelerator facility. Of particular interest was the view of the construction site from the hill above the existing SIS18 ring accelerator, which has been extensively upgraded. The guests also had the opportunity to learn about the outstanding experimental opportunities available to researchers at FAIR.
The border crossing, organized by the Wixhausen district administrator Bernd Henske and the first chairman of the trade association Klaus Müller, started at Kerbplatz Wixhausen and ended with a final rest at Aumühle. The “Wixhäuser Grenzgang” has been organised again since its incorporation in 1977, and the district administration has thus revived an old tradition. (BP)
]]>Gisela Taucher-Scholz studied biochemistry in Santiago, Chile, and received her doctorate for a research project conducted at the Max Planck Institute for Medical Research in Heidelberg. She has worked in the biophysics department of GSI since 1988, and has headed a research group there since 1999. She was awarded an honorary professorship in biology at the Technische Universität Darmstadt (TUD) in 2012. Her research activities focus on the molecular radiobiology of charged particles, DNA repair in the context of chromatin, and spatiotemporal studies and living-cell microscopy of repair proteins. In addition to research, her work is mainly devoted to providing support for young academics. This aspect of her work is reflected in her many years of commitment as a juror in the youth science competition “Jugend Forscht” and her scientific presentations to schools as part of the “Brückenschlagen” (Building Bridges) project, to name just a few examples. Since 2011 she has been responsible for the Radiation Biophysics module in the master’s degree program Technical Biology, which is offered every winter semester at GSI.
The Ulrich Hagen Award has been presented since 2004 to scientists for outstanding achievements in the field of radiation research. The award is named after Professor Ulrich Hagen (1925–2007), the pioneer of molecular radiation biology.
GBS presents this award every two years for significant achievements in biological radiation research. In addition to scientific excellence, there are also additional criteria, such as participation in the support of young academics and networking and commitment to the research community in Germany. (cp)
]]>The building blocks of matter in our universe were formed in the first 10 microseconds of its existence, according to the currently accepted scientific picture. After the Big Bang about 13.7 billion years ago, matter consisted mainly of quarks and gluons, two types of elementary particles whose interactions are governed by quantum chromodynamics (QCD), the theory of strong interaction. In the early universe, these particles moved (nearly) freely in a quark-gluon plasma. Then, in a phase transition, they combined and formed hadrons, among them the building blocks of atomic nuclei, protons and neutrons. In the current issue of the science journal "Nature", an international team of scientists presents an analysis of a series of experiments at major particle accelerators which sheds light on the nature of this transition. The scientists determined with precision the transition temperature and obtained new insights into the mechanism of cooling and freeze-out of the quark-gluon plasma into the current constituents of matter such as protons, neutrons, and atomic nuclei. The team of researchers consists of scientists from the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt, and from the universities of Heidelberg, Münster, and Wroclaw (Poland).
Analysis of experimental results confirm the predicted value of the transition temperature / One hundred and twenty thousand times hotter than the interior of the sun
A central result: The experiments at world-wide highest energy with the ALICE detector at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at the research center CERN produce matter where particles and anti-particles coexist, with very high accuracy, in equal amounts, similar to the conditions in the early universe. The team confirms, with analysis of the experimental data, theoretical predictions that the phase transition between quark-gluon plasma and hadronic matter takes place at the temperature of 156 MeV. This temperature is 120,000 times higher than that in the interior of the sun.
"Snowballs in hell"
The physicists analyzed more precisely the yields of a number of particles and anti-particles. "Our investigations revealed a number of surprizing discoveries. One of them is that light nuclei and their anti-particles are produced at the same temperature as protons and anti-protons, although their binding energies are about 100 times smaller than the energy corresponding to the transition temperature", explains Prof. Dr. Anton Andronic who recently joined the University of Münster from the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung. The scientists presume that such "loosely bound objects" are formed at high temperature first as compact multi-quark objects which only later develop into the observed light nuclei and anti-nuclei. The existence of such multi-quark states was proposed a long time ago but no convincing evidence was found.
"Confinement": Charm quarks travel freely in the fireball
Another remarkable observation concerns a phenomenon long known but poorly understood: Normally, quarks are confined into the interior of protons and neutrons; isolated quarks have never been observed, a property which scientists describe as "confinement". In the interior of the fireball formed in nuclear collisions at high energy this confinement is lifted (deconfinement). The new study shows that charmonium states such as J/psi mesons, consisting of a pair of charm and anti-charm quarks, are produced far more often at LHC energies compared to observations at lower energies, such as at the "Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider" in the USA. Because of the higher energy density at LHC the opposite, namely a reduction of J/psi mesons through dissociation was expected. In contradistinction, enhancement was predicted 18 years ago by two of the team members (Prof. Dr. Peter Braun-Munzinger, GSI, and Prof. Dr. Johanna Stachel, Universität Heidelberg) because of deconfinement of the charm quarks. The consequences of the prediction were worked out in detail in a series of publications by the whole team. The now observed enhanced production of J/psi particles confirms the prediction: J/psi mesons can only be produced in the observed large quantities if their constituents, the charm- and anticharm quarks, can travel freely in the fireball over distances of a trillionth of a centimeter – corresponding to about ten times the size of a proton. "These observations are a first step towards understanding the phenomenon of confinement in more detail", underlines Prof. Dr. Krzysztof Redlich of the University of Wroclaw (Poland).
Experiments at CERN and at Brookhaven National Laboratory
The data were obtained during several years of investigations in the framework of the experiment "ALICE" at the Large Hadron Collider accelerator at the research center CERN near Geneva. In "ALICE", scientists from 41 countries investigated in collisions between two lead nuclei the state of the universe within microseconds after the Big Bang. The highest ever man-made energy densities are produced in such collisions. These result in the formation of matter (quarks and gluons) as it existed at that time in the early universe. In each head-on collision more than 30,000 particles (hadrons) are produced which are then detected in the ALICE experiment. The actual study also used data from experiments at lower energy accelerators, the "Super Proton Synchrotron" at CERN and the "Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider" at the US-Brookhaven National Laboratory on Long Island, New York.
The investigations were supported in the framework of the "Collaborative Research Center" 1225 "Isolated quantum systems and universality under extreme conditions (ISOQUANT)" by the German Research Foundation (DFG). Furthermore, they were supported by the Polish National Science Center (NCN) (Maestro grant DEC-2013/10/A/ST2/00106).
The investigation of relativistic nuclear collisions has a long tradition at GSI, first at the SIS18 accelerator, then at the CERN SPS. Until 1995 the group was led by Prof. Dr. Rudolf Bock, from 1996 on by Prof. Dr. Peter Braun-Munzinger.
The ALICE group at GSI is since 1993 member of the ALICE collaboration and has played a leading role in the design and construction of the experiment as well as in operation and analysis. Prof. Braun-Munzinger had, as project leader of the ALICE Time Projection Chamber TPC as well as in the design and construction of the ALICE Transition Radiation Detector TRD, together with his team an important impact on the whole successful experiment and is involved in ALICE data analysis as well as in the development of projects for the future of ALICE. Since 2011 Prof. Dr. Silvia Masciocchi leads the ALICE GSI group.
The phenomenological investigations towards interpretation of the ALICE data which are central to this Nature publication were performed within the framework of the ExtreMe Matter Institute EMMI, currently led by Prof. Braun-Munzinger.
The results reported in the Nature publication are also trail blazing for research at the future FAIR facility: especially the results on the production of light nuclei and hyper-nuclei open new perspectives for the CBM experiment at FAIR.
Original publication: Andronic A., Braun-Munzinger P., Redlich K. und Stachel J. (2018): Decoding the phase structure of QCD via particle production at high energy. Nature Sep. 20, 2018 issue; DOI: 10.1038/s41586-018-0491-6
]]>The CR is designed for fast precooling of hot secondary ions coming from the antiproton separator and the Superconducting Fragment Separator (Super-FRS). The fast cooling will be done by means of the RF debuncher and stochastic cooling systems, which are developed by GSI. The CR is going to be used for mass measurements of short-lived secondary rare isotope beams from the Super-FRS in a special CR optical mode as well.
A large part of the CR is being developed under the direction of the Budker Institute as a Russian in-kind contribution to FAIR. The Budker Institute also bears the main responsibility for the Collector Ring. The signed contracts provides that BINP manufactures dipole, quadrupole and sextupole magnets, a vacuum system, power supplies for all magnets, beam diagnostic components and injection/extraction system. The most challenging components are 26 dipole magnets weighing almost 60 tons each. The BINP is responsible for assembly and commissioning of all CR components at FAIR site.
With the contract now signed, all decisive prerequisites for the technological demanding Collector Ring are in place. (BP)
]]>The special symposium was embedded in the Euroschool week 2018, which took place in Leuven from August 26th to September 1st. The school covers general topics in physics of exotic nuclei, experimental and theoretical studies of nuclear structure and reaction dynamics, nuclear astrophysics, research on superheavy elements and interdisciplinary applications in medicine, energy and society.
The aim of the Euroschool is to promote young scientists at the highest level. The main activity is to provide an excellent lecture program that bridges the gap between the university education and the forefront research activities at the European accelerator-based large-scale laboratories. The lectures are given by invited experts of the field and focus on physics, techniques and applications related to modern nuclear research. The Euroschool trains new generations of young scientists from across Europe and helps them to establish contacts with the leading scientists in the field. Therefore, the school is an important asset to prepare the next generation of scientists for their research work at institutions such as GSI and FAIR.
The Euroschool is organized by its “Board of Directors”, an association of twelve European, internationally recognized research scientists and university professors. The chair is the GSI scientist Professor Christoph Scheidenberger. The annual school events take place in different countries and have typically 60 to 80 participants. Over the last 25 years, the Euroschool on Exotic Beams has had around 1200 participants. The first events took place in Leuven (years 1993-1998 and 2000) and were funded by the European Commission via a training and mobility program, while it is funded by various sources since 2006. Since then the school’s funding is based on a Memorandum of Understanding between several European laboratories, including GSI and FAIR, and universities. Since 2001, the school has travelled throughout Europe and took place at 15 different locations in eleven countries. The Euroschool on Exotic Beams is attended by participants from Europe as well as non-European scientists from North and South America, Australia, Africa, India, China and Japan.
Among other achievements, meanwhile five text books have emerged from this school, which are widely used by students and lecturers. (JL)
Web Site: https://www.euroschoolonexoticbeams.be
]]>In an introductory talk the two FDP politicians got an overview on the GSI research and the FAIR project, one of the largest cutting-edge research projects worldwide. In the following joint conversation, the FAIR and GSI management gave more detailed information on the plans for the scientific use of the FAIR accelerator facility, the strategic goals for FAIR and GSI and the further development of the campus.
During the guided tour through the existing research facility the visitors informed themselves on the research highlights of GSI, e.g. the tumor therapy with carbon ions, the discovery of new elements and the production of cosmic matter at the HADES detector. The guests also got an impression of the high-tech developments for FAIR which are in full progress. Furthermore, René Rock and Brian Röcken were able to take a direct look at the work on the FAIR site during a bus tour. On the 20-hectare site, the shell construction work for the central ring accelerator SIS100 is ongoing and the excavation pit for the first of the future large-scale experiment stations is prepared.
]]>The therapy was the result of joint research by the GSI Helmholtzzentrum, the Clinic of Radiology and the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) in Heidelberg, and the Helmholtz research laboratory in Rossendorf. Individual radiation treatment with heavy ions had initially been conducted as early as December 1997. This had been preceded by four years of technical development of the therapy unit at the heavy-ion accelerator of GSI, which included a radiation facility for patients, and by 20 years of fundamental research in radiation biology and physics.
Treatment with ion beams is a very precise and highly effective, yet extremely gentle, therapeutic process. The major advantage of this method is that the ion beams, which have previously been brought to very high speeds in the accelerator facility of GSI, develop their strongest effect in the tumor itself, while sparing the healthy tissue that surrounds it. Because the range of the heavy-ion beam can be controlled with millimeter precision, particles are stopped inside the tumor and can release their energy there in a concentrated burst. As a result, this process is especially suited for deep-seated tumors that are located near high-risk organs such as the optic nerve or the brain stem.
The raster-scan method, which was also developed at GSI and was used in heavy-ion therapy for the first time, enables the carbon beam to cover the tumor very precisely. The radiation dose can be applied to the malignant tumor tissue point by point. In order to regulate the intensity of the effect, the beam is left long enough at each point to reach the intended dose. Despite the large number of dots/pixels, the irradiation of a field takes only a few minutes. This process makes it possible to irradiate very precisely tumors with complex shapes, and it is a great improvement over conventional beam delivery methods.
In the period until 2008, GSI used carbon ion beams to treat more than 440 patients for tumors of the head and neck with great success. Today, special clinics in Heidelberg (Heidelberg Ion-Beam Therapy Center — HIT) and Marburg (Marburger Ionenstrahl-Therapiezentrum — MIT) and Shanghai, China, offer customized versions of the treatment that was first used at GSI in Darmstadt 20 years ago. The initiator and the crucial pioneer of this tumor therapy is Professor Gerhard Kraft, who created GSI’s biophysical research department in the early 1980s and was its director from 1981 to 2008. This is how he remembers the early years: “Back then, most people would hardly have thought it possible to make the outstanding biomedical properties of ion beams technically available for therapy. That became possible only through the collaboration of many disciplines, such as nuclear and atomic physics, radiation biology and radiation medicine, accelerator physics, computer science, to name just a few.”
The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, emphasizes the great social benefits of this treatment: “This method is an outstanding example of how fundamental research benefits society and individual patients through successful technology transfer, and how it is being continuously advanced today.” The establishment of the facilities in Heidelberg and Marburg — in whose development and construction GSI played a major role — by no means marks the end of the research work in this field. Additional medical applications are also a major goal of the biophysical research that will be conducted in the APPA program, which is one of the four major research pillars of the future accelerator center FAIR that is currently being built at GSI. FAIR can offer new research opportunities for the next-generation particle therapy, for example using very high-energy ions for radiography or radioactive ions for PET imaging online.
“Having pioneered heavy ion therapy in Europe, GSI is now the main center for research in this field” says the successor of Professor Kraft as Director of the Biophysics Department, Professor Marco Durante. “We are committed to improve particle therapy for the benefit of the patients, and to seek new strategies and solutions to use heavy ion beams for treating cancer and noncancer diseases”, concludes Durante. For example, scientists in the Biophysics Department are working on the combination of heavy ion therapy and immunotherapy. They are also investigating the use of ion beams to treat cardiac arrhythmia. Here too, the advantages of ion therapy — extremely precise point-by-point application and optimal protection of the surrounding tissue — can be put to good use. As a result, in the next few years carbon ions could be successfully used to treat cardiac arrhythmia as a noninvasive alternative to the present treatment with cardiac catheters or drugs.
Another major goal is to treat moving tumors in the inner organs, such as is the case with lung, liver and pancreatic cancer. The ion beam is targeted very exactly, and for this reason the patients must be held in place with millimeter precision so that this high-precision radiation can be effective. However, tumors in the abdominal and thoracic cavities are moved by the patient’s breathing and heartbeat. Current research is therefore searching for ways to achieve the precision and homogeneity that ion beam radiation requires in order to treat moving targets as well as fixed ones. Tumor therapy with heavy ions thus still offers great opportunities for further scientific findings that will enable it to be used even more effectively in the future for the benefit of many patients. (BP)
]]>After an introductory presentation about the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung and the development of the FAIR project, which is currently being constructed at GSI and is one of the largest research projects worldwide, there was an opportunity for discussion with the management of FAIR and GSI. This also included an exchange on the strategic goals for FAIR and GSI, which are the basis of the site's activities.
Afterwards a bus tour led over the FAIR construction site, where the visitors informed themselves about the progresses. These included the shell construction of the large SIS100 ring accelerator and the excavation pits for the transfer building, the central hub for guiding the facility´s beam, and for the CBM experimental site. CBM is one of the four research pillars of the future accelerator center.
The visit was completed by a guided tour of the existing accelerator and research facilities, during which the guests gained the latest up-to-date insights into science on campus. They visited among other things the linear accelerator UNILAC, the facility for ion-based tumor therapy that has been developed at GSI, the large-scale experiment R3B and the large-scale detector HADES – all of them key stations, which will also play an important role for future experiments at FAIR. (BP)
]]>The masses of the exotic chromium nuclides were measured more accurately than ever before by the experimenters at CERN in the Penning trap mass spectrometer ISOLTRAP. The binding energies can be derived from the results. When the physicists plot the binding energies of the six isotopes they can draw a trend line through the points and from this line they can see whether a shell closure occurs in this region or the nuclear shape suddenly changes between one isotope and the next. The measurement uncertainties were previously too large to enable reliable statements. “Thanks to the new, extremely precise measurements we can now state with confidence that the abrupt change of shape that had previously been speculated about does not occur in the case of these isotopes,” said Frank Herfurth, a scientist from GSI who participated in the experiment. “The new, more exact data shows us a slow change of shape away from the symmetrical form. Thanks to the joint efforts of experimenters and theorists we have been able to compare our results with an ab initio model for the first time. These are special nuclear models, the calculations of which are essentially based on the interactions of protons and neutrons and thus are less dependent on intuitive approximations. Two out of four nuclear structure models confirm our observation, the other two don’t. The experiment results are a valuable help to test the assumptions that underlie the different models.”
ISOLTRAP is a Penning trap mass spectrometer combined with a multi-reflection time-of-flight (MR-ToF) mass separator. This structure enables the masses of especially rare isotopes to be measured directly. The combination of two Penning traps enables precise and clean measurements unaffected by contaminants. The most exact mass measurements of exotic, short-lived nuclei can thus be carried out using penning trap spectrometers.
ISOLTRAP is a forerunner of the Penning trap precision experiment for exotic ions. Technology, software, and hardware that has been and is being developed for ISOLTRAP is in use at SHIPTRAP, HITRAP, and is also planned for use at the FAIR experiment collaboration MATS within the NUSTAR collaboration. At FAIR, the particle accelerator facility that is under construction at GSI, similar experiments with even more exotic nuclei are planned.
The ISOLTRAP experiment, initiated by the former head of Atomic Physics at GSI, Prof. Kluge, is the result of a collaboration over many years between GSI, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, the University of Greifswald, and the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics (MPIK) in Heidelberg. In recent years MPIK’s Prof. Blaum has taken over the leadership of the collaboration, and the Institute continues to be supported in this by various GSI/FAIR departments such as Experiment Electronics, Atomic Physics, and Decelerators.
Original publication in Physical review Letters: Precision Mass Measurements of 58–63Cr: Nuclear Collectivity Towards the N=40 Island of Inversion
]]>After a presentation about the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung and the future accelerator center FAIR, there was also an opportunity for exchange, for example about the strategic goals for FAIR and GSI. Afterwards, a tour of the existing accelerator facility and the FAIR construction site was on the agenda.
During the tour of the construction site, Jörg-Uwe Hahn and Dr. Dierk Molter were able to take a direct look at the work on the 20-hectare site, for example the ongoing shell construction work for the central ring accelerator SIS100 and the excavation pit for the first of the future large-scale experiment stations to be built. (BP)
]]>Dr. Andreas Samberg has received the Ruprecht Karls Award for his doctoral thesis entitled "Applied String Theory, Hot and Cold: A Holographic View on Quark-Gluon Plasma and Superfluids". In his research work, Dr. Andreas Samberg uses methods from string theory to describe strongly interacting quantum systems in terms of weakly interacting theories of gravity in a higher-dimensional space. The principle of this holographic duality is analogous to the well-known holograms on banknotes which generate a three-dimensional picture from a flat metal film. This holographic duality is employed by Andreas Samberg for the description of the hottest and coldest forms of matter in the Universe. On the one hand, he considers the behavior of heavy quarks in the quark-gluon plasma - an extremely hot state of matter which microseconds after the Big Bang filled the whole Universe and which is now created at the LHC accelerator at CERN. He also studies this state of matter at very high densities as they will be reached in experiments at the future FAIR facility. On the other hand, he considers a phenomenon due to which fluids flow without any viscosity at low temperatures, so-called superfluidity. He discovers new aspects of the dynamics of this state of matter, in particular concerning the turbulence of vortices at strong coupling. Two-dimensional superfluids as they are investigated here will be realized in future experiments on ultra-cold quantum gases.
The thesis honored by the award was performed under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Carlo Ewerz at Heidelberg University and at the ExtreMe Matter Institute EMMI at GSI. It was supported by GSI with a fellowship in the framework of the strategic cooperation with Heidelberg University. During his thesis work, Andreas Samberg was a member of the Heidelberg Graduate School of Fundamental Physics (HGSFP) and of the Helmholtz Graduate School for Hadron and Ion Research (HGS-HIRe). Together with EMMI, the latter supported a research stay of several months at Princeton University (USA).
The Ruprecht Karls Award is endowed with 3000 Euro and is awarded by the Heidelberg University Foundation for outstanding research work by young scientists at the Ruprecht-Karls-University Heidelberg. Each year, the award honors the five best doctoral theses of all disciplines at Heidelberg University which are selected in a university-wide, multistage procedure. The award was presented in a ceremony in the Great Hall of the University Heidelberg.
]]>Die Vortragsreihe "Wissenschaft für Alle" richtet sich an alle an aktueller Wissenschaft und Forschung interessierten Personen. In den Vorträgen wird über die Forschung und Entwicklungen an GSI und FAIR berichtet, aber auch über aktuelle Themen aus anderen Wissenschafts- und Technikfeldern.
Ziel der Reihe ist es, die wissenschaftlichen Vorgänge für Laien verständlich aufzubereiten und darzustellen, um so die Forschung einem breiten Publikum zugänglich zu machen. Die Vorträge werden von GSI- und FAIR-Mitarbeitern oder von externen Rednern aus Universitäten und Forschungsinstituten gehalten.
Die Vorträge finden im großen gemeinsamen Hörsaal der Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (FAIR) und des GSI Helmholtzzentrums für Schwerionenforschung, Planckstraße 1, 64291 Darmstadt, statt. Der Eintritt ist frei, eine Anmeldung ist nicht erforderlich. Externe Teilnehmer werden gebeten, für den Einlass ein Ausweisdokument bereitzuhalten.
Professor Bock receives this high-ranking award for his outstanding achievements in the field of heavy ion research. In his laudatio Fortov commended Rudolf Bock on his accomplishments in the fields of heavy ion physics and as one of the founding fathers of GSI. In addition, he emphasized the important contributions of Rudolf Bock to the Russian-German collaboration in research over several generations, in particular his support for young scientists.
Rudolf Bock studied physics at Heidelberg University, where he received his PhD in 1958 with a thesis on nuclear reactions, supervised by Nobel Prize winner Professor Walther Bothe. Afterwards, as a member of the newly founded Max-Planck-Institute for Nuclear Research in Heidelberg, he started heavy ion research at the new Tandem accelerator, the first one in Germany. In 1967, he became professor at Marburg University from where he pursued the founding of the new heavy ion research center GSI, jointly with other Hessian professors. After its foundation in 1969 he belonged to the board of directors from 1970 to 1995. From the beginning he took care of many international collaborations, in particular with Russian research institutes, since 1982 also in the framework of a research project on energy production via intertial fusion driven by heavy ion beams. Since 1979 he is External Scientific Member of the Max-Planck-Institute for Nuclear Physics, since 1979 he is a Fellow of the American Physical Society. He was awarded with a Honorary Professorship of the Chinese Academy of Science in 1987, and an honorary doctorate at the University of Frankfurt in 2000.
The Semenov medal is named after Nikolai Nikolayevich Semenov (1896-1986), one of the founders of physical chemistry, creator of polymer theory and author of many publications on chemical kinetics, awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1956. The Semenov medal can awarded by RAS to Russian or foreign scientists who have made major contributions to the development of physical and chemical sciences.
]]>Ms. Radomski informed herself about the current status of the FAIR construction project, which is one of the largest cutting-edge research projects worldwide, and about previous research successes and the current experimental program “FAIR Phase 0.” The visit also provided an opportunity to discuss the strategic goals in all of the areas of management. These goals provide the framework for all of the activities conducted at FAIR and GSI
Ms. Radomski was able to view the progress on the FAIR construction site from close up during a drive around the site. The status of the various building works ranged from the recently started shell construction for the SIS100 central ring accelerator to the excavation pit for the first of the large-scale experimental stations to be built. Information was also provided about the project organization behind the work and the construction site logistics.
The visit concluded with a tour which provided Ms. Radomski with an insight into the existing research facilities. She visited the Experimental Storage Ring ESR, the therapy unit for tumor treatment using carbon ions, and the HADES large-scale detector. (BP)
]]>Physicist Antje Peters, 27, received the prize of €200 and a certificate for her dissertation titled Investigation of heavy-light four-quark systems by means of Lattice QCD. Her doctoral advisor was JProf. Dr. Marc Wagner from the Goethe University in Frankfurt.
The PANDA Collaboration has awarded the Theory PhD Prize for the first time in order to honor the best theory dissertation written in connection with the PANDA Experiment and its science program. It will be granted annually. PANDA will be one of the key experiments of the future accelerator center FAIR. The experiment focuses on antimatter research as well as on various topics related to the weak and the strong force, exotic states of matter, and the structure of hadrons. More than 500 scientists from 20 countries currently work in the PANDA Collaboration. In her dissertation, Dr. Peters studied lattice QCD calculations for open-flavour tetra-quark systems – a very important topic for the PANDA physics program.
Candidates for the PhD Prize are nominated by their doctoral advisors. In addition to being directly related to the PANDA Experiment, the nominees’ doctoral degrees must have received a rating of “very good” or better. Up to three candidates are shortlisted for the award and can present their dissertations at the PANDA Collaboration meeting. The winner is chosen by a committee that is appointed for this task by the PANDA Collaboration. The PANDA Collaboration awards the Theory PhD Prize to specifically honor students’ contributions to the PANDA project and to highlight the importance of cooperation with theory groups. (BP)
]]>From plasma physics to tumor therapy and atomic physics: Every summer student gets the chance to work on his own research project within the current GSI and FAIR experiments.
The main focus are developments and tests of technical and experimental components for the accelerator facility FAIR, which is being built at GSI, and its future experiments. Apart from the scientific program there are also social events planned like a barbecue party, a football match or trips to the region for networking and international exchange. In public lectures, which are part of the program, the summer students learn about GSI and FAIR research and scientific results.
For many of the students, who come mainly from European but also from more distant countries in Asia or Central America, the Summer Student Program is the first step to a master or PhD thesis at GSI and FAIR. The Summer Student Program, which takes place for the 38th time, is organized together with the graduate school HGS-HIRe.
The lectures are public and can be visited by everyone.
Professor Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, welcomed the participants and informed them about the research activities. Subsequently, Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, gave an overview about the FAIR project and the advancements of the construction, which was enhanced by a bus tour to the construction site.
Furthermore, Dr. Michael Schulz and Dr. Pradeep Ghosh reported on the biophysics research and the student program GET_involved. In a guided tour lead by Dr. Ingo Peter and Dr. Klaus-Dieter Groß, the guests from Thailand visited the existing research facility: In the Main Control Room they were able to witness the commissioning of the accelerator. Also they visited the experimental storage ring ESR, the therapy facility for the treatment of tumors with carbon ions as well as the large-scale detector HADES. In the energy-efficient high-performance computer center Green IT Cube they got to know more about the data processing of FAIR and GSI.
]]>He is the leader of the Medical Physics group at the Biophysics Department at GSI. His field of research includes innovative applications of ion beams, for example in a process that could be used in the future to treat cardiac arrhythmia. The ion beams used in the process were made up of carbon ions. As in the tumor therapy that has already been developed at GSI, the ions can be directed very precisely, while leaving the surrounding tissue largely unscathed. In the next few years, carbon ions could be successfully used to treat cardiac arrhythmia as a noninvasive alternative to the present treatment with cardiac catheters or drugs.
After studying medical engineering at Hamburg University of Technology, Graeff received his doctorate in engineering with a study of the computer tomography-supported diagnostics of osteoporosis. He did postdoctoral work in the Medical Physics group of the Biophysics Department at GSI. He has been the leader of this group since 2012. His research has focused on innovative applications of ion beams, the development of processes for irradiating moving targets with scanned ion beams, and the development of new therapy monitoring systems for raster scanning.
The Günther von Pannewitz Award, which is endowed with €1,000, is presented in recognition of outstanding research work devoted to radiation therapy for non-malignant diseases, including radiation biology, radiation physics, and clinical research. The presentation of this award honors the lifetime achievement of the Freiburg-based radiologist Günther von Pannewitz. (BP)
]]>Burghardt was welcomed by Professor Paolo Giubellino, the Scientific Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, and Jörg Blaurock, the Technical Managing Director of FAIR and GSI. In a joint discussion they reported about previous research highlights and the currently running research program of GSI, as well the plans for the scientific use of the FAIR accelerator facility. Burghardt received comprehensive information about the construction of FAIR, and was able to see the progress with his own eyes on a subsequent bus tour to the construction site.
In the following tour to the existing GSI facility he witnessed the accelerator operation in the main control room. He also visited the experimental storage ring ESR, and learned more about the tumor therapy with carbon ions developed at GSI.
]]>What exactly happens when a star explodes and becomes a neutron star? Scientists use complex model calculations to study this question. Simulations of a neutrino-driven supernova explosion have now provided indications that the muon, an elementary particle that was previously unjustifiably neglected in the calculations, actually needs to be taken into account. This result has been published in the journal Physical Review Letters.
Muons have previously been neglected in simulations of supernova explosions because it had been assumed that they were not produced in significant quantities in such events. The scientists working with Prof. Gabriel Martínez Pinedo, a theoretical physicist at GSI/FAIR and TU Darmstadt, have shown in their publication that the temperature and the electrochemical potential, however, are such that muon production is possible. “That changes the composition of the particles in the stellar material and the neutrino emission,” says Martínez Pinedo. These two effects are based on the following mechanism: A neutron star forms in the interior of certain supernovae. As such a star forms, it attracts matter, and powerful gravitational forces are present. Electrons in the interior of the neutron star, however, work against the gravitation due to their mutual repulsion and so create pressure. A proportion of these electrons are now converted into muons. Because muons have a higher mass than electrons, they generate less counterpressure in the interior of the neutron star being formed. As a result, the contraction speeds up. The faster contraction gives rise to more heat, which results in more neutrinos being produced and emitted. That affects the explosion mechanism. “The models must therefore take account of muons, because they affect the supernova explosion mechanism,” concludes Martínez Pinedo.
Theoretical calculations often provide important reference points for laboratory experiments. This is also the case at GSI and FAIR. Cosmic matter can be created in the laboratory using the particle accelerators in Darmstadt. The HADES experiment and the future CBM experiment at FAIR can, for example, reach the temperatures and densities at which the muon production takes place during neutron star formation. Theoretical predictions could provide the experimental physicists with orientation when they evaluate their experiments. “For our next step we are planning simulations that will tell us more about the role of the pions,” says Martínez Pinedo, looking forward. “They could also be playing an important role that is not yet completely understood.”
Muon Creation in Supernova Matter Facilitates Neutrino-Driven Explosions, Physical Review Letters
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A conversation with the management of GSI and FAIR offered the Lord Mayor an opportunity to find out about the strategic goals of the areas represented by the Scientific Managing Director, Professor Paolo Giubellino; the Administrative Managing Director, Ursula Weyrich; and the Technical Managing Director, Jörg Blaurock. Significant steps towards achieving these goals are already visible today. The “FAIR-Phase 0” research program is just beginning, the construction of FAIR is making great progress, the started upgrades of the existing facilities are on the home straight, and the constructional development of the campus is also significantly forging ahead. The outstanding profile of Darmstadt as a research site was another theme discussed during the Lord Mayor’s visit.
The discussion was followed by a tour of the FAIR construction site to observe the current status of the work under way there, including the excavation of the pit for the SIS100 accelerator tunnel, which has now reached a depth of 17 meters, and the further construction measures. On a tour of the existing accelerator facility, Jochen Partsch also visited the main control room, which has been restructured, technically optimized, and equipped with state-of-the-art technology for its future task of controlling the complex accelerator facilities of GSI and FAIR. (BP)
]]>Kalantar-Nayestanaki, who was born in Iran, conducts research and teaches as a professor of experimental nuclear physics at the KVI Center for Advanced Radiation Technology at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands. He has made a name for himself at the international level primarily for his research on the forces acting between very small nuclear particles. His research has focused on fields including systems consisting of a small number of nucleons, the structures of exotic nuclei, and hadron spectroscopy. Thanks to Kalantar-Nayestanaki’s outstanding research, the processes for calculating the forces within systems consisting of three nuclear particles have been significantly improved. His more than 350 publications are often cited by fellow researchers all over the world. In 2013 he was made a Fellow of the American Physical Society, and in 2017 he was elected a member of the Academia Europaea.
He also participates in the FAIR research program, in particular through the NUSTAR collaboration, which is one of the four scientific pillars of this future accelerator center. His research within NUSTAR focuses on matter under extreme conditions. As the speaker of NUSTAR, he also took on the task of representing the more than 850 participating scientists from 40 countries.
In addition to his numerous academic activities, he also represents the interests of individuals in other fields, for example in the representative body of employees of the University of Groningen. For many years he was also the Chairman of the Minority Council in Groningen, which advised the municipality on social issues.
Nasser Kalantar-Nayestanaki expressed great pleasure upon receiving his recent award. “I feel extremely honored. This award gives me an extra impetus to continue my activities with commitment and scientific curiosity,” he said. He also expressed his enthusiasm about the unique research opportunities that will be opened by FAIR: “For example, in combination with other studies in which I also participate, we will find out a great deal of new information about how the elements originated within the interiors of stars and what kinds of properties they have. FAIR truly brings the universe into the laboratory.”
The Order of the Netherlands Lion has been awarded since the 19th century in the name of the King to individuals who have rendered outstanding services to society. The order was founded by King William I of the Netherlands, and its Grand Master is the current monarch of the Netherlands. The recipients of this award have included scientists, artists, and successful athletes. (BP)
]]>“The international FAIR accelerator facility with its unique research opportunities for scientists from all over the world is one of the reasons for me to come to TU Darmstadt,” says Obertelli. “I look forward to working at FAIR and contributing to its scientific output by my research. This will also enhance the cooperation between TU Darmstadt and FAIR, and will further establish the ‘City of Science’ Darmstadt as a world-class research location.”
The Alexander von Humboldt Professorship, which is endowed with up to five million euros each, is awarded to the world's leading researchers of all disciplines who have so far worked in another country. They are to conduct forward-looking research at German universities in the long term. The award is granted by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation and financed by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research.
The Humboldt Professorship enables German universities to offer top international researchers competitive general conditions for research and to sharpen their own international profiles in the global research market at the same time. The award is granted on the precondition that the new Humboldt Professors are given long-term prospects for their research in Germany. To date, a total of 68 researchers, including twelve women, have been appointed to a Humboldt Professorship, facilitating their move to Germany.
Born in France, Alexandre Obertelli previously worked at the Institute of Research into the Fundamental Laws of the Universe (IRFU) at the Commissariat à l’énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives (CEA) in Paris‐Saclay, France, from 2006 as a Senior Researcher. In between times, he conducted research in the National Superconducting Cyclotron Laboratory (NSCL) at Michigan State University, USA, and at the RIKEN Research Institute in Japan. His work has gained him numerous grants, including an ERC Starting Grant and an ERC Consolidator Grant from the European Research Council. He is a member of various programme advisory boards at renowned research institutions like CERN in Switzerland as well as the Research Center for Nuclear Physics (RCPN) and RIKEN in Japan. In the context of FAIR and GSI Obertelli already has a number of tangible project proposals for the enhancement of the scientific coverage of the R3B and HISPEC experiments which belong to NUSTAR (Nuclear Structure, Astrophysics and Reactions), one of the four experimental pillars of FAIR.
How were chemical elements — the building blocks of our world — originally formed? What are the processes behind their formation? In the context of these fundamental questions in nuclear and atomic physics Alexandre Obertelli studies so‐called exotic nuclei, atomic nuclei with a comparatively disproportionate number of protons or neutrons. They have barely been researched so far. A deeper understanding of their properties could provide insights into the development of elements in the universe because neutron‐rich atomic nuclei play a central role in the formation of heavy elements. In this connection, Obertelli led experimental investigations on the reactions and structures of exotic nuclei which have now become a benchmark in nuclear physics. He has also developed and implemented spectroscopic measuring methods for characterising extremely neutron‐rich isotopes, whose further developments shall be implemented at FAIR. In the framework of his Humboldt Professorship he plans new projects for an enhancement of the R3B experiment to facilitate new research opportunities with exotic ions beams at FAIR, e.g. the study of neutron-rich hyper nuclei or the exploration of properties of neutron-rich nuclear matter as it occurs in neutron stars.
Ms. Beer and the management first discussed the strategic goals of the activities conducted at FAIR and GSI. Significant steps towards achieving these goals are already visible today. The “FAIR-Phase 0” research program is just beginning, the construction of FAIR is making great progress, the started upgrades of the existing facilities are on the home straight, and the constructional development of the campus is also significantly forging ahead.
In addition to receiving information about the progress that is being made at all strategic levels, Ms. Beer was given a guided tour of the existing accelerator facility, including the UNILAC linear accelerator, the main control room, the therapy center for tumor treatment with carbon ions, the ESR experimental storage ring, the HADES large detector, and the Green IT Cube. During her visit, Nicola Beer, elected representative in the German Bundestag and member of the parliamentary Committee on Education, Research and Technical Assessment, also had the opportunity to take a tour of the construction site to find out about the current status of the unique accelerator center FAIR, which is currently under construction. (BP)
]]>Atoms consist of a positively charged nucleus surrounded by an electron shell. The inner electrons penetrate the volume of the nucleus and thus atomic level energies are influenced by the size and shape of the atomic nucleus. A difference in size of two different atomic nuclei resulting, for example, from a different number of neutrons results in a small shift of electronic energy levels. Precise measurements of these energies are possible using laser light. Energy shifts are traced by varying the frequency and correspondingly the color of the light required to excite electrons to higher energy levels. So far, this method could only be applied to isotopes of lighter elements which are produced at larger production rates and whose atomic structure was already known from experiments with abundant long-lived or stable isotopes. Nuclei of elements above fermium (Fm, Z=100) can be produced at minute quantities of a few atoms per second in fusion reactions and generally exist only for at most a few seconds. Therefore, their atomic structure was so far not accessible with laser spectroscopic methods.
In the current experiments, nobelium isotopes were produced by fusion of calcium ions with lead at the velocity filter SHIP at GSI’s accelerator facility. To enable laser spectroscopy, the high energetic nobelium atoms were stopped in argon gas. The results are based on a preceding experiment also conducted at GSI, exploring the atomic transitions of nobelium (No). The chemical element with atomic number 102 was discovered about 60 years ago. The recent experiment investigated the isotopes No-254, No-253 and No-252 which differ in the number of constituent neutrons in their nuclei, with laser spectroscopy. The rates available for the experiment reached values below one ion per second for the isotope No-252.
From the measurements of the excitation frequency for the individual isotopes, the shift in color of the required laser light was determined for No-252 and No-254. For No-253, the fragmentation of the line into several hyperfine components induced by the single unpaired odd neutron was also resolved. The sizes and the shapes of the atomic nuclei were deduced from using theoretical calculations of the atomic structure of nobelium, which were carried out in collaboration with scientists from the Helmholtz Institute Jena in Germany, the University of Groningen in the Netherlands, and the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia. The results confirm that the nobelium isotopes are not spherical but are deformed like an American football. The measured change in size is consistent with nuclear model calculations performed by scientists from GSI and from the Michigan State University in the USA. These calculations predict that the studied nuclei feature a lower charge density in their center than at their surface.
Thanks to these pioneering studies, further heavy nuclides will be accessible for laser spectroscopic techniques, enabling a systematic investigation of changes in size and shape in the region of heavy nuclei. These experiments are so far only possible at GSI and allow for a unique in-depth understanding of the atomic and nuclear structure of the heaviest elements. The results also play a role for the future facility FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research), which is currently under construction at GSI. The same techniques and methods could also be employed in the low-energy branch of FAIR’s super fragment separator.
The experiments were conducted by an international team of scientists from GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, Johannes Gutenberg-University Mainz, Helmholtz institute Mainz, TU Darmstadt, KU Leuven (Belgium), University of Liverpool (UK) und TRIUMF (Vancouver, Canada).
The internship of Lilly Schönherr was supervised by Dr. Wolfgang Quint and his colleagues from GSI’s atomic physics department, especially Nils Stallkamp und Davide Racano. Mainly she worked at the experiments ARTEMIS and HILITE of the ion trap HITRAP, which is connected to the experimental storage ring ESR. Among other things, she built in detectors, tested vacuum components for her leak tightness and equipped a thermic shield with a multi-layered foil during her internship. Also milling in the workshop, the work with electronics and the design of mechanical components with a CAD system was part of her work. Lilly wants to become a physicist, and her conclusion in the internship report is: “I couldn’t have wished for a better internship.”
The “Arbeitskreis Schule Wirtschaft Osthessen”, a task force to bring together schools and industry in the eastern part of the State of Hesse, consists of the six sub-divisions in Schlüchtern, Gelnhausen, Hanau, the city of Offenbach, and the districts of Offenbach East and West. The competition is held in six school types. A jury of regional representatives of schools and companies evaluates the reports taking into account their formal structure, their content, their layout and originality and the overall impression. The winners of all school types receive sponsored prizes and an award certificate.
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The modernized facility is to run at a significantly higher level of performance for the future FAIR operation and will already offer unique opportunities for the "FAIR Phase 0" experimental program that is now starting. In addition to the GSI accelerators UNILAC (linear accelerator), SIS18 (ring accelerator) and ESR (experimental storage ring) as well as the existing experimental structures and the Petawatt High-Energy Laser PHELIX, FAIR components can already be used also, such as the storage ring CRYRING and a number of detectors, measuring instruments and other pieces of high-tech equipment developed especially for FAIR.
“Back in operation,” the machine is running again, was the decisive statement of the accelerator experts: That thrilling and extremely successful moment, the restart of the system, was preceded by the longest shutdown phase in the history of GSI. Over the past two years, GSI circular accelerator facilities had already been significantly improved for their future role as a pre-accelerator for FAIR. The pre-injector will be further upgraded in the future for the FAIR operation.
It was a precision landing: The process schedules drawn up two and a half years ago for shutting down and recommissioning the machines could be kept exactly to the day. The key objectives for the various parts of the existing facility have been achieved. Among other things, these include machine upgrades, the new FAIR control systems and new measurement technology. The connection, scheduled for later on, of the GSI accelerator to FAIR was also prepared. In addition, the new transformer station at the north side of the FAIR complex is already in operation for the start of the experiment period and is ensuring a more powerful electricity supply.
The scientific program now starting is a major step toward the future research at FAIR. “FAIR Phase 0” offers outstanding opportunities for experimentation. The demand from the international scientific community for the use of beam time is correspondingly high, and it underscores how attractive the FAIR project already is. Last year, an overwhelming number of scientists (over 1,000) submitted applications for beam time for the start of the FAIR research program, asking for more than twice of the currently available beam time. This shows the importance of the experimental program and the enthusiasm that prevails in the global research communities with regard to FAIR.
The period of experiments was preceded by an established selection process. The proposals were examined by an international committee, and selections were made based on scientific relevance and feasibility. 118 experiments have been granted for this and next year. Therefore, the accelerator facility will run for about 110 days per year.
During the beam times, scientists from around the world travel to Darmstadt to carry out their investigations at the facility and use the beam for experiments in a variety of fields of research, including particle physics, nuclear physics, plasma physics, biophysics and materials research.
In the coming weeks, the accelerator experts will initially be working diligently on the commissioning with beam. After testing all basic functions with beam on the machines, the machine settings required for experimental operation are tested, scientific measuring instruments are fine-tuned and the beam quality is checked. After that, finally, it’s “beam on” for science and the FAIR research program. (BP)
]]>Together, these centres want to set up two German flagship projects in accelerator research based on innovative plasma-based particle accelerators and ultramodern laser technology: an electron accelerator at DESY in Hamburg and a hadron accelerator at HZDR. At both facilities, a range of different fields of application are to be developed, ranging from a compact free-electron laser, through novel medical uses to new applications in nuclear and particle physics. As soon as they have reached the necessary level of maturity to be put to practical use in a particular area, new compact devices could be built for use in other Helmholtz centres, as well as in universities and hospitals.
“The funding of the ATHENA project, which is coordinated by DESY, is an important milestone in the ARD (Accelerator Research and Development) programme which was set up by the Helmholtz Association in 2011,” explains Reinhard Brinkmann, one of the initiators of ARD and the head of the accelerator department at DESY. “Channelling the competencies of the various Helmholtz accelerator centres promises to lead to ground-breaking developments and new applications for ultra-compact particle accelerators.”
Ralph Aßmann, the project coordinator of ATHENA and lead scientist at DESY, and Ulrich Schramm, head of laser particle acceleration at HZDR, agree that “The study of new types of plasma accelerators takes place in the context of strong international competition from the US and Asia. ATHENA is consolidating the traditional leading role of Germany’s accelerator research and supporting Germany’s international competitiveness as a place for doing science.”
The work on ATHENA is closely embedded in the wider context of European research through the EU-sponsored design study EuPRAXIA, with its 40 partner institutes, which is also coordinated by DESY. Hence the top German research project ATHENA has had a clear European perspective and orientation right from the start.
]]>The GSI Helmholtzzentrum is part of the Netzwerk Teilchenwelt since 2017. The network supports particle physics institutes in Germany to offer workshops on astrophysics and particle physics for young people and teachers at schools, school labs or museums. Now the first two-day workshop took place at the campus of GSI and FAIR and at Schuldorf Bergstraße. One GSI scientist and two GSI PhD students, who are active in Netzwerk Teilchenwelt, managed the event with support of the teacher. The students got an impression of the principles of research at accelerator experiments by working with real science data. They analyzed data of the CERN experiment ALICE where GSI researchers are involved. On the tour through the facility the students saw particle accelerators and large detectors.
For eight years the International Masterclass takes place at GSI and FAIR, where students analyze real experiment data as well. With the help of Netzwerk Teilchenwelt the program is supposed to be expanded. More events for students and teachers are planned.
Here, young people, teachers and project managers can find more events and teaching material: https://www.teilchenwelt.de/
]]>This is a key step toward the proposed superconducting (continuous-wave) linear accelerator (cw linac), which has the potential to open up new prospects for research with its continuous particle beam. The researchers have now reported on their results in the scientific journal “Physical Review Accelerators and Beams” (PRAB).
The demonstrator of the continuous-wave linac was studied in a test environment at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum. During this study, argon ions were injected into the new accelerator structure and accelerated. The test module consisted of a CH-cavity surrounded by two superconducting high-field magnets. Dr. Winfried Barth, head of the development team for the cw linac, describes the new design of the CH cavity as groundbreaking and summarizes the successful test by saying: “With the demonstrator of the cw linac, we have attained full particle acceleration up to the desired beam energy. With an acceleration voltage of 4.0 megavolts, the demonstrator accelerated a heavy-ion beam with an intensity of 1.5 particle microamperes to the target energy over a distance of only 70 centimeters.” The result confirms the effectiveness and capabilities of the new design of the CH cavity.
A continuous particle beam from the proposed continuous-wave linac is of interest for the generation and study of new chemical elements, and for experiments from the field of materials research that could also profit from the continuous beam of the proposed new linac. (BP)
Scientific publication in Physical Review Accelerators and Beams
]]>Prof. Petersen received the award at the Quark Matter Conference in Venice, where she also presented the latest results from her working group. The quark matter conference is the largest conference in this field with over 800 participants. Hannah Petersen is the youngest member of the International Advisory committee of the Quark Matter Conference.
She is working on new theoretical descriptions of the state of matter shortly after the Big Bang. Relativistic heavy ion collisions offer a way to study strongly interacting matter under the extreme conditions that prevailed at that time. “By accelerating lead or gold nuclei to almost the speed of light and smashing them together, we can reach temperatures and densities that existed in the early universe only microseconds after the Big Bang,” she says to describe her research. At such high energy densities, the basic theory of strong interaction, the quantum chromodynamics, predicts the existence of a new phase of matter—the quark-gluon plasma—which expands explosively at extremely high pressure.
Prof. Petersen was one of the first to recognize and investigate how the course of this explosion was affected by density and temperature variations resulting from quantum effects. By comparing theoretical and experimental data she was able to propose a frequently cited hybrid model that illustrates the dynamics and viscosity of the plasma as a function of the respective initial state of the quantum fluctuation.
The future accelerator center FAIR will provide the researchers with conditions that otherwise only exist in outer space. The work of Prof. Petersen and her Young Investigators Group is an important element for drawing essential conclusions from the experiments. Her main goal is to develop a transport approach for the dynamical description of heavy ion reactions at FAIR using state-of-the-art scientific computing. The scientific managing director of GSI and FAIR, Prof. Paolo Giubellino, is delighted about the young physicist’s award. “Hannah Petersen’s analytical method lays an important new foundation for experimental measurements at FAIR. Her work has now been rightly honored with the highest award for young theoretical physicists in the area of heavy ion physics,” he said.
The Zimanyi Medal is awarded by the Wigner Research Center for Physics of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences in Budapest. The prize was created in memory of the nuclear physicist József Zimányi, who died in 2006. Zimányi was also a member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and a professor at the Institute for Particle and Nuclear Physics (RMKI). The medal is awarded to theoretical physicists under the age of 40 years who have achieved important international recognition and impact in the area of theoretical high-energy physics. (BP)
]]>PHELIX (Petawatt High-Energy Laser for Ion Experiments) is one of the most powerful lasers in the world. It can deliver laser pulses with energies of up to 1,000 joules and laser pulses with a power of up to half a petawatt. The output power is quintillion times (billions of billion times) greater than that of a laser pointer or a laser in a CD player.
PHELIX is so large that it takes up an entire building the size of a two-story house with a clean-room atmosphere inside. The laser beam, which has a diameter of 30 cm, is guided to the site of the experiment using special mirrors and focused on a point. A laser pulse can be generated only about every 90 minutes.
Since it was first started up in the year 2008, PHELIX has completed a total of 115 operational periods or “beam times.” Over 100 experiments were successfully performed during these periods, resulting in more than 70 scientific publications. For years, there has been great demand among the research community for beam time at PHELIX. The amount of beam time requested regularly exceeds what can be offered. For this reason, there is an established selection procedure to allow research groups to carry out their experiments at PHELIX. Following the calls to submit proposals for experiments, these proposals are examined by an international committee, and experiments are then selected based on scientific relevance and feasibility.
“At PHELIX, in combination with the GSI accelerator facility scientists can conduct experiments that aren’t possible anywhere else in the world,” says Dr. Vincent Bagnoud, head of the “Plasma Physics/PHELIX” research department at GSI. “The objective is to study matter when it exists in the form of what is called plasma. In this state, the electron shell of atoms is completely or partially separated from the atomic nuclei. This is only possible under extreme conditions and above all at high temperatures of the sort found in stars or inside large planets such as Jupiter.” Plasma is one of the four states of matter — the other, more familiar states being solid, liquid and gaseous. In our everyday lives, we encounter less energetic types of plasma, such as a candle flame or a bolt of lightning during a thunderstorm.
In their experiments, the researchers expose samples of matter to radiation. These samples can be heated up with the laser beam to such a degree that a plasma forms. Just fractions of a second later, they can be bombarded with ions. An analysis of the resulting reactions makes it possible to study the properties of the plasma.
The possibility of using the laser beam to accelerate ions and then transfer them to stationary conventional accelerator structures is also being studied. This combined use of the laser and ion accelerator is unique and enables the generation of very brief ion pulses with high particle counts.
Further improvements are contemplated for the future, especially for use at the FAIR accelerator facility: In the long term, researchers are aiming to use ion acceleration with the laser to achieve different sorts of ions, higher energies and greater intensities. An increase in the pulse repetition rate of the laser is also planned.
]]>The novel Laser systems from Class 5 Photonics are deployed worldwide in leading research laboratories. The Supernova OPCPA already received the PRISM AWARD in the category of Lasers in January of this year. This Laser system allows researchers to conduct experiments ten times faster.
CEO Robert Riedel is pleased about the double recognition: “We are really proud having won this award. The Supernova has shown its’ strengths now for the second time against many other excellent competitors – it really proves that this laser system is a highly desired product. The Laser Focus World Innovators Award is a great incentive for us to continue our work and deliver outstanding products.
The spin-off company was founded in 2014 in Hamburg. The scientists from Helmholtz Institute Jena and DESY are developing high power lasers with pulses in the femtosecond range. One femtosecond is a quadrillionth of a second. Shorter laser pulses allow more precise working of materials, for instance. Also, such short laser pulses open up new innovative applications like 3D nanostructuring. For science, the technology is of great importance.
The event began with the annual Workshop on Ion and Particle Beams (Ionenstrahl Workshop) covering the activities of the German science community using positrons and ion beams (from eV up to GeV) for analysis, material modification and fabrication of nanostructures. The progress reports of research projects funded by German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF)
The progress of the collaborative research projects funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research was presented in numerous contributions and the upcoming activities for the FAIR phase 0 were discussed. During the following MAT Collaboration Meeting, the users of the GSI facilities presented their current activities in many different fields covering radiation effects in solids, radiation hardness of accelerator materials and electronic devices, and ion-track nanotechnology.
The event also offered a platform to gather experts from materials science, plasma physics, high-pressure science, mineralogy and geoscience, in order to discuss upcoming opportunities at the future APPA facilities at FAIR. APPA is one of the four research pillars of the future accelerator facility FAIR
Dedicated talks covered exciting topics such as the response of solids to multiple extreme conditions (e.g. irradiation, temperature, and pressure) and the creation of quenchable high-pressure phases. Further topics included the emission of beam-induced acoustic signals, mitigation processes of surface desorption under high-intensity ion beams, and warm dense matter physics, also in combination with nanostructured targets. The stimulating discussions made clear that coupling swift heavy ions, high pressure, and versatile state-of-the-art instrumentation provide exciting new research opportunities partially already available at the existing facilities within the phase 0 of FAIR.
]]>Over the years, project management has become a separate discipline in big construction projects. The importance of targeted, solution-oriented project management is also exemplified by the future accelerator center FAIR, which is currently being built at GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung. Jörg Blaurock, the Technical Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, held a speech at the conference, where he presented the FAIR project in all of its facets.
A holistic efficient project organization was created to carry out the highly complex FAIR construction project. Building construction, civil and structural engineering, accelerator development and construction, and scientific experiments are being closely coordinated with one another in the overall planning work. This enables the builders to proceed in a very concentrated way as they make FAIR a reality. To this end, the planners developed and established an integrated construction work schedule and tailored contracting strategies for the construction services.
The construction of FAIR commenced in the summer 2017, when the groundbreaking ceremony was held for the FAIR ring accelerator SIS100 in an event that attracted widespread public attention. In the years ahead, a group of international partners will build a one-of-a-kind accelerator facility where it will be possible to perform an unprecedented variety of scientific experiments. To make this possible, scientists, engineers, and other experts have teamed up with industrial partners to engage in a structured process for the development of new technologies in many areas. (BP)
]]>Atomic nuclei consist of two building blocks, the protons and neutrons. Schütrumpf and Nazarewicz developed a model to predict the behavior of these building blocks and also to visualize it. The new technique demonstrates that groups of protons and neutrons form temporary clusters which correspond to smaller, stable nuclei within the larger nucleus produced by the collision. These clusters are variable and can change between different states.
The researchers analyzed reactions triggered by collisions of oxygen, calcium, and carbon, which can – depending on the collision energy – result in either fusion or fission. The calculations reveal clusters corresponding to the nuclei helium-4, carbon-12, magnesium-24, and argon-36. For example, two oxygen-16 nuclei colliding at an energy of 20 mega electron-volt form a pre-compound in which two deformed carbon-12 clusters oscillate against two helium-4 nuclei (alpha particles).
“Such fleeting nuclear states often appear in stars or other space phenomena. This is why they are of great interest to the scientists and are frequently examined in collision reactions. To understand their structure is fundamental for deciphering them,” explains Dr. Bastian Schütrumpf, who works as a post-doc in the GSI research department “Theory”. “Previous theory and experiments have suggested the existence of clusters in the pre-compound. Existing models, however, couldn’t reveal their detailed nature.” To address this problem, Schütrumpf and Nazarewicz used a mathematical tool originally developed to describe electron arrangements within atoms and molecules and applied it to the nucleons.
In the future, the scientists want to improve and enhance their calculations. Thus, the model could tackle even more complex asymmetrical reactions with different nuclei. While the current application focusses on low-energy reactions, clustering of neutrons and protons is a ubiquitous phenomenon which impacts also high-energy collisions as they will occur e.g. at FAIR.
FAIR and GSI will be present at IPAC with a booth at the exhibition area. The exhibition is open from 29 April to 2 May until 6 p.m. FAIR experts are available for discussions to give deeper insight into the accelerators and experiments and to answer questions. In two talks Dr. Peter Spiller, head of the SIS100/SIS18 department responsible for the new FAIR ring accelerator, will inform about the status of the FAIR project, and Professor Mei Bai, head of the Accelerator Operation, will explain the challenges of the current experiment activities of FAIR Phase 0.
For the participants, Girls’Day began with a welcoming address by Dorothee Sommer, head of the Human Resources department, and Dr. Birgit Kindler as a representative of the equal opportunities committee. This was followed by a tour of the particle accelerator and experiment facilities on the research campus.
After that, the girls could gain practical experiences in various technical and scientific working areas at workshops, technical laboratories, and research departments. Many departments had prepared for the girls’ visit by creating a special program, and they provided plenty of support for their young visitors. For example, the girls could try their hand in the mechanical workshops, soldered electronics and worked with concrete. They were also given a tour of the construction site of the future FAIR particle accelerator, which will be unequaled anywhere else in the world.
After all this, the girls could look back on an exciting day during which they had achieved many practical results. For example, they had produced candle holders, milled buttons for themselves, made ice cream with liquid nitrogen, controlled bikes for their safety equipment or plated components with a metallic layer in the electroplating shop.
Girls’Day is a day of action all over Germany. On this day, businesses, factories, and universities all over Germany open their doors to schoolgirls from Grade 5 and above. There the girls learn about courses of study and professions that offer traineeships in the areas of IT, the skilled trades, the natural sciences, and technology — areas where women have seldom been active in the past.
]]>Jonson was awarded with the Lomonosov Medal for his extensive contributions within fundamental nuclear physics. The RAS emphasizes that his work is of fundamental importance for the study of the nuclear structure and nuclear stability of exotic lightest nuclei at the boundaries of nucleon stability.
The prize acknowledges outstanding achievements in the natural sciences and the humanities. Among the previous recipients, there are many renowned scientist and even Nobel Prize laureates.
The award ceremony was held in Moscow at the General Meeting of the RAS in March 2018. The Lomonosov Gold Medal is awarded each year since 1959. Since 1967, two medals are awarded annually: one to a Russian and one to a foreign scientist. This year’s Russian medal went to Professor Yuri Oganessian.
Some 15 years ago, researchers at PTB in Braunschweig, the National Metrology Institute of Germany, developed a concept for the design of a novel optical clock with unique characteristics. Instead of exploiting oscillations in the electron shell, they proposed that one could make use of a transition between energy levels within an atomic nucleus as the basis for a nuclear clock. Because the protons and neutrons in the nucleus are orders of magnitude more densely packed and much more tightly bound than the electrons in the outer electron shells, they are much less susceptible to perturbation by outside forces that might affect their transition frequencies. Therefore, a nuclear clock should be far more stable and precise than present-day optical atomic clocks. However, the typical frequencies of nuclear transitions are much higher than those that occur in electron shells and generally lie in the gamma-ray region of the electromagnetic spectrum. This means that they cannot serve as the basis for an optical atomic clock, as all such clocks are based on excitation by microwaves or laser light.
The exception to this rule is found in an unstable isotope of thorium, thorium-229, which exhibits a quasi-stable, so-called isomeric nuclear state with an extraordinarily low excitation energy. The frequency of the transition between the ground state and this isomeric state corresponds to that of ultraviolet light. This transition can therefore be induced by means of a laser-based technique similar to that used in state-of-the-art optical atomic clocks. More than ten research groups worldwide are now working on the realization of a nuclear clock based on the thorium-229 isomer. Experimentally speaking, this is an exceedingly challenging endeavor. While the existence of the state was inferred from data obtained over several decades, the direct detection and hence unambiguous proof of its existence in the first place was achieved in 2016 in collaborative work of the LMU group together with the groups in Mainz and Darmstadt. They subsequently succeeded in measuring its half-life. However, it has not been possible to observe the nuclear transition by optical means yet, as the exact excitation energy of the isomer has not been determined with sufficient precision. The transition itself is extremely sharp – as required for timing purposes – and can only be induced if the frequency of the laser light corresponds exactly to the difference in energy between the two states. The quest for the magic frequency may be compared to the proverbial search for a needle in a haystack.
A collaborative effort by researchers and engineers at PTB, LMU, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, the Helmholtz Institute Mainz, and GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung has now achieved an important breakthrough in this search. The researchers have now measured some of the basic features of the thorium-229 isomer, such as the size of its nucleus and the general form of the distribution of protons. In the present study, the nuclei were not excited from the ground state by means of laser light, as they would be in a future clock. Instead, the isomer was produced by the alpha-decay of uranium-233 and decelerated in a device developed at LMU, extracted, and stored in an ion trap as Th2+ ions. The uranium-233 source was provided by the groups in Mainz und Darmstadt. For this purpose, uranium-233 was chemically purified and its decay products were removed to avoid any influence on the measurements. Subsequently, suitable sources were deposited as homogenous thin films on a silicon layer in an electrochemical procedure for the laser experiments of PTB at the LMU apparatus. Christoph Düllmann, professor at the Institute of Nuclear Chemistry at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz and head of the involved research teams at HIM and GSI, said: "This is a fascinating interdisciplinary team of physicists and chemists studying a topic that connects nuclear and atomic physics. Our contribution is testimony to the need of nuclear chemistry expertise in the preparation of samples suitable for experiments in a variety of fields in contemporary physics and chemistry research."
With the aid of laser systems specifically developed for spectroscopic analyses of this ionic species at PTB, researchers have now been able to determine the transition frequencies in the electron shell of Th2+. These parameters are directly influenced by the state of the nucleus and encode valuable information on its physical properties. On the basis of theoretical modeling alone, it has not been possible to predict how the structure of the thorium-229 nucleus in this unusually low-excited isomer might behave.
Professor Thomas Stöhlker, Vice Director of Research and head of the Atomic Physics division at GSI, added: "These fantastic new results are very helpful to determine the energy of the transition of Th-229 in future experiments at the storage rings of GSI and FAIR with high precision." Furthermore, it is now possible to probe the structure of the electron shell to confirm a successful laser-excitation of the nucleus into the isomer. The hunt for determining the optical resonance frequency that triggers the transition to the isomeric first excited state of the thorium-229 nucleus is not yet over. But researchers now have a far better idea of what the needle in the haystack really looks like.
The quadrupole units, weighing tons, consist of a superconducting quadrupole magnet that is combined in a variety of arrangements with superconducting sextupole and steering magnets. Unlike conventional copper cables, superconductors enable electricity to flow through them without any resistance. In order to achieve superconductivity, the units are cooled down to ‑270 degrees Celsius during operation.
The acceptance tests for the FoS units were conducted in the presence of a team of experts from GSI and the responsible work package manager, Egbert Fischer. The quadrupole magnets worked flawlessly during the performance tests at an operating temperature of 4.5 K (i.e. 4.5 degrees Celsius above absolute zero, which is about -273 degrees Celsius). During fast-pulsed operation at 23,000 amperes per second, the magnets surpassed the intended maximum operating current of about 12,000 amperes. Initial evaluations of the measured magnetic fields indicate that the units are of a sufficiently high quality within the range of the defined requirements.
The FoS units will soon be accepted and sent to FAIR. Series production is scheduled to be approved in the near future. GSI will subject the two units to an initial integration test, in which they and other installations will be mounted onto a carrier system.
Over the past four years, GSI and the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR) have built a high-performance testing facility in Dubna, Russia, to conduct cryogenic testing of the units from the series. The facility was put into operation during an official ceremony in late 2016. It tests superconducting magnets for the two future accelerator centers FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) and NICA (Nuclotron-based Ion Collider fAcility), which are currently being built at GSI in Darmstadt and at JINR in Dubna, Russia, respectively. About half of the tests at the facility will be of magnets for the NICA project, while the other half will be of magnets for the future SIS100 accelerator at FAIR. A corresponding contract for the operational implementation of the serial tests will be signed soon. The contract will require JINR to conduct the site acceptance tests (SATs) of the quadrupole units on behalf of GSI.
For the construction of FAIR, researchers are developing and using ultra-innovative methods and techniques in numerous areas. One example of that is the main quadrupoles of the units that recently underwent cryogenic testing. The quadrupoles are based on a technology that was originally developed for the Nuclotron accelerator at JINR. The key element of this technology is a Nuclotron cable that consists of superconducting strands wrapped around a copper-nickel tube. This cable technology is completely different from that of Rutherford cables, which are employed in high-field magnets. The new technology is especially well suited for the construction of superconducting magnets that enable fast electric current changes (high ramp rates). In a development process lasting several years, GSI and JINR optimized the Nuclotron magnet technology for use in the FAIR ring accelerator SIS100.
The focus was on reducing dynamic losses (heat input) at high ramp rates, optimizing the magnetic design, and adapting the system to a new high-current Nuclotron cable that offers sufficiently low hydraulic resistance. The steering magnet technology is based on a further development of the nucleon cable that was created specifically for FAIR’s SIS100 ring accelerator. In this system, the strands are insulated from one another so that the number of turns of a coil can be significantly increased even though the current is reduced.
The development of this new kind of cable was initially supported by a program funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and JINR. The development process was successfully completed when the first two SIS100 units were accepted. (BP)
]]>At the career day FAIR and GSI were able to offer a whole series of current job advertisements, a large part of them in the "FAIR Site & Buildings" department. The main focus was on specialized engineers and technicians with emphasis on construction, building services engineering and electrical engineering in planning and implementation, but also IT specialists. Young professionals and those with initial professional experience were just as much in demand as those with many years of professional experience.
There was a great demand at the FAIR and GSI booth, numerous participants took the opportunity to enter into direct dialogue and inquire in detail about employment possibilities and career opportunities. The contact persons of FAIR and GSI were in constant conversations with interested parties and potential applicants. There was also extensive information on the FAIR project, one of the largest construction projects for research worldwide, which was also presented at the central forum of the event.
Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, gave a positive review of the trade fair presentation. "Our presence in this environment of highly qualified engineering and technology has borne fruit. We were also one of the few companies in the field of science and research. A unique selling point that piqued great interest."
Many unsolicited applications were already received on the day of the fair itself, and the response via the regular application process in the following period is also very positive. (BP)
More information on working at FAIR and GSI and current vacancies can be found here.
]]>The FAIR and GSI management board informed the delegation in two introductory talks about the existing GSI accelerator facilities and research highlights as well as about the future international research center FAIR and the progress of the construction project. In a bus tour to the construction site the participants were able to take a look at the advancements: Current works include, among other things, the connection of the existing GSI facilities to the FAIR accelerator, the commissioning of two transformer stations for the energy supply of both facilities, and the excavation works for the FAIR ring accelerator SIS100.
Furthermore, in a guided tour through the existing facility the delegation visited the experimental storage ring ESR, the tumor therapy with carbon ions and the large-scale detector HADES, which will become part of the CBM experiment for the investigation of compressed matter at FAIR.
]]>A research team led by physicists at LMU Munich reports a significant advance in laser-driven particle acceleration. Using tiny plastic beads as targets, they have produced proton bunches that possess unique features, opening up new opportunities for future studies. The experiments were performed at the PHELIX laser on the campus of GSI und FAIR.
In their experiments, a team led by physicists at LMU Munich fired a powerful laser pulse at a micrometer-sized plastic sphere, blasting a bunch of protons from the target and accelerating them to velocities approaching the speed of light. The resulting velocity distribution is much narrower than that obtained when thin metal foils are used as targets. The physicist now present their research results in the scientific journal Nature Communications.
Recent years have seen remarkable advances in the development of a new approach to the acceleration of subatomic particles. This strategy makes use of the intense electric fields associated with pulsed, high-energy laser beams to accelerate electrons and protons to ‘relativistic’ velocities (i.e. speeds approaching that of light). Hitherto, the laser shot has generally been directed at a thin metal foil, generating and accelerating a plasma of free electrons and positively charged ions. Physicists at LMU have now replaced the foil target by a plastic microsphere with a diameter of one-millionth of a meter. These beads are so tiny that they cannot be stably positioned by mechanical means. Instead, the researchers use an electric field to levitate the target particle. Using a feedback circuit, the levitated bead can be trapped with sufficient precision to ensure that it does not drift off the beam axis. The electromagnetic trap was designed and built in the Department of Medical Physics at LMU.
“The basic approach is analogous to collisions between billiard balls. In our experiment, one of the balls is made of light and the other is our tiny levitated target,” explains Peter Hilz, who led the experiments. This novel approach to the generation of proton beams will make experiments feasible which have hitherto been out of reach.
Last year, physicists at TU Darmstadt cast doubt on our current understanding of the interplay between electrons and atomic nuclei, and are now upping the ante by proposing a solution to this so-called “hyperfine puzzle”. New measurements of the magnetic properties of bismuth atomic nuclei are now published in an article in the prestigious “Physical Review Letters” journal. A researcher from the Helmholtz Institute Jena, a branch of GSI, is also involved.
The optical spectrum of any given atom is a result of the interplay between light and the electrons within the atomic shell. Ultra-precise measurements can even reveal the effects of the internal structure of the atomic nucleus, which are referred to as the “hyperfine structure”. When measuring the hyperfine structure of highly-charged ions with few remaining electrons, researchers at TU Darmstadt found a discrepancy between the theoretically predicted and experimentally determined splittings: these empirically observed discrepancies were referred to as the “hyperfine puzzle”, and raised the question as to whether the interplay between the few electrons bound to the atomic nucleus and the nucleus itself, under the influence of the prevailing enormously strong magnetic fields, is fully understood. The next step towards solving the puzzle was to re-determine the strength of the magnetic field within the atomic nucleus: theoretical predictions are strongly dependent on this parameter, which must be determined experimentally.
Physicists of the working groups of Prof. Wilfried Nörtershäuser and Prof. Michael Vogel from the Institute for Nuclear Physics and the Institute for Condensed Matter Physics, respectively, at the TU Darmstadt were collaborating to remeasure the strength of the magnetic field – the so-called magnetic moment – using nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, which is used in medicine where it is referred to as MRI. It is based on the principle that atomic nuclei have a magnetic field, if they, like the bismuth isotope under investigation, have a nuclear spin. The north and south poles are oriented along the spin axis and will align with the magnetic field axis of an external magnetic field. The orientation of the nuclear magnets can be reversed by irradiating the atoms under investigation with radio waves of an appropriate frequency, and this effect can be observed. The frequency of the radio waves at which the poles change their direction depends upon the magnetic moment. Measuring the frequency allows one to deduce the value of the magnetic moment.
To achieve this, the researchers introduced an aqueous solution enriched with bismuth ions to a superconducting magnet and irradiated it with radio frequencies via a small coil until they registered a polarity reversal in the bismuth ions.
The challenge in doing this is that the ions’ environment, i.e., the atoms to which it is bound as well as the fluid in which it is dissolved, changes the external magnetic field in the vicinity of the atomic nucleus, which, in turn, affects the precise measurement of the magnetic moment. This disruptive effect has to be subtracted from the calculation, to which end highly specialised quantum-theoretical calculations were carried out by a group of theoretical physicists at the University of St. Petersburg and at the Helmholtz Institute Jena. It became apparent that the effect was much larger than previously expected when using bismuth-nitrate solutions, which means that measurements taken with the aid of bismuth-nitrate solutions are evidently inadequate.
The researchers finally achieved a breakthrough by using a complex organometallic compound, which releases hexafluoridobismuthate(V) ions in organic solution. The Darmstadt-based scientists received support from a research group specialised in fluorine chemistry at the University of Marburg, who produced a sample of the required substance. Thus, it was possible to measure much narrower resonance curves and to make more precise statements about the magnetic moment of the nucleus. Moreover, from the quantum-theoretical perspective, much more accurate calculations can be performed for this system than had previously been possible for bismuth nitrate.
The researchers used the newly calculated value for the magnetic moment of the stable bismuth isotope and made a theoretical prediction of the hyperfine structure splitting within the highly-charged ions. The values obtained, are in very good agreement with the results from the previously reported laser-spectroscopic measurements. “It would be too early to state that this represents the complete solution to the hyperfine puzzle,” Prof. Wilfried Nörtershäuser of the TU Darmstadt’s Institute for Nuclear Physics explains, going on to say; “nevertheless, it is for sure a significant part of the solution. Further experiments are still needed to achieve complete clarity about the interplay between the atomic nucleus and the shell and, therefore, to verify the theoretical predictions of the nature of quantum mechanics in very strong fields”. To better understand the complex influence of the electron shell on measurements of nuclear magnetic moments, scientists at TU Darmstadt now want to conduct measurements of nuclear magnetic moments on atomic nuclei with just a single bound electron or no electron shell at all. According to Nörtershäuser, such experiments are prepared at the GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research in Darmstadt involving also other working groups from TU Darmstadt.
One of Germany’s strongest lasers is located on the campus of GSI and FAIR: the Petawatt High-Energy Laser for Ion Experiments (PHELIX). By focusing all of the light energy into a hair-thin beam, plasma physicists can use the laser to study states of matter under conditions that are similar to those inside stars and giant planets. However, they also test possible applications such as laser-driven particle acceleration. To do this, scientists shoot the laser at a target to study how the ultra-powerful pulse of light affects the material. Now, scientists have, for the first time, tested a target with a nanowire surface instead of one with a smooth surface. “In the new surface, extremely thin nanowires are located close to one another like tall tree trunks in a dense forest that is bombarded from above by a laser,” explains Paul Neumayer, a plasma physicist at GSI and the director of the experiment. Nanotargets are extremely fragile structures. Until recently, laser pulses would destroy such targets before fully reaching them. In cooperation with the Helmholtz Institute Jena, the scientists at FAIR have greatly improved PHELIX’s temporal contrast, which means the laser pulse is now extremely “cleanly” delineated in terms of time. As a result, the wires are immediately hit by the laser’s full energy density, thus stripping off the electrons from the target atoms at one blow. This creates an electrostatic field, which, in turn, can accelerate lightweight particles.
“The new target enabled us to accelerate 30 times more particles than with the normally employed smooth foil targets under the same conditions,” says Neumayer. “Moreover, we increased the energy of the accelerated particles by 2 to 2.5 times.” There are two reasons for this improvement. First, a nanotarget has a much higher surface area than a smooth one, thus intensifying the laser’s interaction with the material. Second, the laser pulse can penetrate deep into the target’s structure in the spaces between the wires. As a result, the laser energy can be deposited with much higher densities than would normally be achievable with the laser light.
In addition to making laser-driven particle acceleration more efficient, the new targets have another benefit: they greatly increase the X-ray emissions of the hot plasma. “This is not only a huge advantage for the measurement of exotic plasmas, but also opens up interesting prospects for the development of extremely intense short-pulsed X-ray sources for future FAIR experiments,” explains Neumayer.
The innovative nanotargets were developed by Dimitri Khaghani as part of his doctoral dissertation. Khaghani is a laser and plasma physicist who earned his doctorate at Goethe University Frankfurt. For his dissertation, he worked together very closely with GSI’s Materials Research department, which has been researching and producing nanowires for years. Nanowires grow in tiny channels in plastic foils. To create these channels, researchers first bombard the foils with heavy ions from a linear accelerator. The areas damaged along the ions’ path are then chemically etched to turn them into open channels that are subsequently filled using an electrochemical method. “This process enabled us to test nanowires made of different materials and of various lengths and diameters so that we could find out when laser acceleration is most efficient,” says Khaghani, who received the Giersch Excellence Grant and the Giersch Award for Outstanding Doctoral Thesis for his research with nanotargets. “The synergy effect achieved through the close cooperation between the Plasma Physics and Materials Research departments on the campus certainly contributed to the success of the experiments and enabled us to take a big step forward,” says Khaghani, who is now a postdoc at the Helmholtz Institute Jena.
Original publication: Nature Scientific Reports, „Enhancing laser-driven proton acceleration by using micro-pillar arrays at high drive energy“
]]>The young persons were asked to evaluate and interpret data of the ALICE experiment. Under professional supervision of scientists they autonomously analyzed recent data recorded in proton-proton and lead collisions. In the lead collisions a so-called quark-gluon plasma is generated – a state of matter which existed in the universe shortly after the big bang. This plasma undergoes a phase transition back to normal matter in fractions of seconds. The particles produced in the process can give insight into the properties of the quark-gluon plasma.
In two introductory talks about quark-gluon plasma and the examination of heavy ion collisions at the ALICE experiment the pupils were informed about the analysis. Furthermore they visited the large-scale experiment HADES, one of the current experiments at the GSI accelerator facility that will also become a part of the future FAIR accelerator. Afterwards they started the data analysis.
The basic idea of the program is to allow the students to work in the same fashion as the scientists. This includes having a videoconference at the end of the day. In a conference connection with groups from the universities in Frankfurt, Münster, and Padua (Italy) as well as CERN they presented and discussed their results.
This year 215 universities and research institutes from 52 countries participate in the International Masterclasses. They are organized by the International Particle Physics Outreach Group (IPPOG). All events in Germany are held in cooperation with the "Netzwerk Teilchenwelt", a nationwide network committed to the communication of particle physics to youngsters and teachers. They aim to make particle physics accessible to a broader public. As of late, GSI as a location is also a part of “Netzwerk Teilchenwelt”.
ALICE is one of the four large international experiments at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). It is the experiment specifically designed to investigate collisions of heavy nuclei at high energies. Scientists of GSI and of German universities were involved in the development of new detectors and in the scientific program of ALICE from the beginning. The GSI computing center is an inherent part of the computing grid for data analysis of ALICE.
This high-tech branch is known as Big Science and for the first time, eighteen of the world’s largest research facilities gathered to create Big Science Business Forum to present their offers to European industry. BSBF was a one-stop shop for companies from all over Europe, where Big Science facilities could give them insight into our future investments and purchases in just one location over the course of a few days.
BSBF 2018 was the first ever conference of its kind, to which FAIR contributed and thus consolidated its place in the world’s big-league of scientific facilities.
The conference took place in Copenhagen from 26th -28th February, hosted by the Danish Ministry of Higher Education and Science and BigScience.dk. Altogether, some 1,000 delegates from more than 500 companies and organizations spanning approximately 30 countries attended. FAIR was represented by the In-Kind and Procurement team (David Urner and Sonia Utermann) and FAIR Legal (Felix Arndt). Among the other Big Science facilities attending were e.g. CERN, ESA, the European XFEL and DESY.
David Urner presented FAIR to an audience of potential suppliers and in-kind procurement experts from other Big Science facilities. His presentation marked the launch of FAIR’s new in-kind procurement portal, that gives potential bidders access to FAIR tenders. Several new industrial FAIR liaison officers (ILOs) have been nominated to offer the best – and simplest – communication between FAIR and industrial partners, a route that has proven so successful for CERN, ESS and ESA.
The FAIR delegation met potential new providers of cryogenic systems, vacuum chambers and magnets. In private meetings with delegates from ITER, ESS, European XFEL and CERN, they were able to exchange tips, legal texts and experiences in in-kind procurement in order to learn from each other and further improve the work at FAIR. They learned from potential suppliers how to make it more attractive for them to provide their services to FAIR; not just by expanding on our procurement portal and strengthening our network of ILOs, but also, for example, by encouraging syndication amongst small and medium-sized enterprises. The FAIR delegations looks forward to putting the new knowledge into practice.
As part of the collaboration, the partners have created a test facility containing three magnet test rigs. The first tests are scheduled to begin in 1st half of the year 2018. The facility will conduct intense endurance tests of multiplets, which are superconducting magnet units with corrective lenses, and then examine if they behave flawlessly in accordance with high quality standards during operation. Unlike the usual copper cables, superconducting systems don’t pose any resistance to electric currents. To achieve superconductivity, the units are cooled to around -270 degrees Celsius during operation.
The multiplets, which weigh up to 60 tons each, will later be used for beam correction in the Super-FRS at FAIR to achieve a high-precision particle beam. This part of the future accelerator center FAIR will be used for experiments on the fundamental structure of extremely rare exotic nuclei. For these experiments, ions of the heaviest elements will be shot at a target, where they will shatter upon impact. The resulting fragments will include exotic nuclei that the Super-FRS can supply to scientists for their experiments. The Super-FRS will enable researchers to produce exotic nuclei up to uranium at relativistic energies and separate them into pure isotopes. Because this process lasts for only a few hundred nanoseconds, it provides researchers access to very short-lived nuclei.
The multiplets, which were manufactured in Genoa, Italy, are an important in-kind contribution from GSI to the FAIR project, as is the subsequent testing process. GSI is the German shareholder of the international FAIR GmbH. All of the superconducting magnets that will be needed for the Super-FRS will be tested in the new test facility at CERN. The magnets will initially consist of a total of 33 multiplet units, which will be followed by 24 superconducting dipole magnets that will be needed for deflecting the particle beam. (BP)
]]>Two transformers at FAIR’s North Transformer Station were recently switched through to GSI in order to supply parts of the facility with electricity. Until then, GSI had been supplied with power exclusively through the transformer station at Leonhardstanne. The new transformers will improve the performance of the pulse load supply, which will be needed in the future for the operation of the SIS18 and SIS100 particle accelerators.
The transformers were delivered to the FAIR construction site in the fall of 2017. They were then installed and have been put into operation as planned. The second transformer station, FAIR South, is expected to go into operation in the second quarter of 2018. The new transformers convert the 110 kV high-voltage electricity that arrives at GSI and FAIR through underground high-voltage cables to 20 kV so that the current reaches the various consumers on the campus in line with their needs.
The new transformer station will be needed for the facility’s next beam time, which is scheduled for the summer of 2018. In addition to the GSI accelerators UNILAC, SIS18, and ESR, as well as the current experiments, scientists will also be able to use components of FAIR, such as the CRYRING storage ring, for the planned FAIR Phase 0 experimentation program. The experiments using this beam time will involve scientists from all over the world.
]]>Dr. Yusuke Tsunoda receives the Young Scientist Award for the invention of the so-called T-Plot method. This visualization method is the key for understanding and grasping the essence of complex many-body quantum systems like atomic nuclei. He developed this method to display mathematical solutions that can be assigned to different states and shapes of atomic nuclei. It helps to interpret and understand experimental results and is becoming a standard method in the study of the structure of exotic nuclei. The T-Plot method attracts great attention in the scientific community worldwide.
The five scientists assigned with the GENCO Membership Award are:
Although it has long been known that water can remain liquid far below 0 degrees Celsius without freezing, the result depends on the volume of the sample used. The fast evaporative cooling of tiny water droplets in a vacuum gives scientists a good means of analyzing supercooled water, i.e. water that is still liquid even though its temperature is below freezing. However, it’s difficult to get a reliable value for the droplet temperature under such extreme experimental conditions. Because this value is of crucial importance for further studies, the reliable and exact measurement of the temperature of supercooled water is a great challenge.
In their research, the scientists demonstrated a new technology that achieves an unparalleled level of precision when measuring the temperature of extremely small droplets of water. The system does this by determining the temperature of a droplet on the basis of its diameter. In this process, uniform droplets of warm ultrapure water that are only a few thousandths of a millimeter wide are sprayed in a targeted jet of liquid into a vacuum chamber. The upper layers of the droplets evaporate and the inner layers cool off greatly, so the droplets shrink. This shrinkage can be precisely measured with optical methods, and the result is used to determine the droplets’ temperature. A key element for such high-precision measurements is the unique instrumentation available at GSI for Raman spectroscopy, in which the droplets are illuminated with a laser beam. The spectrum and form of the scattered light enable scientists to determine the diameter of the droplets.
In its research, the team can build on the expertise gathered over many years at GSI and at the international FAIR accelerator center, which is currently under construction. This expertise especially benefits the development of targets for atomic and nuclear physics experiments. Inside the accelerator facility, the particle beams are guided to the experimental stations, where they hit the targets made of the material samples. Targets that consist of tiny jets of liquids also have to be specially developed for such studies in the target hall and in the experimental storage rings at GSI and FAIR. FAIR will be a unique accelerator center with great knowledge potential. As a result, the current research with supercooled water for the development of targets for FAIR is also an example of the innovation potential at FAIR.
Droplets of supercooled water can also be found in nature — in the upper layers of the earth’s atmosphere, where they exist under conditions that are similar to those created experimentally by the research team. That’s why the work being conducted by the scientists under the direction of Robert Grisenti can also improve our understanding of ice formation in the atmosphere. It is thus an important step on the path toward the development of reliable climate models. (BP)
Publication in Physical Review Letters 120
Report in Nature - Research Highlights
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By signing the agreement, ESA Director General Professor Johann-Dietrich Wörner and the FAIR Management Board, consisting of the Scientific Managing Director Professor Paolo Giubellino, the Administrative Managing Director Ursula Weyrich, and the Technical Managing Director Jörg Blaurock, sealed an international partnership that will open up far-reaching opportunities for new scientific findings. For example radiation is a showstopper for human missions to the Moon and Mars as well as for scientific missions to the depths of space. Also present was ESA astronaut Thomas Reiter, one of the initiators of the cooperation.
Unique research opportunities
“The partnership between FAIR and ESA will open up unique opportunities for carrying out outstanding research in the area of cosmic radiation and its effects,” said Professor Paolo Giubellino. “FAIR will be an institute that is unique in the world. It will enable researchers to reproduce the diversity of the universe in the laboratory, so to speak, in order to investigate fundamental questions such as how the chemical elements came into existence in the cosmos, gain knowledge about the effect of radiation on cells and solid objects, and forge ahead with practical applications in areas such as biophysics and materials research. We are eagerly looking forward to closer cooperation with the ESA.”
Professor Johann-Dietrich Wörner also emphasized the significance of the new partnership between the two international institutes: „GSI is the only facility in Europe capable of simulating high-energy heavy nuclei occurring in cosmic radiation. With FAIR, experiments with an even wider range of particle energies and intensities will soon be possible. This reproduction of the cosmic radiation environment can support us in many areas, from materials research for satellite missions to radiobiology, which deals with the effects of cosmic radiation on the human organism, and is an important preparation for long-term astronautical missions to the moon and beyond.“
When they move beyond the Earth’s protective atmosphere and its magnetic field, astronauts, satellites, and space probes are exposed to cosmic rays. An essential component of cosmic rays are fast particles that are ejected into space during stellar explosions or emitted by the sun and by distant galaxies. What effects would radiation have on human beings and spacecraft during a long space journey, for example to Mars? What would happen to the sensitive electronics on board? What materials, in which thicknesses, would be suitable protective shields to mitigate these effects? Can radiation-resistant materials and electronic components be developed in a targeted manner? These are some of the basic questions that are crucial to the implementation of such space missions. The aim is to provide the best possible conditions for human beings and materials in space and to minimize the risks to health.
In the future, researchers at the FAIR accelerator facility will be able to generate the kinds of radiation that exist in space and make them available to scientists for their experiments. For example, researchers will be able to investigate how cells and human DNA are altered or damaged by exposure to cosmic radiation and how well microchips stand up to the extreme conditions in space.
The central points of the cooperation agreement between ESA and FAIR include the research fields of radiation biology, electronic components, materials research, shielding materials, and instrument calibration. The research will be conducted at the future FAIR facility as well as the existing accelerator facilities at GSI, which are currently being improved through major upgrading measures and prepared for their future use as preaccelerators for FAIR. The two partners have also agreed to cooperate on technology and software developments and on additional joint activities in areas such as innovation management.
Particle accelerator will enable broad range of radiation research
The new partnership is building on a very successful and reliable foundation of cooperation that has been formed between ESA and GSI over many years in several research projects. For example, the IBER (Investigations into Biological Effects of Radiation) research project has been running since 2008 and is currently entering a new round with the allocation of beam time. The project enables research groups to investigate the biological effects of space radiation at the existing accelerator facilities of GSI.
The GSI accelerator facility is the only one in Europe that can generate all of the ion beams that occur in our solar system, which range from the lightest one, hydrogen, to the heaviest, uranium. The research opportunities will be expanded even further by the future FAIR accelerator center. Thanks to its centerpiece, the ring accelerator SIS100 with a circumference of 1,100 meters, FAIR will enable researchers to conduct experiments with an even wider spectrum of particle energies and intensities, and to simulate the composition of cosmic radiation with a precision that no other accelerator facility will be able to match.
The fundamental research issues are being investigated against a background of complex relationships. There are many different kinds of cosmic rays, and they can have very different effects on spacecraft and their occupants, depending on the kinds of particles, the particles’ energies, and the duration of the exposure. In addition, cosmic rays’ interactions with matter, such as their impact on a protective shield, produce secondary cosmic rays that have very different effects. These secondary rays can do even more damage to biological tissue and sensitive electronics than the original primary cosmic radiation.
Optimized instruments, advantages for mission planning
The objective of the new partnership is to precisely identify these complex relationships and investigate them in even greater depth. For example, new findings could help scientists adapt sensitive instruments specifically for utilization in space. Such research projects are also of interest to the ESA´s European Space Operations Centre ESOC in Darmstadt. This is where satellite missions are controlled and their trajectories are calculated. Detailed knowledge of the radiation sources and effects is helpful for mission planning. It can help researchers select flight variants that will minimize the total radiation load. Both FAIR and ESOC very much look forward to the opportunities of enhanced collaboration between these two Darmstadt-based institutions, which contribute to strengthen Darmstadt as an internationally established City of Science.
Benefits for life on earth
The results of the new partnership will provide future-oriented information not only for space travel but also for life on earth. For example, data from the experiments can provide more detailed insights into radiation risks on earth. They can also help to optimize radiation protection measures and improve radiation therapies for treating cancer. (BP/IP)
Paolo Giubellino held very productive discussions with, among others, Minister Mr. Ramin Guluzade of the Ministry of Transport, Communication and High Technologies (MTCHT) of the Republic of Azerbaijan and Professor Abel Maharramov, Rector of the Baku State University (BSU), one of the largest universities in the country. During his visit, he also learned about current research and infrastructure in Azerbaijan.
The Memorandum of Understanding provides for scientific and technological cooperation and joint projects between scientists from BSU, MTCHT and FAIR. Among other things, the MoU encompasses a variety of opportunities for collaboration and information sharing, such as seminars, symposia, and science meetings. The memorandum will also promote cooperation by means of joint research projects and exchange activities between professors and scientists — particularly young scientists, and university students. The activities are coordinated by Professor Paolo Giubellino and Dr. Anar Rustamov, Deputy Director at the Institute for Physical Problems of BSU.
“FAIR will become a world-leading accelerator facility and a driver of innovation in many areas," said Paolo Giubellino. “In addition to scientific excellence, it is also an important task to promote relations with the scientific communities in countries around the world. We are looking forward to working with the Azerbaijani researchers in the future."
University Rector Abel Maharramov also emphasized the importance of cooperation in science and technology to strengthen links between the scientific communities of both countries. Minister Ramin Guluzade moreover announced that a roadmap for Azerbaijan's possible accession to the international FAIR GmbH would be developed. (BP)
“We are delighted to win this prestigious award and being recognized as the premier laser technology partner for the most advanced R&D labs and institutions worldwide,” said Class 5 Photonics CEO and co-founder Robert Riedel. “With our products we aim to enable cutting-edge research to gain new insights in processes, building blocks and interactions in physics, chemistry and bio sciences.”
The PRISM AWARDS are the premier worldwide event in the photonics industry and awarded annually during the SPIE Photonics West conference and tradeshow in San Francisco. More than 150 applicants entered the competition in ten categories this year. With its high-performance laser SuperNova OPCPA Class 5 Photonics convinced the jury.
The spin-off company was founded in 2014 in Hamburg. The scientists from Helmholtz Institute Jena and DESY is developing high power lasers with pulses in the femtosecond range. One femtosecond is a quadrillionth of a second. Shorter laser pulses allow more precise working of materials, for instance. Also, such short laser pulses open up new innovative applications like 3D nanostructuring. For science, the technology is of great importance.
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Subsequently the Technical Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, Jörg Blaurock, showed him the current progress of the SIS100 tunnel construction and the further construction activities in a bus tour of the FAIR construction site. In a guided tour through the existing accelerator facility he visited the materials research, the experimental site for the discovery of superheavy elements SHIP, the PHELIX laser, the therapy site for tumor treatments with carbon ions, the FAIR storage ring CRYRING and also the large-scale experiment R3B, which houses a French contribution to FAIR, the so-called GLAD magnet.
Yves Bréchet is the Government Scientific Advisor for the missions of the French Atomic Energy and Alternative Energies Commission (CEA, Commissariat à l’énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives). The governmental institution is subordinate to the French ministries for research, energy, armed forces, and industry. Together with the French National Center for Scientific Research (Centre national de la recherche scientifique, CNRS) the CEA holds half of the French shares of FAIR.
]]>Download of "target" – Issue 16, January 2018 (PDF, 6,5 MB)
A group of scientists from GSI, FIAS and the university Frankfurt used deep learning techniques to develop a tool for better understanding heavy ion collisions. The present study is a proof of principle study where Long-Gang Pang, Kai Zhou, Nan Su, Hannah Petersen, Horst Stöcker, former Scientific Director of GSI, and Xin-Nian Wang (University of California in Berkeley, USA) used more than 20,000 pictures from relativistic hydrodynamic simulations of heavy ion collisions, as they also occour in experiments with the GSI accelerators and the future FAIR accelerators, in a convolution neural network (CNN) to classify two regions in the phase diagram.
"We started the project when a human professional was defeated in the game of Go against AlphaGo designed by Google Deepmind. The news ignited our enthusiasm and we discussed a lot on whether artificial intelligence can assist scientists to tackle challenging unsolved scientific problems." explains Long-Gang Pang, a former FIAS postdoc from Hannah Petersens group, who is now at the University of California in Berkeley, USA.
Die Vortragsreihe "Wissenschaft für Alle" richtet sich an alle an aktueller Wissenschaft und Forschung interessierten Personen. In den Vorträgen wird über die Forschung und Entwicklungen an GSI und FAIR berichtet, aber auch über aktuelle Themen aus anderen Wissenschafts- und Technikfeldern.
Ziel der Reihe ist es, die wissenschaftlichen Vorgänge für Laien verständlich aufzubereiten und darzustellen, um so die Forschung einem breiten Publikum zugänglich zu machen. Die Vorträge werden von GSI- und FAIR-Mitarbeitern oder von externen Rednern aus Universitäten und Forschungsinstituten gehalten.
Die Vorträge finden im großen gemeinsamen Hörsaal der Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (FAIR) und des GSI Helmholtzzentrums für Schwerionenforschung, Planckstraße 1, 64291 Darmstadt, statt. Der Eintritt ist frei, eine Anmeldung ist nicht erforderlich. Externe Teilnehmer werden gebeten, für den Einlass ein Ausweisdokument bereitzuhalten.
The city of Darmstadt is organizing an event called “Wissenswerte Digitalstadt” (a digital city worth knowing) that will be open to all from 3 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. on Tuesday, December 5. It will be followed by the “Wissenscampus” (knowledge campus) exhibition, which will include the GSI and FAIR stand and will be open to the public until 6:30 p.m. Among other things, GSI and FAIR will present the research opportunities that will be offered at the FAIR particle accelerator center now being constructed at GSI, as well as the construction project itself. The highlights of the presentation will include the best-known results of the scientific research at GSI, such as the development of an innovative cancer therapy using ions and the discovery of six new chemical elements in the periodic table. Visitors to the stand will also be able to simulate the creation of an element in a large-format model — and thus to understand how the new element called “Darmstadtium” was born at GSI. The venue of the “Wissenswerte” forum was named the Darmstadtium after this element.
GSI and FAIR will also play a major role in the conference program, which will give the participating specialists from all over Germany insights into the latest findings of current scientific research. In a moderated discussion, GSI Research Director Professor Karlheinz Langanke and the physicist Dr. Ingo Peter will present the topic “The Universe in the Laboratory — Creating Cosmic Matter in Accelerators.” At the Forum for Young Researchers, the leading young researcher Professor Tetyana Galatyuk will offer insights into the scientific work she is doing at the large-scale detector HADES at GSI.
Finally, on the third day of the event GSI and FAIR will host an excursion for the specialized visitors at “Wissenswerte.” It will include a walking tour of the research campus and a bus tour of the 20-hectare construction site of the new FAIR accelerator facility. This is one of the world’s biggest construction projects for a basic research facility, and it is currently one of the most exciting construction sites in the region. In the future, about 3,000 scientists from all over the world will conduct cutting-edge experiments at FAIR in order to gain new fundamental knowledge about the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe.
"Saturday Morning Physics" is a project of the physics department of the TU Darmstadt. The series of lectures is held annually and aims to increase the interest of young people in physics. In lectures and experiments on six consecutive Saturdays the high-school students learn about the latest developments in physical research at the university. Those who take part in all six courses receive the "Saturday Morning Physics" diploma. The visit to FAIR and GSI takes place as an excursion within the series. GSI has been one of the sponsors and supporters of this project since the start.
The project funding will come from the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research. The new project, GREWIS alpha, is the successor of the project called GREWIS, a German acronym that stands for “the genetic risks and anti-inflammatory effect of ionizing radiation.” The word “alpha” stands for the strongly ionizing alpha particles that are emitted when radon and its daughter nuclei decay. The Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Professor Paolo Giubellino, was pleased with the research funding: "The decision shows that the wealth of experience regarding biophysical und biological radiation research here at GSI has a very promising potential for the future. We will continue to conduct research in this area to gain fundamental insights, but also to enable optimal treatment options and targeted prevention. Biophysics is also an important part of our strategic long-term plans for the future accelerator facility FAIR."
The radiation biologist Professor Claudia Fournier from the Biophysics Department of GSI is the overall coordinator of this joint project, in which GSI is cooperating with TU Darmstadt, Goethe University Frankfurt, and the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg. A total of seven work groups from four institutions are working on this research project. The Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) is the project’s sponsor. A recent kick-off meeting on the GSI campus in Darmstadt marked the beginning of the new project. It was attended by over 30 participants from TU Darmstadt (Department of Biology), Goethe University Frankfurt (Centre for Radiotherapy), the University Clinic Erlangen, and the biophysics department at GSI, as well as representatives of KIT.
The radioactive element radon is used in the form of baths or inhalations in healing caves and baths to treat many patients, and it has met with success. The pain-relieving effects of low-dose radon therapies for patients with painful chronic inflammatory illnesses have been known for centuries on the basis of experience. These therapies are used for diseases of the locomotor system such as rheumatism and arthrosis, as well as diseases of the respiratory system and the skin, including neurodermatitis and psoriasis. But even though it is nowadays assumed that low doses of radiation can mitigate chronic inflammation, the cellular and molecular mechanisms of action that underlie the observed pain relief, especially in the case of a radon therapy, are still largely unknown. As a result, the objective of the GREWIS researchers is to investigate with increasing precision the potentially helpful aspects as well as the risks of low-dose exposure to radon and to put this therapy on a solid scientific foundation.
“We now have a good basis on which we can build and refine the questions we are asking,” says Project Lead Claudia Fournier regarding the new joint project. The cooperative work in the GREWIS project, which was launched in 2012, has been very successful so far. The researchers were able to clarify key questions regarding the physical and biological effect of the treatment and to demonstrate the resulting cellular changes. One of the aims of the first project was to create a radon chamber on the GSI campus. Experiments in this chamber have generated new insights, primarily through targeted examinations of tissue. For example, these experiments provided the first indications of the extent of DNA damage in organs such as the liver, lungs, kidneys, and heart after exposure to radon. A great deal of further research is still needed in this area. The researchers aim to use such insights to evaluate the risks and long-term effects of this radiation more reliably and to control the dosage of a radon therapy more effectively. These insights can also help medical personnel to decide whether a certain healing cave or therapeutic bath would be more appropriate for an individual patient, or whether a completely different therapy should be used.
Investigations conducted as part of the GREWIS project have also provided insights into the concrete mechanism by which radon therapy works. It was surmised that the activation of the patient’s immune system plays a central role in radon’s effects. However, the immune system responds to many stimuli, including warmth. As a result, it’s necessary to find out whether a warm radon bath has positive effects on pain relief or the alleviation of arthritis because of the heat or because of the radon. The scientists are therefore also trying to decode radon therapy’s underlying mechanisms in particular. In a new study that was published this year, the clinically observable pain-relieving effect of a radon therapy was associated for the first time with concrete changes in certain types of immune cell. For the first time, the study revealed a modulation of the immune cells of peripheral blood (the blood circulating through the blood vessels) after a standard radon bath therapy. These modulations could be connected with the suppression of inflammations. “We’re seeing a reduction of inflammatory factors in the serum of patients undergoing radon therapy. This reduction gives us indications of a suppression of an existing inflammatory immune reaction. In addition, in the patients’ serum we’re seeing a reduction of markers that indicate bone loss. Trials in irradiated cells have shown that the number and activity of bone-absorbing cells is decreasing. Both of these factors indicate that the bone loss is slowing down,” explains Professor Fournier.
The objective of GREWIS alpha is to add concrete details to such insights and to do even deeper research — for example, to go one step further in determining organ doses and also the long-term genetic risk — and to find out whether it’s really the radiation that causes the described effects of a radon therapy. The researchers also want to investigate, in greater detail than before, the molecular mechanisms that could depend on an interplay between the immune system and bone metabolism, according to the findings gained so far. They also want to investigate whether radon binds to the pain receptors in the body and thus changes the patient’s perception of pain.
The ERRS (formerly known as the European Society of Radiation Biology) is a European nonprofit organization for the promotion of radiation resarch. It was founded in 1959 in order to promote communication between scientists, especially in Europe. It does this by putting scientists into personal contact and holding annual conferences, which created networks throughout Europe even during the Cold War. The ERRS is an important platform for the discussion of new findings and processes in the field of radiation research.
Within about 20 years, the researchers at GSI in Darmstadt developed Kraft’s ion beam cancer treatment method from the basic physical and biological research to the stage of clinical application. This technique effectively destroys cancer cells while leaving healthy tissue untouched.
Gerhard Kraft created GSI’s biophysical research department in the early 1980s and was its director from 1981 to 2008. His vision was to develop an extremely precise irradiation technique that would fully bring to bear the advantages of ion beams: their precision and their intense biological effect. Between 1997 and 2008, GSI used ion beams to treat more than 440 patients for tumors of the head and throat with great success. The insights gained during the pilot project were directly incorporated into the Heidelberg Ion-Beam Therapy Center (HIT). Since 2009, the center has been using the technique developed at GSI to treat approximately 800 patients annually. In 2015 an ion-beam therapy facility also went into operation in Marburg.
Gerhard Kraft was involved in many initiatives for the development and adoption of ion beam therapy throughout Europe. He is also a founding member of the ion beam therapy initiative European Network for Research in Light Ion Hadron Therapy (ENLIGHT) at CERN. He has received many honors for his achievements, including the Helmholtz Association’s Erwin Schrödinger Prize in 1999 and the Officer’s Cross of Germany’s Order of Merit in 2008. He is also a recipient of the Bacq and Alexander Award, which is presented annually by the ERRS to an outstanding European scientist in order to honor achievements in the field of radiation research. Gerhard Kraft received this renowned award in 2006.
]]>Helmut Zeitträger, a former Administrative Director of GSI, gave a welcoming address commemorating the association’s 20th anniversary. The participants had previously been greeted by the chairman of the association, Dr. Dieter Schardt. A talk celebrating the anniversary, titled “Particle Therapy: from a Niche Existence to a Clinical Routine?”, was delivered by Prof. Eugen B. Hug, Chief Medical Officer and Managing Director of MedAustron GmbH.
In his master’s thesis at Heidelberg University, Lennart Volz addressed the feasibility of using ion beams for the imaging of patients. In this process, ion beams with low intensity but high energy are used to penetrate the patient’s body in order to assess the retardant behavior of various tissue types at diverse locations in the bodies of individual patients. If the individual behavior of these tissue types is known, the precision of the subsequent ion beam therapy can be improved. Volz developed a formal process for describing the trajectory of ions in matter, and in an experiment he was able to demonstrate that helium ions would be very suitable for this imaging technique.
Dr. Johannes Petzoldt’s dissertation at TU Dresden addresses the measurement of the ion beam during tumor treatment. A new procedure called “prompt gamma timing” could be used for this purpose. In this procedure, the gamma radiation generated by nuclear reactions of the ions used for tumor treatment are evaluated along their course toward the target volume. Petzoldt systematically used this procedure to find the detector material that is best suited for measuring the gamma radiation in this type of treatment. He also investigated the degree to which fluctuations of the parameters of the treatment beam influence the measurement procedure, as well as the methods for determining these fluctuations. Finally, he demonstrated the clinical feasibility of prompt gamma timing by creating a prototype of a measurement setup.
In his dissertation at TU Darmstadt, Dr. Kristjan Anderle improved the frequently used TRiP software for planning treatments with ion beams. The software is now able to quickly and efficiently carry out computations in complex cases involving large tumors or several tumors and numerous high-risk organs. He also conducted studies of radiation therapy planning for cases of lung tumors. Thanks to the tremendous technical progress in the fields of radiation technology and imaging in conventional radiation technology with photons, it is now possible to effectively irradiate small lung tumors at high doses in a few sessions. However, in the case of larger tumors and more complex situations with nearby high-risk organs, effective irradiation is often not possible because it puts too much strain on the healthy surrounding tissue. Anderle was able to demonstrate that irradiation with ions could also be used in a large proportion of these cases and that significantly more patients could thus be treated effectively.
The prize money amounts to €750 for the master’s thesis and €1,500 for each of the doctoral dissertations. The awards, which were presented this year for the 19th time, are named after Professor Christoph Schmelzer, the co-founder and first Scientific Director of GSI. The GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, where heavy ion therapy was developed in Germany to the clinical use stage in the 1990s, traditionally offers an appropriate setting for the annual presentation ceremony.
The Association for the Promotion of Tumor Therapy supports activities conducted within the research project Tumor Therapy with Heavy Ions at GSI, with the goal of improving tumor treatment by refining the system and making it available for general use in patient care. During a pilot project conducted at the accelerator facility at GSI from 1997 to 2008, more than 400 patients with tumors in the head and neck were treated with ion beams. The cure rate of this method has been more than 90 percent in some categories, and the side effects are very slight. At the Heidelberg Ion-Beam Therapy Center (HIT), patients have routinely been treated with heavy ions since 2009. Germany’s second major therapy facility using 12C ions and protons, the Marburger Ionenstrahl-Therapiezentrum (MIT), was opened in Marburg in 2015.
Verein zur Förderung der Tumortherapie mit schweren Ionen e.V.
]]>Our new film "FAIR — The Universe in the Laboratory" introduces the FAIR facility and shows in a comprehensible fashion which scientific questions will be addressed with FAIR. Furthermore, we explain, which technologies will be used and why our location is the right place for the construction of the facility.
Update: calendars for shipping are out of stock.
If you want to order the DIN A2 sized calendar, please contact Kalender(at)gsi.de directly and we will immediately send the calendar to you by post. Be sure to mention the following information: your name, your address and the number of calendars you wish to order (3 max.). GSI and FAIR employees can get a copy at the foyer or the storage.
Please understand that because of the limited edition you can only request a maximum of three calendars (while supplies last) per order.
]]>Among the members of the delegation visiting GSI and FAIR were representatives of the political committees of the city of San Antonio, its scientific institutions and the Chamber of Commerce as well as representatives of the city of Darmstadt. Hightech, research and development were among the leading themes of the programme for the American guests during their stay in Darmstadt.
]]>Special electromagnets and a special vacuum chamber are used to generate the magnetic field that forces the beams along a circular path. Both of these components are being produced by German manufacturers. The dipole magnets are being made by the company Babcock Noell (BNG) in Würzburg, while the vacuum chamber is being produced at the company PINK in nearby Wertheim. During operation, the dipole magnets are cooled to a temperature of -270 degrees Celsius in order to make the associated magnet coil superconducting. Unlike conventional copper cables, superconductors enable electricity to flow through them without any resistance. This allows the magnets to be made very compact and limits the amount of electrical pulse power that is needed for the accelerator facility.
Moreover, the magnets that are cooled to near absolute zero will enable the integration of a similarly cold vacuum chamber through which accelerated ion beams will travel. To accelerate intense beams of heavy ions, the interior of the beam pipe needs to have vacuum conditions that are very close to those found in outer space. The vacuum chamber acts like a superpump on whose walls the gas particles that are not eliminated by conventional vacuum pumps freeze.
The magnets are technologically challenging not only with regard to their superconductivity, but also with respect to the level of mechanical precision that has to be achieved in the interior. To achieve optimal results, each of the two magnetic poles have to be positioned parallel to one another with a precision of ±50 micrometers.
BNG, which was awarded to contract for manufacturing the 110 dipole magnets that are required for the heavy-ion synchrotron SIS100, was able to demonstrate that it has the production technology needed to do the job with the first of series (FOS) magnet. This first dipole magnet, which has already been delivered to GSI in Darmstadt, was cooled to near absolute zero at the series test facility that was especially created for this purpose and then operated at the high electric currents that are needed in accelerator operation. In this test, about 17,000 amperes of current flowed through a superconducting wire approximately one-centimeter in diameter. By way of comparison, a household circuit breaker generally trips at 25 amperes. High precision is crucial here as well. At such high currents, imprecise manufacturing could cause the wire to lose its superconductivity. The FOS dipole magnet achieved all of the specified properties during testing at GSI. After the acceptance tests were completed, GSI approved the magnets’ series production. BNG has equipped a new assembly hall specifically for this purpose.
The first dipole magnet to be completed after series-production approval was recently delivered to GSI following a successful factory acceptance test (FAT). Superconducting dipole magnets will be regularly delivered to GSI from now on. A total of 110 magnets will be supplied by 2019. Each magnet undergoes four weeks of testing after it arrives at GSI. Magnets that successfully pass these tests will be stored until the new accelerator tunnel is completed. The magnets will be installed into the tunnel beginning in 2021. The assembled particle accelerator is scheduled to be cooled to its operating temperature of -270 degrees Celsius for the first time in 2023. Soon thereafter, it will generate the first beam for experiments at the FAIR research facility.
]]>The multinational BASE collaboration at the European research center CERN brings together scientists from the RIKEN research center in Japan, the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU), the University of Tokyo, GSI Darmstadt, Leibniz Universität Hannover, and the German National Metrology Institute (PTB) in Braunschweig. They compare the magnetic properties of protons and antiprotons with great precision. The magnetic moment is an essential component of particles and can be depicted as roughly equivalent to that of a miniature bar magnet. The so-called g-factor measures the strength of the magnetic field. "At its core, the question is whether the antiproton has the same magnetism as a proton," explained Stefan Ulmer, spokesperson of the BASE group. "This is the riddle we need to solve.“
The BASE collaboration published high-precision measurements of the antiproton g-factor back in January 2017 but the current ones are far more precise. The current high-precision measurement determined the g-factor down to nine significant digits. This is the equivalent of measuring the circumference of the earth to a precision of four centimeters. The value of 2.7928473441(42) is 350 times more precise than the results published in January. "This tremenduous increase in such a short period of time was only possible thanks to completely new methods," said Ulmer. The process involved scientists using two antiprotons for the first time and analyzing them with two Penning traps.
Antiprotons stored a year before analysis
Antiprotons are artificially generated at CERN and researchers store them in a reservoir trap for experiments. The antiprotons for the current experiment were isolated in 2015 and measured between August and December 2016, which is a small sensation as this was the longest storage period for antimatter ever documented. Antiprotons are usually quickly annihilated when they come into contact with matter, such as in air. Storage was demonstrated for 405 days in a vacuum, which contains ten times fewer particles than interstellar space. A total of 16 antiprotons were used and some of them were cooled to approximately absolute zero or minus 273 degrees Celsius.
The new principle uses the interaction of two Penning traps. The traps use electrical and magnetic fields to capture the antiprotons. Previous measurements were severely limited by an ultra-strong magnetic inhomogeneity in the Penning trap. In order to overcome this barrier, the scientists added a second trap with a highly homogeneous magnetic field. "We thus used a method developed at Mainz University that created higher precision in the measurements," explained Ulmer. "The measurement of antiprotons was extremely difficult and we had been working on it for ten years. The final breakthrough came with the revolutionary idea of performing the measurement with two particles." The larmor frequency and the cyclotron frequency were measured; taken together they form the g-factor.
The g-factor ascertained for the antiproton was then compared to the g-factor for the proton, which BASE researchers had measured with the greatest prior precision already in 2014. In the end, however, they could not find any difference between the two. This consistency is a confirmation of the CPT symmetry, which states that the universe is composed of a fundamental symmetry between particles and antiparticles. "All of our observations find a complete symmetry between matter and antimatter, which is why the universe should not actually exist," explained Christian Smorra, first author of the study. "An asymmetry must exist here somewhere but we simply do not understand where the difference is. What is the source of the symmetry break?“
The BASE scientists now want to use even higher precision measurements of the proton and antiproton properties to find an answer to this question. The BASE collaboration plans to develop further innovative methods over the next few year and improve on the current results.
A parts-per-billion measurement of the antiproton magnetic moment; Nature, 19. Oktober 2017
BASE: Baryon Antibaryon Symmetry Experiment
Ulmer Fundamental Symmetries Laboratory
press release "Magnetic moment of a single antiproton determined with greatest precision ever" (19 Jan. 2017)
press release "Magnetic moment of the proton measured with unprecedented precision" (6 June 2014)
press release "Quantum leap: Magnetic properties of a single proton directly observed for the first time" (21 June 2011)
On October 16 a team of scientists, including members from the LIGO and Virgo collaborations and several astronomical groups, announced the detection of both gravitational and electromagnetic waves, originating from the merger of two neutron stars. These mergers have been speculated as the yet unknown production site of heavy elements including Gold, Platinum and Uranium in the Universe. In 2010 an international collaboration led by Gabriel Martínez-Pinedo (GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung and Technische Universität Darmstadt) and Brian Metzger (Columbia University) pointed out that the heavy element synthesis in the merger process leads to a unique electromagnetic wave emission pattern.
The electromagnetic signal observed from the merging neutron stars indeed shows this pattern and confirms that the site for the heavy element production in the Universe is finally found, solving one of the 11 most important question in physics, as named by the US National Academies in 2003. This breakthrough puts even further focus on the Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (FAIR), which is currently being built in Darmstadt and at which the short-lived and very neutron-rich nuclei which drive the observed electromagnetic signal will be produced and studied for the first time.
60 years ago the main processes responsible for the production of elements in the Cosmos were outlined. Since then, it has been possible to identify the astrophysical sites for most of those processes except for the so called r process that is responsible for producing half of the elements heavier than Iron. It requires an environment with extreme neutron densities, permitting neutron captures on nuclei to proceed much faster than beta-decays. „Identifying the site of the astrophysical origin of elements heavier than Iron is viewed as one of the Millenium problems in physics" says Friedrich-Karl Thielemann, Professor at the University of Basel and now also member of the GSI theory group, who in 1999 performed the first nucleosynthesis study showing that the r-process can operate in material ejected during the coalescence of two merging neutron stars.
Almost simultaneously, it was suggested that the radioactive decay of the freshly synthesized nuclei will trigger an electromagnetic transient. The first realistic modeling of the electromagnetic signal was performed in 2010 by an international team led by Gabriel Martinez-Pinedo and Brian Metzger, including Almudena Arcones, GSI and Technische Universität Darmstadt, and key experimental guidance from GSI scientists Aleksandra Kelic-Heil and Karl-Heinz Schmidt. They predicted that such an event will be a thousand times brighter than a nova and will reach its maximum on timescales of a day. It was named "kilonova". This picture has been confirmed by the recent observation of an optical/infrared counterpart associated with GW170817. „This represents a unique case in nuclear astrophysics, as usually astronomers observe a new phenomenon which is much later explained by theorists. In the present case we anticipated a novel astronomical signal without the benefit of observational guidance much before it was confirmed by observations“, says Gabriel Martinez-Pinedo.
Several signatures point to the radioactive decay of r-process nuclei to explain the observations. The time dependence of the signal corresponds to what is expected assuming that the energy is produced from the decay of a large ensemble of radioactive nuclei. Furthermore, the evolution in color of the signal shows that a broad range of r-process nuclei has been produced from the lighter elements with Z ~ 50 to the heavier with Z ~ 82. It has been estimated that GW170817 produced around 0.06 solar masses of r-process ejecta with over ten times Earth's mass in Gold and Uranium.
The LIGO and Virgo collaborations predict that once the gravitational wave detectors reach the design sensitivity in 2019 we may be able to detect neutron star mergers as frequently as once per week. This will represent a complete change of paradigm in our understanding of heavy element nucleosynthesis demanding high precision nuclear data, in particular of heavy neutron-rich nuclei to reproduce the observations.
It is very fortunate that with FAIR the facility needed to provide these data is already under construction in Darmstadt. First results are expected from experiments performed in the FAIR phase-0 starting 2018. Once FAIR reaches its complete potential in 2025, it will offer unique physics opportunities to determine the properties of heavy neutron-rich nuclei of relevance to r-process nucleosynthesis. In the meantime, it is the aim of the GSI theory group to identify key nuclear information to fully characterize the variety of electromagnetic transients expected from neutron star mergers.
Publication in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
]]>Professor Giubellino informed the delegation about the current and future research program of FAIR/GSI along with opportunities where both parties can strengthen their collaboration with the NUSTAR Collaboration and also expand by participating in the GET_INvolved Programme. Professor Munjal on behalf of the IIT Ropar’s delegation put forward the interest to participate in the active training of young students and researchers of the IIT Ropar and also an exchange of the scientific staff from both institutes strengthening their relationship. The delegation also had an active session with the heads of different research pillars. The delegation expressed their keen interest in formulating a Memorandum of Understanding for joint areas of cooperation and a dedicated agreement for student training and exchange programme of research staff.
IIT Ropar is an advanced technical institute located in the north-west of India in the state of Punjab (approximately 300 km drive north of New Delhi). IIT Ropar is already a member of NUSTAR Collaboration with several researchers and students working actively on optimisation and development of Gamma camera (a patented technology manufactured and developed in GSI). The institute is also involved in the testing of the components for the DEGAS detector (NUSTAR) at IIT Ropar.
GET_INvolved Programme is an initiative by the FAIR/GSI management to provide international students and early stage researchers with opportunities to perform Internships or Traineeships and early research experience in order to GET_INvolved in the FAIR project while receiving scientific and technical training. This programme is also creating synergies between collaborating universities and advanced technical institutes in shareholder and partner countries by offering mobility opportunities for young students and researchers and contribute to the project in research and development. For more information contact the programme coordinator at International@fair-center.eu or International@gsi.de.
]]>Following the trade fair, Jörg Blaurock, the Technical Managing Director of FAIR GmbH and GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH, expressed his satisfaction with the event’s positive results. “We continued to very successfully showcase FAIR as an attractive construction project and to present our detailed, market-oriented contracting plans for the various services needed for the FAIR project,” he said. At Expo Real, FAIR also presented the underlying project organization, especially that of the construction unit, which has increased its workforce.
Trade fair visitors and potential contractors were able to gain comprehensive information about the FAIR construction project and the opportunities for participating in it. Questions about the latest developments and the next steps were answered in detail. The numerous one-on-one discussions and in-depth talks at the trade fair stand once again showed that such a scientific megaproject is extremely attractive for a construction company’s portfolio, said Blaurock. “We were able to conduct important talks in a very focused manner and promote our strategy,” he added. “Many companies were impressed by the project’s dynamism. The market continues to be greatly interested in realizing the project, and we have made many valuable contacts with experts.”
Because many decision-makers and important players from the construction sector were present, the trade fair provided an outstanding platform on which FAIR could describe the huge progress that has been made in recent months and actively present the next steps in awarding further contracts to the construction industry. The construction of the FAIR particle accelerator facility at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt began a few weeks ago. The groundbreaking ceremony for the FAIR ring accelerator SIS 100 was an important step for the project. The gigantic FAIR construction project is progressing as planned, with work being carried out on drainage, excavation, and shoring measures.
In the next phases of the ongoing construction activities, numerous separate systems will be integrated with one another. One of the biggest measures and the current focus of the activities is the technical building equipment, which includes heating, air conditioning, ventilation, and power supply. FAIR will begin to call for bids for the technical building equipment in the summer of 2018. The contracts will be awarded in 2019. The complex construction project is divided into contracting units that are appropriate for the market. As a result, the presentation of the new Project Director FAIR Site & Buildings Michael Ossendorf at a special Expo Real event could not have come at a better time, especially given that Ossendorf’s focus is on the technical building equipment.
FAIR’s partnership with Darmstadt as a science city once again paid off this year with regard to trade fairs. More specifically, the FAIR project had its own presentation at the Darmstadt stand, which was featured as part of the Frankfurt Rhine-Main metropolitan area. The Expo Real trade fair attracts around 40,000 visitors each year and is one of Europe’s most important get-togethers for the real estate, construction, and location marketing sectors.
FAIR will be one of the largest and most complex accelerator facilities in the world. The centerpiece of the facility is a ring accelerator with a circumference of 1,100 meters. Engineers and scientists are working in international partnership to advance new technological developments in a number of areas, – such as information technology and superconductor technology. Around 3,000 scientists from all over the world will be able to conduct top-level research at FAIR. Their outstanding experiments will generate new fundamental insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe. Alongside Germany, FAIR's shareholders are the countries Finland, France, India, Poland, Romania, Russia, Sweden, and Slovenia. The United Kingdom is an associated partner.
]]>The medal was sponsored after the death of Dieter Möhl in 2012 by CERN. The awardee is chosen by a selection committee. The medal is awarded every two years during the COOL conference. Name patron Dieter Möhl supported the planning of new accelerator facilities at GSI in committees and as advisor for many years. After his retirement he provided important contributions to the planning of the FAIR storage rings and especially the design of their beam cooling systems with his counsel.
]]>The research center construction project is extraordinary in both scientific and technical terms. It requires customized solutions in many areas and is continually growing. In Munich, trade fair visitors and potential contractors will be able to gain comprehensive information about the FAIR construction project and the opportunities for participating in it. The FAIR project will be presented at the stand that showcases the “science city” Darmstadt (stand number C1 331). In addition, the Technical Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, Jörg Blaurock, will report on current developments and the next steps of the project at the FAIR event beginning at 1:45 p.m. on October 4 in the Metropolarena at Expo Real. The title will be “A Megaproject under Construction — the FAIR Particle Accelerator Research Facility at Darmstadt.”
In the next phases of the ongoing construction activities, numerous separate systems will be integrated with one another. Building construction, civil engineering, accelerator development and construction, and scientific experiments are closely coordinated with one another in an integrated overall plan. The complex construction project is divided into manageable contract award packages. One of the biggest areas is the technical building equipment, which includes heating, air conditioning, ventilation, and power supply. The total amount of the contract award packages for the technical building equipment lies in the nine-digit range. These contracts are also divided into contract award units that are appropriate for the market. The contract awarding calendar for this package, from the call for tenders to the contract award, will last from summer 2018 until summer 2019. In addition, plans call for the contract for the shell construction on the North building site to be awarded in the last quarter of 2017. This is in line with the detailed contract awarding plan for FAIR. One year later, in the fourth quarter of 2018, it will be followed by the shell construction on the South building site. The contracts for construction logistics, crane systems, and lifts will be awarded by spring 2018.
The construction of the unique FAIR particle accelerator facility at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt began a few weeks ago. The groundbreaking ceremony for the FAIR ring accelerator SIS 100, which attracted great media interest all over Germany, was an important step for the project. It marked the start of the building construction and civil engineering work. A further milestone for the construction activities is the ongoing work to connect the existing accelerator systems of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum to the new international FAIR center.
International Trade Fair for Property and Investment, October 4 - 6, 2017, Munich
FAIR Stand No.: C1 331
FAIR event (in German): Metropolarena, Stand No.: C1 334
Wednesday, 4. Oktober 2017, 13.45-14.15 Uhr
„Megaprojekt in der Realisierung – Der Forschungsbeschleuniger FAIR in Darmstadt“
Jörg Blaurock, Technischer Geschäftsführer FAIR und GSI
Thomas Burkhard, Project Director (ad interim) FAIR Site and Buildings
Moderation: Klaus Ringsleben, Chair FAIR Building Advisory Committee
FAIR will be one of the largest and most complex accelerator facilities in the world. The centerpiece of the facility is a ring accelerator with a circumference of 1,100 meters. Engineers and scientists are working in international partnership to advance new technological developments in a number of areas, – such as information technology and superconductor technology. Around 3,000 scientists from all over the world will be able to conduct top-level research at FAIR. Their outstanding experiments will generate new fundamental insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe. Alongside Germany, FAIR's shareholders are the countries Finland, France, India, Poland, Romania, Russia, Sweden, and Slovenia. The United Kingdom is an associated partner.
]]>Last summer the ESA called on scientists to submit ideas for experiments that would help to improve the risk assessment of cosmic radiation doses or enable protective countermeasures that would make safe manned space travel possible. Out in space, the crews of spacecraft can be subjected to a variety of doses and types of radiation that can impair their health.
The results of such studies will not only serve future space travel but also provide information for a better life on earth. For example, data from the experiments can provide insights about the radiation risks on earth and help improve radiation therapies for treating cancer.
At the workshop, the participants will discuss the various project ideas and their feasibility. Researchers will then be able to submit detailed proposals, which a committee of experts will decide on by the end of the year. Scientists from GSI will assist the committee in evaluating the proposals. After the committee has made its evaluations, GSI will set aside a total of 160 hours of beam time in 2018 and 2019 for the selected proposals. To conduct their experiments, the researchers will use the GSI accelerator facilities. These have already been vastly improved and will be further upgraded technically for their future use as preaccelerators for the unique accelerator center FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research), which is currently being built at GSI.
]]>Physicist Erik Etzelmüller, 30, received the prize of €200 and a certificate for his dissertation titled “Developments towards the technical design and prototype of the PANDA Endcap Disc DIRC“. His doctoral advisor was Professor Dr. Michael Düren from the Justus Liebig University in Gießen. The Panda Collaboration has awarded the PhD Prize once per year since 2013 in order to honor the best dissertation written in connection with the Panda Experiment. Panda will be one of the key experiments of the future accelerator center FAIR. The experiment focuses on antimatter research as well as on various topics related to the weak and the strong force, exotic states of matter, and the structure of hadrons. More than 500 scientists from 17 countries currently work in the Panda Collaboration.
In his dissertation, Dr. Etzelmüller studied the Endcap Disc DIRC, a Cherenkov detector that forms one of the main components of the charged particle identification of the Panda detector, which is being built at the FAIR accelerator facility.
Candidates for the PhD Prize are nominated by their doctoral advisors. In addition to being directly related to the Panda Experiment, the nominees’ doctoral degrees must have received a rating of “very good” or better. Up to three candidates are shortlisted for the award and can present their dissertations at the Panda Collaboration meeting. The winner is chosen by a committee that is appointed for this task by the Panda Collaboration. The Panda Collaboration awards the PhD Prize to specifically honor students’ contributions to the Panda project.
]]>The transformers were manufactured in Turkey and transported by ship from Izmir to Rotterdam. From there, they were carried by 30-meter-long lowboys to Darmstadt-Wixhausen. “Thanks to our foresighted planning, everything went well despite the long distances and the lengthy approval process for obtaining a special road transport permit,” says transformer specialist Udo Zerb from e-netz Südhessen.
In the next step, the transformers will be installed into the North and South Transformer Stations, which are currently under construction. Each transformer will weigh 114 tons when it is in operation. “The transformers will convert the 110 kV high-voltage electricity that arrives at GSI and FAIR through underground high-voltage cables to 20 kV so that the current reaches the various consumers on our campus in line with their needs,” says Karl-Heinz Trumm, Head of the Electric Power Systems department at FAIR and GSI. FAIR will need up to 90 megawatts of electricity for its powerful electromagnets, infrastructure, cooling purposes, and other needs. The South Transformer Station will ensure that FAIR is supplied with enough electricity to meet its normal needs. The North Transformer Station is being built to supply energy to the SIS18 and SIS100 ring accelerators, because the special mode of operation of the normally conducting and superconducting magnets puts extreme demands on the quality of the electricity supply system. The North Transformer Station is scheduled to go into operation in December 2017, while the South Transformer Station is expected to go on line in spring 2018.
]]>
Where do you come from and what are you studying?
Anushka: I’m studying Bachelor of Engineering with focus on Computer Science in North West India.
Jayati: Me too. We both are studying at Mody University. I’m writing my bachelor’s thesis at the Department for Superconducting Magnets.
Mateusz: I’m doing my bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering at Technical University of Bialystok in Poland.
How did you learn about the GET_INvolved programme?
J: I learned about GSI already in my first year because some of our senior students were here before. I can say that it was my goal to come here from the beginning, which is one reason why I studied so hard. Earlier this year one of my professors asked me if I was interested to do an internship here.
A: I got to know about GET_INvolved through my professor, too. I took the chance at once!
M: I was chosen for this programme because I stood out in the skills that are involved in my tasks here. I guess I was considered a good representative of my university.
What makes GET_INvolved special for you?
M: I’m working on a dedicated software for calibrations of precise measurement devices. It's great to be part of a project which is important for so many detectors!
A: It's the first time that I work on my own project and that I can apply the knowledge I learned at university on a theoretical level. I create a database for the fragment separator group which allows for a better sorting of data. I have the feeling that I already learned an incredible lot and could evolve personally and intellectually in a very short period of time.
J: It's great that we have three months here and are supported by a dedicated mentor. With the support, we could realize our own ideas after getting familiar with the surroundings. To get to know Germany and Europe a bit is also very interesting! I visited Paris, Heidelberg and was in a beer garden for the first time in Darmstadt.
Which experiences did you have at GSI and FAIR so far?
A: The tasks and challenges I faced here made me more independent. In the beginning I was quite shy but by now I dare to be more extroverted.
J: I’m impressed by the motivation and passion of the people who work here. Sometimes it is just more important to solve a problem than to have “Feierabend” (editor: see below). I have the feeling that one enjoys more freedom in individual organisation and execution of tasks here. That gives me more room for creativity.
M: I noticed that as well. This freedom makes working here enjoyable.
What would you tell your fellow students about the GET_INvolved programme?
A: I would very much recommend my fellow students to apply for this programme. I am in Europe for the first time — in the beginning it wasn’t easy because I was a bit homesick — but now I would love to stay longer. I made friends and really like it here!
M: I think that the programme would be interesting for many students at my university because there are many projects in coding and about measuring technique. It is important though to be able to speak English well.
J: If you get the chance you should really do an internship here. Many questions and doubts I had in university were clarified because I got to know how Computer Science gets implemented in the scientific field of research.
Do you have plans for the future?
M: I like what I am doing here. I would be happy to come back.
A: When I complete my bachelor I would like to do my master in Europe. Maybe I could come to GSI and FAIR for my PhD or Postdoc.
J: I would like to continue working in physics for my master — preferably in Germany!
The GET_INvolved Programme welcomes applications throughout the year. The available positions depend on the applicants’ interests and profile.
Participants benefit from multiple forms of support. Accommodation and travel expenses can be funded. Scholarships from European or national funds, fellowship programmes and enterprise funding to sponsorship by GSI/FAIR are available for prospective participants to apply. Participants are also extensively supported in administrative processes.
Interested in participating in the GET_INvolved programme? Apply by sending your CV and a motivation letter indicating you research interest, in particular, how it corresponds to the topics or projects at GSI. Successful applicants will be able to demonstrate the relevance of their research interest to existing projects at GSI, and how they can contribute to the projects. Applications can be sent to the Office of International Student Programme at international(at)gsi.de or international(at)fair-center.eu. There is no deadline.
Footnote: Feierabend = a German word referring to getting off work, and literally means ‘evening celebration’
]]>The cooperation between GSI and Chinese research facilities can look back on a long tradition. The starting points were personal contacts between Professor Yang Chengzhong, the founding director of IMP, and Professor Rudolf Bock, member of the founding directorate and for many years head of the former Nuclear Physics I department of GSI, at the International Nuclear Physics Conference at Caen in 1976, and during mutual visits to GSI and Beijing in 1977. At that time, the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) launched a program in heavy-ion physics, aiming for the construction of a heavy-ion accelerator at the IMP. In 1979, the first three guest scientists from China visited GSI in the framework of the Humboldt fellow program and worked in the field of nuclear reactions for about two years. A regular exchange program was established in the following years with stays of Chinese researchers at GSI and visits of GSI scientists to Lanzhou, which is still on-going. Contacts with other CAS institutes were also established during that time.
Scientific exchange and cooperation with China has since prospered into many areas ranging from hadron, nuclear and atomic physics to plasma research, radiation-biology, radiation safety, accelerator physics and vacuum technology. In particular with the start of the Chinese Cooler-Storage Ring project (CSR) in 1998 in Lanzhou and FAIR and the Chinese accelerator project HIAF lately, scientific and technical cooperation has been further intensified. Due to the good and efficient cooperation the International Cooperation Award in 2002 and the Friendship Award for Foreign Experts of China in 2006 were conferred to Dr. Nobert Angert and the ‘Dunhuang award’ for international cooperation of Gansu local government in 2004 was granted to Dr. Otto Klepper, both GSI experts. A Helmholtz-CAS Joint Research Group has been established, which facilitated exchange of students and young postdocs between both institutions. The group has produced approx. 100 peer-reviewed scientific publications so far. Several GSI/FAIR scientists hold IMP guest professorship awards, are members of Chinese programme advisory committees or collaborate on R&D work for both GSI and the IMP.
The course for a continuation of this valuable collaboration has already been set. In spring 2017 the agreement of collaboration between IMP and GSI has been prolonged for another five years and also the FAIR GmbH has been added as a partner.
]]>Litvinov studied physics in St. Petersburg and is a GSI researcher since 1999. In 2003 he defended with distinction his PhD thesis at the university of Gießen (doctoral supervisor Professor Hans Geissel). Starting in 2009 he spent two years at the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg for his habilitation. Since then Litvinov is actively involved in the APPA/SPARC research activities led by Professor Thomas Stöhlker. Among other tasks at GSI he is the coordinator of the experiments at the experimental storage ring ESR, and since 2012 he is the head of the SPARC Detectors department, which has now moved to the Atomic Physics division. Since 2016, Litvinov is the principal investigator of the ERC Consolidator Grant „ASTRUm“ funded by the EU.
]]>In the exhibition, patients tell their stories, briefly or at length, on life-sized photo posters. There are 33 stories altogether, told directly from 33 German university clinics. They are representative of the millions of people in Germany who place their trust in the top performance of German university medicine day after day. The stories are moving, because they offer personal insights into the patients’ lives. The exhibition will run from September 4 to 13 in the foyer of the Clinic and Polyclinic for Obstetrics and Gynecology, Building 102, Langenbeckstraße 1, 55131 Mainz.
Pascal’s story will also be told there. He was one of the patients for whom the new ion-beam cancer therapy was considered viable. From 1997 to 2008, more than 440 patients with tumors of the head and neck were treated very successfully with ion beams at GSI’s accelerator facility as part of a pilot project. The advantage of this new therapy is that the ion beam selectively destroys tumors while sparing the surrounding healthy tissue. The pilot project, which is now over, was conducted by GSI together with the Radiation Oncology Center at Heidelberg University Hospital, the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), and the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf. Since 2009, patients have routinely been treated with heavy ions at the Heidelberg Ion-Beam Therapy Center (HIT). In November 2015 a second large treatment center for 12C ions and protons began operating in Germany with the opening of the Marburg Ion-Beam Therapy Center. On the basis of these very positive results, this form of therapy is now an accepted medical procedure. Further research will focus on applying the new treatment method to other tumors as well.
“Thanks to this therapy, I can lead a completely normal life today,” Pascal says. You can read his story here.
]]>In cooperation with colleagues from Germany and the United States, researchers at the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR) have managed to demonstrate ‘diamond showers’ forming in the ice giants of our solar system. Using the ultra-strong X-ray laser and other facilities at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC) in California, they simulated the conditions inside the cosmic giants. For the first time ever, they were able to observe the fission of hydrocarbon and the conversion of carbon into diamonds in real time. One GSI scientist participated in the experiments. The results were published in the journal “Nature Astronomy”.
The interior of planets like Neptune or Uranus consists of a solid core swathed in thick layers of “ice”, which is mostly made up of hydrocarbons, water and ammonia. For a long time, astrophysicists have been speculating that the extreme pressure that reigns more than 10,000 kilometers beneath the surface of these planets splits the hydrocarbons causing diamonds to form, which then sink deeper into the planet’s interior. “So far, no one has been able to directly observe these sparkling showers in an experimental setting,” says Dr. Dominik Kraus, who is the head of a Helmholtz Young Investigator Group at HZDR. That was precisely the breakthrough Kraus and his international team have now achieved: “In our experiment, we exposed a special kind of plastic – polystyrene, which also consists of a mix of carbon and hydrogen – to conditions similar to those inside Neptune or Uranus.”
They did this by driving two shock waves through the samples, triggered by an extremely powerful optical laser in combination with the X-ray source Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) at SLAC. At a pressure of about 150 gigapascal and temperatures of about 5,000 degrees Celsius, they compressed the plastic. “The first smaller, slower wave is overtaken by another stronger second wave,” Dominik Kraus explains. “Most diamonds form the moment both waves overlap.” And since this process takes only a fraction of a second, the researchers used ultrafast X-ray diffraction to take snapshots of the diamonds’ creation and the chemical processes involved. “Our experiments show that nearly all the carbon atoms compact into nanometer-sized diamonds,” the Dresden researcher summarizes.
Based on these results, the authors of the study assume that the diamonds on Neptune and Uranus are much larger structures and likely sink down to the planet core over a period of thousands of years. “Our experiments are also providing us with better insights into the structure of exoplanets,” Kraus anticipates. Researchers can measure two main metrics in these cosmic giants outside of our solar system: The first one is mass, based on positional changes of the mother star; and the other is its radius, derived from the shadow that is cast as the planet passes a star. The relation between these two metrics offers clues about the planet’s chemical make-up, for instance, whether it consists of light or heavy elements.
“And, for their part, these chemical processes inside the planet tell us something about its vital properties,” Dominik Kraus continues. “This allows us to improve planetary models. As our studies show, previous simulations have not been accurate.” In addition to astrophysical insights, these experiments also hold potential for practical application. The nano-diamonds created in the experiments can be used in electronic instruments, medical procedures, or as cutting materials in industrial production. Current production of such diamonds is mainly done by blasting. Laser-based production could mean a cleaner and more controllable process.
The researchers from HZDR and SLAC were joined by scientists from the University of California in Berkeley, the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, the Osaka University, the TU Darmstadt, the European XFEL, the University of Michigan and the University of Warwick.
Die Vortragsreihe "Wissenschaft für Alle" richtet sich an alle an aktueller Wissenschaft und Forschung interessierten Personen. In den Vorträgen wird über die Forschung und Entwicklungen an GSI und FAIR berichtet, aber auch über aktuelle Themen aus anderen Wissenschafts- und Technikfeldern.
Ziel der Reihe ist es, die wissenschaftlichen Vorgänge für Laien verständlich aufzubereiten und darzustellen, um so die Forschung einem breiten Publikum zugänglich zu machen. Die Vorträge werden von GSI- und FAIR-Mitarbeitern oder von externen Rednern aus Universitäten und Forschungsinstituten gehalten.
Die Vorträge finden im großen gemeinsamen Hörsaal der Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (FAIR) und des GSI Helmholtzzentrums für Schwerionenforschung, Planckstraße 1, 64291 Darmstadt, statt. Der Eintritt ist frei, eine Anmeldung ist nicht erforderlich. Externe Teilnehmer werden gebeten, für den Einlass ein Ausweisdokument bereitzuhalten.
The cw-linac demonstrator that consists of one CH-cavity was studied with beam for the first time in June and July 2017, using a beam of heavy ions at a test facility of GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung. In this test, argon ions were injected into this innovative system and accelerated. “The continuous wave linac demonstrator achieved full particle transmission and reached the target beam energy,” says Dr. Winfried Barth, who heads the cw-linac development team. “The cw-linac demonstrator used an acceleration voltage of 1.6 megavolts to accelerate a heavy-ion beam with an intensity of 1.5 particle microamperes to the target energy over a distance of just 70 cm,” said Barth, describing the success of the test. The result confirms the effectiveness and capabilities of the novel design of CH-cavity, whose development was largely funded by the Helmholtz Institute Mainz through the Acceleraor R&D programme "Matter and Technologies" by the Helmholtz Association.
Because the proposed cw-linac is to generate a continuous beam of particles, it is particularly useful for the creation and examination of super-heavy elements, which is one of the traditional fields of research at GSI, the Helmholtz Institute Mainz, and the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz. At GSI, scientists have discovered a total of six new elements and investigated their chemical and physical properties. The proposed cw-linac’s continuous beam will not only benefit the heavy element programme, but also experiments in the field of materials research.
“A normally conducting accelerator would have to be much longer than the proposed superconducting cw-linac. Moreover, it would need huge amounts of energy to create such strong electromagnetic fields and it would also have to be strongly cooled,” says Dr. Florian Dziuba, who designed, developed, and commissioned the CH-cavity, a radio-frequency accelerator structure that is the key component of the continuous wave linac. Dziuba performed this work as part of his doctoral thesis at Goethe University in Frankfurt.
Because of its compact structure, the superconducting continuous wave linac will be able to save space and conserve considerable amounts of resources in the future. The linac is expected to accelerate ions to as much as 10% of the speed of light over a distance of 13 meters. “The system’s multicellular structure, which is being used here for the first time, is the most complex superconducting radio-frequency structure to have ever been built for use with an ion beam,” says Dziuba, who is now employed at the Helmholtz Institute Mainz.
The current test module of the cw-linac is approximately 2.20 m long and has a diameter of 1.10 m. In order to become superconducting, the accelerator’s interior, which is made of niobium, is cooled down to -269°C. “The fact that the demonstrator achieves the expected performance is a big success for the whole team and shows that the new design of the CH-cavity is groundbreaking”, says Barth.
GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung (GSI), Darmstadt, and Johannes Gutenberg University (JGU), Mainz, jointly established the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM) in 2009 in order to further strengthen their partnership, which has existed for many years. At its location in Mainz, the HIM conducts experiments and theoretical investigations concerning the structure, symmetry, and stability of matter and antimatter. The institute receives its basic funding from the German federal government and the state of Rhineland-Palatinate. JGU supports the HIM by providing it with infrastructure.
]]>Among other things, the money will be used to provide two years of funding for a postdoc position for studying the theory and experiments at GSI and FAIR. This research will focus on the PHELIX high-energy laser system, the CRYRING storage ring (FAIR’s first ion storage ring), and the ESR experimental storage ring. More specifically, the research will address the preconditions for investigating relativistic quantum dynamics in experiments at the GSI and FAIR research facilities. The DFG funding proposal was made in response to a joint German-Russian application submitted by Professor Thomas Stöhlker, Head of the Atomic Physics Division at GSI, Director of the Helmholtz Institute Jena, an outstation of GSI in Jena (HIJ), and holder of the Chair at the Friedrich Schiller University Jena, Institute for Optics and Quantum Electronics, and by Professor Vladimir Shabaev, Head of the Quantum Mechanics Division at St. Petersburg State University. Moreover, Dr. Angela Bräuning-Demian and Dr. Alexandre Gumberidze from the Atomic Physics Division of GSI Darmstadt are also extensively involved in the project.
Collisions of heavy ions play a key role in researching the relativistic quantum dynamics of electrons in very strong electromagnetic fields. The implementation of the FAIR project will open up new opportunities for investigating the collisions of super-heavy ions and atoms at low energies. Experimental investigations of such collisions are being planned at GSI and FAIR, and the associated theoretical studies are urgently needed. “This will be addressed by our research project, which is why it is coming at precisely the right time,” state Stöhlker and Shabaev, who also emphasize how important this work will be for the understanding of additional experimental findings at GSI/FAIR in Darmstadt.
Another important aspect is the collaboration between the two groups. While Russia covers the costs of the Russian group, Germany does the same for the German group. “It’s a very effective way for promoting international cooperation between the groups,” say Stöhlker and Shabaev.
]]>Every summer student gets the chance to work on his own research project within the current GSI and FAIR experiments. The topics range from accelerator science to tumour therapy and astrophysics. In public lectures, which are part of the programme, the summer students learn about GSI and FAIR research and scientific results.
For many of the students, who come mainly from European but also from more distant countries like Mexico, China, India or South Africa, the Summer Student Programme is the first step to a masters or doctorates thesis at GSI. The Summer Student Programme, which takes place for the 37th time, is organised together with the graduate school HGS-HIRe. Apart from the scientific programme there are also social events like cooking together or exploring the region.
The public lectures are in English and are open to everyone. Lecture Programme
Ion beam therapy has been established as cutting edge technology in the fight against cancer permitting a more precise irradiation in comparison to conventional therapy with high doses to the tumour while sparing surrounding healthy tissue. CNAO in Italy is one of the facilities in Europe where this radiation modality is available for therapy; it uses the raster scan technology that has been developed at GSI. To enhance this technique the irradiation control system of CNAO will now be installed at GSI. “The control system developed at CNAO has the advantage of flexibility and easy maintenance because it is based on modern industrial components”, explains Michael Scholz, head of the GSI Biophysics department. “This facilitates rapid implementation of the new developments planned at GSI.”
The main goals of these improvements are to reduce the irradiation time and to integrate motion management techniques, allowing a more precise treatment of tumors that move with breathing. The transfer of these upgrades to the clinical environment for the benefit of patients is then largely facilitated thanks to the close collaboration with CNAO. “We expect this collaboration to offer great advantages for the future treatment of patients with moving tumoral targets, such as liver or lung cancer”, says Sandro Rossi, General Director of CNAO. First test irradiations with the new control system at the GSI therapy cave are planned for 2018.
CNAO and GSI have been collaborating successfully for many years. For the therapy center in Italy GSI for example developed, installed and launched parts of the injector linear accelerator as well as of the beam diagnostics system.
CNAO as Italian National Center for oncological Hadrontherapy is in operation since 2011 and has treated more than 1300 patients. Besides tremendous clinical experience, CNAO also developed the center’s technology in large parts and also licensed it for medical use. This includes a so-called dose delivery system, the real-time computers and detectors controlling the precise irradiation of patients with scanned ion beams. This system is in operation in two centers, both at CNAO and at the new Austrian therapy center MedAustron.
GSI played a pioneering role in the establishment of heavy ion therapy in Europe, with a pilot project treating 440 patients with carbon ion beams from 1997 to 2008. The raster scanning technique was developed here which is now established as state of the art in modern particle therapy centers. GSI also has a long standing experience in the therapy development of moving targets such as lung cancer. Several new technologies such as beam tracking or 4D-optimization were pioneered and experimentally tested here.
]]>Cells use sophisticated repair mechanisms to deal with damaged genetic material. In cooperation with scientists from Munich and Berlin, researchers from Technische Universität Darmstadt (TU Darmstadt) and GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, Darmstadt, recently identified one of the elementary structural units of this repair mechanism. They reported their findings in the renowned scientific journal Nature Communications.
Genetic material can be damaged during DNA replication and as a result of X-rays and other influences. In most cases, a cell’s DNA repair mechanism responds to damage quickly and effectively. “The spatial organization of the genetic information in the cell nucleus plays a key role in repairing damage,” says M. Cristina Cardoso, Professor of Cell Biology and Epigenetics at the Department of Biology of TU Darmstadt. In the cell nucleus, the thread-like DNA double helixes are clustered closely together with proteins. Areas containing active genes are rather loosely structured, while inactive genetic material is densely packed.
To conduct the studies that the team headed by Cardoso has now published in Nature Communications, the researchers subjected human cells to X-rays in order to induce DNA double-strand breaks. Such breaks are among the most dramatic DNA defects, as they can cause cancer and other severe illnesses.
One of the first steps of the cellular repair process is the phosphorylation of a protein that is involved in the packing of DNA in the cell nucleus. Using super-resolution optical microscopy, the researchers discovered clusters composed of phosphorylated proteins and subunits of DNA clusters. These clusters, which measure only a few hundred nanometers, form tiny units, each one capable of the repair of a DNA double-strand break. When the scientists analyzed the temporal distribution of the clusters in cell nuclei, they noticed that loosely packed DNA is repaired faster than densely packed DNA. Repairs can be made more easily if the clusters of DNA strands are loosened.
The researchers also found out that the protein CTCF, which controls the spatial distribution of the DNA in the cell nucleus, plays a key role in the repair mechanism. Cells with a low CTCF content are bad at making repairs. CTCF probably stabilizes the genetic material in a form that enables it to be easily repaired.
Although the DNA in a cell nucleus may seem to be a chaotic cluster, it is actually governed by sophisticated packing and unpacking mechanisms. “It’s surprising that we fully understand the molecular structure of DNA, but don’t know very much about its spatial organization inside the cell nucleus,” says Cardoso. That’s why the current study examines not only DNA repair but also the fundamental questions regarding the arrangement of the genetic material within cell nuclei. In this way the research highlights a previously underestimated factor that has a big impact on our health.
In addition to scientists from TU Darmstadt, researchers from Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, the Max Delbrück Center for Molecular Medicine, Berlin, and GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, Darmstadt were involved in the study.
FAIR will be a unique particle accelerator facility with an investment volume of more than €1 billion. The facility is being constructed by nine partner countries and is scheduled to go into full operation in 2025. Around 3,000 scientists from all over the world will work at FAIR, where they will gain groundbreaking insights into the structure of matter and the development of the universe. The key component of FAIR will be an underground ring accelerator with a circumference of 1,100 meters. Connected to it is a complex system of storage rings and experimental stations.
Over the past few weeks and months, extensive preparations have been made for the huge construction project. For example, work is already under way to connect the existing accelerator facilities of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum to the new FAIR complex. Retaining walls are being built and contracts have been awarded for the excavation and installation of the ring tunnel following a successful call for bids. These were important preparatory steps for the large-scale work on the FAIR infrastructure, which has now begun with the groundbreaking ceremony for the SIS 100 ring accelerator. The cutting-edge accelerator and experiment facilities will be installed after the new buildings are completed.
At the ceremony, government officials and scientists from Germany and abroad extended greetings and symbolically broke the ground with a shovel. This crucial milestone was attended by representatives from all nine partner countries.
Georg Schütte, Chair of the FAIR Council and State Secretary at the Federal Ministry of Education and Research, said, “The beginning of the civil construction of FAIR marks a new phase in the project. FAIR is a highly complex large research project at the limits of scientific and technical feasibility. This project and its diverse challenges can only be managed in close alliance with our international partners. We expect FAIR to become a driver of innovation in many areas, ranging from fundamental research and application-oriented developments to technical building solutions.”
The Scientific Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, Professor Paolo Giubellino, emphasized the great potential that FAIR offers for scientific research: “FAIR will create unique opportunities for cutting-edge research, with enormous discovery potential. Scientists will be able to study the universe in the lab: FAIR will address fundamental problems such as the origin of heavy elements in the universe or the structure of neutron stars, but also applications from material sciences to medicine. Through the close cooperation with researchers from all over the world FAIR will not only expand our knowledge but also be a motor for technological innovation while developing the next generation of scientists and engineers.”
The Technical Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, Jörg Blaurock, added, “FAIR is an unusual construction project from both a scientific and a technological point of view. It requires customized solutions and the interplay of a wide variety of different trades. That’s why building construction, civil engineering, accelerator development and construction, and scientific experiments are closely coordinated with one another in our integrated overall plan. The complex construction project is divided into manageable packages. Today’s groundbreaking ceremony is the reward for precise preparatory work and shows that this is the right strategy for FAIR.”
Ursula Weyrich, the Administrative Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, said, “We worked hard on developing the focus and the framework of the FAIR project and created an overall structure that organically links GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH with FAIR GmbH. This rearrangement of the overall organizational structure is an important precondition for the further implementation of the FAIR project. That’s why today is also a success for the entire workforce and the result of outstanding and fruitful cooperation.”
Eric Seng, Deputy State Secretary at the Hessian Ministry for Higher Education, Research and the Arts said, “The FAIR project is the further development of a Hessian idea almost 50 years old: GSI was founded in 1969 by an initihttps://www.gsi.de/ative of Hessian universities. GSI and FAIR have a world-wide appeal. As the hosting federal state we will do everything in our power for the international scientific community to not only feel welcome but enable them to perform cutting-edge research.“
In line with the groundbreaking ceremony, FAIR also began FAIR Phase 0 of its experimentation program in order to harmonize research operations with the progress of construction. Beam times are already being scheduled for researchers at existing GSI facilities and at components for FAIR. To conduct this research, scientists are using the GSI accelerator facilities, which have been substantially enhanced for their later use as preaccelerators for FAIR and will have their technology further upgraded in the future. Moreover, parts of FAIR can already be used, including the CRYRING storage ring.
„The scientific community looks forward to the mega project FAIR entering a crucial phase with today’s groundbreaking“, said the Indian professor Sibaji Raha, the Chair of the Joint Scientific Council of FAIR and GSI. „Already now scientists all over the world work on the research programme and the technical implementation of this facility unique in the world. FAIR will be the international showcase for hadron and nuclear physics in the coming decades and offer outstanding research opportunities.“
FAIR will be one of the largest and most complex accelerator facilities in the world. The centerpiece of the facility is a ring accelerator with a circumference of 1,100 meters. Connected to it is a complex system of storage rings and experimental stations. The existing GSI accelerators will serve as preaccelerators. Engineers and scientists are working in international partnerships to advance new technological developments in a number of areas, such as information technology and superconductor technology. Around 3,000 scientists from all over the world will be able to conduct top-level research at FAIR. Their outstanding experiments will generate new fundamental insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe. Alongside Germany, the partner countries of FAIR GmbH are Finland, France, India, Poland, Romania, Russia, Sweden, and Slovenia. The United Kingdom is an associate partner.
]]>The management of GSI and FAIR welcomed the princess along with the delegation from Thailand, which included representatives of the country’s scientific and diplomatic communities. After listening to a presentation about GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung and the future FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) accelerator center, the visitors toured the GSI campus and the FAIR construction site. During the tour, the visitors made stops at the Green IT Cube, one of the most modern and efficient high-performance computer centers in the world, the HADES large-scale detector, and the facility for ion-based cancer treatments that have been developed at GSI. Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn and the Thai delegation then learned about the international FAIR project, one of the world’s biggest construction projects for scientific research, and viewed the work that is currently being performed on the 20-hectare construction site next to the GSI campus.
The visit concluded with the signing of a memorandum of understanding concerning the establishment of a scientific and technological partnership between five Thai universities and scientific institutes on the one hand and GSI and FAIR on the other. Among other things, the MoU encompasses a variety of opportunities for collaboration and information-sharing such as seminars, symposiums, and science meetings. The memorandum will also promote cooperation by means of joint research projects and exchange activities between professors and scientists — particularly young scientists, postdocs, and university students.
Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn is working to promote humanitarian projects and improve education in the Kingdom of Thailand and around the world. She is widely known for her strong interest in science and technology. She has also won numerous awards in Thailand and abroad for her commitment to improving international relations.
]]>At the surface of the nuclei of bismuth atoms, magnetic fields exist which are otherwise only present at the surface of massive neutron stars. The behavior of electrons in these fields has been investigated by a group of researchers under the leadership of the Technische Universität Darmstadt. Only recently have they achieved a breakthrough by observing for the first time a special transition in lithium-like ions of this element.
They have now succeeded in measuring this transition at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt with such precision that it was possible for the first time to reassess the underlying theory convincingly. In the latest issue of the specialist journal "Nature Communications", the scientists give an account of their surprising result: the discrepancy between the theory and the experiment is striking. It suggests an error in our understanding of how an electron interacts with the complex inner structure of a nucleus.
Simple atoms consisting of a single nucleus and one or a few electrons are ideal systems to check our understanding of the underlying physical forces at stake. We have a better grasp of the theory of the atom's electron shell based on quantum electrodynamics (QED) than of the actual structure of the atomic nucleus. QED allows the properties of the electrons and the states in which the atom can exist to be calculated with great accuracy. These calculations are then checked by means of precision measurements. To date, QED has passed all these tests with flying colors.
When using heavy nuclei, the scientists are mainly interested in the influence of the gigantic electric and magnetic fields on the electrons bound in the shell. Only very few experimental verifications of this theory have been carried out under these extreme conditions, and they do not – by far – exhibit the same accuracy as the experiments performed with light nuclei. The strong fields make the theoretical calculations much more difficult. In addition, the complex inner structure of the nuclei is not know with sufficient precision although it has a strong influence on the atomic shell.
In order to by-pass this difficulty, theoreticians calculate certain differences for systems with different numbers of electrons, but with the same atomic nucleus. These so-called "specific differences" are of such a nature that the contributions of the nucleus' structure should eliminate themselves almost exactly and that they can be used by the researchers as a starting point to check the QED calculations with more precision. The results that have now been published, however, seem to question the concept of specific difference.
In its experiment, the team first generated hydrogen-like and lithium-like bismuth ions. These ions were injected into the experimental storage ring (ESR) at the GSI accelerator facility which has a circumference of 108 m and is equipped with two straight sections where experiments can be carried out. In one of those sections, an electron beam of defined energy is superimposed with the ion beam. After a few seconds, the ions' speed adjusts to that of the electrons. In this section, a pulsed laser beam is, in addition, superimposed with the ion beam. The laser's wavelength is then modified in tiny increments. When the laser reaches exactly the wavelength of the transition of the ion to be investigated, the ions absorb light particles (photons) – and thus energy – from the laser beam. Ions that are excited in this way release this energy after a short while, thereby emitting a very small number of photons.
This small number of photons was efficiently detected by means of a special mirror and single-photon detection system which was developed at the University of Münster. Due to the high speed, the wavelength of the laser is compressed or stretched by a factor of approx. 2.4, for a counterpropagating or a copropagating laser, respectively. This factor depends on the accelerating voltage of the electrons. To measure this high voltage of approx. 214,000 volts with an accuracy on the order of 1 V, a high-voltage divider developed at PTB in Braunschweig was used. Scientists from TU Darmstadt were responsible, among other things for the data acquisition and the time-dependent synchronization of the laser pulses, which only last a few billionths of a second (nanoseconds) with the revolution of the ions inside the storage ring. They also analyzed the data.
The specific difference in the transition wavelengths measured in hydrogen-like and lithium-like bismuth does not agree with the theoretical prediction, even when taking all known sources of systematic errors into consideration. The cause for this deviation is not known yet and is to be investigated within the scope of further measurements with other isotopes of bismuth. These isotopes are, however, radioactive and must therefore be produced before being injected into the storage ring. These possibilities are available at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum. The new accelerator facility, FAIR, whose construction in Darmstadt will soon begin, will provide new possibilities for further investigations of this subject.
The results published in "Nature Communications" are based on a cooperation project between the Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster, PTB Braunschweig, the Johannes-Gutenberg-Universität Mainz, the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung Darmstadt, and the Helmholtz-Institut Jena as well as other institutions under the leadership of the Institut für Kernphysik (Institute of Nuclear Physics) of the Technische Universität Darmstadt.
The visitors were treated to an extremely varied program. At more than 30 stations and in the course of five different tours, they were able to conduct hands-on experiments and gain insights into the research using ion beams that is being done at the center. Visitors of all ages were enthusiastic about the center’s world-leading research and the exciting scientific stations, which ranged from a stand demonstrating the ion-beam cancer therapy that was developed in Darmstadt to a 120-meter-long linear accelerator to the FAIR Forum with information about the new particle accelerator center or the impressively staged large-scale detector Hades.
The motto of the Open House was “The Universe in the Laboratory.” The employees at GSI and FAIR had made special preparations to the research operation so that visitors could gain an understanding of as many topics as possible. More than 400 volunteers were on hand during the Open House. They made sure the guests had an interesting and informative day, tirelessly answered their questions, and helped the guests to explore the GSI complex. Also for the physical well-being was well taken care.
The members of the GSI and FAIR management team were also exceptionally satisfied with the event. Ursula Weyrich, the Administrative Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, said, “We are excited about the visitor’s overwhelming interest in our work. The day has shown that research consists not only of fascinating technology, but also lives on dedicated and inspired employees.“ Professor Paolo Giubellino, the Scientific Managing Director of GSI, added, “We succeeded in raising excitement and curiosity for science. We are glad that so many young people came. Science needs interested junior researchers and many clever minds employing their talents for research.” Jörg Blaurock, the Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, also judged the event to be a great success. “Our Open House highlights the fascination carried by research. We were able to demonstrate in a direct dialogue what our world-wide unique FAIR project ecompasses, which guarantees a promising future trend for the location Darmstadt.”
Jochen Partsch, the Mayor of Darmstadt, a “City of Science,” also came to the Open House and officially opened the event together with the management team of GSI and FAIR. Partsch said, "I am extremly pleased that GSI has opened its doors to the citizens of Darmstadt in the anniversary year ,20 years City of Science‘. It was a unique opportunity to get to know cutting edge research right in front of the doorstep. The fact that so many people have used this opportunity shows how deeply connected the inhabitants of Darmstadt are with the City of Science and how exciting it is for them to ‚explore‘ the GSI on their own. We live in a city which ist eponym of a chemical element discovered at GSI. Here, breakthroughs in cancer therapy have been achieved and with the FAIR project a new particle accelerator is currently being built which will set a new standard worldwide. Therefore, excellent research does not take place anywhere in the ivory tower but can rather be experienced by everyone thanks to an open house day. Furthermore you should not forget, that in addition to new knowledge, research also creates important jobs and shapes the life in our city. "
Photo album at facebook
]]>The motto of the Open House will be “The Universe in the Laboratory.” The employees at GSI and FAIR have made special preparations so that visitors will be able to get an idea of as many topics as possible. For example, guests will be able to individually explore 30 separate stations on five different journeys of discovery conceived as round tours of the research campus. Contact persons stationed throughout the center will offer tours and be available to answer questions and engage in discussions. Bus tours will take visitors to the construction site of the future FAIR particle accelerator, which will be unequaled anywhere else in the world. The specially designed FAIR Forum will offer a wealth of information about this fascinating science project, whose impact can be felt throughout the campus.
The information on offer at the Market of Possibilities will include a survey of the many job opportunities available at GSI and FAIR and the chance for visitors drop in to “Seltzer with an Expert” and talk with experts from the fields of science and industry. Visitors young and old will also have many opportunities to conduct hands-on experiments that explore physical phenomena such as the behavior of chocolate-covered marshmallows in a vacuum and the creation of chemical elements. The main auditorium will feature presentations focusing on FAIR and the hot-topic science show “Fire and Ice.”
The extensive entertainment program will focus on fun and excitement. Visitors will be able to test their knowledge of FAIR and GSI in a science quiz. The first prize will be an aerial tour of the FAIR/GSI site and the surrounding region, starting from the Egelsbach airfield. The same aerial tour will also be the first prize in the Science Selfie Contest. A number of Selfie Spots have been set up throughout the campus to serve as photogenic backgrounds for visitors’ selfies. The most beautiful self-portrait shot in one of these spots will be the winner. The youngest visitors will be able to participate in a rubber stamp collecting competition to gain the title of “Research Expert” with a certificate and a surprise gift.
There’ll also be lots going on along the way, such as visitors from outer space, courtesy of the “501 German Garrison” costume club, whose members will appear in costumes as characters from the Star Wars saga. Balloon artists, bouncy castles, and a chair-o-plane will also be available to young visitors. On this day, the research campus will also become an art campus. In the “Focus on Research” exhibit, large-format photographs will document the instruments of science, and several researchers from the center will showcase their works along the Art Walk. There will be music on the Seebühne stage and food and drink at various locations, including the “Hot Dense Matter” barbecue stand and the “Liquid Crystals” beverage stand. The organizers of Open House are making sure that at the end of the day their visitors will be able to take home a wealth of fascinating impressions and extraordinary insights.
You can find out more informations, for example how to get there on our special Web page for the Open House Day. Only a limited number of parking spaces are available on Planckstraße in front of the campus. We recommend that visitors come via local public transportation. A free shuttle service has been set up between the Wixhausen commuter train station and the Arheilgen/Dreieichweg streetcar terminus. Admission to all the features on the GSI and FAIR campus will be free of charge. The organizers expect that several thousand visitors will take advantage of this opportunity to experience the fascination of science at GSI and FAIR up close.
]]>For the participants, Girls’Day began with a welcoming address by Ursula Weyrich, the Administrative Managing Director of FAIR and GSI. This was followed by a tour of the particle accelerator and experiment facilities on the research campus, which made the girls curious and generated many questions: How big are atoms? Is it possible to see them? How is a detector put together?
After that, the girls could gain practical experiences in various technical and scientific working areas at workshops, technical laboratories, and research departments. Many departments had prepared for the girls’ visit by creating a special program, and they provided plenty of support for their young visitors. For example, the girls were able to try their hand at milling, soldering, and programming. They were also given a tour of the construction site of the future FAIR particle accelerator, which will be unequaled anywhere else in the world. Occupational safety was the focus of all of these experiences.
After all this, the girls could look back on an exciting day during which they had achieved many practical results. For example, they had milled pencil holders and buttons for themselves, created targets — the paper-thin foils that are used as targets for experiments, equipped a circuit board with LEDs and connected it, and created their own web page. One highlight of the day was the ice cream they made themselves with liquid nitrogen.
Girls’Day is a day of action all over Germany. On this day, businesses, factories, and universities all over Germany open their doors to schoolgirls from Grade 5 and above. There the girls learn about courses of study and professions that offer traineeships in the areas of IT, the skilled trades, the natural sciences, and technology — areas where women have seldom been active in the past.
]]>All scientists and active, involved citizens are called upon to speak up for their conviction that facts established through scientific methods are indispensable for any public dialogue.
For this purpose, freedom of science, research and teaching as well as freedom of speech and tolerance towards those whose opinions are different need to be preserved as precious assets of our enlightened society. This also includes the free exchange between scientists of different nations.
We therefore would like to encourage you to participate in the “March for Science Event” in Frankfurt on 22nd April 2017 (or in a parallel event organized by the “March for Science Event” initiative).
Please follow this link to watch the speech of Helmholtz President Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. mult. Otmar Wiestler on YouTube.
Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director
Ursula Weyrich, Administrative Managing Director
Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director
GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH
FAIR Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research GmbH
In his PhD thesis "Online selection of short-lived particles on many-core computer architectures in the CBM experiment at FAIR" Zyzak developed software for the fast identification of short-lived particles produced in heavy ion collisions by their decay products. This is of great importance to the CBM experiments for the selection of rare events in real time. The software packet "KFParticleFinder" developed by the awardee analyses more than 100 different decay channels at the same time by employing parallel computing. Apart from its future use in CBM the packet is already in use by currently running experiments (STAR, ALICE).
Candidates for the award are nominated by their advisors. The selection is carried out by a committee appointed by the CBM collaboration. The criteria for the selection are originality and quality of the scientific work, scientific value, impact of the results on the field of research in general and on CBM in particular, as well as the presentation of the work in the dissertation. The award will is handed out to the best PhD thesis within the CBM experiment annually. The CBM collaboration especially wants to honour the contributions of students to the CBM project with the award.
]]>Since during this period also major construction work for FAIR is going on, operation will be limited to approximately three month per year. In total about 600 8-hour-shifts at the UNILAC, 400 at the SIS18 and 170 at ESR and CRYRING are available in the coming two years. Additional running of CRYRING stand-alone is envisioned. For experiments at the PHELIX laser 170 shifts are available.
Proposals are to be submitted via web forms, further information can be found on the website of the Program Advisory Committee (G-PAC) at www.gsi.de/g-pac. Deadline for the proposal submission is May 31, 2017. Proposals will be presented to the G-PAC or the responsible sub-committee in short oral presentations of the spokespersons or research field representatives in a meeting at GSI in summer. After evaluations by the review committee beam time will be granted by the directorate.
]]>Eighty bored piles are currently being driven into the ground to create a solid foundation for the retaining walls to the north of the GSI facilities. The piles are driven up to 14 meters into the ground by a pile driver more than 25 meters tall. The poured concrete piles, which are up to 1.2 meters in diameter and strengthened by steel reinforcement cages, are there to stabilize the building site. The outer retaining wall will extend along the Prinzenschneise lane, which will be open to the public again after FAIR is completed. The inner retaining wall will protect the existing accelerator ring. A campus road will be built between them.
Preparations are also under way at the two transformer locations on the 20-hectare FAIR construction site (one in the north, the other in the south). The work also includes the building of construction site access roads, the setting up of additional construction site equipment, and the creation of a temporary storage facility for construction material and excavated earth.
The Technical Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, Jörg Blaurock, considers the current construction work to be an important step in the facility’s development. “We are now taking key preparatory measures before we soon begin with the building construction and civil engineering tasks for the future FAIR accelerator center,” he says. “It’s already apparent that the many different trades are working together extremely well. We are making very good progress in line with our integrated overall plan.”
]]>On this day, researchers, engineers, and mechanics will be inviting visitors into their accelerator and experimentation facilities, workshops, computing center, and labs. They will provide tours, answer questions, and hold discussions with visitors at around 30 stations. This will enable visitors to explore the research campus on their own and to go on an exciting voyage of discovery into the world of GSI and FAIR.
The Open House Day will provide the public with a wide range of opportunities to get in touch with the science world: It extends from the accelerator facilities through which ions fly at around 270,000 kilometers per second during research operation to the large-scale experiments’ detectors that are up to six meter high and which provide the scientists with evidence of hundreds of reaction products at the same time. Among the other highlights of the day are unique infrastructure facilities such as the target lab, which produces extremely thin films that serve as targets for experiments, and a six-story high-performance computing center known as the Green IT Cube.
On Open House Day, the general public will, for the first time, also be able to get a close-up view of the construction site of the FAIR facility. At the approximately 20-hectare site northeast of the GSI campus, builders are currently constructing a fascinating scientific facility that will encompass accelerator and storage rings, high-tech infrastructure, and experimentation opportunities for around 3,000 scientists from all over the world, who plan to create and investigate cosmic matter right in the laboratory. Guided bus tours will enable visitors to examine the construction site where preparatory building activities are already under way. The first high-tech systems for FAIR can also be viewed in Darmstadt, where experts will explain the construction plans. In addition, a huge 3D model of FAIR will provide visitors with a vivid impression of one of Europe’s largest research projects.
On Open House Day, GSI and FAIR will also offer a special program aimed primarily at younger visitors. It will enable them to satisfy their curiosity during exciting science shows devoted to “fire and ice” or to become active themselves by participating in experiments that reveal the nature of physical phenomena. Children will also be able to enjoy bouncy castles and additional animations.
People who would one day like to work at one of the fascinating research facilities can obtain information about the wide variety of job opportunities at GSI and FAIR: From traineeships and jobs in scientific, technical, and administrative areas to construction work and academic careers. The big exhibition tent will house presentations by the human resources department, trainees, and the Helmholtz Graduate School for Hadron and Ion Research (HGS Hire), which coordinates the training of doctoral candidates for scientific professions at GSI and FAIR. The works council and the equal opportunities office will also be on hand to present their work.
The open house day will be rounded out by an extensive supporting program, featuring outdoor music performances at the pond, various exhibitions, and a science quiz. A diverse range of food and beverages will be offered at the “Zum schnellen Ioni” restaurant, the “Quark-Teilchen” coffee bar, and various stands throughout the grounds.
Information about Open House Day 2017 and how to get there can be found at the special Web page www.gsi.de/open-house. Admission is free of charge to all of the features on the GSI and FAIR campuses. The organizer expects that thousands of visitors will take advantage of this opportunity to experience the fascination of science up close at GSI and FAIR.
]]>The Building Forum is part of the trade fair program. It is organized by the German Industrial Association for Building Services and Technical Installations (BTGA) in cooperation with the Association for Automation and Management of Homes and Buildings in the Federation of German Mechanical Engineering Industry Association (VDMA), the German Property Federation (ZIA), and Messe Frankfurt. The Building Forum is supplemented by the Real Estate Forum of the BTGA, which is held at ISH in a special area. The Building Forum showcases innovative solutions for the professional design and realization of buildings and real estate and for their energy-efficient operation. One of Blaurock’s key aims was to make the FAIR project better known in this market and the technical building services community. “A major part of the construction contracts for FAIR relate to the heating, ventilation, and air conditioning industry as well as the electricity supply sector,” says Blaurock. “The trade fair provides us with a great platform on which to establish contacts with these sectors.”
In addition, the trade fair enables potential contractors to obtain information about the construction project and the possibilities of becoming involved in it. “FAIR doesn’t require standard equipment, but rather customized solutions that are cost-effective and efficient. Because this is quite a challenge, we cooperate closely with the overall planning team to divide the complex construction project into manageable packages,” says Blaurock. Karl-Walter Schuster, the official in charge of European issues at the German Industrial Association for Building Services and Technical Installations (BTGA) and President of the European umbrella organization for installers of technical building services equipment (GCP Europe), is also very interested in the development of the 20-hectare construction site of FAIR and GSI in Darmstadt. “The FAIR project is not only one of the most exciting projects for the scientific community but also for the technical building services equipment sector. That’s why the sector will be greatly interested in the construction measures,” he says.
ISH is held every two years in Frankfurt. It is the world’s biggest showcase for energy efficient heating, air-conditioning, and technical building services equipment, renewable energies and innovative bathroom design. At the fair, around 2,400 domestic and international exhibitors present their products and services on more than 250,000 square meters of exhibition space. The range of offers at ISH covers all aspects of future-oriented building solutions.
]]>At the FAIR facility, the CR will store particle beams from a variety of sources and cool the stored particles. It will be possible to use the cooled particle beams to conduct additional experiments directly in the CR or in the linked High-Energy Storage Ring (HESR). A large part of the CR is being developed under the direction of the Budker Institute as Russia’s contribution to FAIR. The Budker Institute also bears the main responsibility for the Collector Ring.
BINP is supplying all of the magnets, for example, as well as the vacuum and energy supply systems. One of the recently signed contracts governs the provision of 26 dipole magnets, each of which weighs almost 50 tons. “They will be among the biggest magnets that we’ll be using at FAIR,” explains Dr. Jürgen Henschel, who manages the overall project. “The contract we’ve just concluded with the Budker Institute is the key contract for the Collector Ring.”
Another development contract that was also signed at the recent meeting in Novosibirsk stipulates how topics related to the technologically demanding Collector Ring will be addressed at the same time as the facility is built.
The key contracts for all of the rings at FAIR — from the 1.1 kilometer long SIS100 ring accelerator to the High-Energy Storage Ring (HESR) — have now been signed.
]]>Dr. Tanaka searched for bound states of so-called Eta' mesons with carbon atoms in a novel experiment at the GSI fragment separator FRS. The existence of these bound states is theoretically predicted and already for many years experiments are conducted to find them. Although bound states were not observed in Dr. Tanakas experiment yet, by putting upper bounds on the formation cross section he succeeded for the first time to draw quantitative conclusions on the strength of the interaction of both particles and the binding forces taking effect in the process. This advance leads to an improvement of the theoretical understanding and gives target-oriented indications for the design of detectors and experiments for the further search. It is therefore perceived as an important milestone on the way to the discovery among the experts.
Scientists bestowed with the GENCO Membership Award are: Professor Dr. Maria Borge (University of Madrid, Spain) for her important contributions to the understanding of exotic nuclear systems, especially via beta-delayed particle emission studies; Professor Dr. Piet Van Duppen (University of Leuven, Belgium) for advancing laser-ionization techniques for production and post-acceleration of radioactive beams, and for nuclear structure and decay studies, in particular investigations of shape coexistence; Thomas Glasmacher (FRIB, USA) for exploring rare isotopes with new experimental techniques involving gamma-rays and for opening new horizons with design and construction of the FRIB facility; Professor Dr. Hendrik Schatz (MSU/NSCL, USA) for outstanding contributions to nucleosynthesis in explosive stellar events; as well as PD Dr. Peter Thirolf (LMU Munich) for his remarkable achievements in spectroscopy of strongly-deformed nuclei and new applications of laser-driven particle acceleration in nuclear and medical physics.
Greetings were delivered by Dr. Georg Schütte, State Secretary at the Federal Ministry of Education and Research and Chairman of the GSI Supervisory Board and FAIR Council, and Professor Otmar D. Wiestler, President of the Helmholtz Association. Words of greetings were also spoken by Dr. Rolf Bernhardt from the Hessen State Ministry for Higher Education, Research and the Arts , Jochen Partsch, Mayor of the City of Darmstadt, and Professor Angela Bracco, Chair of the Nuclear Physics European Collaboration Committee (NuPECC) — an expert committee of the European Science Foundation (ESF).
In his role as Scientific Managing Director, the 56-year-old Italian physicist Paolo Giubellino succeeds Professor Boris Sharkov at FAIR and Professor Karlheinz Langanke at GSI. By taking up his new position, he completes the joint management team of GSI and FAIR. This doubling up of managerial responsibility is also the case with the Administrative Managing Director Ursula Weyrich, who was appointed in late 2014, and the Technical Managing Director Jörg Blaurock, who was appointed in early 2016. The GSI Supervisory Board and the FAIR Council had announced their decision to appoint Paolo Giubellino in September 2016, and Giubellino took up his duties in January 2017.
Dr. Georg Schütte, State Secretary at the Federal Ministry of Education and Research and Chairman of the GSI Supervisory Board and FAIR Council, said, "Paolo Giubellino's appointment as Scientific Managing Director completes the joint management team of GSI and FAIR. It guarantees excellent future research at FAIR. The foundation for this is laid by GSI’s current scientific work. I wish the three directors Paolo Giubellino, Ursula Weyrich and Jörg Blaurock much success with their challenging task to realize FAIR in the framework agreed upon with the international partners.“
In his comments, Professor Otmar D. Wiestler, the President of the Helmholtz Association, emphasized the international significance of this appointment. "Because of his scientific achievements and his extraordinary talent at leading an international team, the presence of Paolo Giubellino is a great enrichment for our association and for Darmstadt as a center of scientific research. His appointment also testifies to the attractiveness of Helmholtz research to scientists all over the world. With the new management team, including Ursula Weyrich and Jörg Blaurock, GSI and FAIR are well positioned for their great future tasks.“
Paolo Giubellino is beginning his term of office at an extremely exciting time for GSI and FAIR. The construction of the FAIR facility is due to begin this year. This will be one of the biggest and most ambitious projects for worldwide research, and it will be realized through the cooperation of international partners. In addition, the further development of the research campus is forging ahead. The existing facility is being enhanced and equipped with cutting-edge technology to enable scientists from all over the world to participate in an outstanding research program.
The NuPECC-Chair Professor Angela Bracco said, "FAIR is the European flagship facility for hadron and nuclear physics in the coming decades. The world-wide unique FAIR facility will allow unprecedented fore-front research in a broad spectrum of basic and applied research disciplines."
In his ceremonial address, Paolo Giubellino offered a glimpse of the future and expressed his enthusiasm about his new workplace. “Its research potential is unique,” he said. “An unprecedented variety of experiments will be possible at FAIR. Through them, physicists from all over the world can expect to gain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe, from the Big Bang until today. The FAIR project guarantees future-oriented further development, not only for the center in Darmstadt but also for fundamental research in all of Europe and beyond.” The new Scientific Managing Director’s vision of the future also includes up-and-coming young scientists. “Today we already need lots of bright young people — highly qualified young scientists who will contribute their talent and their know-how to the creation of FAIR,” he said. Giubellino concluded with a promise: “I will do everything I can to help ensure that we can work together to fully exploit the tremendous research potential of GSI and FAIR.”
Since January 2017 Paolo Giubellino is Scientific Managing Director of GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH (GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research) and the Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research in Europe GmbH (FAIR GmbH). Research focus of Paolo Giubellino is the physics of high-energy heavy ion collisions and the matter produced in them. After studying at Turin University and the University of California in Santa Cruz, he took part in many heavy-ion experiments at the European Organization for Nuclear Research CERN in Switzerland. Since the early 1990s, he has held several senior positions at CERN’s ALICE experiment. In 2011 Giubellino was appointed Spokesperson of ALICE. He has also worked at the Torino section of the Italian National Institute for Nuclear Physics (Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare, INFN) since 1985. For his work he has received numerous awards. Among other things, he received the Lise Meitner Prize of the European Physical Society in 2014 as well as the Enrico Fermi Prize, the highest award bestowed by the Italian Physical Society (2013). In 2012 the Italian president awarded him the title of "Commendatore della Repubblica Italiana" for his scientific achievements. In 2016 he was elected into the Academia Europae.
FAIR will be one of the largest and most complex accelerator facilities in the world. The centrepiece of the facility is a ring accelerator with a circumference of 1,100 metres. Engineers and scientists are working in international partnership to advance new technological developments in a number of areas – such as information technology and superconductor technology. Around 3,000 scientists from all over the world will be able to conduct top-level research at FAIR. Their outstanding experiments will generate new fundamental insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe.Alongside Germany, FAIR’s shareholders are the countries Finland, France, India, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovenia and Sweden. The United Kingdom is an associated partner.
]]>The young persons were asked to evaluate and interpret data of the ALICE experiment. Under professional supervision of scientists they autonomously analysed recent data recorded in proton-proton and lead collisions. In the lead collisions a so-called quark-gluon plasma is generated – a state of matter which existed in the universe shortly after the big bang. This plasma undergoes a phase transition back to normal matter in fractions of seconds. The particles produced in the process can give insight into the properties of the quark-gluon plasma.
In an introductory talk about quark-gluon plasma the pupils were informed about the analysis. Furthermore they visited the large-scale experiment HADES, one of the current experiments at the GSI accelerator facility that will also become a part of the future FAIR accelerator.
The basic idea of the programme is to allow the students to work in the same fashion as the scientists. This includes having a videoconference at the end of the day. In a conference connection with groups from the universities in Frankfurt, Münster, Copenhagen (Denmark) and Zagreb (Croatia) as well as CERN they presented and discussed their results.
This year 210 universities and research institutes from 52 countries particpate in the International Masterclasses. They are organised by the International Particle Physics Outreach Group (IPPOG). All events in Germany are held in cooperation with the "Netzwerk Teilchenwelt", a nationwide network committed to the communication of particle physics to youngsters and teachers. They aim to make particle physics accessible to a broader public.
ALICE is one of the four large international experiments at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). It is the experiment specifically designed to investigate collisions of heavy nuclei at high energies. Scientists of GSI and of German universities were involved in the development of new detectors and in the scientific programme of ALICE from the beginning. The GSI computing centre is an inherent part of the computing grid for data analysis of ALICE.
In the article, which was published in 2016, the researchers, some of whom come from the Super Heavy Elements departments at GSI and HIM, report on the first-ever direct detection of the exotic thorium isomer Th-229m. This is a decisive step that brings us closer to being able to build an ultra-precise nuclear clock based on this isomer. Atomic clocks are currently the most precise timekeepers in the world. The record is currently held by a clock that will keep time to within one second in 20 billion years. The team that has just been commended is led by PD Dr. Peter Thirolf and Lars von der Wense from the LMU München and has achieved the first experimental demonstration of an excited state of the thorium-229 isotope that had been sought worldwide for more than 40 years and could help improve the timekeeping precision by a factor of around ten. The researchers reported their findings in the scientific journal Nature. A nuclear clock features a multitude of potential applications, including the search for dark matter and gravitational waves. It would also provide ultra-high sensitivity to detect potential time variations of fundamental constants.
The ten most important “Breakthroughs of the Year” are selected by Physics World every year. The criteria for the list of the ten most important discoveries are the fundamental importance of the research result, a significant advance in knowledge, a strong connection between theory and experiment, and the discovery’s general interest for all physicists.
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On behalf of FAIR/GSI the Scientific Managing Director Professor Paolo Giubellino and the Research Director Professor Karlheinz Langanke as well as further representatives participated in the meeting. Members of the Chinese delegation were Professor Wenlong Zhan, President of the Chinese Physical Society, as well as representatives of the Institute of Modern Physics (IMP) of CAS, led by the IMP Deputy Director Dr. Hongwei Zhao.
During their stay in Darmstadt Professor Paolo Giubellino gave the guests an overview of the current state of the FAIR project. The Chinese visitors reported on the present status of the High Intensity heavy ion Accelerator Facility (HIAF) projected in China. Important topic during the meeting was the further cooperation, e.g. in research and technical developments for FAIR and HIAF and in promoting of young scientists’ education and exchange. Based on the results of the discussions the existing Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between GSI and IMP will be extended to FAIR and expanded for another five Years, thematically widened by mutual accelerator developments. Following the discussions the guests did a guided tour on the site and visited several stations on the FAIR/GSI campus.
]]>The scientific managing director of GSI and FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research), Professor Paolo Giubellino, is delighted about the young physicist’s appointment. “We’re proud that a researcher from our ranks is now a minister of science, where she can work at the political level to contribute her expertise and international experience to the benefit of society. We wish her much success in her new position. Dr. Sanja Damjanovic will certainly benefit from the experience she gathered at GSI and the nuclear research center CERN,” he says.
Dr. Damjanovic, 44, has been working on international research teams at GSI and CERN since 1999. In 2007 she also played a key role in initiating the cooperation agreement between her homeland, Montenegro, and the nuclear research center CERN. In her new position as Minister of Science, Sanja Damjanovic will continue to be able to draw on this experience. “My work at GSI and CERN, both of which are world-famous international research centers, was certainly one of the reasons why I was chosen to perform this task for my homeland, Montenegro. The experience that I’ve collected will serve me well in my new position, where it will be a major asset.”
Sanja Damjanovic was born in Niksic, Montenegro. After studying physics in Belgrade, she earned her doctoral degree at Heidelberg University in Germany. The doctoral supervisor of her dissertation on “Electron-Pair Production in Pb-Au Collisions at 40 AGeV” was the former scientific managing director of GSI, Professor Hans J. Specht. After obtaining her doctoral degree, she took on a postdoc position at GSI and Heidelberg University. This was followed by a scholarship at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) and project work at CERN and GSI.
In the area of basic research, Sanja Damjanovic focuses on the experimental physics of high-energy nuclear collisions. In applied research, her emphasis is on studies of the radiation fields created by high-energy particle beams. These aspects are of importance for the protection of accelerators, for example, as well as for beam diagnostics and the radiation protection of personnel. Sanja Damjanovic has worked in beam diagnostics at the Accelerator Department of GSI since 2014. For some of this time, she has also had an associate contract at CERN.
]]>One of the program’s main aims is to network the Helmholtz centers with one another and with universities. This goal is also be the focus of the meeting in Darmstadt, which includes a workshop and features opportunities for participation in topic-specific meetings and a poster session. The annual conference opened with a welcoming address by the Technical Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, Jörg Blaurock and a presentation about FAIR and GSI by the Scientific Managing Director of FAIR and GSI, Professor Paolo Giubellino.
The Matter and Technologies program is divided into two sections: Accelerator Research and Development (ARD) and Detector Technologies and Systems (DTS). As an important effect the developments often lead to spinoffs in other fields. In detector technologies this is the case for example in medicine or in satellite-based astrophysics.
During the annual meeting at Darmstadt the young scientists associated with the program held the third MT Student Retreat in parallel with the meeting. This meeting enables doctoral candidates to get to know one another and discuss their ideas and possible solutions. More than 40 participants attend the retreat in order to get an impression of the diverse areas covered by the research work in the Matter and Technologies program.
]]>Der Forschungsbau geht auf eine Empfehlung des Wissenschaftsrats aus dem Jahr 2011 zurück. Mit dem Bau beauftragt wurde der Landesbetrieb Liegenschafts- und Baubetreuung (LBB), der das neue Gebäude auf dem Campus der JGU in unmittelbarer Nähe der Institute für Physik, Kernphysik und Kernchemie errichtet hat. Begonnen wurde im Dezember 2013, die Fertigstellung erfolgte im Sommer 2016, sodass mittlerweile bereits ein großer Teil des Gebäudes bezogen werden konnte. Der Stahlbeton-Massivbau besteht aus einem viergeschossigen Bürotrakt, einem zweigeschossigen Labortrakt und einer eingeschossigen Experimentierhalle mit einer lichten Deckenhöhe von bis zu 10 Metern. Auf einer Hauptnutzfläche von 3.600 Quadratmetern befinden sich Forschungsräume, Büros und Werkstattarbeitsplätze für insgesamt bis zu 170 Mitarbeiter. Ihnen steht eine wissenschaftlich-technische Ausrüstung inklusive Großgeräten, wie etwa ein Hochleistungsrechner, zur Verfügung. Die Gesamtkosten des Neubaus einschließlich der technischen Ausrüstung in Höhe von 35 Millionen Euro wurden vom Bund und vom Land Rheinland-Pfalz übernommen.
Der Staatssekretär im Ministerium für Wissenschaft, Weiterbildung und Kultur, Prof. Dr. Salvatore Barbaro, sagte: „Für Rheinland-Pfalz war und ist die Gründung des Helmholtz-Instituts als erste Helmholtz-Förderung ein schöner Erfolg in der überregionalen Forschungsförderung. Durch die konsequente Ausrichtung der Forschungspolitik auf die Förderung profilbildender Forschungsschwerpunkte an den Hochschulen wurden zwischen 2008 und 2016 in der Forschungsinitiative des Landes die Rahmenbedingungen für exzellente Spitzenforschung und Nachwuchsförderung mit 160 Millionen Euro nachhaltig verbessert. Weitere Landesmittel sind vorgesehen, um die Exzellenzstrategie-Vorbereitungen in Rheinland-Pfalz zu unterstützen.“
„Helmholtz-Institute sind für uns ein hervorragendes Instrument, um gemeinsam mit Universitäten starke Partnerschaften für spezifische Zukunftsthemen aufzubauen. Sie bilden die Grundlage für eine intensive und dauerhafte Zusammenarbeit“, sagte Prof. Dr. Otmar D. Wiestler, Präsident der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft. „Das HIM auf dem Campus der Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz ist ein gelungenes Beispiel dafür. Mit seinen herausragenden Forschungsleistungen beweist es zudem, dass Helmholtz-Institute ein sehr erfolgreicher Weg hin zu einer nachhaltigen Stärkung unseres Wissenschaftsstandortes sind.“
Die Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftler am HIM arbeiten auf den Gebieten der Kern-, Teilchen-, Atom- und Beschleunigerphysik. Sie beschäftigen sich mit grundlegenden Fragen zur Struktur, Symmetrie und Stabilität von Materie und Antimaterie. Insbesondere geht es ihnen darum, die starke Wechselwirkung besser zu verstehen, eine der vier fundamentalen Kräfte der Physik. Ein wichtiger Bereich ist außerdem die Entwicklung von Beschleunigersystemen und Detektoren für Experimente am GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt und der dort entstehenden Beschleunigeranlage FAIR. FAIR, eines der größten Forschungsvorhaben für die Grundlagenforschung weltweit, soll neue Einblicke in den Aufbau der Materie und die Entwicklung des Universums ermöglichen.
„Das HIM verbindet die spezifischen Kompetenzen der Universität und der GSI in optimaler Weise. Die am HIM verfolgten Forschungs- und technischen Entwicklungsarbeiten sind von höchstem Wert für die wissenschaftlichen Programme an der GSI sowie an der internationalen Beschleunigeranlage FAIR. Durch den Neubau und seine innovative Forschungsinfrastruktur wird diese fruchtbare Zusammenarbeit erheblich gestärkt“, sagte Prof. Dr. Paolo Giubellino, Wissenschaftlicher Geschäftsführer des GSI Helmholtzzentrums für Schwerionenforschung.
„Der Mainzer Universitätscampus bietet hervorragende Voraussetzungen für die Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftler am HIM, die hier in der Physik und Chemie ein ausgezeichnetes Forschungsumfeld vorfinden. Dazu gehören auch der Elektronenbeschleuniger MAMI, der Forschungsreaktor TRIGA und der geplante neue Linearbeschleuniger MESA“, merkte der Präsident der Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz, Prof. Dr. Georg Krausch, an. Die JGU beteiligt sich mit technischer Infrastruktur, wissenschaftlichem und technischem Personal sowie Overheadmitteln am Betrieb des HIM.
„Nach der arbeitsreichen Phase der Planung, des Baus und der Inbetriebnahme freuen wir uns sehr, den im nationalen Wettbewerb eingeworbenen Forschungsbau jetzt zu beziehen und vor allem für unsere Forschung nutzen zu können. Die räumliche Nähe, die technischen Installationen und die verschiedenen Laboratorien versetzen uns umso mehr in die Lage, weiterhin sichtbare Spitzenforschung in einem internationalen Umfeld zu betreiben um damit auch den Nachwuchs auszubilden. Für diese Möglichkeiten sind wir dankbar und werden dies als Ansporn nehmen, weiterhin unser Bestes zu leisten“, sagte der Direktor des Helmholtz-Instituts Mainz, Prof. Dr. Frank Maas.
Markus Rank, Leiter der Mainzer Niederlassung des Landesbetriebs Liegenschafts- und Baubetreuung (LBB), dankte den Baubeauftragten des Helmholtz-Instituts und der Universität für die vertrauensvolle Zusammenarbeit: „Im Ergebnis ist ein Bau entstanden, von dem wir hoffen, dass er wie ein Maßanzug für die Wissenschaft ist, der den Anforderungen der Spitzenforschung auf viele Jahre hinaus entspricht.“
Für die Kunst am Bau im Foyer zeichnet der Künstler Mario Hergueta aus Nauheim verantwortlich. Er hat die Wände der bis ins Obergeschoss hinaufreichenden Eingangshalle mit geometrischen Formen in Schwarz, Grau, Weiß und der reflektierenden Metallfarbe Silber gestaltet. In dem vom rheinland-pfälzischen Finanzministerium ausgelobten beschränkten Wettbewerb mit vorgeschaltetem offenem Bewerberverfahren hatte sich Hergueta gegen sechs Mitbewerber durchgesetzt.
Helmholtz-Institut Mainz
Prof. Dr. Frank Maas
Direktor
Staudingerweg 18
55128 Mainz
Tel.: 06131 39-27447
Fax: 06131 39-27448
E-Mail: him(at)uni-mainz.de
Homepage: https://www.him.uni-mainz.de/
The Action will aim to maximise the scientific and innovative return of huge investments already made in experimental facilities located across Europe, including GANIL in France, the first underground laboratory for nuclear astrophysics LUNA in Italy, and the accelerator facility FAIR being constructed at GSI in Germany.
Approved by COST on 24 October 2016, the Action is one of 25 approved out of 478 eligible proposals collected earlier this year. The COST Action will provide funding for networking activities, including workshops, training schools and short-term scientific missions for four years, and will also train a new generation of European scientists, providing interdisciplinary expertise and knowledge-transfer skills.
COST is supported by the EU Framework Programme Horizon 2020.
]]>Klaus Peters is full professor at the Goethe University Frankfurt since 2004 and Leading Scientist at GSI for hadron physics. He acted as Vice Research Director of GSI from 2011-13 and has an impressive record of important results in the spectroscopy of light and heavy hadrons. Moreover he is working in many international boards and has wide experience within many international collaborations. Klaus Peters is currently engaged in GlueX particle physics experiment at Jefferson Lab, Newport News (USA) and the BES3 Spectrometer collaboration at the Beijing Electron Positron Collider in China.
The PANDA collaboration comprises more than 50 institutes world-wide and about 500 scientists. “I look forward to the new assignment and I feel honored, it is an amazing challenge to conduct the construction of PANDA at FAIR for a great scientific success to come”, said Klaus Peters.
]]>Approximately 350,000 patients in Germany suffer from various forms of cardiac arrhythmia. The condition can lead to permanent damage as a result of stroke, or it may cause sudden heart failure. In forms of arrhythmia like atrial fibrillation or ventricular tachycardia, the heart departs from the regular rhythm set by a natural pacemaker, the sinoatrial node. This type of arrhythmia is often treated with drugs or with a “catheter ablation,” in which catheters are guided through blood vessels to the heart, and certain tissue there is selectively destroyed. Based on this principle, ions from the particle accelerator could one day be used to perform a treatment without catheters. Scientists have been able to show that high-energy carbon ions can be used in a non-invasive procedure to make specific changes to cardiac tissue that prevent the transmission of the electrical signal.
This procedure using carbon ions has now been studied for the first time in a feasibility study by scientists at the GSI Helmholtz Center for Heavy Ion Research in Darmstadt in collaboration with physicians and scientists of the Mayo Clinic (Minnesota, U.S.), the Helmholtzzentrum Dresden-Rossendorf, Heidelberg University, the Friedrich Alexander University Erlangen-Nuremberg (FAU), the Heidelberg Ion-Beam Therapy Center and the University of Trento (Italy). The researchers have published their results in the journal Scientific Reports from the publishers of Nature.
After prior tests on cardiac cell cultures and beating heart preparations yielded promising results, the scientists developed an animal study. “The new method is a big step into the future, because for the first time, it allows us to perform this treatment with pinpoint accuracy but without any catheters at all,” says Dr. H. Immo Lehmann, a physician and scientist at the Mayo Clinic and one of the authors of the study. “The study showed that the method can be successfully used to change cardiac tissue in such a way as to permanently interrupt the propagation of disruptive impulses. Further detailed studies are needed, however, before the method can start to benefit patients,” says Dr. Christian Graeff, head of the Medical Physics research group at GSI.
The irradiation of tissue with carbon ions promises to be gentler and potentially also more effective than treatment with catheters. When the method is technically mature, the procedure will take only a few minutes, in contrast to the sometimes hours-long catheter operations. One crucial advantage is that the ions can penetrate to any desired depth. By contrast, since the left ventricular wall of the heart is especially thick, it is often not possible to effectively destroy tissue there with catheters, although this is precisely the spot at which patients suffering from severe forms of ventricular tachycardia must be treated.
“It is exciting that the carbon beam could work with surgical precision in particularly sensitive areas of the body,” says Paolo Giubellino, Scientific Managing Director of FAIR and GSI. “The wealth of experience regarding medical applications of ion beams here at GSI is the basis of this new, promising method of treatment. The knowledge regarding the biological effectiveness of carbon ions and the technological know-how for irradiating patients are indispensable for developing an idea like this to the point where it’s mature enough for a medical application. We’re proud that the first steps toward a new therapy have now been taken.”
In their study, the scientists were able to rely on many technologies originally developed for cancer treatment with scanned ions, which was carried out at GSI for the first time in 1997. This form of treatment has now become well established and has been used in thousands of patients worldwide. Further experiments are currently being planned so that the method can be put into practice at facilities such as the Heidelberg Ion-Beam Therapy Center.
Scientific publication in the journal "Nature – Scientific Reports"
]]>In the 15th issue of our "target" magazine we report the arrivial of new magnets for the FAIR ring accelerator as well as other components for FAIR. Also FAIR has been progressing concerning the calls for tender for the construction works, and we have presented the project on the real estate fair Expo Real. In research there has been news about the development of nuclear clocks and the spectroscopy of heavy elements. Our interview covers Janina Krieg's work about topologic isolators in materials research, and in our section "GSI stellt sich vor" we inform you about our long-standing and very successful Summer Student Program.
Download of "target" – Issue 15, December 2016 (German, PDF, 4,4 MB)
<link presse target_magazin.htm internal-link internal link in current>Abonnement und target archiv (German only)
Die Vortragsreihe "Wissenschaft für Alle" richtet sich an alle an aktueller Wissenschaft und Forschung interessierten Personen. In den Vorträgen wird über die Forschung und Entwicklungen an GSI und FAIR berichtet, aber auch über aktuelle Themen aus anderen Wissenschafts- und Technikfeldern.
Ziel der Reihe ist es, die wissenschaftlichen Vorgänge für Laien verständlich aufzubereiten und darzustellen, um so die Forschung einem breiten Publikum zugänglich zu machen. Die Vorträge werden von GSI- und FAIR-Mitarbeitern oder von externen Rednern aus Universitäten und Forschungsinstituten gehalten.
Die Vorträge finden im großen gemeinsamen Hörsaal der Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (FAIR) und des GSI Helmholtzzentrums für Schwerionenforschung, Planckstraße 1, 64291 Darmstadt, statt. Der Eintritt ist frei, eine Anmeldung ist nicht erforderlich. Externe Teilnehmer werden gebeten, für den Einlass ein Ausweisdokument bereitzuhalten.
Weitere Informationen und aktuelle Ankündigungen finden Sie unter: www.gsi.de/wfa
]]>The Long Range Plan regularly establishes the perspectives and prospects of the European nuclear physics community for the next ten years and beyond. Its contents are presented to the European and national bodies for science funding as planning suggestions. “The Long Range Plan provides the community with an opportunity to formulate how Europe should position itself in order to remain a world leader and competitive in an international context,“ explained Professor Angela Bracco, NuPECC Chair. “GSI and the future FAIR accelerator center play an outstanding role in this effort.“ According to Bracco, the new possibilities for research in Darmstadt are unique and are expected to produce groundbreaking new insights for nuclear research.
Professor Paolo Giubellino, the new Scientific Managing Director of GSI and FAIR, since January 1, 2017, will also report on the FAIR project at the Town Meeting, emphasizing the outstanding role played by the Darmstadt location and FAIR/GSI in this area of science. “The FAIR project builds on the excellence of GSI and guarantees a promising future development with outstanding experimental facilities within European research.”
The members of NuPECC come from more than 20 European countries. They represent the European nuclear physics community and important research centers and funding agencies. The tasks of the renowned expert committee include providing the European Science Foundation and other bodies with suggestions and recommendations, and coordinating activities in the fields of nuclear and hadron physics within Europe.
]]>Research in nanomaterials and nanotechnology is quickly evolving worldwide and new discoveries are frequently reported in applications including nanoelectronics, sensor technologies, robotics, as well as in the energy and healthcare sector. GSI's contribution to the event highlighted the unique possibilities of heavy ions to modify materials' properties and to produce micro- and nanostructures. Examples are microfluidic systems and polymeric single-pore membranes for biosensor applications, as well as model systems for ion channels in biomembranes. Numerous other partners from science and industry reported about their results and offers during the event.
The event was organized by HEPTech and GSI in cooperation with Enterprise Europe Network Hessen. It was also supported by the transnational network NANORA.
]]>The festive inauguration ceremony will be held at the Darmstadtium Congress Center in Darmstadt on March 3, 2017. The guests will include Dr. Georg Schütte, State Secretary at the Federal Ministry of Education and Research and Chairman of the GSI Supervisory Board and FAIR Council, Professor Otmar Wiestler, President of the Helmholtz Association, and various politicians, university representatives, and partners from the international scientific collaborations.
In his role as scientific managing director, the 56-year-old Italian physicist Professor Paolo Giubellino succeeds Professor Boris Sharkov at FAIR and Professor Karlheinz Langanke at GSI. By taking up his new position, Giubellino completes the joint management team of GSI and FAIR. Paolo Giubellino is performing his management tasks for GSI as well as FAIR. This is also the case with the administrative managing director Ursula Weyrich, who was appointed in late 2014, and the technical managing director Jörg Blaurock, who was appointed in early 2016. Weyrich and Blaurock look forward to working together with Giubellino. Their aim is to conduct cutting-edge research at the existing facility and to complete the future FAIR accelerator facility in an international collaboration.
After studying at Turin University and the University of California in Santa Cruz, Giubellino has worked, since 1985, at the Turin section of the Italian National Institute for Nuclear Physics (Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare, INFN). His research activity has focused primarily on the physics of high-energy heavy ion collisions and the matter produced in them. He took part in many heavy-ion experiments at the European Organization for Nuclear Research CERN in Switzerland. Since the early 1990s, he has held several senior positions at CERN’s ALICE experiment. In 2011 Giubellino was elected spokesperson of ALICE at CERN position he held until the end of 2016. He will also become a professor at TU Darmstadt.
]]>The local accelerator that enables the ring to run independently has now been completed, as has the beamline that extends from the ESR to the CRYRING. Moreover, both of these systems have successfully sent ion beams to the CRYRING’s first diagnostic stations. The commissioning of the ring began in the summer of 2016. In the first step of this process, a group of researchers from the GSI accelerator team, the GSI research department for atomic physics, and the SPARC experiment collaboration successfully tested the beam transport line from GSI’s ESR to the first FAIR storage ring, the CRYRING. During the previous beam time period at GSI, scientists extracted completely ionized carbon ions (C6+ ions) from the ESR. They then channeled these particles to the first diagnostic station at the CRYRING. The test showed that the adjusted beamline from the ESR to Cave B (the location of the CRYRING) and the new septum magnet in the CRYRING are fully functional. The researchers also tested the beam diagnosis equipment and the FAIR-standard control hardware and software in actual beam operation.
A second beam time period took place in October/November. During this phase, the local source supplied a beam of hydrogen gas ions (H2+) that was propelled into the ring at 300 keV/u. The diagnostic systems detected this beam after one turn in the ring. This brought the first turn to a successful conclusion and demonstrated that all of the key elements work properly.
In the next step, the researchers will prepare the necessary ultra-high vacuum. The remaining ring installations — the electron cooler, in particular — will be put into operation next year. When the GSI accelerators recommence operations in 2018, the CRYRING will be able to carry out its first experiments with slow highly charged ions. In cooperation with other FAIR collaborations, the SPARC experiment collaboration is preparing many new experiments that use slow highly charged ions to investigate processes in atoms and nuclei as well as conduct research in biomolecular physics and the materials sciences.
The integrated schedule for realization, in which civil engineering, accelerator development and construction, as well as the scientific experiments are closely coordinated, has met the approval of the shareholders. The plan foresees a full operation of the new accelerator facility, which is directly connected to the existing GSI campus, in the year 2025. The execution of civil works on the site shall start in summer 2017 and are expected to be substantially completed at the end of 2022. After the civil construction of the new buildings the installation of the state-of-the-art accelerator and experiment facilities will begin.
The nine partner countries funding the large-scale research infrastructure alongside Germany expressed their full support for the construction project execution plan as well as for the concrete elaboration of the scientific program planned for FAIR by the experiment collaborations. This also includes the progresses in the technical development and the realization of detector components for the experiments.
The FAIR Council and the GSI supervisory board had already recognized the reorganization and the establishment of a dedicated project structure as a milestone for the realization of FAIR in their previous meeting this July. Since then the management in Darmstadt has continued to work on the new orientation and the implementation of the FAIR project. Also the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) has approved proceedings for the start of construction works for the realization of the FAIR facility. Since September 2016 the first calls for tender for excavation and shoring have been made throughout Europe, since November also for the civil construction work of the large ring tunnel.
FAIR will be one of the largest and most complex accelerator facilities in the world. The centrepiece of the facility is a ring accelerator with a circumference of 1,100 metres. Engineers and scientists are working in international partnership to advance new technological developments in a number of areas – such as information technology and superconductor technology. Around 3,000 scientists from all over the world will be able to conduct top-level research at FAIR. Their outstanding experiments will generate new fundamental insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe.Alongside Germany, FAIR’s shareholders are the countries Finland, France, India, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovenia and Sweden. The United Kingdom is an associated partner.
]]>"Saturday Morning Physics" is hosted by the physics department of the Technical University. The series of lectures is held annually aims to further the interest of young people for physics. In talks and experiments on consecutive Saturdays the high school students learn about the current research at the university. The visit to FAIR and GSI is the only excursion. GSI, amongst many others, sponsors the project already from the start.
Website of Saturday Morning Physics: https://www.satmorphy.de/
]]>Beams can be extracted either quickly or slowly. During fast extraction, a device known as a “kicker” propels the entire beam out of the ring within a millionth of a second so that it can be transferred to one of the downstream storage rings, for example. The slow extraction process, on the other hand, takes several seconds to extract the circulating ions and keeps the intensity as constant as possible during the process. This type of extraction is required for the R3B and CBM experiments at FAIR, for example.
The new resonance sextupole magnet was delivered by the Danish company Danfysik and will be followed by five more magnets of this type. Each magnet weighs around 1.6 tons, measures 70 centimeters in diameter by 80 centimeters in length, and has three north poles and three south poles. The six magnets will be installed into the accelerator ring’s six segments. They will enable the ion beam to be slowly and continuously extracted from the SIS100 by means of the process known as resonance extraction. Once the desired beam energy level has been reached, the particles circulating in the ring are stimulated to resonate in horizontal oscillations around their intended track. Among other things, this is achieved by non-linearly focusing the appropriately programmed six resonance sextupole magnets. “The oscillations grow in amplitude within just a few revolutions, enabling the electrostatic septum to extract the particles from the SIS100,” explains As Peter Spiller, a project area manager at GSI responsible, among other things, for the construction of the ring accelerator SIS100. In this way, the resonance sextupole magnets enable the particle beam to be peeled off, leading to the extraction of a seconds-long flow of particles for use in the experiments.
“The first resonance sextupole magnet has now finished testing at the magnetic field measurement station at GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung,” state work package directors Carsten Mühle and Peter Rottländer. As a result, the magnets can now be approved for series production. Peter Spiller hopes the remaining magnets will be delivered soon. “The resonance sextupole magnets are important components of the SIS100 ring and essential for conducting the FAIR research program,” he says.
]]>In a guided tour and a talk with the management, the Minister gained an insight into the latest developments at GSI and FAIR. The process of realizing the FAIR accelerator center is gaining speed: FAIR and GSI will soon begin the process of awarding construction contracts — for example, for the tunnel of the approximately 1.1-kilometer-long subterranean ring accelerator, as well as other buildings and infrastructure.
Minister Lorz indicated his strong interest in the progress of the FAIR project, which is one of the world’s biggest projects for cutting-edge research. The German state of Hesse is one of the shareholders of GSI, and it is also playing a major role in the financing of FAIR. The state of Hesse is also supporting the participation of Hessian universities in the research and technology development for FAIR through programs such as the LOEWE Excellence Initiative.
During several theme-based weeks, the state government of Hesse is currently presenting a number of key projects. Members of the state cabinet will be visiting projects in the areas of security, education, and science until mid-December. The visits began in mid-October with the theme complex in the area of security, followed by education. The program is currently focusing on the area of science. In order to emphasize the special significance of the fields of science and research for Hesse, the ministers are visiting selected universities and research institutes during the theme weeks in order to gather information about their activities. One of the stops in this round of visits was GSI/FAIR
FAIR will be one of the largest and most complex accelerator facilities in the world. The centerpiece of the facility is a ring accelerator with a circumference of 1,100 meters. Engineers and scientists are working in international partnership to advance new technological developments in a number of areas, such as information technology and superconductor technology. Around 3,000 scientists from all over the world will be able to conduct top-level research at FAIR. Their outstanding experiments will generate new fundamental insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe. Alongside Germany, the partner countries of FAIR GmbH are Finland, France, India, Poland, Romania, Russia, Sweden, and Slovenia. The United Kingdom is an associated partner.
Press release of the Hessian Ministy of Education (in German)
]]>The opening speeches were given by Professor Gerhard Kraft, the initiator of cancer therapy with ion beams and founder of the biophysics research department at GSI, and Professor Karlheinz Langanke, the Scientific Managing Director of GSI. Previously, Dr. Dieter Schardt, Chairman of the Assiciation, welcomed the participants. The keynote lecture was given by Professor Rita Engenhart-Cabillic of the Clinic for Radiotherapy and Radiation Oncology, University Clinic Giessen and Marburg.
For her master’s thesis at the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München (advisor: Professor Katia Parodi), Bianca Berndt analyzed the CT data of patients undergoing proton therapy. In the framework of her master’s thesis concerning “DECT Based Tissue Segmentation as Input to Monte Carlo Simulations for Proton Treatment Verification Using PET Imaging,” she used a special CT technique to analyze both the density and the elemental composition of tissue. The purpose of her work is to improve the accuracy of dosage verification in the patient by means of PET.
In her dissertation at TU Darmstadt (advisor: Professor Marco Durante), Dr. Marta Rovituso carried out studies regarding the possible use of helium ion beams in tumor therapy. In tumor therapy, 4He ion beams could represent a good extension of the treatment options between proton and carbon ions. With her dissertation “Fragmentation and Lateral Scattering of 120 and 200 MeV/u 4He Ions on Water Targets,” Marta Rovituso studied the physical properties of 4He ion beams in the therapeutically relevant range of 120 to 200 MeV/u. This filled the gap in the experimental measurements available in this energy range while also providing precise data for the benchmarking of Monte Carlo simulations.
In her dissertation at Heidelberg University (advisor: Professor Christian Karger), Dr. Maria Saager dealt with “Determining the Relative Biological Effectiveness of Carbon Ions in the Rat Spinal Cord” and contributed to a better understanding of the mode of action of heavy-ion therapy in normal tissue of the central nervous system (CNS) relative to photon irradiation. In carbon therapy, the central nervous system is one of the most critical organs at risk. For the safety of patients, it is crucially important to obtain a precise calculation of relative biological effectiveness (RBE) on basis of the local effect model. Dr. Saager’s study established an extensive data pool that can be used to validate the RBE models used in planning irradiation treatments. In addition, she studied the mitigating effect of an ACE inhibitor for protecting healthy CNS tissue.
The award comes with a purse of 750 euros for the master’s thesis and 1,500 euros each for the dissertations. The Christoph Schmelzer Award, which is being presented this year for the 18th time, is named after the co-founder and first Scientific Managing Director of GSI. During the 1990s at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH, heavy-ion therapy was developed to a level appropriate for clinical use. GSI has traditionally been a fitting venue for the annual award ceremony.
In conjunction with the research project “Tumor Therapy with Heavy Ions” at GSI, the Association for the Promotion of Tumor Therapy promotes activities aimed at developing the therapeutic system further in order to improve the treatment of tumors and make that treatment available for general patient care. From 1997 to 2008, over 400 patients with tumors, generally head tumors, were treated with ion beams at GSI’s accelerator facility as part of a pilot project. The cure rates of this method are in some instances over 90 percent, and the side effects are very minor. Since 2009, patients have routinely been treated with heavy ions at the Heidelberg Ion-Beam Therapy Center (HIT). On November 11, 2015, a second large treatment center began operating in Germany with the opening of the Marburg Ion-Beam Therapy Center, which also uses 12C ions and protons.
]]>The awards were presented in recognition of the success and the importance of the long-standing scientific cooperation between the Institute of Modern Physics (IMP) in Lanzhou, China, and GSI. IMP vice-director Hongwei Zhao handed over the award certificate during the visits of the awardees in China in July and August 2016.
The collaboration between CAS and GSI has a long tradition and covers accelerator physics and research fields such as atomic, nuclear, and astrophysics as well as materials science. Both institutions operate heavy-ion accelerator facilities and plan the next-generation accelerators, FAIR in Darmstadt and HIAF in Huizhou.
]]>What happens when a chemical bond is broken? How do individual atoms join to form a molecule, and disengage from each other again? Understanding the dynamics of chemical processes is often described as the “Holy Grail” of physical chemistry; once you understand what is happening, you are in a position to influence such bonds and perhaps even design completely new materials.
Observing such chemical processes with great precision calls for high-speed cameras with an extremely high temporal and spatial resolution, such as the X-ray free electron laser European XFEL, which is currently being constructed in the Hamburg metropolitan region and will allow scientists to look at individual molecules and atoms. However, a laser that emits short-wave ultraviolet light is all that is needed to observe chemical bonds being broken in small molecules – that and a coincidence detector of the type developed for synchrotron and X-ray laser experiments.
In their experiments, the Helmholtz scientists fired short pulses of high-intensity XUV light at iodomethane molecules (CH3I), also called methyl iodide, consisting of an iodine atom and a methyl group (CH3). The light broke the bond between the iodine and the methyl group, and the fragments of the molecule were captured and measured in a spectrometer. This allowed the rearrangement of the electrons in the excited molecule to be deduced, and hence the subsequent induced chemical processes.
The experiments were based on a tabletop laser system for light in the so-called extreme ultraviolet range (XUV). The laser, which was developed at the Helmholtz Institute Jena, produces very short, high-intensity pulses of XUV by first strongly amplifying a pulse of infrared radiation in an optical fibre, and subsequently generating odd multiples of the original laser frequency. For these experiments, one of these so-called higher harmonic frequencies, with a wavelength of about 18 nanometres, was extracted using special optical devices and used for the experiment.
“The XUV laser system produces flashes of light consisting of one million photons, which only last 30 femtoseconds, with a pulse frequency of up to 100 kilohertz,” explains Professor Jens Limpert. Jan Rothhardt, who helped to develop the laser, adds: “The combination of a high photon flux and very high repetition rate in combination with very high stability qualifies this system, in principle, to carry out user experiments in chemical dynamics.”
Using higher harmonics to produce the pulses offers an additional built-in advantage: a chemical reaction can be triggered by a pulse of light produced by the laser, and then examined after a fixed time using a pulse of XUV radiation produced by the same laser. “The delay between the first and the second pulse can be adjusted with a high degree of precision,” says Rothhardt. This “pump and probe” technique was not yet used in the first series of experiments; but it has already been tested and is to be included in follow-up experiments.
A second important component of the experiments was a complex sample and detector chamber, developed for use in free electron lasers (FELs), which had already been deployed in DESY’s FLASH and PETRA III accelerators. In this CAMP experimental chamber, operated at FLASH by the group of Daniel Rolles, the sample is fired into the beam of light as a thin jet travelling at supersonic speeds. The interaction with the XUV radiation destroys the molecules, and the properties of the fragments that fly away are measured with great precision in a built-in spectrometer. Coincidence measurements allow the captured fragments to be assigned to their original molecules, and the precise characterisation of the building blocks means that the breaking of the bond can be deciphered across time. “By bringing together the experimental and scientific possibilities from Jena and Hamburg, we are opening up new opportunities for observing chemical dynamics,” says DESY scientist Professor Jochen Küpper, who instigated the experiments and who is also a member of the Center for Free-Electron Laser Science and the Hamburg Centre for Ultrafast Imaging at the University of Hamburg. DESY scientist Tim Laarmann adds: “In the next step, we will use the apparatus to conduct pump and probe experiments. In principle, this set-up should in fact allow us to achieve much higher temporal resolutions of less than one femtosecond, making it possible to observe extremely fast movements of electrons in complex molecules.”
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Please understand that because of the limited edition you can only request a maximum of three calendars (while supplies last) per order.
]]>Dr. Ingo Tews’ work on his doctoral dissertation was motivated by his desire to achieve a better understanding of neutron stars and neutron-rich nuclides. The matter in neutron stars is very strongly compressed. Because of these extreme conditions, systematic calculations of the equation of state of neutron-rich matter are required. Dr. Tews successfully conducted the first-ever quantum Monte Carlo simulations based on the latest effective field theories of the strong interaction. His results are regarded as a milestone by researchers in this field.
“I’m delighted with this gratifying recognition, and I feel honored to receive the FAIR-GSI doctoral candidate award for my work. Strongly interacting systems under extreme conditions are an exciting field of research. Through my findings I can make a contribution to it,” said Tews, who initially studied physics at the Technische Universität Darmstadt and subsequently wrote his doctoral dissertation there under supervision of professor Achim Schwenk. Dr. Tews is currently carrying out research at the renowned Institute for Nuclear Theory in Seattle in the USA.
“These findings are especially fascinating because the physics of neutron-rich nuclei and neutron stars is one of the main research areas of the new FAIR accelerator facility,” said Professor Karlheinz Langanke, the Scientific Managing Director of GSI. “The outstanding research opportunities at the GSI accelerator facility and the development of FAIR are attracting many young scientists from all over the world to GSI. Through their innovative ideas, they are making important contributions to the development of the new accelerators and detectors.”
Dr. Ulrich von Hülsen, a member of the Management Board of Pfeiffer Vacuum GmbH, congratulated the award winner for his commitment to scientific research. “Scientific projects are highly regarded at Pfeiffer Vacuum,” he said. “Whenever we can support research work by supplying our company’s vacuum know-how, we are happy to help, with commitment and reliability.”
Pfeiffer Vacuum and GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung have worked together as partners for many years. Vacuum solutions from Pfeiffer Vacuum have been successfully utilized at the Centre for decades.
The FAIR-GSI doctoral candidate award is presented annually for the year’s best doctoral dissertation. To be eligible to compete, candidates must have received a doctoral degree in the previous year and must have received support either within the strategic partnerships between GSI and the universities in Darmstadt, Frankfurt, Gießen, Heidelberg, Jena, and Mainz or directly through the research and development program. Today more than 300 doctoral candidates are working on their doctoral dissertations at GSI and FAIR within the Helmholtz Graduate School for Hadron and Ion Research (HGS-HIRe).
]]>Die Ausstellung spannt einen zeitlichen Bogen, der Historie, Gegenwart und Zukunft verbindet, und rückt dabei Innovationen von Frauen in den Mittelpunkt. Hierbei werden aus dem historischen Blickwinkel Erfindungen und Patentanmeldungen von Frauen beleuchtet. Bei einigen dieser Erfindungen wird auch der Bezug zur Gegenwart aufgezeigt. Nach dem Besuch der Ausstellung bleiben primär die Erfindungen in den Köpfen der Zuschauerinnen hängen, mit dem zusätzlichen Wissen: "Das wurde von einer Frau erfunden."
Des Weiteren findet am Mittwoch, dem 9. November 2016, um 14 Uhr der Vortrag "Löcher, Drähte und Patente – Entwicklungen aus der Ionenstrahl-Nanotechnologie" von Christina Trautmann und Maria Eugenia Toimil-Molares, beide GSI, im Rahmen der Vortragsreihe "Wissenschaft für Alle" statt. In dem Vortrag werden Erfindungen vorgestellt, die aus dem Bereich der Materialforschung bei GSI und FAIR entstanden sind. Auch im Anschluss an die Vortragsveranstaltung ist eine Besichtigung der Ausstellung möglich.
Organisiert wird die Ausstellung durch das Gleichstellungsgremium von FAIR und GSI sowie die Gruppe für Technologietransfer, unterstützt durch die Blumbach, Zinngrebe Patent-und Rechtsanwälte GbR sowie die TransMIT Gesellschaft für Technologietransfer mbH.
"Patente Frauen"
Ausstellung des Netzwerks Frauen.Innovation.Technik der Hochschule Furtwangen
im KBW-Foyer auf dem FAIR/GSI-Campus, Planckstraße 1, 64291 Darmstadt
Öffnungszeiten: 1.–4. November 2016, 15–17 Uhr
Bitte halten Sie für den Einlass ein Ausweisdokument bereit.
Beginning in January 2017, the EU will grant almost €4 million to AVA for a period of four years, says the AVA network’s spokesperson, Carsten Welsch from the University of Liverpool. The funds will be used to train young scientists for low-energy antiproton physics at CERN and at the new accelerator center FAIR, which is currently being built at GSI.
At GSI, which will receive around €500,000 or around 13 percent of the total amount, the Nuclear Physics department and experts from the Beam Instrumentation department will play a leading role in the network. For one thing, they will develop ion trap technologies that are also suited for antiprotons. In addition, they will forge ahead with the development of cryogenic current comparators. Major contributions to this project will also be made by the Institute of Solid State Physics at Jena University and the Helmholtz Institute Jena, which is an outstation of GSI.
These systems will be used at the existing CRYRING and be installed at FAIR, where they will serve as the standard technology for the diagnosis of beam currents.
The CRYRING is one of Sweden’s contributions to FAIR and was transported from Stockholm to GSI in 2013. It was built in cooperation with GSI and initially used for experiments and machine tests at the existing GSI accelerator facility. In the long run, plans call for it to be used for carrying out nuclear physics research using slow antiprotons at FAIR.
Antiprotons, which are held in storage rings or traps at low energies, are important for the study of essential questions, such as the fundamental interactions or the static structure of antiproton atoms, as well as for gravity experiments.
GSI/FAIR is familiar territory for Carsten Welsch, the spokesperson of the EU-funded AVA network. As part of the Helmholtz support program for top young scientists, Welsch headed a Young Investigators Group at GSI and Heidelberg University from 2007 to 2012. In this position, Welsch had already actively worked within networks. His former Helmholtz Young Investigators Group has evolved into the Quantum Systems and Advanced Accelerator Research (QUASAR) team, a Europe-wide research group that focuses on the development and experimental use of particle accelerators and radiation sources. One of the team’s aims is to firmly establish accelerator physics as a subject of research and university instruction on the international level.
The AVA project receives funding from the EU’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No. 721559.
Physicist Stefan Diehl, 28, received the prize of €200 and a certificate for his dissertation titled Optimization of the Influence of Longitudinal and Lateral Non-Uniformity on the Performance of an Electromagnetic Calorimeter. His doctoral advisors were Professor Kai-Thomas Brinkmann and Dr. Rainer Novotny from the Justus Liebig University in Giessen.
The PANDA Collaboration has awarded the PhD Prize once per year since 2013 in order to honor the best dissertation written in connection with the PANDA Experiment. PANDA will be one of the key experiments of the future accelerator center FAIR. The experiment focuses on antimatter research as well as on various topics related to the weak and the strong force, exotic states of matter, and the structure of hadrons. More than 500 scientists from 17 countries currently work in the PANDA Collaboration. In his dissertation, Dr. Stefan Diehl studied the electromagnetic calorimeter (EMC) that forms one of the main components of the PANDA detector, which is being built at the FAIR accelerator facility in order to carry out measurements of photons and electrons.
Candidates for the PhD Prize are nominated by their doctoral advisors. In addition to being directly related to the PANDA Experiment, the nominees’ doctoral degrees must have received a rating of “very good” or better. Up to three candidates are shortlisted for the award and can present their dissertations at the PANDA Collaboration meeting. The winner is chosen by a committee that is appointed for this task by the Collaboration. The Collaboration awards the PhD Prize to specifically honor students’ contributions to the PANDA project.
The Nobel laureates David Thouless, Duncan Haldane and Michael Kosterlitz accept their award for their theoretical work on the description and prediction of exotic states of matter. Since the formulation of this model, generations of scientists have joined the successful search for these new exotic materials. The Materials Research department at GSI is joining the quest. The scientists use the ion beam provided by the linear accelerator at GSI, called UNILAC to synthesize and investigate these materials on a very small scale.
The topic of investigation focuses on the so called Topological Insulators. These materials are actually insulating, but exhibit electrical conducting on their surface. Since this ability to conduct only occurs within a very thin layer, which is one atom thick, the scattering of electrons is reduced resulting in very low resistive electrical transport. Additionally, the spin of the electrons, amounting to two values - “up” or “down” -, is coupled to the direction of electron motion. Finding a way of manipulating the spin opens new possibilities in information transfer technology.
In the framework of her PhD thesis in the Materials Research department at GSI, Janina Krieg synthesizes nanowires of the Topological Insulator material bismuth-telluride which are as small as 1/10000 of the thickness of a hair. By fabricating tiny electrical contacts, an electrical potential can be applied to a single nanowire. Adding a very strong magnetic field (250000 times that of the earth), the exotic surface states are investigated. This knowledge is a further step on the route towards energy efficient electronics and fast-computing quantum computer applications.
“The future accelerator center FAIR was successfully profiled,” summarized Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of FAIR and GSI. “The FAIR project generated high interest among exhibition visitors thanks to the facility’s complex construction and the interaction between numerous individual trades that will be required for the upcoming building and civil engineering activities.” During talks at the exhibition booth, Blaurock pointed out that this scientific mega-project could be an impressive addition to a construction company’s portfolio: “We were able to convince potential partners by giving them comprehensive information, meaning that we could make important contacts for future business.”
Klaus Ringsleben, Chairman of the FAIR Building Advisory Committee, was also very happy with the feedback given at Expo Real: “We were able to promote the FAIR project and present it to many decision makers and key players in the construction sector,” he said, adding that Expo Real is the flagship event for the whole sector. “Potential contractors were able to gain information about our scientifically and technically extraordinary construction project and about their own possible participation. We certainly made our mark as a fascinating project.”
Expo Real attracts 40,000 visitors every year and is one of the most important European trade fairs for real estate, construction and location marketing. The FAIR project was presented at the booth of the City of Darmstadt, which in turn was part of the metropolitan region Frankfurt/Rhine-Main. Individual face-to-face appointments were complemented by public panel discussions on realizing the FAIR project and on the importance of science and education as locational factors. Scientific Managing Director of GSI, Prof. Karlheinz Langanke, also gave a keynote speech about the FAIR research program. He emphasized the uniqueness of FAIR as a research accelerator of the future.
FAIR will be one of the largest and most complex accelerator facilities in the world. The centerpiece of the facility is a ring accelerator with a circumference of 1,100 meters. Engineers and scientists are working in international partnership to advance new technological developments in a number of areas, – such as information technology and superconductor technology. Around 3,000 scientists from all over the world will be able to conduct top-level research at FAIR. Their outstanding experiments will generate new fundamental insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe. Alongside Germany, FAIR's shareholders are the countries Finland, France, India, Poland, Romania, Russia, Sweden, and Slovenia. The United Kingdom is an associated partner.
]]>We know the energy spectra of most of the 118 elements that have been discovered to date. However, scientists were previously unable to experimentally investigate the elements beyond fermium (transfermium elements), which have more than 100 protons in the nucleus and the same number of electrons in their electron shells. Research is hampered by the fact that the inner structure of these atoms is greatly influenced by the relativistic effects caused by the high speeds at which the electrons orbit atomic nuclei with such high proton numbers and by the interactions between the many electrons. Like the other transfermium elements, nobelium is very hard to investigate experimentally. Nobelium does not occur in nature and can only be produced artificially in very small numbers of atoms. As a result, the element’s properties and inner structure are largely unknown.
An extremely sensitive method, which had been developed by the group of Professor Hartmut Backe und Dr. Werner Lauth at the Institutes of Physics and of Nuclear Physics at Mainz University in the early 1990s, was now used to detect and characterize excited states of nobelium atoms for the first time. “At the GSI accelerator facility, we bombarded thin films of lead with calcium projectiles in order to create the isotope nobelium-254 by fusing the atomic nuclei of the reaction partners. We then used the SHIP separator to isolate the nobelium isotopes, which enabled us to irradiate them with laser light,” writes Professor Michael Block, head of the department Superheavy Elements Physics, GSI, and head of the section Superheavy Elements Physics, HIM, about the experiment. The team determines the energy transitions in the electron shell by varying the energy of the irradiating laser light. If the transition energy is correct, the laser light is absorbed and an electron is removed from the atom, turning it into a positively charged ion. This ion can then be clearly identified on the basis of its radioactive decay. “The experiment unit is so sensitive that only about four atoms need to be created per second for our experiments. The radioactive nobelium atoms exist for only 50 seconds before they decay again,” says Dr. Mustapha Laatiaoui, GSI scientist heading the experiment.
After the researchers had measured the first atomic transition in nobelium-254, they were able to extend their investigations to the even shorter-lived isotope nobelium-252, which can be created at only one fifth the rate of nobelium-254. The measurement of the energy shift of an atomic transition between different isotopes provides information about the size of their respective nuclides.
For the first time the experiments allowed measuring the atomic structure of a transfermium element, e.g., the element nobelium (Z=102) with laser spectroscopy. The extremely high precision with which the energies of the atomic states were measured during the laser experiments provides a basis for further theoretical work and opens up new perspectives for future high-precision experiments for the measurement of the atomic and nuclear properties of the unstable nuclides of super-heavy elements.
The experiments were jointly conducted by scientists from GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, the Helmholtz Institute Mainz, the Technische Universität Darmstadt (Germany), the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (Belgium), the University of Liverpool (UK), and TRIUMF (Vancouver, Canada).
“We are about to make the worldwide unique FAIR particle accelerator facility a reality in Darmstadt,” says Jörg Blaurock, Technical Managing Director of FAIR and GSI. “Many different trades will work together on the upcoming building construction and civil engineering tasks. In this project, we are creating a very sophisticated building complex, where high-tech systems will be used to conduct cutting-edge international research.”
In addition to issuing calls for tender and making other construction-related preparations, FAIR will present the future accelerator center at the internationally renowned real estate trade fair Expo Real in Munich from October 4 to 6. This trade fair offers FAIR an outstanding opportunity to enter into an intense dialogue with representatives of the construction and real estate sectors. At the fair, potential contractors will be able to gain detailed information about the construction project and the opportunities for participating in it. The FAIR project will be presented at the stand that showcases the “science city” Darmstadt as part of the Frankfurt/Rhein-Main metropolitan region.
Calls for tender for FAIR construction
International Trade Fair for Property and Investment, October 4-6, 2016, Munich
FAIR Stand No.: C1 331
FAIR events at the Expo Real (in German): Metropolarena, Stand No.: C1 334
FAIR will be one of the largest and most complex accelerator facilities in the world. The centerpiece of the facility is a ring accelerator with a circumference of 1,100 meters. Engineers and scientists are working in international partnership to advance new technological developments in a number of areas, – such as information technology and superconductor technology. Around 3,000 scientists from all over the world will be able to conduct top-level research at FAIR. Their outstanding experiments will generate new fundamental insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe.
Alongside Germany, FAIR's shareholders are the countries Finland, France, India, Poland, Romania, Russia, Sweden, and Slovenia. The United Kingdom is an associated partner.
Paolo Giubellino succeeds Professor Boris Sharkov, the scientific managing director of FAIR, and Professor Karlheinz Langanke, the interim scientific managing director of GSI. Giubellino’s appointment completes the joint management team of GSI and FAIR. The new scientific managing director will perform his management tasks for GSI as well as FAIR. This is also the case with the administrative managing director Ursula Weyrich (end of 2014) and the technical managing director Jörg Blaurock (beginning of 2016). Both expressed their delight at the appointment of Paolo Giubellino and their future teamwork. To conduct cutting-edge research and to realize the future accelerator facility FAIR in international cooperation will be the aim.
State Secretary Dr. Georg Schütte of the Federal Ministry of Education and Research, the Chairman of the GSI Supervisory Board and the FAIR Council, said: "With Paolo Giubellino we've won an outstanding scientist, who has plenty of experience with international scientific collaborations. His in-depth knowledge of heavy-ion research and his clear vision of forward-looking basic research will play an important role in the further realization of FAIR.“
In addition Professor Otmar D. Wiestler, president of the Helmholtz Association, emphasized the international significance of this appointment: "With the extensive international experience Paolo Giubellino gained at CERN in Switzerland, he has ideal prerequisites to tackle the assignment in Darmstadt. Being able to attract people like Paolo Giubellino to FAIR shows the world-wide appeal of the Helmholtz research. We have chosen the right path with our strategy to pursue a more international course. We will continue it consistently in the future."
Research focus of the 56 year-old Paolo Giubellino is the physics of high-energy heavy ion collisions and the matter produced in them. After studying at Turin University and the University of California in Santa Cruz, he took part in many heavy-ion experiments at the European Organization for Nuclear Research CERN in Switzerland. Since the early 1990s, he has held several senior positions at CERN’s ALICE experiment — one of the four major permanent experiments at the LHC particle accelerator. In 2011 Giubellino was appointed Spokesperson of ALICE at CERN. More than 1,600 scientists from 42 countries are currently members of the ALICE Collaboration. Giubellino has also worked at the Torino section of the Italian National Institute for Nuclear Physics (Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare, INFN) since 1985 and has served as research director since 2006.
GSI is well-known terrain for Paolo Giubellino. This is due partly to GSI’s links to the ALICE experiment, since scientists from GSI play a leading role in the collaboration’s scientific program as well as in the development and construction of measuring instruments for ALICE. Moreover, Giubellino is currently the Chairman of GSI’s General Program Advisory Committee, whose members come from all over the world. This committee advises the GSI management board how the accelerator facility should be used and which experiments proposed by scientists should be conducted.
Paolo Giubellino is married and has a son. In addition to his scientific expertise, he has extensive experience with international collaborations and has often played a key role in the development of bilateral agreements and research programs, such as those from the European Union. He is now eagerly looking forward to his future tasks at GSI and FAIR. “It is a great pleasure and a great responsibility for me,” he says. “FAIR is a new and unique accelerator facility that is being built at GSI. Over 3,000 scientists from all over the world will work at FAIR in the future. It is a fantastic opportunity for a scientist.” The future scientific managing director is thrilled by the research opportunities at FAIR: “We will conduct outstanding experiments here to gain pioneering new insights into the structure of matter and the universe,” he says. “The questions that we hope FAIR will answer are fascinating. For example, how do stars create the chemical elements that are essential for our lives?” FAIR will also be a magnet for young people from all over the world. That will make it possible to train highly qualified young scientists and engineers in Darmstadt within an international environment, he adds.
Giubellino has received numerous awards for his work, which includes more than 300 scientific publications. Among others, he was awarded the 2014 Lise Meitner Prize of the European Physical Society as well as the Enrico Fermi Prize, the highest award bestowed by the Italian Physical Society (2013). In 2012 the Italian President Napolitano awarded him the title of Commendatore della Repubblica Italiana for his scientific achievements.
]]>In the following tour the guests visited the existing GSI facilities as well as the FAIR construction site. Among other things they saw the medical treatment facility that was used to develop a novel method for tumour therapy with carbon ions — an expample for social responsibility within research. Another destination was the high-performance computing centre Green IT Cube, inaugurated this year, that excels by having an especially sustainable construction concept: an energy-efficient water cooling of the computing systems and a space- and cost-saving form of construction. Additionally the waste heat of the computing centre is used to heat a new office building.
CSR stands for Corporate Social Responsibility, an entrepreneurship balancing economic, ecologic and social goals. CSR is a value-based management focussing on fair competition, regard of natural resources, a visible social partnership and a high commitment to the region of living and working. CSR also has a positive impact on the image and thus on the economic situation of a company. With the event series "CSR-Breakfast" the IHK Darmstadt wants to offer its members an opportunity to learn about best practice examples and to encourage exchange about the topic.
Die Vorträge finden im großen gemeinsamen Hörsaal der Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (FAIR) und des GSI Helmholtzzentrums für Schwerionenforschung, Planckstraße 1, 64291 Darmstadt, statt. Der Eintritt ist frei, eine Anmeldung ist nicht erforderlich. Externe Teilnehmer werden gebeten, für den Einlass ein Ausweisdokument bereitzuhalten.
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7 out of 9 FAIR shareholders are European countries, and 3,000 scientists and engineers from all over the world are working since many years to realize FAIR. After short presentations about current and future research and construction activities the politicians visited the FAIR construction site and several research projects such as the GLAD magnet and CRYRING.
]]>During the last beamtime block at GSI, the teams extracted C6+ ions from ESR at 6 MeV/u (corresponding to Bρ ≈ 0.7 Tm) in a microsecond bunch and transported the particles onto the first diagnostic station inside of CRYRING@ESR. The modified transport beam line from ESR to Cave B (where CRYRING is being set up) has been fully operational including the newly built magnetic septum in CRYRING. Furthermore, new beam diagnostics and FAIR-like control hardware and software could be tested with real beam.
CRYRING, formerly in Stockholm, is an immensely successful ion storage ring which has enabled central research contributions in atomic and molecular physics for many years. As Swedish in-kind contribution to FAIR, the ring was delivered to Darmstadt in 2013. Here, the ring has been modernized and adapted to FAIR standards and was placed downstream of ESR, as CRYRING@ESR project. It will allow testing of novel FAIR technologies and enable research on slow highly charged ion (HCI) beams and possibly exotic systems. SPARC along with other FAIR collaborations prepares many new experiments in the domain of atomic and nuclear processes, in material science and possibly even biomolecular physics with slow HCIs.
The successful beam transport from ESR to CRYRING also marks the beginning of its commissioning, byintegrating both rings into one facility. For the year to come all ring installations will be brought into operation, including a local ion source, the electron cooler and necessary ultra-high vacuum conditions. After 2018, CRYRING shall be ready to perform its first experiments with slow HCI beams, when the GSI accelerators will also recommence their operation.
In our brochure "Successful Support for Young Academics – The Helmholtz Young Investigators Groups at GSI" we introduce our Young Investigators Groups an their leaders to you in detail.
Download of the brochure (German and English, PDF, 7,9 MB)
This participation is Australia’s first contribution to the research at FAIR and demonstrates the science program’s global appeal for a world-spanning community of researchers. NUSTAR is the world’s largest research partnership in the field of nuclear physics. With the inclusion of Australia, 39 countries are now involved in the program, whose approximately 850 members work at more than 180 institutes all over the globe. Other than Antarctica, all of the world’s continents are represented in the partnership.
“FAIR will be a magnet for around 3,000 guest researchers in the future and it’s already a coveted partner for international partnerships, as the involvement of ANU shows. The Australian team will find unparalleled research opportunities at the FAIR accelerator center, but will also contribute its unique expertise and increase the NUSTAR project’s discovery potential,”says Karlheinz Langanke, Scientific Managing Director of the GSI Helmholtz Center for Heavy Ion Research in Darmstadt, where currently the FAIR accelerator facility is being built.
The NUSTAR program aims to transport a piece of outer space into the lab and solve the mysteries of the creation of the elements in their “birthplaces”: massive stellar explosions. For example, the NUSTAR scientists want to determine the properties of rare and highly unstable nuclides that contain large numbers of neutrons. Such nuclides are created inside supernovae.
NUSTAR encompasses a very broad research program, involving plans for more than 60 individual work packages. The participation of the Australian team now rounds out this main subject of NUSTAR and marks an important step in the overall planning of research at FAIR. In the next step, the team headed by Professor Andrew Stuchbery will get organized, specify its research objectives, and precisely define the instruments it needs. Stuchbery, who is the Head of the Department of Nuclear Physics at the Australian National University, is already looking forward to the opportunities he’ll find in Darmstadt. “FAIR will be one of the most attractive research facilities in the world,” he says. “It will be very exciting for us to perform experiments there. We can already start preparations to get detailed information about the structure and characteristics of exotic nuclei by g-factor measurments.”
“We’re delighted that our Australian colleagues are participating in FAIR. Their expertise will be of great benefit for the NUSTAR experimental program. It also emphasizes the global significance of the NUSTAR research program at FAIR,” says Björn Jonson from Chalmers University of Technology in Gothenberg, who serves as the spokesperson of the international NUSTAR Collaboration and is a former chairman of the Nobel Prize Committee. Jürgen Gerl, the coordinator of the NUSTAR project at GSI, is also delighted about the new partnership. “The individual experiments supplement one another, so that we can study the structure and forces that hold nuclides together from all angles,” he says. “We are very happy to have the Australian colleagues onboard.”
FAIR will be one of the largest and most complex accelerator facilities in the world. The centrepiece of the facility is a ring accelerator with a circumference of 1,100 metres. Engineers and scientists are working in international partnership to advance new technological developments in a number of areas – such as information technology and superconductor technology. Around 3,000 scientists from all over the world will be able to conduct top-level research at FAIR. Their outstanding experiments will generate new fundamental insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe.
]]>The first bypass segment is a Polish contribution to FAIR. It was manufactured by the company Kriosystem of Wrocław, Poland, based on a design and preliminary developments of the Wrocław University of Science and Technology (Politechnika Wroclawska). The Jagiellonian University (Uniwersytet Jagielloński) in Kraków is also playing a major role as a contractual partner of FAIR.
As Peter Spiller, a project area manager at GSI responsible, among other things, for the construction of the ring accelerator SIS100, explains: “The bypass ensures that the cold temperature can be maintained throughout the whole system.” The challenge faced by the cryotechnology here is that the powerful magnets of SIS100 that guide the particles, keep them on their circular path, and focus them must be extremely cold. However, other accelerator components that are operated at room temperature are connected up right next to the magnets, such as high-frequency systems, injection systems, or extraction systems. For these warm components, the system therefore needs a bridging mechanism that can act as a sort of Thermos bottle and maintain the extremely cold temperatures in the ring system at these spots too—a bypass.
There are six segments in the accelerator ring that must be bridged with bypasses, says Thomas Eisel, the work package manager responsible for the local cryogenics. The bypasses transport both liquid helium as a cryogenic agent and an electrical current of several thousand amperes to the magnets. For the synchrotron SIS100 of FAIR, the superconducting magnets are needed not only to guide the beam but also to cool down the vacuum chambers in the magnets to close to absolute zero. The residual gases in the beam pipe then adhere to the extremely cold chamber surface, so that an extremely low residual gas pressure is generated in the beam pipe. The magnet chamber thus serves as a super vacuum pump. An extremely good vacuum is indispensable for generating heavy ion beams with high intensities, one of the core jobs of FAIR.
But superconductivity is only achieved when the magnet coils are cooled with liquid helium to the extremely low temperature of 4.5 Kelvin (-268.6 °C). That is the temperature norm for the whole cryomagnetic system of SIS100.
The approximately seven-meter-long segment of the bypass that has now been delivered is currently being kept in the test facility of GSI and FAIR, where it will be closely examined beginning now: It will be cooled down to -268.6° C and then tested to ensure it can withstand a number of different stress conditions. Is everything well insulated, or are there weld seams that aren’t sealed? Does any helium escape? Does the superconductivity break down? Is damage incurred because of the high electrical current? If all the tests are passed, the bypass segment will be placed in temporary storage. In the coming months, more components are expected to follow.
]]>At the beginning of the visit the members of the Marketing Committee, consisting among others of economic experts and marketing professionals, had the opportunity to find out about heavy ion research in general and current developments at GSI and FAIR. Various aspects of marketing in Darmstadt were covered afterwards during the meeting of the Marketing Committee, to whom Ursula Weyrich belongs.
]]>Every year the Summer Student Program offers the participants a unique insight into the research at a particle accelerator. Every summer student gets the chance to work on his own scientific or technical project within the current GSI and FAIR experiments. The topics range from accelerator science to tumor therapy and astrophysics. In public lectures, which are part of the program, the summer students learn about GSI and FAIR research and scientific results.
For many of the students, who come mainly from European and Asian countries, the Summer Student Program is the first step to a masters or doctorates thesis at GSI. The Summer Student Program, which takes place for the 36th time, is organized by the graduate school HGS-HIRe. Apart from the scientific program there are also social events like barbecue parties, football competition or exploring the region.
The public lectures are in English and are open to everyone. Lecture Program
Together with about 50 hikers she was welcomed by the management board, represented by Technical Managing Director Jörg Blaurock. He explained the current state of planning for the FAIR project. Press officer Ingo Peter gave an insight into the research activities and the unique experimental opportunities at the future accelerator facility FAIR.
]]>The tumor therapy with ion beams is a particularly effective and gentle method. Ion beams penetrate the body and unfold their maximal effect in the tumor tissue, where they are stopped. They can be aimed at the tumor tissue point-by-point with millimeter accuracy using the raster scan method developed by GSI, so that the surrounding healthy tissues are spared. Up to 40,000 raster points in a three-dimensional space can be precisely targeted.
The publication describes the computer programming for treatment planning, which is used for the application of the raster scan method. "The raster scan method for carbon ions was an absolute novelty in radiation therapy back then, and the same is true for the necessary treatment planning. The software is a standard in this field until today," says Dr. Michael Krämer, scientist in the GSI biophysics department and the first author of the publication.
The GSI treatment planning created the basis for radiation therapy adapted to the shape of the tumor by using ion beams with variable intensity and energy and high spatial resolution. "It was innovative to integrate physical and radiobiological modeling, as well as three-dimensional optimization, in the software, and to take into account the relative biological effectiveness of the ions at the same time. This technique or comparable ones are in use in all new facilities for therapy with proton or ion beams today," explains Krämer. The publication was quoted several hundred times until now, representing a measure for its scientific impact. The software TRiP (Treatment planning for particles) is still in use today, not only for carbon ions but also for other particles such as protons, and helium and oxygen ions. Additionally it is used for the treatment planning of of tumors in the lung or liver, which can move during treatment due to breathing ( so-called 4D radiation therapy).
The field of 4D radiation therapy shows a large development potential for future innovative treatment techniques. Furthermore, it is planned to expand the treatment planning software to be used for risk assessment of the radiation hazards in outer space, for example in space flight missions. In the future the research on these topics shall be deepened in the biophysical research both at GSI and also at the planned international accelerator FAIR.
An article on the likewise relevant radiobiological aspects of the tumor therapy with ion beams was published in the same issue of the journal in the year 2000. The two subjects were published separately, although scientifically they belong together. The goal already then: as a first publication the paper about treatment planning aimed to serve as a reference for future research.
The international journal "Physics in Medicine and Biology" issued by IOP Publishing has been published since 1956. It covers publications on physics in relation to medicine and biology, among them e.g. radiation therapy, biomedical imaging, and radiation protection. The editorial office and the international editorial board of the journal selected the publication out of the total number of more than 10,000 publications.
Download of "target" – Issue 14, July 2016 (German, PDF, 4.6 MB)
Following the FAIR Council’s decision in late September 2015 on the overall scope of the FAIR facility, the management team in Darmstadt was able to begin intensive work on defining the orientation and framework conditions of the FAIR project. The result is a new overall structure that merges the GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research and FAIR GmbH at organisational level. An important part of this process is establishing a specific project structure for realising the FAIR facility that integrates the engineering and building work, the development and construction of the accelerator, and the scientific experiments themselves. The research objectives were also more precisely defined and ranked.
The management team presented the research programme for the coming years at the Darmstadt site. This was met with great approval by the FAIR Council and the GSI supervisory board. The programme represents a major step forward with regard to the future research at FAIR and offers excellent research opportunities in the period until FAIR goes into operation. For this purpose scientists make use of the existing GSI accelerators, which have undergone significant improvements for their future use as pre-accelerators for FAIR and will receive further technical upgrades. Scientists also already have access to the first measuring devices made especially for FAIR: these detectors are high-tech developments that form the basis for globally unique experiments. The promise of exciting new research possibilities is already enabling researchers to generate enthusiasm for FAIR among junior scientists.
FAIR will be one of the largest and most complex accelerator facilities in the world. The centrepiece of the facility is a ring accelerator with a circumference of 1,100 metres. Engineers and scientists are working in international partnership to advance new technological developments in a number of areas – such as information technology and superconductor technology. Around 3,000 scientists from all over the world will be able to conduct top-level research at FAIR. Their outstanding experiments will generate new fundamental insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe.
Alongside Germany, FAIR’s shareholders are the countries Finland, France, India, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovenia and Sweden. The United Kingdom is an associated partner.
]]>A central subject there was the chemistry of the recently officially recognized element 113 which, according to IUPAC, was discovered in Japan and has recently been proposed to be given the name "Nihonium". Professor Hinde, as a member of a collaboration project managed by the Superheavy Elements Chemistry (SHE Chemistry) Department, was a guest for one week at the TASCA recoil separator. There, 40 scientists and engineers from ten research centers are collaborating. The objective of the three-week experiment was to study the chemical characteristics of the element. Another main subject of the visit was planning of the next joint experiments of the two research groups, to be carried out at the ANU accelerator in Australia. A very close partner is also the Institute for Nuclear Chemistry of Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, which also cooperates within HIM. After the visit to the Rhine-Main region, he attended a symposium in Sweden on superheavy elements, then returned to his homeland of Australia.
This visit strengthens the intensive scientific exchanges between the Australian researchers and their colleagues at GSI and HIM. Research collaboration started five years ago, and was intensified from 2012 by Professor Hinde and Christoph Düllmann, professor at the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz and Head of the SHE Chemistry Departments at GSI and HIM. Hinde remembers: "Christoph came in 2012 to a conference in Australia; we met there and soon decided to strengthen our collaboration." As a result of the joint research interests and the complementary research infrastructure at ANU and GSI, an increasingly strong cooperation was developed in recent years between the research groups in Germany and Australia. Research experiments have been conducted at ANU since 2011 and at GSI since 2012. "GSI has excellent tools, which are among the best in the world", says Hinde.
The nomination of David Hinde for the Helmholtz International Fellow Award has also arisen from this cooperation and was initiated by HIM via GSI. Christoph Düllmann, who himself was in Canberra for several months in the past winter and worked together with Hinde and other members of his research group on joint experiments on the tandem-accelerator, points out: "David Hinde is a recognized expert in fundamental high-precision research on low-energy nuclear fusion reactions covering a large area of the chart of the nuclides. Under his direction, unique devices were built for such research, which optimally use the precision beam characteristics of the ANU accelerator."
This is a complex subject, but it is based on a very simple stimulus which led the now 59-year-old English-born researcher to his career choice: "I love physics, and it should not sound like bragging, but I am good at what I do. I have always wanted to know how things in nature function." The married father of two grown-up children has known Germany for many years, since in the late 1980s he worked for two years at the Hahn-Meitner Institute in Berlin, which is today the Helmholtz Center Berlin (HZB). And how did he get to know the GSI? Get to know does not appear to be the right word because Hinde says simply: "Everybody knows the GSI. It is famous around the world."
Hinde still remembers with pleasure one key moment: During a conference in 1996, Professor Peter Armbruster reported about the discovery at GSI of element 112 (Copernicium) – and described the long alpha-particle decay chain from 112 as “a poem of physics”. Hinde has never forgotten those words: "I found this very inspiring, this passion and poetry. For me this was a strong motivator for my subsequent work."
]]>Today the Minister of Science Konrad Wolf, the president of the Helmholtz Association Otmar Wiestler, the vice president for research of the Johannes Gutenberg University Wolfgang Hofmeister and the Scientific Director of GSI Karlheinz Langanke visited the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM) and the research building "Structure, Symmetry and Stability of Matter and Antimatter" which are located on the university's campus close to the institutes for nuclear physics, physics and nuclear chemistry.
Seven years ago the first Helmholtz Institute in Germany, the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM), was founded. Since then the cooperation between the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt and the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz is well-established. Approximately 80 scientists currently work on research concerning structure, symmetry and stability of matter and antimatter.
For science minister Konrad Wolf the HIM has a pioneering role in Germany, and thus a special significance. "Our HIM was the first Helmholtz Institute ever formed. At that time the idea aimed at using the scientific assets of the university for the Helmholtz Association and simultaneously provide the universities in their strategic areas of profile with recognicion and support of the federal government—for the benefit of universities and Helmholtz Association."
The new research building is supported equally with funds of approximately 29 million Euro by the federal and the federal state government.
The computing in the Green IT Cube started directly after the move. Scientific data gained in the HADES and ALICE experiments are since then analysed. Also the theory division now uses the new computing centre for calculations.
In autumn additional servers will be moved into the Green IT Cube in a next step. To deactivate old components in other computing centres and switch to new high-performance hardware is part of the plan. This will greatly improve the energy efficiency of GSI.
The second is our basic unit for the measurement of time. In today’s conventional atomic clocks, the time a second is tied to the oscillation period of electrons in the atomic shell of the element cesium (Cs). The best atomic clock currently in use boasts a relative precision of almost 10-18. „Even greater levels of accuracy could be achieved with the help of a so-called nuclear clock, based on oscillations in the atomic nucleus itself rather than oscillations in the electron shells surrounding the nucleus“, said Thirolf. „Furthermore, as atomic nuclei are 100,000 times smaller than whole atoms, such a clock would be much less susceptible to perturbation by external influences.“
However, of the more than 3,300 known types of atomic nuclei, only one potentially offers a suitable basis for a nuclear clock, i.e., the nucleus of the thorium isotope with atomic mass 229 (Thorium-229), which, however, does not occur naturally. For over 40 years physicists have suspected this nucleus to exhibit an excited state with energy only very slightly above that of its ground state. The resulting nuclear isomer, Th-229m, possesses the lowest excitation state in any known atomic nucleus. Furthermore, Th-229m is expected to show a rather long half-life from between minutes to several hours. It should thus be possible to measure with extremely high precision the frequency of the radiation emitted when the excited nuclear state falls back to the ground state.
Direct detection of the thorium isomer Th-229m has never before been achieved. „Up until now, the evidence for its existence has been purely indirect,“ said Thirolf. In a complex experiment, the researchers involved have now succeeded in detecting the elusive nuclear transition. They made use of uranium-233 as a source of Th-229m, which is produced in the radioactive alpha decay of uranium-233. In an experimental tour-de-force, the scientists isolated the isomer as an ion beam. „The uranium-233 was chemically cleaned at the Institute of Nuclear Chemistry at Mainz University, before experts from the Mainz-based and Darmstadt research teams separated it in the form of an ultra-pure thin layer on a titanium-coated silicon wafer from the semiconductor industry. This uranium-233 source was then brought to Munich, where it was mounted inside the experimental apparatus at LMU to produce the Th-229m for examination,“ explained Professor Christoph Düllmann, head of the work groups at Mainz und Darmstadt.
„Through a number of intermediate steps, the Th-229m was finally isolated as an ion beam. Using a microchannel plate detector, we were then able to measure the decay of the excited isomer back to the ground state of Th-229 as a clear and unambiguous signal. This constitutes direct proof that the excited state really exists,“ said Thirolf. „This breakthrough is a decisive step toward the realization of a working nuclear clock,“ emphasized the LMU physicist. „Our efforts to reach this goal in the framework of the European Research Network nuClock will now be redoubled. The next step is to characterize the properties of the nuclear transition more precisely, i.e., its half-life and, in particular, the energy difference between the two states. These data will allow laser physicists to set to work on a laser that can be tuned to the transition frequency, which is an important prerequisite for an optical control of the transition.“ Professor Thomas Stöhlker, research director at the GSI Helmholtz Center for Heavy Ion Research in Darmstadt, added: „These new findings are very valuable for our experiments with Th-229m planned at the GSI/FAIR storage ring, particularly those concerning the determination of the energy of the nuclear transition.“
Publication in the journal Nature
]]>The Girls’Day started with a guided tour through the facility for the participants that raised many questions: Why can’t the particles in the accelerator reach the speed of light? Do results differ when particles hit each other with 90% or 99% of the speed of light? And from which elements was Darmstadtium produced?
Afterwards the girls were divided into small groups and explored the workshops, technology laboratories and scientific departments. The girls from grades five to nine were able to build small detectors, work with metals on milling and turning machines, or use a 3D printer. Highlight was self-made ice cream produced with liquid nitrogen.
In the large group the participants presented their results and raised a cheer. Also for GSI and FAIR the Girls’Day was a great success, as one of the girls was already certain: “I definitely want to study astrophysics. Or something else with physics.”
]]>The now tested dipole will be mounted into the beam transport that directs the beam coming from the existing GSI ring accelerator to an experiment at FAIR. Until its installation it is planned to use the magnet for calibration of measurement facilities for further accelerator components.
The dipole magnet was drafted and designed by GSI. On the basis of these technical specifications, the production drawings were created and the components were manufactured by the Efremov Institute in St. Petersburg. The appendant vacuum pipe was built by the Budker Institute for Nuclear Physics in Novosibirsk, Russia, co-operating with the Efremov Institute for this order. It is the first of 51 magnets in total to be manufactured by the Efremov Institute for FAIR in the coming years. They are based on the same principle, but have different deflection angles and magnetic field strengths. The 51 magnets and vacuum chambers are a Russian in-kind contribution to FAIR.
Approximately 365 magnets of different designs are needed for the FAIR beam transport in total. With just a few exceptions the orders for the construction of these components have already been placed.
]]>In his PhD Doering worked on the development of a micro vertex detector (MVD) for the Compressed Baryonic Matter Experiment (CBM) in the team of Professor Joachim Stroth. He tested and evaluated CMOS sensors for the MVD, produced with new technologies, with particular emphasis on their radiation hardness which would qualify them to be applied for CBM. He showed that high-resistive epitaxial layers constitute an important step forward in tolerance to non-ionising radiation, and that the combination of such material with a new CMOS process is a most promising way to fulfil the CBM requirements for monolithic active pixel sensors (MAPS). His work has high impact for the future MAPS developments in general and for the CBM project in particular.
Candidates for the award are nominated by their advisors. The selection is carried out by a committee appointed by the CBM collaboration. The criteria for the selection are originality and quality of the scientific work, scientific value, impact of the results on the field of research in general and on CBM in particular, as well as the presentation of the work in the dissertation. The award was granted for the first time this year and will in future be annually awarded to the best PhD thesis within the CBM experiment. The CBM collaboration especially wants to honour the contributions of students to the CBM project with the award.
]]>In ring accelerators septum magnets are used to inject or extract the beam into or from the accelerator. This requires strong magnetic fields to force the beam onto a curved trajectory. At the same time the magnetic field must not disturb the circulating beam in the ring. Therefore a magnet with two regions divided by a thin wall (septum) is necessary, which induces a strong magnetic field on one side of the wall and a vanishing magnetic field on the other side.
Common electromagnets use a coil for the generation and a rectangular iron yoke for the forming of the magnetic field. In septum magnets the yoke is open on one side (c-shape) to reduce the field to zero on that side. Sugita's idea is based on another type of magnet: So-called cosine-theta magnets are mainly built as superconducting magnets with high magnetic-field strength. The novel concept is to equip the cosine-theta magnet with an iron yoke (in this case a round one), which is truncated on one side to reduce the field to zero. This enables the use of a cosine-theta magnet as a septum magnet.
For Sugita, who works in GSI's "SIS100/SIS18" department and comes from Japan, this work has special personal meaning. "I worked on this topic five years ago, during the time of the catastrophic earthquake in Japan. I worked very hard, because this was almost all I could do here. I was deeply impressed by my colleagues at GSI who organized a fund-raiser and supported a special programme for Japanese graduate students who could not complete their studies at Japanese accelerator facilities. Such activities at GSI truly encouraged me. I hope my patented invention will contribute to GSI and the international accelerator community."
Sugita's invention could lead to septum magnets with magnetic-field strengths of more than two Tesla, which is the limit of the conventional design. By introducing a superconducting coil, even up to eight Tesla are achieved in electromagnetic simulations. Quadrupole or higher multipole septum magnets could also be realised with the design. This new septum type might be used for accelerators in medicine or in future large-scale facilities for research such as FAIR or the Future Circular Collider (FCC) planned at CERN.
]]>In the memorandum FAIR and CINVESTAV declare their intention to further the exchange of scientists between both institutions and to implement joint research and development activities relating to the research facilities planned at FAIR. Thus, technical innovations and socio-economic developments on the basis of equality and for joint benefit are to be promoted beyond research.
The Chair of the FAIR Council, State Secretary Dr. Georg Schütte from the German Federal Ministry for Education and Research, welcomes the participation of CINVESTAV in the science programmes of FAIR: „This is an important step to further promote scientific-technological cooperation between Mexico and Germany, opening the perspective for joint forefront research and technological development at the international FAIR facility in Darmstadt.”
"The scientific exchange and the cooperation with international partners within large promising research projects like FAIR are important elements of the Mexican science policy," said Dr. José Mustre de León, General Director of CINVESTAV. "We look forward to an active dialogue between the Mexican and the FAIR scientists that will be beneficial for both parties. Especially junior scientists will profit from the planned cooperation in research and technology as well as from the cultural exchange."
"We are glad that with CINVESTAV a very renowned science institution from Mexico will collaborate with FAIR," said Professor Boris Sharkov, Scientific Managing Director of FAIR. "Research needs discourse, which furthers new ideas and innovations. The cooperation with our Mexican colleagues will set new impulses for FAIR."
Mexico and Germany have agreed on the realisation of so-called "Nation Years" for 2016/17 to further the knowledge about culture, economy, science and technology in the other country. The scientific cooperation between Germany and Mexico can look back on a long-standing tradition. Already in 1974 a basic agreement on technical and scientific cooperation between the Federal Republic of Germany and the Mexican government had been signed.
FAIR will be one of the largest and most complex accelerator facilities in the world. The existing GSI accelerator facility will be part of FAIR and serve as first acceleration stage. For FAIR engineers and scientists will expedite technological developments in many areas in international cooperation, for example in computer science or in superconductivity techniques. Approximately 3,000 scientists from all over the world will conduct cutting-edge research at FAIR. In unique experiments they will gain new basic insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe.
]]>The GSI and in future the FAIR accelerators get billions of charged atomic nuclei, so called ions, up to high speed. In the collision of the beam with a material sample, called a target, a beam of new nuclei not existent on Earth is produced. They are the goal of the researchers, as they could e.g. give information about the element synthesis in stars. But the desired objects are unstable and decay after a short time – so you better hurry up with your studies.
And also another problem arises: The desired particles move with different speeds in all directions in reference to an ideal particle. They have, in the language of the scientists, a large momentum spread. "A cooling of the beam i.e. a reduction of the momentum spread is needed to accumulate or to analyze those nuclei. But the established cooling methods like stochastic cooling are only effective if the momentum spread is small to begin with. Otherwise cooling can not be performed for all particles. And for particles, which can be cooled it will take too long and the nuclei have decayed before they are prepared for their experiments", explains Dr. Oleksiy Dolinskyy, head of the FAIR project department "Collector Ring".
To reduce momentum spread the debunchers are necessary. They are positioned in the FAIR Collector Ring (CR) where the new nuclei are cooled. The word debuncher derives from the word bunches. That's what the tighly-packed heaps of ions in the acceleration process are called. Electric fields form the bunches and take care that the positively charged ions don't repel each other, but cuddle closely together. Already during the acceleration very short bunches of 50 nanoseconds duration can be generated, which lead to equally short bunches of new atomic nuclei via the collision with the target. Not a lucky coincidence, but a prerequisite for the now following process of debunching.
So we have two parameters to look at: the momentum spread and a time component. In combination those two span a so called phase space, in which the ions move. To reduce momentum spread, the scientist use a trick: The debunchers rotate the bunch in the phase space transforming a large momentum spread into a bunch with a long duration, and vice versa changing a long (short) bunch to a small momentum spread. This method reduces the momentum spread by a factor of three in the CR,. After that they stretch the beam around the whole ring and generate a continuous or "coasting" beam, and thus prepare the beam for stochastic cooling.
The debuncher operates at a frequency from 1.1 to 1.5 megahertz, and each debuncher is able to deliver a voltage of 40 kilovolts for the bunch rotation, in sum 200 kilovolts. They are a German in-kind contribution for FAIR with GSI being responsible for the delivery. "We worked out the specifications and a conceptual design, and then contracted out the detailed design as well as the production", says Dr. Ulrich Laier from the FAIR project department "Ring RF". "Three companies have been entrusted with the three main components of the first model and will also build the other four debunchers after our acceptance." RI Research Instruments from Bergisch-Gladbach built the cavity, Ampegon PPT GmbH from Dortmund built the amplifier and OCEM Power Electronics from Bologna, Italy, built the power supply.
]]>In the field of relativistic heavy ion collisions Petersen works on new theoretical models of the so-called “little bang”. In heavy ion collisions a quark-gluon plasma with extremely high pressure is generated, leading to an explosive expansion. Inside conditions similar to those of the Big Bang are present. Petersen identified and examined as one of the first, that and how the course of this explosion is influenced by fluctuations in density and temperature due to quantum effects. By comparison of theory and experimental data Petersen developed a oft-quoted hybrid model, that describes the dynamics of the plasma and its viscosity in dependency of the initial state of the quantum fluctuation. With her “event-by-event” method of analysis she delivered new foundations for experimental measurements e.g. at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (Brookhaven, USA) and at the future Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (Darmstadt).
As a recognition and an incentive to pursue their scientific career straight-lined, the Heinz Maier-Leibnitz-Award is given to outstanding young scientists since 1977. Named after the atomic physicist and former DFG president – in whose term of office it was awarded for the first time – the award is not only the most important of its kind for young scientists in Germany. In a poll by the magazine “bild der wissenschaft” it was also voted the third most important scientific award in Germany in total – following the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Award of the DFG and the Zukunftspreis of the Federal President.
The origin of the chemical elements in the universe is one of the unsolved mysteries of natural science. A collaboration of two nuclear astrophysicists of GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung and the Technical University of Darmstadt – Dirk Martin and Almudena Arcones – and two nuclear physicists of the Michigan State University – Witold Nazarewicz and Erik Olsen – discovered that the properties of nuclear interactions have influence on the synthesis of the most heavy elements in our universe.
The heavy elements in our solar system – like gold or uranium – were formed by a complex chain of nuclear reactions and decays, also known as the "rapid neutron capture" process (r-process). This mechanism requires extremely high neutron densities as well as short-lived so-called exotic isotopes which can't be produced in existing particle accelerators as of yet. Current information about these conditions stems solely of theoretical models which rely on extreme extrapolations to areas of the nuclear chart where no experimental data is available. The two favoured astrophysical scenarios for the r-process are catastrophic core-collapse supernova explosions and the merging of neutron stars. In their work the scientists predict the synthesis of the elements in the r-process with different models of nuclear interaction.
In their article published in the scientific journal Physical Review Letters they determine systematic uncertainties of the predicted abundance distributions directly linked to the modelling of masses for realistic astrophysical scenarios.
The results published in the article will be useful in the future to identify regions in the nuclear chart that are crucial for the synthesis of the heavy elements. The two accelerator facilities under construction FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) in Darmstadt and FRIB (Facility for Rare Isotope Beams) in Michigan will be world leaders in this area and conduct important measurements to verify these predictions.
While it is not yet possible to determine whether the gold in jewellery or the dysprosium in the engine of an electric car come from colliding neutron stars or from a supernova, still the scientists are closer to the understanding of their astrophysical origin than ever.
Die Vortragsreihe "Wissenschaft für Alle" richtet sich an alle an aktueller Wissenschaft und Forschung interessierten Personen. In den Vorträgen wird über die Forschung und Entwicklungen an GSI und FAIR berichtet, aber auch über aktuelle Themen aus anderen Wissenschafts- und Technikfeldern.
Ziel der Reihe ist es, die wissenschaftlichen Vorgänge für Laien verständlich aufzubereiten und darzustellen, um so die Forschung einem breiten Publikum zugänglich zu machen. Die Vorträge werden von GSI- und FAIR-Mitarbeitern oder von externen Rednern aus Universitäten und Forschungsinstituten gehalten.
Die Vorträge finden im großen gemeinsamen Hörsaal der Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (FAIR) und des GSI Helmholtzzentrums für Schwerionenforschung, Planckstraße 1, 64291 Darmstadt, statt. Der Eintritt ist frei, eine Anmeldung ist nicht erforderlich. Externe Teilnehmer werden gebeten, für den Einlass ein Ausweisdokument bereitzuhalten.
Dr. José Luis Rodríguez Sánchez received the award for applying the inverse kinematics technique to the long-standing problem of nuclear fission and the possibility, for the first time, to determine the mass, charge and kinetic energy of the two emerging fission fragments, thus yielding new, exciting insights to the fission process and dynamics. He conducted his research with the ALADIN-LAND setup at GSI and the new SOFIA experiment setup.
Additionally two GENCO Membership Awards were granted: Professor Muhsin Harakeh of the Kernfysisch Versneller Instituut and the University of Groningen was appointed member for pioneering work using radioactive beams for elastic and inelastic scattering and studies of giant resonances. Ursula Weyrich, Adminstrative Director of FAIR and GSI, was honoured with a membership for her support of young scientists and the realization of the FAIR project.
]]>Here, GLAD will undergo further extensive testing in order to precisely verify its specifications. Thereafter it will be completely installed and connected to the experimental setup. Its coils will be cooled down to a temperature below minus 268 degrees Celsius. The magnet will be used for experiments at the GSI facility until it is moved to the future FAIR accelerator facility.
“FAIR’s ring accelerator will be composed of many different components that we design, develop, and plan in detail with the help of complex calculations and design studies,” says GSI project area manager Peter Spiller, who is responsible, among other things, for the construction of the ring accelerator at FAIR. “The fact that the delivery of the components has now begun is a real milestone for us. We expect to receive several additional components this year.”
“We’re delighted that the development and production of the bunch compressors has enabled our small Hessian company to make a major contribution to FAIR, a globally significant high-tech project,” says Joachim Scherer, Managing Director of Aurion Anlagentechnik GmbH in Seligenstadt.
FAIR’s ring accelerator will be able to accelerate ions (electrically charged atoms) from any element as well as antiprotons to almost the speed of light. Before particles are accelerated, they first have to be packed into bunches that consist of up to 500 billion ions each. The particles are then channeled to the various experiments. The size of the ion bunches depends on the experiment they are used for. The bunch compressor can generate especially short pulses that are needed for experiments in plasma physics and nuclear astrophysics, for example.
“The bunches have a temporal length of 200 to 300 nanoseconds during acceleration. This is too long for some experiments, which require the large number of ions in a shorter period of time,” says Spiller. “The bunch compressor system shortens the ion bunches to a duration of 30 to 90 nanoseconds. To do this, we use high-frequency electric fields that compress the ion pulse by rotating it in the phase space.”
“The bunch compressor is 2 meters long and 1.20 meters wide. It is 2.10 meters tall and weighs around two tons. The key structural elements are two sets of eight disks composed of special magnetic alloys that are arranged around the beamline. These disks can generate a high-frequency voltage of 40,000 volt,” says high-frequency physicist Hans Günter König from GSI’s Ring RF department. König and his colleague Peter Hülsmann were the main people in charge of implementing the project technology and liaising with the manufacturer. “In the next step, the device will be subjected to extensive testing that will be conducted on the test rig for high-frequency systems at GSI. These tests are scheduled to be completed this spring. Series production will begin as soon as the bunch compressor has passed all of the tests.”
FAIR will be one of the largest and most complex accelerator facilities in the world. The existing GSI accelerator facility will be part of FAIR and serve as first acceleration stage. For FAIR engineers and scientists will expedite technological developments in many areas in international cooperation, for example in computer science or in superconductivity techniques. Approximately 3,000 scientists from all over the world will conduct cutting-edge research at FAIR. In unique experiments they will gain new basic insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe.
]]>The Green IT Cube is an especially energy-efficient, space-saving and cost-effective high-performance computing centre. Instead of air, the Green IT Cube cools its computers with water. This means the energy used for cooling is only seven per-cent of the electrical power used for computing. Conventional computing centres with air cooling use 30 to 100 per-cent. The Green IT Cube will host 300,000 processing units. Scientists use it to perform simulations, to develop detectors for FAIR and to analyse measurements obtained from experiments in the accelerator facilities of GSI and, in future, FAIR.
Al-Wazir commented on the visit on Twitter: "One of the three (because of water cooling) most energy efficient computers in the world. Where? At GSI in Darmstadt of course" and documented his tour with pictures on Facebook and Twitter (in German).
]]>The students were asked to evaluate and interpret data from the ALICE experiment. Under professional supervision by scientists they autonomously analysed data recorded in collisions of protons and from lead nuclei. In the collisions the so-called quark-gluon plasma can be generated for a short time—a state of matter which existed in the universe for the first few microseconds after the big bang. The plasma undergoes a phase transition back to normal matter in fractions of seconds. The particles produced in this process can give insight into the properties of the quark-gluon plasma.
In a guided tour the students also visited the FAIR storage ring CRYRING and experiments at the GSI accelerators. The basic idea of the programme is to allow the students to work in the same fashion as the scientists. This includes a videoconference at the end of the day, where the students presented and discussed their findings with other students from the universities in Frankfurt, Münster, Zagreb, and with CERN.
Approximately 200 universities and research facilities from 47 countries participate in the International Masterclasses this year. Organiser is the International Particle Physics Outreach Group (IPPOG). All events in Germany take place in cooperation with the Netzwerk Teilchenphysik, a nationwide network for the communication of particle physics to youngsters and teachers. They aim to make particle physics accessible to a broader public.
ALICE is one of the four large international experiments at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). It is the experiment specifically designed to investigate collisions of heavy nuclei at high energies. Scientists of GSI and of German universities were involved in the development of new detectors and in the scientific programme of ALICE from the beginning. The GSI computing centre is an inherent part of the computing grid for data analysis of ALICE.
Horst Stöcker is a leading scientist in the GSI research department “Theory” and Judah M. Eisenberg Professor Laureatus at the Goethe University Frankfurt, as well as Senior Fellow of the Frankfurt Institute of Advanced Studies (FIAS). He was GSI’s Scientific Director from 2007 to 2015, and vice president of the Helmholtz Association twice. Stöcker holds a honorary doctorate also from the University of Bucharest, Romania, and from the Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow.
Already in his diploma thesis more than 40 years ago Stöcker analysed some of the first data from JINR’s accelerator Synchrophasotron, the first relativistic heavy-ion accelerator. In the following years he contributed scientifically to the understanding of the dynamics of hadron and heavy ion collisions as well as to the underlying phase structure of quantum chromo dynamics at the NICA collider currently under construction at JINR and to the complementary high-energy colliders RHIC, USA, and LHC, Switzerland. Stöcker’s focus was also on the differentiation to the future FAIR accelerator complex. FAIR’s worldwide unique features will be high beam intensities and qualities of heavy ions, antiprotons, strange matter and isotopes unknown so far.
Further awardees of the JINR honorary doctorate were professor Jemal Khubua, professor at the University of Tbilsi, Georgia, and professor Yuri Oganessian, discoverer of elements and head of the Flerov Laboratory for Nuclear Reactions at JINR.
JINR is an international centre for research concerning the basics and applications of nuclear physics, having its 60th anniversary this year. It was founded as a counterpart to the research centre CERN in Switzerland approximately at the same time.
]]>In his talk "Gravitationswellen – Kräuselungen der Raumzeit", delivered in German, Bengt Friman reported on the direct observation of gravitational waves by the LIGO collaboration in the USA. He described the basic principles behind the generation of the waves, which were predicted by Albert Einstein already 100 years ago. Subsequently, he described possible observational methods as well as the earlier indirect detection of gravitational waves in a binary pulsar system. The current gravitational-wave event emanated from a collision of two black holes. Other sources of gravitational waves that may be detected with terrestrial interferometers are fast rotating neutron stars, supernovae as well as binary systems of neutron stars. Finally, Bengt Friman presented the current observation of the LIGO collaboration in comparison with simulations and gave an outlook on research at the accelerator facilties at GSI and, in the future, at FAIR, where the production of matter similar to that in the interior of neutron stars will be possible.
]]>Madhan was welcomed by the FAIR and GSI management. Furthermore he received information about the status of the FAIR project by professor Karlheinz Langanke, Scientific Director of GSI, and, in additional talks, about the cooperation with India. In a joint lunch with Indian students and scientists he got to know about the research and education on the campus. Afterwards he visited the accelerators, the Green IT Cube, the HADES detector, the therapy facility and the FAIR construction site.
]]>Der Eintritt ist frei, eine Voranmeldung ist nicht erforderlich. Besucher bringen bitte für den Einlass ein gültiges Ausweisdokument mit.
Gravitationswellen sind Kräuselungen der Raumzeit. Sie wurden bereits von Albert Einstein vor 100 Jahren vorhergesagt, konnten jedoch bisher nur indirekt nachgewiesen werden. Am 11. Februar 2016 berichteten Forscher der LIGO-Kollaboration über die erste erfolgreiche direkte Messung von Gravitationswellen. Somit beginnt ein neues Kapitel in der Astronomie. Bengt Friman, Leiter der Forschungsabteilung Theorie an der GSI, wird in seinem Vortrag die Grundlagen zur Entstehung und zum Verständnis von Gravitationswellen sowie die Messmethode und die aktuellen Ergebnisse der LIGO-Messung erörtern. Außerdem wird er darlegen, wie die Forschung bei GSI und zukünftig bei FAIR damit verknüpft ist. An den Beschleunigeranlagen lässt sich die kosmische Materie direkt im Labor erzeugen und untersuchen.
FAIR will be one of the largest and most complex accelerator facilities in the world. For FAIR engineers and scientists will expedite technological developments in many areas in international cooperation, for example in computer science or in superconductivity techniques. Approximately 3,000 scientists from all over the world will conduct cutting-edge research at FAIR. In unique experiments they will gain new basic insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe.
"FAIR is an international high-tech-project for research which will be realized in Darmstadt. For me it is an extraordinarily interesting task which I am looking forward to contributing to with my expertise in the realization of large scale plants," says Jörg Blaurock.
Jörg Blaurock, born in 1964, studied mechanical engineering at the Helmut Schmidt University in Hamburg during his career as an officer in the Bundeswehr, where he worked until 1994. He went on to work for large scale plant construction firms Uhde GmbH and Lurgi GmbH in the turnkey production of petrochemical industrial plants at various international locations. In 2007 he joined Alstom, today General Electric, where he worked in a number of positions – most recently for General Electric Deutschland GmbH in Stuttgart. There, as Managing Director he was responsible for the turnkey delivery of utility steam generators for electricity-generating fossil-fuel power stations.
]]>Inside the GSI and future FAIR accelerators prevails a very high vacuum to ensure that the accelerated particles don't collide with remaining gas particles and get lost. To gain such ultra-high vacua in accelerator facilities the scientists use, amongst other things, gas resorbing materials, so called non-evaporable getters (NEG). The inner walls of the vacuum chambers are coated with special materials that resorb gases on their surface and so "pump" them. In his diploma thesis Nordmann produced a NEG surface from titanium, zirkonium an vanadium. He analysed the quality of the surface with spectroscopic methods and characterised the pumping behaviour for different gases like hydrogen, nitrogen and carbon monoxide. The results help with the application of NEG surfaces in the FAIR project.
Jannette Hofmann received the second award bestowed with 500 Euro. She developed a precise interferometric position measurement for microscopy. Her work in cooperation with Leica Microsystems resulted in a patent application.
]]>The Green IT Cube is a highly energy-efficient computing center because it uses much less energy to cool its computers than conventional computing centers. Instead of air, the Green IT Cube cools its computers with water. This means the energy used for cooling is only seven percent of the electrical power used for computing. Conventional computing centers with air cooling use 30 to 100 percent. Such centers require high ceilings or cold aisle and hot aisle systems with complex climate controls.
This effective cooling process enables space-saving positioning of computers in the Green IT Cube. The cube-shaped building measures 27 x 30 x 22 meters and can hold 768 computer cabinets side by side on six floors. Simultaneously saving energy and space makes the Green IT Cube very cost-efficient. Investment costs for the building were about €12 million and were provided by the German federal government and the state of Hesse via a Helmholtz investment program.
The Green IT Cube is used by researchers to perform simulations and to develop detectors for FAIR. In addition, they will use it to analyze measurements obtained from experiments in the accelerator facilities of GSI, and, in future, FAIR, in order to gain fundamental insights into the structure of matter and the development of the universe. To make this possible, the Green IT Cube will be equipped with computer systems that meet the researchers’ long-term needs for processing power, storage capacity and transfer rates.
“The new Green IT Cube computing center is an important milestone for the future accelerator center FAIR,” says Schütte. “It also shows that international research projects like FAIR produce many new technologies that can be important for society as a whole. In view of the great need for processing power and the necessity of saving energy, the technology in the Green IT Cube has the potential for broad application.”
“We are pleased that top-level research is going on here in Darmstadt and that the state of Hesse is thus setting standards for IT technology and energy efficiency,” says State Secretary Jung. “The Green IT Cube is an example of successful basic research that also benefits Hesse’s industry and economy.”
“We would like to thank the Federal Ministry of Education and Research and the Hessen State Ministry of Higher Education, Research and the Arts, which financed the construction of the Green IT Cube via the Helmholtz investments in further expansion,” says Prof. Karlheinz Langanke, Scientific Director of GSI. “We would also like to thank the developers of the Green IT Cube for their outstanding work. The Green IT Cube will give our researchers the computing capacity they need at GSI and FAIR today and in the future. Later, the Green IT Cube will be FAIR’s main computing center.”
Currently, two storeys of the Green IT Cube are equipped with four megawatts of cooling power. When it is finished it will have 12 megawatts of cooling power. The cube can house around 300,000 CPUs, which corresponds to about 100,000 PCs. They offer the superior processing power needed for simulating and analysing experiments at GSI and FAIR. The plan calls for 100 petabytes to store experiment data – the equivalent of around one million conventional PC hard drives. The very high data rates of these experiments can be recorded at a speed of over one terabyte per second. That is the equivalent of around 500,000 residential DSL connections.
The GSI’s existing computers will begin moving into the Green IT Cube in February. Among them is the L-CSC cluster, which ranks third in the Green500, the list of the world’s most energy-efficient supercomputers (it held first place until June 2015). The L-CSC has a rate of computation of 5.27 billion operations per second per watt of electrical power. Its processing power is equal to one quadrillion operations per second (one petaflop per second).
The Green IT Cube was developed by Professor Volker Lindenstruth, head of information technology at GSI, his team, and his colleague Professor Horst Stöcker, in cooperation with the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS) and Goethe University Frankfurt. The Green IT Cube concept has already won multiple awards. Among them was the Green IT Best Practice Award for its computing center and computing concept, presented in 2011 under the aegis of the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy. In June 2015, the Green IT Cube received an international award for the most innovative computing center at Datacloud 2015, the European conference on data centers and cloud computing.
Download "target" – Issue 13, January 2016 (PDF, 6 MB)
<link presse gsi_magazin_target.htm internal-link internal link in current>Abonnement und target archive
]]>The atomic interaction between nucleus and electrons is described by the quantum electrodynamics of bound states (BS-QED), one of the most tested theories in physics. So far no measurement showed any deviation of the theoretical predictions of BS-QED. In their recent examinations the scientists tested the magnetic momentum of bound electrons in strong electromagnetic fields as they appear at the surface of heavy atomic nuclei. This magnetic momentum is characterized by the so called g-factor. In the experiment the scientists compared the g-factors of two calcium isotopes. "Thanks to this comparison we succeeded in including all the details of the movements of the electrons and the nucleus and to precisely determine the behavior of the nuclei of the highly charged ions", explains Dr. Wolfgang Quint, physicist at GSI.
The experimental determination of the difference in the two g-factors of the lithium-like calcium-48 and calcium-40, i.e. calcium atoms that have only three electrons left in their shell, took place at two experimental setups. In an experiment at the University Mainz a single ions of each of the calcium isotopes was captured in the 3.8 tesla strong magnetic field of an apparatus consisting of three Penning traps and stored for several month. Via irradiation with microwaves the orientation of the outer bound electron was repeatedly flipped and the oscillation frequency of the electron was determined.
In a second experiment at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum the mass of the calcium isotope Ca-48 was measured with seven times the precision achieved so far. "With the ion trap SHIPTRAP at GSI we can capture the calcium isotopes and determine their mass very precisely. The calcium ions are held inside the trap by magnetic fields and circulate on a tiny spiral orbit with a certain frequency which can be directly used to calculate the mass", says GSI scientist Professor Michael Block, who is in charge of the experimental setup. The difference in the g-factors was determined from the measured data with a precision of ten parts in a billion, also the movement of the nucleus was completely taken into account for the first time. Thus the experiment lays a foundation for a new generation of tests of the BS-QED and paves the way for future basic precision measurements in atomic physics.
Participating institutes:
GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, Darmstadt
Max-Planck-Institut für Kernphysik, Heidelberg
Helmholtz-Institut Mainz, Mainz
Institut für Kernchemie, Johannes Gutenberg-Universität, Mainz
Department of Physics, St Petersburg State University, St Petersburg, Russia
Institut für Theoretische Physik, Technische Universität Dresden, Dresden
Institute for Theoretical and Experimental Physics, Kurchatov Institute, Moskau, Russia
Petersburg Nuclear Physics Institute, St Petersburg, Russia
Institut für Physik, Johannes Gutenberg-Universität, Mainz
In atomic nuclei, protons and neutrons arrange in individual shells. Nuclei containing just the right numbers to fill a proton and a neutron shell are considerably more stable than their neighbours. For protons, 82 is the last known of these “magic numbers”, while it is 126 for neutrons. This makes lead-208, with 82 protons and 126 neutrons, the heaviest “doubly-magic nucleus” known to date. For decades, scientists tried finding out how many protons will fit into the next shell, which was conjectured to give rise to an "island of stability" in the region of superheavy elements. Current theoretical models still disagree: some favor 114, others prefer 120 or even 126. Element 114 is known, but can be studied at rates of only about one atom per day. Elements 120 and 126 are yet unknown. Scientists thus look for other experimental data allowing to refine their models.
In their recent work, an international team led by Dr. Jadambaa Khuyagbaatar from the Helmholtz Institute Mainz, Germany, and the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt, Germany, traced this last neutron shell closure towards heavier elements. The question is whether the neutron number 126 remains as dominant in these increasingly unstable nuclei as it is known to be in lead-208. For this, they produced exotic nuclei of uranium. Usual uranium nuclei as found in nature, like uranium-238, have far more neutrons than around 126, so the researchers first produced the new uranium-221 and acquired new and improved data on uranium-222, of which only three atoms were observed in a study dating back to 1983.
For this, an intense beam of titanium-50 ions (element 22) was accelerated at GSI Darmstadt and used to irradiate a foil containing ytterbium-176 (element 70). Fusion led to uranium nuclei (element 92), which were separated in the gas-filled recoil separator TASCA and guided to a detector suitable to register their decay. In this way, the team studied these nuclei's instability and found them to decay within microseconds. Such short lifetimes could only be registered thanks to a new, advanced data acquisition system and data analysis techniques. The study of combined data of isotopes of elements from lead up to uranium at and above the 126 neutron shell suggests this to no longer be a pronounced magic neutron number in uranium. These data allow benchmarking models that, e.g., guide efforts to search for new superheavy elements.
Original publication in Physical Review Letters 115
GSI and TU Darmstadt provide almost €1.34 million in funding per year, which primarily goes towards paying grants and salaries for PhD students and post-doc positions. The extension agreement between GSI and TU Darmstadt continues the bilateral cooperation agreement that was initiated on 17 December 2009. The strategic collaboration is targeted at research in the field of nuclear and radiation physics, but also at driving progress in materials research, radiation therapy and basic research into ion-beam therapy.
The cooperation agreement is based on a framework agreement from November 2008 on strategic collaboration on the construction and scientific use of FAIR. As well as GSI and TU Darmstadt, further partners include the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS) and the universities of Frankfurt, Gießen, Heidelberg and Mainz.
FAIR
The FAIR accelerator facility, which is under construction at GSI, is one of the world’s largest research projects for basic research in physics. FAIR is an accelerator facility that will produce antiproton and ion beams of unprecedented intensity and quality. The centrepiece of the facility is a ring accelerator with a circumference of 1,100 metres, which is connected to a complex system of storage rings and experimental stations. The existing GSI accelerators will form part of the FAIR facility and serve as pre-accelerators. FAIR enables a wider range of experiments to be conducted than ever before, allowing scientists from all over the world to gain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe since the Big Bang.
]]>Yuri Litvinov could convince the ERC evaluation panel with his research proposal and succeded despite 2050 other applicants. The proposal is about the physics of stars in which the elements of the periodic table are created. Of special interest are exotic atomic nuclei which occur as intermediate elements but do not exist naturally anywhere on Earth and have to be created artificially with an accelerator.
To produce and store exotic nuclei, Litvinov needs a facility like the one existing at GSI. With the help of the accelerator facility they can be produced and subsequently be injected into the experimental storage ring (ESR) where they can be investigated. The ESR, which has a circumference of 108 meters, will be supplemented by the storage ring „cryring“ with a circumference of 54 meters. The cryring is currently being installed in the GSI halls. It was delivered from Sweden and will later be part of the future accelerator facility of FAIR.
Litvinov wants to measure the exotic nuclei which will be stored in the rings with high accuracy: the masses and their lifetimes as well as their decay paths are important to understand their role in the stellar element synthesis. Therefore the physicist plans the development of new sensitive detectors.
Litvinov’s experiments will pave the way for future experiments at the accelerator facility FAIR. At FAIR scientists will be able to produce hundreds of exotic nuclei, which are not accessible with today’s methods.
Litvinov studied physics in St. Petersburg and is a GSI researcher since 1999. In 2003 he completed his PhD at the university of Gießen and passed with distinction (doctoral supervisor Prof. Hans Geissel). Starting in 2009 he spent two years at the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg and habilitated at the University of Heidelberg in 2011. Since then Litvinov is actively involved in the GSI department APPA/SPARC managed by Prof. Thomas Stöhlker. Among other tasks at GSI he is coordinator of the ESR experiments and head of the SPARC detector department within the FAIR project since 2012.
]]>The LHC receives the beam to accelerate at such energies from a chain of accelerator components, starting with the ion injector, developed and build by GSI in the 90s, a component which is essential for the LHC operation with ion beams. On 25th of November "Stable beams" were declared, the long-awaited start of a measuring campaign with lead ions which will last almost a month.
In Pb-Pb collisions a quark-gluon plasma is produced, a state of matter at high temperatures or densities that existed in our early universe up to 10 microseconds in its lifetime. All four large detectors at the LHC are participating in the present data taking, in particular the ALICE detector, especially designed for the study of the quark-gluon plasma. The ALICE group at GSI is among the most active groups in the analysis of the new data.
The ALICE group at GSI shares responsibility for the operation and calibration of two important detector systems in ALICE. The Time Projection Chamber (TPC) and the Transition Radiation Detector (TRD) were designed and built with a long and dedicated contribution of the ALICE group and the Detector Laboratory of GSI. The High-Level Trigger (HLT) of ALICE, essential for the online filtering and compression of data, has also benefited from the participation of GSI. The support from the IT department, providing high-performance computer farms and data storage for the Grid and for the analyses by the German groups, is crucial.
With ALICE, a couple of hundred million collisions are expected to be registered in the coming weeks. The picture, acquired in the first minutes of the new measuring campaign, displays a typical collision with several thousand reconstructed tracks in the TPC. The first physics results are awaited very soon. The GSI scientists and PhD students have a leading contribution in the ongoing analyses, with a special focus on the transverse-momentum distribution of produced particles. This will provide the first look at the properties of the deconfined quark-gluon medium at the largest energy density ever achieved in laboratory.
]]>In ihrer Masterarbeit an der Universität Heidelberg hat Anne Merle Reinhart die physikalische Charakteristik von leichten geladenen Fragmenten, die bei einer Therapiebestrahlung mit 12C Ionen entstehen, experimentell untersucht. Mit einer von ihr entwickelten 3D-Bildgebungsmethode konnte sie zeigen, dass die Spurrekonstruktion von geladenen Fragmenten vielversprechende Möglichkeiten für die Überwachung von Therapiebestrahlungen in Echtzeit bietet.
Dr. Christian Schömers entwickelte im Rahmen seiner Dissertation an der Goethe-Universität Frankfurt eine neuartige dynamische Intensitätsregelung für den Synchrotron-Beschleuniger am Heidelberger Ionenstrahl-Therapiezentrum (HIT). Damit können die Anforderungen des Rasterscan-Bestrahlungsverfahrens an die Ionenstrahlintensität wesentlich besser als bisher realisiert werden. Dieses Verfahren das bereits für die Patientenbehandlung eingesetzt wird, verbessert die Bestrahlungsqualität und erhöht die Effizienz des Bestrahlungsvorgangs. Damit wird eine deutliche Verkürzung der Bestrahlungszeit erreicht.
In ihrer Dissertation an der TU Kaiserslautern hat Dr. Clarissa Gillmann erstmals einen direkten Vergleich der Qualität von Bestrahlungsplänen von aktiven und passiven Bestrahlungssystemen anhand realistischer klinischer Fälle durchgeführt. Dabei konnte die Rasterscan-Bestrahlung im Vergleich zur passiven Bestrahlungstechnik, insbesondere bei 1-Feld-Bestrahlungen, besser an das Zielvolumen angepasst werden. Im zweiten Teil ihrer Arbeit analysierte sie realitätsnah, wie sich die klinische Implementierung eines von GSI-Biophysikern entwickelten neuen radiobiologischen Modells (LEM-IV) auswirken würde.
Der Verein zur Förderung der Tumortherapie fördert die Aktivitäten im Rahmen des Forschungsprojekts „Tumortherapie mit schweren Ionen" bei GSI mit dem Ziel, durch Weiterentwicklung des Systems die Behandlung von Tumoren zu verbessern und der allgemeinen Patientenversorgung zur Verfügung zu stellen. An der Beschleunigeranlage bei GSI wurden seit 1997 über 400 Patienten mit Tumoren, in der Regel im Gehirn, mit Ionenstrahlen behandelt. Die Heilungsraten dieser Methode liegen zum Teil bei über 90 Prozent und die Nebenwirkungen sind sehr gering. Am Heidelberger Ionenstrahl-Therapiezentrum (HIT) werden Patienten seit 2009 routinemäßig mit schweren Ionen behandelt. Am 11. November 2015 wurde das Marburger Ionenstrahl-Therapiezentrum eröffnet und damit eine zweite große Therapie-Anlage mit 12C-Ionen und Protonen in Deutschland in Betrieb genommen.
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For his dissertation, Dr. Mooser and his colleagues kept a single proton at minus 268 degrees Celsius for 13 months in order to measure the magnetic moment of the proton. This was made possible by high-precision equipment known as the Double Penning trap. Dr. Mooser developed this ultra-sensitive vacuum-isolated apparatus for the experiments at the University of Mainz together with scientists from GSI, the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg and the Japanese RIKEN research institute. “This enabled us to detect single spin quantum jumps of the proton”, explained Dr. Mooser. The magnetic moment of the proton is particularly interesting for solving the puzzle of antimatter in the universe. Close comparison of the magnetic moments of antiprotons and protons can shed some light on why matter and antimatter did not completely annihilate each other after the Big Bang, and why there was a surplus of matter left from which our universe emerged. Recent experiments conducted by the BASE collaboration at CERN, of which Dr. Mooser is meanwhile a member, showed that both charge-to-mass ratios are equal in magnitude.
“I feel honored and extremely gratified that my work has been singled out for the GSI doctoral award”, said Dr. Mooser, who wrote his dissertation at the University of Mainz, the Helmholtz Institute Mainz and GSI. “Measuring the magnetic moment of the proton paves the way for future research into missing antimatter in the universe.”
Pfeiffer Vacuum and the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung have been linked through a partnership for many years. Vacuum solutions from Pfeiffer Vacuum have been successfully utilized there for decades. Dr. Ulrich von Hülsen, member of Pfeiffer Vacuum management, congratulated the laureate: "It is immensely important to Pfeiffer Vacuum to foster new talent in cutting-edge research. Pfeiffer Vacuum has been setting standards in vacuum technology for 125 years. The company was built on a pioneering spirit and passion which has led it to successfully contribute to technological progress in industry and science from the very beginning.”
"The outstanding research opportunities at the GSI accelerator and the development of the future FAIR accelerator attract many young researchers from around the world to GSI," said GSI scientific director, Professor Karlheinz Langanke. "They contribute important innovative ideas to the development of the new accelerators and detectors."
The GSI doctoral candidate award is offered for the best dissertation every year. Eligible students have to have earned their doctorate during the previous year and have been sponsored by GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung as part of its strategic partnerships with the universities of Darmstadt, Frankfurt, Giessen, Heidelberg, Jena and Mainz or through the Research and development program. There are currently over 300 doctoral candidates working on their dissertations at GSI and FAIR within the scope of the graduate school HGS-HIRe (Helmholtz Graduate School for Hadron and Ion Research).
]]>Uncertainties in the theoretical prediction of nuclear effects on the hyperfine splitting were eliminated by measuring two charge states of the same isotope. Although the hyperfine splitting energy in hydrogen like Bismuth is known since 1994, the resonance in the lithium like charge state was not found until 2011. Due to too large uncertainties in the determination of the ions' velocity, no accurate value could be determined then. „Thanks to an in-situ high voltage measurement at the GSI storage ring in combination with extensive improvements of detection systems and data acquisition, the uncertainty could be reduced by one order of magnitude“, Ullmann explains, who does his PhD at the University Jena and GSI. In collaboration with high voltage experts of Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt, the national metrology institute of Germany and detector specialists of University Münster and the group of Professor Nörtershäuser at TU Darmstadt he conducted the experiment.
Every year up to 24 PhD candidates of the graduate school HGS-HIRe get the Giersch Excellence Grant, which is endowed with 2500 Euro. At the ceremony which took place at Campus Riedberg the awardees of the Giersch PostDoc Startup 2015 also were announced. All in all the Giersch Foundation awarded young researchers with 100 000 Euro.
]]>The MIT will offer an efficient form of cancer therapy, with minimal side effects, to as many as 750 patients per year. Following the example of the Heidelberg Ion Beam Therapy Center, the Marburg facility uses a process of irradiation with ions that is based on research and development work done by GSI, the Heidelberg University Hospital, the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), and the Helmholtz Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf.
“We are delighted that the Marburg facility is now completed and that from now on more patients will be able to benefit from the extremely effective and gentle process of ion beam therapy we developed at GSI,” said Gerhard Kraft, the former head of the Biophysics department at GSI. “It’s an outstanding example of how basic research can benefit society and individuals thanks to successful technology transfer.” Karlheinz Langanke, the Scientific Director of GSI, said, “This is also a great personal success for Gerhard Kraft, the founder of ion therapy at GSI and a pioneer in Europe.”
The first promising biological experiments and technical developments related to an innovative technology for irradiating tumors with heavy ions were already being conducted at GSI during the 1980s. Biophysicists worked closely with accelerator physicists, technicians, and physicians to further develop the accelerator facility for cancer therapy. The same accelerator that was used for studying supernovae and neutron stars was to be applied to medical treatment for human beings. The first clinical study was conducted jointly with the Heidelberg University Hospital, the DKFZ, and the Helmholtz Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf from 1997 to 2008. A total of 444 patients, most of whom suffered from basal skull tumors, were treated using beams of carbon ions from the GSI accelerator facility — with great success.
This process is especially effective and gentle, because the ion beams penetrate into the body and have a particularly strong effect in the tumor tissue, where they are absorbed. In addition, the ion beams’ effect can be directed with millimeter precision to individual points within the malignant tumor by means of the raster scan process developed at GSI, so that the healthy surrounding tissue is spared.
The experience gained from the GSI pilot project flowed directly into the design of an accelerator facility that is intended specifically for therapeutic use and designed to make routine clinical procedures possible. The Heidelberg Ion Beam Therapy Center HIT was then constructed on this basis. A significantly smaller accelerator facility was developed by GSI for this center. The Marburg facility has also been constructed according to this model.
]]>About 50 engineers and scientists worked on the development and construction of the magnet over a period of several years and were supported by industry partners. Now, the magnet has arrived at its operation site. A special mobile heavy-duty crane was needed to unload the 60-ton magnet, which was then guided into the experiment hall on air cushions. Precision work was the order of the day, as the hall gate is only a few centimeters larger than the 5.7-meter long, 8.6-meter wide, and 4.3-meter tall magnet.
“The GLAD magnet is a key instrument for studying exotic nuclei with large number of neutrons, and it is also an outstanding example of a very technologically demanding project that has now been successfully completed for FAIR within the framework of an international partnership,” says Haik Simon, who managed the project for GSI.
Scientists plan to use GLAD and the R3B experiment to determine the properties of rare and highly unstable nuclei that contain large numbers of neutrons. The investigation of these neutron-rich nuclei will greatly increase our understanding of exploding stars, or supernovae. Neutron-rich nuclei are formed in supernovae as intermediate stages in the reactions that create all of the heavy elements such as lead or gold that we find on Earth today.
GLAD will initially undergo extensive testing in order to precisely verify its specifications. It will take several months to completely install and connect the newly developed magnet in the experiment unit and cool its coils down to a temperature below -268 degrees Celsius. After that, it will be possible to use the magnet for experiments at the GSI facility and then later at the future FAIR accelerator facility.
FAIR’s accelerator facility will for the first time generate sufficiently large numbers of very neutron-rich nuclei, thereby enabling scientists to measure their properties. These measurements will increase our understanding of how elements are created in the universe.
]]>On the occasion of the award ceremony Langanke gave the key note talk on the unique research opportunities at the future accelerator facility FAIR at GSI at the annual conference of the Korean Physical Society. Furthermore he gave a series of lectures on nuclear astrophysics for students at APCTP.
The professorship is awarded in memory of Benjamin Lee, an outstanding Korean theoretical physicist, who died too young in 1977 during a tragic car accident. Since 2012 the award is granted annually.
]]>Almudena Arcones wants her team to decode the creation of the heaviest elements such as gold and platinum in the universe. Heavy elements like the ones we find on Earth today occur, for instance, in stellar explosions, known as supernovae, or when neutron stars collide. Under these extreme conditions, heavy elements can be created by core reaction paths. Thousands of unstable, largely unknown isotopes occur as intermediate elements.
The physicist and her team want to simulate astrophysical conditions and the reaction processes in detail in order to understand why the individual elements occur precisely in the observed quantities. The future FAIR acceleration system will allow them to examine the physics of the heavy cores experimentally.
“Her simulations of element synthesis are helping to advance our research, and strengthen the collaboration between the GSI and the TU Darmstadt. The theoretical work will also be of tremendous benefit in advancing our experimental research at the GSI and at the future acceleration centre FAIR,” Bengt Friman, head of the Theory department at GSI, is delighted to announce.
]]>Together with the Heidelberg University Hospital GSI scientists developed an accelerator to enable a clinical routine application. 2009 the first therapy center for patients built by GSI together with Siemens and the Heidelberg University Hospital in Heidelberg started operations. Since then more than 3000 patients were treated there.
Press release by Heidelberg University Hospital (in German only)
]]>The topic of his thesis project is the fundamental investigation of electron stripping processes of slow heavy ions in gaseous media. Besides being of key importance for the study of superheavy elements in gas-filled recoil separators like TASCA at GSI, which was successfully used for the identification of elements 114, 115, and 117 as well as for sensitive searches for the new elements 119 and 120, such processes are exploited to produce highly charged ions suitable for heavy ion beam acceleration at GSI and at the future FAIR accelerator facility. The focus of Paul Scharrer's work is on the electron stripping of heavy projectiles used as heavy ion beams at GSI and at heavy ion accelerator centers around the world. Typically, projectiles like 238U are initially produced in a comparatively low charge state (4+ at GSI), which is not well suited for acceleration to high energies. Therefore, after having reached 1.4 MeV/u in the first accelerator stage, the projectiles pass through a gas-filled region, where they are stripped of electrons, which increases their charge state.
Together with his colleagues from the SHE Chemistry Department at GSI and HIM and the Linac and Operation (L&O) Department within the FAIR@GSI division, Paul Scharrer developed a new gas stripper setup, which exploits the very low duty cycle of the FAIR facility. The new setup employs pulsed gas injection, delivering gas only while beam is passing. This allowed reducing the gas load dramatically, allowing for significantly higher gas densities during beam passage to be achieved, despite the limited pumping capacity and the strict vacuum requirements in the adjacent accelerator sections. Furthermore, the new setup allows use of any gas, unlike the previously used stripper, which was exclusively based on N2. Guided by theoretical studies from Prof. V. Shevelko from the Lebedev Physical Institute in Moscow, Russia, who was a HIM Visiting Fellow for several months in 2013-2015 to support the work, systematic studies showed a pulsed hydrogen-based stripper to be superior. The efficient stripping process in hydrogen gas allowed achieving a new record 238U28+ intensity at the UNILAC, exceeding the previous highest values by more than 50%, and already reaching more than 65% of the FAIR design beam brilliance. Besides the perspective to achieve yet higher average charge states for most of the ion species at higher H2-density, the new setup offers opportunities for operation as a pulsed stripper, where every pulse can be tailored to different projectiles from the two ion source terminals feeding this accelerator line. "This significantly enhances the versatility of the UNILAC accelerator and is also a critical step towards the FAIR facility" explains Dr. Winfried Barth from GSI's L&O department. Christoph Düllmann, professor at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz and head of the SHE Chemistry department at GSI and HIM adds "Paul's work highlights the close connection of basic research like studies on production and properties of superheavy elements, and technical advances that arise, sometimes in fields that appear rather remote at first glance".
]]>Die Vortragsreihe "Wissenschaft für Alle" richtet sich an alle an aktueller Wissenschaft und Forschung interessierten Personen. In den Vorträgen wird über die Forschung und Entwicklungen an GSI und FAIR berichtet, aber auch über aktuelle Themen aus anderen Wissenschafts- und Technikfeldern.
Ziel der Reihe ist es, die wissenschaftlichen Vorgänge für Laien verständlich aufzubereiten und darzustellen, um so die Forschung einem breiten Publikum zugänglich zu machen. Die Vorträge werden von GSI- und FAIR-Mitarbeitern oder von externen Rednern aus Universitäten und Forschungsinstituten gehalten.
Aktuelles Programm:
Die Vorträge finden im großen gemeinsamen Hörsaal von GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung und FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research), Planckstraße 1, 64291 Darmstadt, statt. Der Eintritt ist frei, eine Anmeldung ist nicht erforderlich. Externe Teilnehmer werden gebeten, für den Einlass ein Ausweisdokument bereitzuhalten.
Weitere Informationen und aktuelle Ankündigungen finden Sie unter: www.gsi.de/wfa
]]>Gerhard Kraft ist Initiator der Krebstherapie mit Ionenstrahlen in Europa. Das Verfahren wurde über einen Zeitraum von rund 20 Jahren am GSI Helmholtzzentrum in Darmstadt von der physikalischen und biologischen Grundlagenforschung bis zur klinischen Anwendung entwickelt. Krebszellen werden dabei effektiv zerstört, während gesundes Gewebe geschont wird.
Bereits Anfang der 1980er Jahre baute Gerhard Kraft die biophysikalische Forschungsabteilung bei GSI auf, deren Leiter er von 1981 bis 2008 war. Seine Vision war es, ein extrem präzises Bestrahlungsverfahren zu entwickeln, bei dem die Vorteile des Ionenstrahls, das heißt dessen Präzision und hohe biologische Wirkung, voll zum Tragen kommen. Dank der Initiative, der Weitsichtigkeit und Überzeugungskraft von Gerhard Kraft ist dieses Projekt gelungen. Bei GSI wurden von 1997 bis 2008 über 440 Patienten mit Tumoren im Kopf- und Halsbereich mit Ionenstrahlen mit großem Erfolg behandelt.
Die im Pilotprojekt gewonnenen Erkenntnisse flossen direkt in die Konstruktion des Heidelberger Ionenstrahl-Therapiezentrums HIT. Hier werden seit der Inbetriebnahme 2009 jährlich etwa 800 Patienten mit dem bei GSI entwickelten Verfahren behandelt. Auch in Marburg geht demnächst eine Ionenstrahltherapie-Anlage in Betrieb. Gerhard Kraft war an der Realisierung dieses Projekts als Berater beteiligt.
Kraft war in vielen Initiativen an der Entwicklung und Verbreitung der Ionentherapie in Europa beteiligt. So war er Mitglied der European Light Medical Accelerators (EULIMA) Studie (1988 bis 1991) am CERN. Ebenso war er Co-Autor an den Vorschlägen für die Ionenstrahl-Therapien in Pavia (CNAO) 1993 und in der Wiener Neustadt (Med Austron) 1996. Er war Gründungsmitglied der Ionentherapie-Initiative: European Network for Research in Light Ion Hadrontherapy ENLIGHT am CERN. Von 2009 bis 2012 war Kraft Helmholtz-Professor für Biophysik bei GSI. Gerhard Kraft wurde mit vielen Preisen ausgestattet, darunter der Erwin Schrödinger-Preis der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft 1999 und das Bundesverdienstkreuz 1. Klasse 2008.
Die DGMP ist ein gemeinnütziger Verein, der sich der Förderung der Wissenschaft auf dem Gebiet "Medizinische Physik" einschließlich der medizinischen Technik widmet. Die Jahrestagung der DGMP ist die zentrale Veranstaltung, bei der wissenschaftlichen Themen aus der Medizinischen Physik präsentiert und diskutiert werden.
]]>For the experiment, the scientists shot at a 300-nanometer-thick foil of curium with accelerated calcium nuclei. In the collisions studied, the atomic nuclei of the two elements touched, and formed a compound system for an extremely short time. Before the compound system could break apart again, after about a sextillionth of a second, the two nuclei involved exchanged a number of their nuclear building-blocks — protons and neutrons. Different isotopes formed as the end products of this exchange.
The isotopes of berkelium, neptunium, and americium discovered in the GSI experiment were created as the end products of such collisions. They are unstable and decay after a few milliseconds or seconds, depending on the isotope. All of the resulting decay products can be separated and analyzed using special filters composed of electrical and magnetic fields. The scientists used all of the decay products detected to identify the new isotope that has been created.
Every chemical element comes in the form of different isotopes. These isotopes are distinguished from one another by the number of neutrons in the nucleus, and thus by their mass. The newly discovered isotopes have fewer neutrons and are lighter than the previously known isotopes of the respective elements. Due to their low number of neutrons, their structure is very exotic and therefore interesting for the development of theoretical models describing atomic nuclei. To date, we know of around 3,000 isotopes of the 114 chemical elements of the periodic system. According to scientific estimates, more than 4,000 additional, undiscovered isotopes should also exist. The hunt for these unknown isotopes goes on at GSI. Atoms that are heavier than uranium are especially interesting in this hunt.
“By using this method, we have succeeded in generating many different atomic nuclei at once,” says Sophia Heinz, the head of the experiment. “Our results are especially important for the study of super-heavy elements. New isotopes, in particular those of super-heavy elements, which contain an especially large number of neutrons, cannot be made by any other method. Experiments aimed at creating these neutron-rich nuclei are already being prepared.”
The current experiments will make it possible to explore previously unknown areas on the isotope chart. The elements 107 to 112 were discovered using the same experimental facility at GSI. The mechanisms responsible for the production of new isotopes will also be studied at the planned accelerator center FAIR in the future.
By the discovery of the four new isotopes, on the ranking list GSI moves closer to the laboratory which discovered the most isotopes. Head of the ranking list at the moment is the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in the USA. GSI is on the second place.
The experiment at the GSI accelerator facility was carried out by an international team of researchers. Participants included the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, scientists from the Manipal Centre for Natural Sciences in India, the Justus Liebig University Giessen, the Japan Atomic Energy Agency, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in the USA, and the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in Russia.
]]>„In this cooperation we will mainly investigate the quark-gluon-plasma. This is the state of matter in the early universe shortly after the big bang“, says Peter Braun-Munzinger.
The cooperation includes theoretical as well as experimental work at the experiments ALICE at CERN in Geneva, STAR in Brookhaven, USA, and the CBM experiment at the future accelerator facility FAIR at GSI.
]]>Press release of MPI für Kernphysik Heidelberg
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Every year thousands of patients suffering from rheumatic diseases undergo radon treatment either by bathing in radon containing water or breathing air containing radon in radon galleries. The radon treatment is based on a long lasting medical experience and yields pain relieve for many patients, although the basis of the medical action is not understood on a physical, cellular and molecular level. The densely ionizing alpha particles emitted from radon and its progenies produce the largest and most efficient contribution to the totally emitted dose. Their physical and radiobiological effects in cell cultures, tissues and in patients are studied in detail by the different GREWIS members. In the framework of the patient studies genetic alterations and mutations are studied after radon exposure which represents a major contribution of the radiation burden especially in uranium containing areas.
During the last two years of research and successful collaboration in the GREWIS consortium, important results concerning the physical and biological action of radon could be obtained and cellular alterations in patient blood could be measured. With the renewed funding of more than two million euro these studies will be continued with the goal of optimizing the radon therapy and determining the risk of radon exposure with higher precision.
]]>Every summer student gets the chance to work on his own research project within the current GSI and FAIR experiments. The topics range from accelerator science to tumour therapy and astrophysics. In public lectures, which are part of the program, the summer students learn about GSI and FAIR research and scientific results.
For many of the students, who come mainly from European but also from other GSI and FAIR partner countries, the Summer Student Program is the first step to a masters or doctorates thesis at GSI. The Summer Student Program, which takes place for the 35th time, is organised by the graduate school HGS-HIRe. Apart from the scientific program there are also social events like cooking together or exploring the region.
The public lectures are in English and are open to everyone. Lecture Program
Every year PTCOG organizes and hosts an international conference to support and improve discussion and exchange on the latest developments in particle therapy. This year the annual conference took place in San Diego and focussed on „The Modern Era of Particle Beam Therapy: Widening the Therapeutic Window for Better Patient Outcomes.“ During the event Marco Durante was elected Vice Chair of the Steering Committee of PTCOG. In this position Durante is also Associate Editor of the International Journal of Particle Therapy, the official PTCOG journal.
]]>He was awarded for his investigations of innovative radiation concepts for treating intra-fractionally moving tumors with scanned ion beams, which mainly originates from his time at GSI before his appointment to the University of Erlangen. The award is endowed with 2000 euro and is supposed to acknowledge outstanding innovations and developments of young scientists within the research area of high precision radiation therapy. The presentation took place during the annual meeting of DEGRO in Hamburg in June 2015.
]]>Her results contribute to an improved biological radiation planning in particle therapy by modeling the biological effect. The award is supposed to acknowledge outstanding creative achievements of individuals and especially the creativity of young researchers. The award is endowed with 1500 euro and was presented on the annual meeting of DEGRO in Hamburg in June 2015.
]]>https://www.helmholtz.de/ueber_uns/20_jahre_helmholtz
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The Green Cube will allow for the efficient analysis of enormous data volumes acquired from experiments on the accelerator facilities at GSI and the future accelerator facility FAIR. Upon overall completion the “Green Cube” will be one of the biggest scientific data centers in the world, with a cooling capacity of twelve megawatts. It will also accommodate the world’s most energy-efficient supercomputer, the high-performance computer L-CSC, which currently occupies first place in “Green500”, the global ranking of energy-saving supercomputers. With one watt of electrical power the L-CSC attains a computing volume of 5.27 billion computing operations per second.
The “Green Cube” will go into operation in the autumn of this year in an initial configuration. The “Green Cube” is being constructed on the GSI site in line with a concept developed by the head of the information technology division of GSI, Professor Volker Lindenstruth at the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS) and at Goethe University Frankfurt. Thanks to a new cooling concept, considerable cost savings are possible, both in the construction phase and once in operation. The investment costs through to overall completion will amount to some 16 million euros.
The key to the high energy and cost efficiency of the “Green Cube” is a special cooling system, with which the resulting heat is already dissipated in the doors of the computer cabinets using water cooling. Thus the cooling energy required is reduced to one tenth compared to conventional supercomputers. Moreover, the computing center does not require any complex cooling of the ambient air and the computer cabinets can even be stacked right next to one another similarly to a high rack warehouse, which in turn reduces the investment costs. The “Green Cube” data center will require less than ten per cent of the electrical power needed by the computers for the cooling and the remaining operation (technicians call this PUE<1.1).
The Datacloud Award with which the “Green Cube” has now been honored was presented for the eighth time for outstanding achievements in the development of computing centers and cloud computing – the use of mainframe computers over the internet – at the Datacloud Conference. There are winners in ten main categories as well as a special prize from the judges.
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The conference, which took place in Darmstadt from 18 to 21 May, brought together almost 180 scientists from more than 20 countries. During four days the participants discussed novel insights into the complex processes occurring when high-energy ions interact with matter. The program covered basic and applied research including topics such as radiation effects in many different solids, beam-induced material modifications, radiation biology, as well as nanotechnology, atomic physics, and plasma physics with ion beams. At the occasion of his 85th birthday, Professor Kurt Schwartz (GSI) was honored in recognition of his outstanding scientific work and lifetime achievements in radiation physics. The conference is organized by the Materials Research department of GSI.
]]>Aufgrund der gestiegenen Zahl an Beschäftigten besteht bei GSI und FAIR der Bedarf für eine größere Kantine und weitere Büroräume. An den lichtdurchfluteten Kantinenpavillon schließt sich ein viergeschossiger Bürokomplex mit 100 Arbeitsplätzen an. Entworfen wurde das Gebäude vom Büro Muffler Architekten, Tuttlingen gemeinsam mit Kaufer + Passer Ingenieure, die die Ausschreibung für sich entschieden hatten.
Die Zeitkapsel zur Grundsteinlegung wurde mit Geldmünzen, den Grundriss- und Ansichtsplänen, den Reden sowie der aktuellen Tageszeitung befüllt. Sie wurde anschließend im Grundstein versenkt und mit drei symbolischen Hammerschlägen besiegelt.
19.03.2013 | Entscheidung im Architekturwettbewerb für neues Kantinen- und Bürogebäude bei GSI
]]>RI is building the cavities in Bergisch Gladbach on the basis of the technical planning and specification of GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH and is in charge of the development process. Together the 14 cavities literally form the “heart” of the future ring accelerator SIS 100: these components create an accelerator voltage as high as 280,000 volts. This corresponds to ten times the voltage of the existing GSI facility. Ampegon will build the tetrode power amplifiers, which supply the cavities with powerful high-frequency signals, at a German subsidiary in Dortmund. The operating frequency will be between 1100 kHz and 3200 kHz. Depending upon what type of particles scientists are using for their experiments the cycle time is between one and ten seconds – the “heartbeat” behind acceleration.
Particles close to the speed of light
Prior to the acceleration of the particles in the synchrotron the ion beam is compressed to specific lengths using pulses (the bunch), which can be accelerated in the high-frequency field. The particles can be accelerated to such an extent that they orbit the accelerator ring more than 276,000 times a second. This corresponds to about 99.95 per cent of the speed of light.
In order to be able to experiment with the ion beam it is necessary for many experiments to nullify this pulse structure – to “debunch” it. To this end RI is already building the debuncher cavities for the collector ring (CR), likewise with Ampegon PPT, a subsidiary of Switzerland’s Ampegon.
The first of series is expected at the beginning of 2016 and will be tested at GSI. “We are very confident as the cooperation to date has been extremely good. RI is a very diligent company when it comes to implementing the requirements of the specification,” emphasizes Dr. Hans Günter König, the responsible work package leader at GSI, the project manager for the FAIR accelerator facilities. As soon as the tests have been concluded and positively evaluated by experts, the series production can begin. All the other cavities then have to pass the Factory Acceptance Test (FAT). Following delivery and completion, the series devices will be installed and tested at the proposed site – in the accelerator therefore.
]]>Nach einer Besichtigung der Beschleuniger- und Experimentieranlagen konnten sie in Werkstätten, Technologielaboren und Forschungsabteilungen ganz praktische Erfahrung in unterschiedlichen technischen und wissenschaftlichen Arbeitsgebieten sammeln.
Der Girls’Day ist ein bundesweiter Aktionstag. Unternehmen, Betriebe und Hochschulen in ganz Deutschland öffnen ihre Türen für Schülerinnen ab der 5. Klasse. Die Mädchen lernen dort Ausbildungsberufe und Studiengänge in IT, Handwerk, Naturwissenschaften und Technik kennen, in denen Frauen bisher eher selten vertreten sind.
Die selbstgebaute Nebelkammer im Einsatz: Video auf GSI-YouTube-Kanal.
]]>Der „Green IT Cube“ besticht vor allem durch seinen kompakten Aufbau und einer weitgehenden Nutzung von Stahl, was die Kosten für den Hochbau im Vergleich zu einer klassischen Bauweise deutlich senkt. Hinzu kommt ein innovatives Konzept für die Kühl- und Klimatechnik sowie die hocheffiziente IT-Infrastruktur zur Reduzierung des Energieverbrauchs.
Das neue Höchstleistungsrechenzentrum wird nach seiner Fertigstellung Wissenschaftlern aus aller Welt zur Verfügung stehen für die Auswertung ihrer enormen Datenmengen, die sie in Experimenten an GSI und der zukünftigen Beschleunigeranlage FAIR gewinnen. Es ist eine Weiterentwicklung des GSI-Supercomputers L-CSC, der Ende 2014 Energiesparweltmeister wurde.
Symbolisch wurden im Grundstein eine Tageszeitung, eine Gebäudegrafik und die Liste aller Bauarbeiter einbetoniert.
]]>With 272 discovered new nuclides Hans Geissel is the current world record holder in this field. He is professor at the University of Giessen and he also is leading the research conducted at the GSI fragment separator, which was used to measure most of the newly discovered nuclides. Together with his group he designed a new fragment separator (Super-FRS) for the new accelerator facility FAIR.
]]><link en start news detailseite approaching-the-island-of-stability-observation-of-the-superheavy-element-117.htm external-link-new-window external link in new>GSI press release from May 2014 about the synthesis of element 117
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Programm 2015 – Erstes Halbjahr
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Chinese partner institutions of FCIC are Tsinghua University, Beijing, University of Science & Technology of China, Hefei, Shanghai Institute for Applied Physics, Shanghai, and the Institute of Modern Physics, Lanzhou.
]]>More information including timetable: <link en topmenu anreise bahn.htm>
www.gsi.de/en/topmenu/anreise/bahn.htm
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For the charge state 28+, which is standard for acceleration in the UNILAC Alvarez section, a maximum intensity of 7.8 mA was measured at very good beam quality. This substantially exceeds the old record of about 5 mA, achieved in 2007. This became possible thanks to modifications in the gas stripper section. There, the U4+-ions delivered by the MeVVa ion source are stripped of electrons in collisions with a gas target, thus increasing their charge state. So far, a nitrogen gas-jet target was used. In the course of the upgrade program, a pulsed stripper was developed, which allows creating targets of highest density for the duration of the beam passage.
In the current experiments, short gas pulses were injected into the stripper section synchronously to the 0.1 ms long uranium pulses, and the performance of different gases was measured. Hydrogen gas proved to most efficiently ionize uranium to the 28+ charge state. This is in agreement with expectations based on theoretical work, e.g., of Prof. Viatcheslav Shevelko of the P.N. Lebedev Physical Institute at the Russian Academy of Science in Moscow, who spent two months at GSI as a visiting scientist through the guest scientist program of the Helmholtz Institute Mainz.
The experiments were jointly performed by the SHE Chemistry department, which was put in charge of the gas stripper upgrade by the project head of FAIR@GSI, and the project division LINAC&Operations, especially the departments Ion Source and Linac.
Text: Christoph Düllmann, Winfried Barth
for the SHE chemistry department and the project division LINAC&Operations
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Weitere Inforamtionen unter:
]]>Toke Ringbæk wird für seine theoretischen Untersuchungen von Rillen-Filtern, die den Strahl in der Tiefe modulieren, geehrt. Bei der Tumortherapie wird der Ionenstrahl Punkt für Punkt und Schicht für Schicht über den Tumor geführt. Dabei kann es aufgrund des sehr scharfen Dosis-Maximums, dem sogenannten Bragg Peak in der Tiefe zu Inhomogenitäten kommen. Für eine gleichmäßige Bestrahlung wird mithilfe dieser Filter die scharfe Dosiverteilung etwas aufgeweitet. Auf der Basis seiner Erkenntnisse hat er ein neues Design eines 2D-Rillen-Filters entwickelt. Seine Masterarbeit hat er an der Universität Aarhus, Dänemark eingereicht und in enger Kooperation mit dem Universitätsklinikum Gießen und Marburg durchgeführt.
In ihrer Doktorarbeit hat Christin Glowa in Langzeitstudien an Prostata-Tumoren die biologische Wirkung von Bestrahlungen mit Kohlenstoff-Ionen im Vergleich zur konventionellen Photonenbestrahlung untersucht. Bei ihren Experimenten stellte sie fest, dass bei der Kohlenstoff-Therapie die biologischen Faktoren des Gewebes eine deutlich geringere Rolle spielen. Die Ergebnisse tragen zum besseren Verständnis der Wirkungsweise der Strahlentherapie bei und liefern wichtige Hinweise für die Wahl des Therapieverfahrens. Ihre Dissertation reichte sie an der Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg ein.
Kristin Stützer hat im Rahmen ihrer Arbeit das Verfahren zur direkten Kontrolle der Behandlung durch Kohlenstoff-Ionen, die sogenannte PET-Technik erstmals auf bewegte Tumore erweitert. Dazu entwickelte sie einen 4-dimensionalen Algorithmus, mit dem sich die Bewegung des Tumors sicher erfassen lässt. Ihre Dissertation hat sie am Zentrum für Innovationskompetenz für Medizinische Strahlenforschung in der Onkologie – OncoRay an der TU Dresden eingereicht.
Der Verein zur Förderung der Tumortherapie fördert die Aktivitäten im Rahmen des Forschungsprojekts "Tumortherapie mit schweren Ionen" bei GSI mit dem Ziel, durch Weiterentwicklung des Systems die Behandlung von Tumoren zu verbessern und der allgemeinen Patientenversorgung zur Verfügung zu stellen. An der GSI-Beschleunigeranlage wurden seit 1997 über 400 Patienten mit Tumoren, in der Regel in der Schädelbasis, mit Ionenstrahlen behandelt. Die Heilungsraten dieser Methode liegen bei über 90 Prozent und die Nebenwirkungen sind sehr gering. Am Heidelberger Ionenstrahl-Therapiezentrum (HIT) werden Patienten mittlerweile routinemäßig mit schweren Ionen behandelt.
]]>An Experimentiersets untersuchen sie selbständig die Bausteine des Atoms und verschiedene Aspekte von radioaktiver Strahlung. Sie lernen Anwendungen von Radioaktivität in Medizin, Technik und Forschung kennen. Auf dem anschließenden Rundgang durch die GSI-Anlagen sehen die Schüler an ausgewählten Forschungsstationen die Messtechniken, mit denen sie selbst experimentiert haben, im großen Maßstab im Einsatz für die Grundlagenforschung wieder.
Darüber hinaus lernen sie am heutigen Helmholtz-Tag die vielseitige Forschung und die zahlreichen Errungenschaften von Hermann von Helmholtz kennen. Der gebürtige Potsdamer erforschte zum Beispiel Phänomene der Optik, Akustik, Geologie, Meteorologie und Wärmelehre. Sein erster großer Erfolg war der von ihm entwickelte Augenspiegel zur Untersuchung der Netzhaut, der noch heute im Einsatz ist. Seine allgemeine Ausführung des Energieerhaltungssatzes ist fester Bestandteil des heutigen Physikunterrichts.
Die 30 Helmholtz-Schülerlabore betreuen jährlich etwa 65.000 Schüler und vermitteln ihnen durch eigenes Experimentieren einen Eindruck vom Ausüben eines wissenschaftlichen Berufs. Darüber hinaus bieten die Schülerlabore auch Fortbildungen für mehr als 2.000 Lehrer an.
]]>Ursula Weyrich is moving to FAIR and GSI from the German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases at the Helmholtz Association (DZNE) in Bonn, where she has been active as an administrative board member since 2009.
Ursula Weyrich studied administrative and industrial management and law in Wiesbaden, Mainz and Clermont-Ferrand in France, completing her legal training in 1998 with the bar examination. She initially worked as a lawyer, focusing on labor, corporate and tax law, before moving to Germany’s Federal Ministry for Education and Research (BMBF) as policy officer. There she was responsible, among other things, for the merger of the GMD Research Center Information Technology with the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft. After a period as the personal assistant to the permanent secretary at the BMBF, in 2006 she became the BMBF head of division, and thus responsible for the Helmholtz Centers in Jülich and Karlsruhe, the Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics (IPP), and for nuclear research. Part of her responsibilities also included accompanying the merger of the University of Karlsruhe with the Research Center Karlsruhe to form the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT). Ursula Weyrich is married and has two children.
]]>Please understand that because of the limited edition you can only request a maximum of three calendars (while supplies last) per order.
]]>Mit der GSI-Beschleunigeranlage wird schon seit den 1970er Jahren mit dem Linearbeschleuniger UNILAC und seit den 1990er Jahren mit dem Ringbeschleuniger SIS18 experimentiert. Die Ionen werden in Pakete verpackt durch die Beschleunigeranlage geschickt. Im GSI-Ringbeschleuniger konnten bisher maximal einige Milliarden Uran-Ionen pro Paket beschleunigt werden. Für die im Bau befindliche Anlage FAIR, Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research, müssen es aber etwa eine halbe Billionen werden. Wissenschaftler suchen jetzt nach Möglichkeiten, die bestehende Anlage so umzubauen, dass sie so viele Ionen aufnehmen kann – Grundlagenforschung auf Maschinenebene also.
Ein Ansatzpunkt ist der Übergang vom Linearbeschleuniger zum Ringbeschleuniger. Die Öffnung zum Ringbeschleuniger ist schmal und hoch. Linearbeschleuniger liefern jedoch generell quadratische Pakete. Daher wurde das Paket aus dem UNILAC bisher beim Übergang in den Ringbeschleuniger einfach an den Seiten beschnitten. Dadurch ging aber ein Teil der Ionen verloren und die Intensität wurde geringer. Gleichzeitig blieb nach oben Platz im Ringbeschleuniger ungenutzt.
Um dieses Potential zu nutzen, hat die GSI-Abteilung LINAC (engl. linear accelerator) im Transferkanal, also dem Übergang vom Linear- zum Ringbeschleuniger, das EMTEX-Setup aufgebaut. Mithilfe von Magneten formt es die Pakete um. „Eine solche Umformung ist bei einem Ionen-LINAC noch nie vorgeschlagen, geschweige denn erreicht worden“, sagt Lars Groening von der LINAC-Abteilung. Er erklärt, wie das Konzept funktioniert: „Anstatt wie bisher Ionen seitlich des Pakets einfach abzuschneiden, strecken wir die Pakete nach oben, um den Platz im Ring auszunutzen. Gleichzeitig stauchen wir die Pakete seitlich zusammen. So bleibt die Dichte der Ionen konstant. Das ist entscheidend, denn Ionen lassen sich nie dichter packen als sie zu Beginn erzeugt wurden.“ Das Stauchen und Strecken der Pakete klingt zunächst einfach. Tatsächlich geschieht es aber in vier Dimensionen. Neben den Ortsangaben Breite und Höhe spielen auch die Geschwindigkeiten der Ionen nach rechts, links, oben und unten eine Rolle. „Die vertikale Fläche, die ein Teilchenstrahl im Phasenraum ausfüllt (Emittanz) soll etwa dreimal größer sein als die horizontale“, sagt Groening. In zwei Strahlzeitperioden wurde das neue Konzept jetzt zunächst mit leichten Ionen bei niedriger Intensität getestet.
„Die Experimente haben sehr gut funktioniert und decken sich mit den Ergebnissen von Simulationen. Wir wissen jetzt also, dass die Idee prinzipiell funktioniert. Im nächsten Schritt entwickeln wir den Aufbau weiter, sodass die Umformung auch mit schweren Ionen bei hohen Intensität funktioniert.“ Für diese Weiterentwicklung wurde das Projekt gerade vom Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung verlängert. Ob und in welcher Form EMTEX bei FAIR zum Einsatz kommen wird, ist noch nicht endgültig beschlossen. Doch nur mithilfe von Grundlagenforschung im Bereich der Beschleunigerphysik, lassen sich die hohen Intensitäten für FAIR erreichen. „Die Wissenschaftscommunity hat großes Interesse an diesem Experiment“, ergänzt Groening. „Auch an anderen Ionen-Beschleunigern könnte EMTEX zum Einsatz kommen.“
]]>Press release of TU Darmstadt (German only)
Download "target" – Issue 12, September 2014 (PDF, 5,7 MB, German only)
The cancer therapy with carbon ions is the result of many years of research at GSI. With the GSI accelerator facility more than 440 patients with tumors in the head or neck region got successfully treated between 1997 and 2008. Thereupon the first ion beam therapy facility was constructed in Heidelberg in cooperation with GSI. This facility is in operation since 2009. Now the therapy will benefit patients at a second location.
Einem Atom seine ganze Hülle aus Elektronen abzustreifen und es zu einem "nackten" Ion zu machen, ist ganz schön schwierig. Gerade die Elektronen, die sich nahe am Kern befinden, sind sehr stark an ihn gebunden. In der GSI-Beschleunigeranlage gelingt es den Forschern nur, indem sie die Ionen auf hohe Geschwindigkeit bringen und mehrfach durch dünne Folien oder Gase hindurchschießen, in denen die Elektronen abgerissen werden. Diesen Vorgang nennt man "Strippen" (engl. Abstreifen).
Bei diesen hohen Energien können die Forscher allerdings nicht alle Eigenschaften der Ionen untersuchen. Besonders Einflüsse des starken elektrischen Felds, das der positiv geladene Atomkern um sich hat, lassen sich genauer studieren, wenn der Kern langsam ist oder fast stillsteht. Um von der hohen Geschwindigkeit kontrolliert abzubremsen, haben die Forscher in den vergangenen Jahren die HITRAP-Anlage gebaut. Sie besteht aus zwei Linearbeschleunigerstrukturen und einer angeschlossenen Ionenfalle. Nun gelang ein vollständiger Abbremsvorgang mit den Beschleunigerkomponenten.
"In den aktuellen Experimenten gelang es, Stickstoff-Atomkerne mit den GSI-Beschleunigern auf 30 Megaelektronenvolt pro Nukleon zu beschleunigen, sie komplett zu strippen, im Speicherring ESR auf vier Megaelektronenvolt pro Nukleon abzubremsen und zu kühlen und sie dann, erstmals, mit HITRAP noch weiter auf sechs Kiloelektronenvolt pro Nukleon abzubremsen. Das ist nur noch ein Zehntausendstel der ursprünglichen Energie", erklärt Dr. Frank Herfurth, der Leiter des HITRAP-Projekts. "Mehrere Schritte sind nötig, um das zu erreichen: Aus dem ESR kommt der Ionenstrahl als langes Paket. Ein Buncher, der erste Baustein von HITRAP, schiebt die Ionen zu mehreren kurzen Paketen zusammen, damit sie in den beiden folgenden Linearbeschleunigern richtig abgebremst werden können. Die Funktion ist ähnlich wie beim Beschleunigen, nur dass man die Geräte invers benutzt – statt schneller zu machen, entschleunigt dieser Beschleuniger."
Die HITRAP-Anlage ist weltweit einzigartig als Apparatur zur Abbremsung von hochgeladenen Ionen. Eine Errichtungszeit von rund zehn Jahren war nötig, um die Apparatur zu konstruieren, zu bauen und anzupassen. Herausforderungen beim Aufbau der Anlage waren die geringen Intensitäten und Wiederholraten der Ionenpakete aufgrund der Grenzen der ESR-Aufnahmekapazität und des Zeitaufwands für die Kühlung. (nur ca. fünf Millionen Ionen alle 30 Sekunden, gegenüber ca. zehn Billionen Ionen 50-mal pro Sekunde am GSI-Linearbeschleuniger). Dies machte eine Verbesserung und teilweise Neukonstruktion der Diagnose nötig. Auch funktioniert der Abbremsvorgang nicht bei allen Ionen gleich gut, so dass einige mit hoher Geschwindigkeit geradeaus durch die Apparatur geleitet werden. Die Diagnose muss zwischen diesen unerwünschten und den korrekt gebremsten Ionen unterscheiden können. Des Weiteren weitet sich der Strahl beim Abbremsen stark auf – ein Effekt, auf den die Stahlführungskomponenten abgestimmt sein müssen.
Konzipiert wurde die Anlage, um schwere Uran-Ionen von Anfangsenergien bis zu 400 Megaelektronenvolt pro Nukleon abbremsen. Eine angeschlossene Ionenfalle, die sich momentan im Aufbau befindet, wird die Ionen einfangen, weiter abkühlen und damit für Präzisionsexperimente verfügbar machen. In diesen wird das starke elektrische Feld des hochgeladenen Kerns in Wechselwirkung mit einzelnen Elektronen oder mit einer Oberfläche, beispielsweise einem Silizium-Gitter, erforscht. Solche starken Felder wie in der Umgebung eines Urankerns sind anders nicht im Labor herstellbar. Sie erlauben es die Grenzen physikalischer Theorien, insbesondere der Quantenelektrodynamik, auszutesten. Dazu möchten die Forscher zum Beispiel die Eigenschaften eines einzelnen Elektrons im Feld eines Urankerns präzise vermessen.
HITRAP ist ein Teil der FAIR-Beschleunigeranlage, die zurzeit in internationaler Zusammenarbeit aufgebaut und an die bestehende GSI-Anlage angeschlossen wird. Es soll auch dort hochgeladene Ionen und zusätzlich die dann verfügbaren Antiprotonen abbremsen und neuartige Präzisionsexperimente ermöglichen. Initiiert in der GSI-Forschungsabteilung Atomphysik, wurde HITRAP gemeinsam mit der GSI-Projektabteilung Decelerators in Kooperation mit der Goethe-Universität Frankfurt gebaut. Wesentlich für den Erfolg war die dauerhafte Unterstützung der Linearbeschleunigerexperten im Beschleunigerbereich und der GSI-Fachabteilungen. Ein europäisches Netzwerk markierte den Startpunkt des Experimentierprogramms, an dem die GSI-Atomphysik, die Technische Universität Darmstadt, die Universität Mainz, das Max-Planck-Institut für Kernphysik sowie die Universität Heidelberg, die Universität Münster, das Kernfysisch Versneller Instituut in Groningen und das Imperial College London beteiligt sind.
]]>Chemical experiments with superheavy elements – with atomic number beyond 104 – are most challenging: First, the very element to be studied has to be artificially created using a particle accelerator. Maximum production rates are on the order of a few atoms per day at most, and are even less for the heavier ones. Second, the atoms decay quickly through radioactive processes – in the present case within about 10 seconds, adding to the experiment's complexity. A strong motivation for such demanding studies is that the very many positively charged protons inside the atomic nuclei accelerate electrons in the atom's shells to very high velocities – about 80 percent of the speed of light. According to Einstein's theory of relativity, the electrons become heavier than they are at rest. Consequently, their orbits may differ from those of corresponding electrons in lighter elements, where the electrons are much slower. Such effects are expected to be best seen by comparing properties of so-called homologue elements, which have a similar structure in their electronic shell and stand in the same group in the periodic table. This way, fundamental underpinnings of the periodic table of the elements – the standard elemental ordering scheme for chemists all around the world – can be probed.
Chemical studies with superheavy elements often focus on compounds, which are gaseous already at comparatively low temperatures. This allows their rapid transport in the gas phase, benefitting a fast process as needed in light of the short lifetimes. To date, compounds containing halogens and oxygen have often been selected; as an example, seaborgium was studied previously in a compound with two chlorine and two oxygen atoms – a very stable compound with high volatility. However, in such compounds, all of the outermost electrons are occupied in covalent chemical bonds, which may mask relativistic effects. The search for more advanced systems, involving compounds with different bonding properties that exhibit effects of relativity more clearly, continued for many years.
In the preparation for the current work, the superheavy element chemistry groups at the Institute for Nuclear Chemistry at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU), the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM), and the GSI Helmholtz Center for Heavy Ion Research (GSI) in Darmstadt together with Swiss colleagues from the Paul Scherrer Institute, Villigen, and the University of Berne developed a new approach, which promised to allow chemical studies with single, short-lived atoms also for compounds which were less stable. Initial tests were carried out at the TRIGA Mainz research reactor and were shown to work exceptionally well with short-lived atoms of molybdenum. The method was elaborated at Berne University and in accelerator experiments at GSI. Dr. Alexander Yakushev from the GSI team explains: "A big challenge in such experiments is the intense accelerator beam, which destroys even moderately stable chemical compounds. To overcome this problem, we first sent tungsten, the heavier neighbor of molybdenum, through a magnetic separator and separated it from the beam. Chemical experiments were then performed behind the separator, where conditions are ideal to study also new compound classes." The focus was on the formation of hexacarbonyl complexes. Theoretical studies starting in the 1990s predicted these to be rather stable. Seaborgium is bound to six carbon monoxide molecules through metal-carbon bonds, in a way typical of organometallic compounds, many of which exhibit the desired electronic bond situation the superheavy element chemists were dreaming of for long.
The Superheavy Element Group at the RNC in Wako, Japan optimized the seaborgium production in the fusion process of a neon beam (element 10) with a curium target (element 96) and isolated it in the GAs-filled Recoil Ion Separator (GARIS). Dr. Hiromitsu Haba, team leader at RIKEN, explains: "In the conventional technique for producing superheavy elements, large amounts of byproducts often disturb the detection of single atoms of superheavy elements such as seaborgium. Using the GARIS separator, we were able at last to catch the signals of seaborgium and evaluate its production rates and decay properties. With GARIS, seaborgium became ready for next-generation chemical studies."
In 2013, the two groups teamed up, together with colleagues from Switzerland, Japan, the United States, and China, to study whether they could synthesize a superheavy element compound like seaborgium hexacarbonyl. In two weeks of round-the-clock experiments, with the German chemistry setup coupled to the Japanese GARIS separator, 18 seaborgium atoms were detected. The gaseous properties as well as the adsorption on a silicon dioxide surface were studied and found to be similar to those of the corresponding hexacarbonyls of the homologs molybdenum and tungsten – very characteristic compounds of the group-6 elements in the periodic table – adding proof to the identity of the seaborgium hexacarbonyl. The measured properties were in agreement with theoretical calculations, in which the effects of relativity were included.
Dr. Hideto En'yo, the director of RNC says: "This breakthrough experiment could not have succeeded without the powerful and tight collaboration between fourteen institutes around the world." Prof. Frank Maas, the director of the HIM, says "The experiment represents a milestone in chemical studies of superheavy elements, showing that many advanced compounds are within reach of experimental investigation. The perspectives that this opens up for gaining more insight into the nature of chemical bonds, not only in superheavy elements, are fascinating".
Following this first successful step along the path to more detailed studies of the superheavy elements, the team already has plans for further studies of yet other compounds, and with even heavier elements than seaborgium. Soon, Einstein may have to show the deck in his hand with which he twists the chemical properties of elements at the end of the periodic table.
Publication: Science, September 19, 2014
DOI: 10.1126/science.1255720
Michael Block studied physics at the Johannes Gutenberg University until 1997. After that he did his PhD and then came to the GSI „Atomic Physics" department as postdoc. There he became project leader of the SHIPTRAP experiment. After a two year research stay in the USA he returned to GSI and became deputy head of the „Superheavy Elements Physics" at GSI. He participates in measuring programs at the University Mainz, the Helmholtz Institute Mainz and at several GSI experiments.
]]>Christain Graeff is head of „Medical Physics“ within the GSI biophysics department. He developped a new method to include the motions of the tumour caused by breathing in ion beam therapy by using four-dimensional CAT scans. The Behnken Berger foundation gives three promotion prizes to young academics every year. The first prize, endowed with 15,000 euro was given to Dr. Karl Zeil of the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf. The third prize, endowed with 5,000 euro, was given to Dr. Sonja Katayama from the department Radio Oncology and Therapy at the university medical center Heidelberg. All laureates were awarded for outstanding scientific contributions in radiology.
The Behnken Berger foundation goes back to Hermann Behnken and his wife Traute Behnken-Berger. Hermann Behnken belonged to the leading pioneers of radiology in Germany. The foundation promotes science and research in radiation protection focussing on the promotion of young scientists.
Die ESA-Sonde "Rosetta" hat nach ihrer zehnjährigen Reise durchs All den Zielkometen Churyumov-Gerasimenko im Sommer erreicht. Aktuell ist sie dabei, ihn zu vermessen und zu charakterisieren, unter anderem, um eine Landezone ausfindig zu machen. Im November 2014 soll dann ein Landefahrzeug auf der Oberfläche abgesetzt werden. Ferri, der die Leitung des Missionssteuerungszentrums ESOC in Darmstadt inne hat, wird über den Missionsverlauf und die neuesten Ergebnisse berichten.
Die Vortragsreihe "Wissenschaft für Alle" richtet sich an alle an aktueller Wissenschaft und Forschung interessierten Personen. In der Regel einmal pro Monat findet jeweils an einem Mittwoch in der Monatsmitte ein Vortrag aus der Reihe statt.
Die Themen decken ein großes wissenschaftliches Spektrum ab – nicht nur über die Forschung an GSI und FAIR wird berichtet, sondern generell über aktuelle Themen aus Physik, Chemie, Biologie, Medizin und Informatik. Ziel der Reihe ist es, die wissenschaftlichen Vorgänge für den Laien verständlich aufzubereiten und darzustellen, um so die Forschung einem breiten Publikum zugänglich zu machen. Die Vorträge werden von sowohl GSI-internen als auch externen Rednern aus Universitäten und anderen Instituten gehalten.
Alle Vorträge finden im Hörsaal des GSI Helmholtzzentrums für Schwerionenforschung, Planckstraße 1, 64291 Darmstadt, statt. Beginn ist jeweils um 14 Uhr. Der Eintritt ist frei, eine Anmeldung ist nicht erforderlich. Externe Teilnehmer werden gebeten, für den Einlass an unserer Pforte ein Ausweisdokument bereitzuhalten.
Weitere Informationen und aktuelle Ankündigungen finden Sie auf unserer Webseite www-dev.gsi.de/wfa.
Apart from GSI 13 partners from Germany, France, Switzerland and the USA collaborate in NAVI. NAVI establishes a synergetic and close co-operation between experimental and theoretical nuclear physics, astrophysics and astronomy. The goal is to answer fundamental questions of nuclear astrophysics like the hydrostatical burning in stars and the synthesis of superheavy elements in the universe via the r-process. At the experimental sites of the partners the scientists are able to do research on the properties of the nuclei involved in the r-process.
]]>In a guided tour Rousset visited the main control room and the facility for tumor treatments with heavy ions. He was impressed by the GSI research and commented positively on keeping and enhancing the cooperation between his region and GSI.
GSI collaborates with Aquitaine in the areas of laser and plasma physics as well as biophysics and materials research. A long cooperation exists with the university in Bordeaux: French scientists supported the construction of GSI's PHELIX laser system with components and expertise and are involved in the current experimental program. Also the research center CENBG in Bordeaux-Gradignan conducts experiments about laser excitation of atomic nuclei. Another example is the Microbeam facility. Scientists study DNA repair mechanisms by accelerating single ions onto cell nuclei. Scientific exchange with a comparable facility in Bordeaux exists.
]]>Further funded projects are "ELiSE – Marine plankton provide models for light structure engineering" of the Alfred-Wegener-Institut (AWI), "Commercializing DESY detectors – commercial distribution of technologically advanced X-ray cameras" of DESY and "Sunbelt Energy Technologies – solar tower system with integrated energy storage system for the production of electricity and heat for industrial high-temperature processes" of Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt (DLR). This brings the total number of Helmholtz centre spin-offs funded by the Association through its Initiative and Networking Fund to 86 since 2005. The Helmholtz Enterprise funding programme supports spin-offs during the critical start-up phase, helping research findings to be applied rapidly for the benefit of society and the economy.
]]>The matches were played in two half-times of ten minutes duration. Seven players per team including the goalkeeper participated in each match. Each team had to have one woman permanently on the field. In total five matches were played by every team during the tournament.
The winners were the "Heavy Lions" in front of the "Fiery Rings" on second and the "Unified Field Heroes" on third places. The Summer Students achieved the fourth place. Stephan Kipp of the "Heavy Lions" was chosen as the best goalkeeper of GSI Football Cup 2014.
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In his opening speech organizer and PhD student representative Pradeep Ghosh explained the spirit of the PhD science day, afterwards GSI research director Professor Karlheinz Langanke talked about the research conducted at GSI. The scientific coordinator Dr. Gerhard Burau of the Helmholtz Graduate School HGS-HIRe, the organization hosting all GSI and FAIR PhD students, gave a few words of motivation. And Dr. Inti Lehmann, deputy research director of FAIR, spoke about the FAIR plans and the future perspectives. Then alumni were available for the participants to exchange information and give career recommendations.
In the final poster session the participating PhD students presented their fields of research in 26 posters. The summer students voted for the two best posters, which were honored with a certificate and a GSI bag. The winners were Claudia Behnke (HADES) and Oliver Deppert (plasma physics).
]]>„Die Errichtung eines Helmholtz-Instituts auf dem Mainzer Universitätscampus bedeutet eine nachhaltige Stärkung unserer Spitzenforschung in der Kernphysik und der Kernchemie insbesondere auch in Kooperation mit dem GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt“, erklärte der Präsident der Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz, Prof. Georg Krausch, „was zur weiteren Schärfung unseres Forschungsprofils – national und international – beiträgt. So ist das Helmholtz-Institut Mainz auch ein starker strategischer Partner in dem Exzellenzcluster PRISMA der Universität.“
„Das Helmholtz-Institut Mainz vereint das Beste zweier Welten: die intellektuelle Stärke einer Forschungsuniversität und die technischen Möglichkeiten eines nationalen Forschungszentrums“, erklärt der geschäftsführende Direktor des Helmholtz-Instituts Mainz, Univ.-Prof. Dr. Frank Maas. „FAIR ist weltweit eines der größten Forschungsvorhaben in der physikalischen Grundlagenforschung. Die Beschleunigeranlage wird Antiprotonen- und Ionenstrahlen mit bisher unerreichter Intensität und Qualität liefern und damit eine nie dagewesene Vielfalt an Experimenten ermöglichen, von denen sich die Forscher neue Einblicke in den Aufbau der Materie und die Entwicklung des Universums vom Urknall bis heute versprechen. Ziel ist es, die Reaktionen von Antimaterie besser zu verstehen und damit die Struktur der uns umgebenden Materie zu erforschen. Der Neubau mit hochspezialisierten Laborräumen, High Performance Computing und einem Großtechnikum schafft hierzu eine exzellente Infrastruktur.“
Der Geschäftsführer des Landesbetriebs Liegenschafts- und Baubetreuung (LBB) Holger Basten sagte: „Die gewerkeweise Vergabe der Bauleistungen durch den Landesbetrieb Liegenschafts- und Baubetreuung ermöglicht bei diesem Projekt, ein technisch sehr anspruchsvolles Gebäude in kürzester Zeit zu realisieren. Gleichzeitig ist dieses Verfahren natürlich mittelstandsfördernd.“
Das Helmholtz-Institut Mainz (HIM) ist ein Forschungsinstitut auf dem Gebiet der Kern-, Teilchen- und Atom- sowie der Beschleunigerphysik. 2009 gegründet gilt es als das erste seiner Art. Es besteht aus einer Außenstelle eines Helmholtzzentrums und einer deutschen Universität. Die Idee zur Gründung des HIMs war es, die herausragende Kompetenz der experimentellen und theoretischen Gruppen der JGU auf dem Gebiet der Kern-, Teilchen- und Beschleunigerphysik mit der weltweit einzigartigen Beschleunigeranlage der nationalen Großforschungseinrichtung der GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH in Darmstadt noch enger und dauerhaft zu verzahnen.
2012 hat der Deutsche Wissenschaftsrat die nationale und wissenschaftliche Exzellenz des HIMs durch die Förderzusage eines Forschungsbaus bestätigt. Der Forschungsbau, geplante Fertigstellung Spätsommer 2015, wird den sechs interdisziplinär aufgestellten Forschungssektionen ein kooperationsförderndes Umfeld bereitstellen. Der Forschungsbau wird hälftig vom Bund und dem Land Rheinland-Pfalz getragen und umfasst neben Büro- und Konferenzräumen hochspezialisierte Laborräume, High Performance Computing und ein Großtechnikum für die Montage von Beschleunigerkomponenten und Detektoren.
Das präzise Verständnis der starken Wechselwirkung im Standardmodell der Physik ist das gemeinsame Forschungsziel der sechs Sektionen des Helmholtz-Instituts Mainz. Die Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftler des HIM sind maßgeblich mit an der Entwicklung und dem Aufbau der internationalen Beschleunigeranlage FAIR („Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research“) in Darmstadt beteiligt. Dort werden einzigartige Möglichkeiten für Präzisionsexperimente geschaffen.
Das Helmholtz-Institut Mainz wird zum einen Teil von Bund und Land finanziert, wobei der Bund 90 Prozent der laufenden Kosten, Rheinland-Pfalz die verbleibenden zehn Prozent trägt. Die Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz bringt in etwa gleicher Größenordnung technische Infrastruktur, wissenschaftliches und technisches Personal sowie Overheadmittel wie Energiekosten ein. Das Institut verfügt dadurch über einen jährlichen Etat von insgesamt rund zehn Millionen Euro.
]]>Three meters long, 2,50 meters high and broad – this is how big the completed detector NeuLAND is going to be. It consists of 3000 measuring instruments, so-called scintillator made of plastic bars. They produce light as soon as a neutron passes through them and interacts with the scintillator. It gets transformed into an electrical signal which delivers information on the neutron to the scientists.
The neutrons originate from a fragmentation reaction: When accelerated neutron rich nuclei hit a foil, they get excited and emit one or several neutrons. Researchers want to measure these neutrons and very precisely register the number of neutrons passing through the detector. This reveals information on neutron rich nuclei which play an important role in the natural formation of elements like gold or lead in supernovae, huge stellar explosions. It is planned to produce these nuclei at the future particle accelerator facility FAIR. Apart from that scientists are especially interested in exotic systems which almost only consist of neutrons and have to be artificially produced. They only exist for a very short period of time. When they decay the motion of the neutrons provides information on their specific properties.
To measure neutrons is a special challenge for physicists. They are neutral, as their name indicates, and therefore not electrcally charged. Thus they hardly interact with matter. Almost unnoticed they scurry through the measuring instruments. „This is why the NeuLAND cube is so big“, Dr. Konstanze Boretzky, head of the NeuLAND working group, explains. „The farther the distance the neutrons have to cover the more likely they reveal themselves. When they pass NeuLAND they emit their energy completely. Beside the time of their impact this amount of energy is an important information“, Boretzky explains. „From measuring the neutrons we want to deduce the original neutron rich nucleus which decayed in a nuclear reaction. This is why we have to know if several neutrons hit the detector close together. This is only possible if we measure their energy and correlate it with the hits.“
Currently the fifth NeuLAND double plane is under construction at GSI. In September one fifth is supposed to be tested in the GSI beam. Until 2017 all 30 double planes should be completed.
NeuLAND is built under the technical supervision of the GSI project area Rare Isotope Beams within the FAIR@GSI project and the NUSTAR collaboration. The experiment will be part of the high energy branch of the Super Fragment Separator at the new particle accelerator facility FAIR. Next to GSI the following institutes were significantly involved in NeuLANDs construction: Technische Universität Darmstadt, University of Cologne, Goethe University in Frankfurt and Petersburg Nuclear Physics Institute.
]]>Beam time – this is what the experimenting time with the ion beam from the particle accelerator is called. Beam time for scientists often means: spending days and nights at the experimental site, working in the laboratoy being pressed for time and crossing fingers to make sure the measuring instruments and the ion beam run perfectly. But there are also times of big delight when the experiment was successful, there is eating pizza together and seeing colleagues again who come from all over the world for an experiment. Employees of the public relations departement will accompany the teams from biophysics, materials science or nuclear physics during beam time and report in a diary.
The articles and photos will be published on the GSI blog „Beam On“, which is online since July 21, 2014. The blog is supposed to allow a glance behind the scenes of GSI research for externals. Beam On is hosted on the Helmholtz Association's blog and provides subscription by RSS feed. A blog is an ongoing collection of articles in chronolgical order. Comments and questions are welcome.
At the beginning of June Haseitl, who works at the GSI department Beam diagnostics and is a comitted photographer in his free time, called GSI and FAIR employees to submit photos for an internal contest. Only condition: The photo had to be self-made and taken on the GSI or FAIR site.
After a two week exhibition of all photos, the audience award and the places 1 to 3 were announced:
The audience chose the picture of Rainer Haseitl, „The silence before
the lethargy“ for the audience award.
The jury categorized the pictures into nature & landscape, technics & science and creativity & humour. „There will be a photography contest in 2015“, Haseitl says. „The details will be published in time.“
]]>At HADES (High-Acceptance Di-Electron Spectrometer) scientists analyse the collisions of accelerated particles onto a target material. They are especially interested in so called pions. They belong to the group of mesons, consisting of a quark and an antiquark. As they don't naturally occur on earth, but only in space, they have to be produced artificially. For that purpose the scientists accelerate nitrogen with the GSI accelerators and collide it with long rods of beryllium. In the passage pions are produced and can be sorted and focused with magnets. Thanks to the upgrade of the GSI ring accelerator for FAIR pions can now be produced in large numbers for the experiments. Inside the HADES setup they are collided with other particles to produce even rarer exotic particles.
"The momentum of the pions is crucial in this collision", explains professor Laura Fabbietti from the Technical University Munich, who built up the CERBEROS system. "We have to determine the momentum with a precision of one per mill. This is why we have developed CERBEROS. It has three heads, like the hellhound. And it's positioned before HADES, so we chose the name." The three heads of the system are three detector components at different places: a diamond counter and two semiconductor detectors made from silicium, one at the pion production and one at the HADES setup.
The electronics connected to the semiconductor detectors is something special. Usually a detector requires an external signal to tell when an interesting event takes place and it should start the measurements. This is called "triggering". A novel microchip called n-XYTER built into CERBEROS is able to trigger itself. It decides wether an event is relevant or uninteresting and only measures the important events. It is combined with the readout electronics TRB3, which is very fast and precise. The diamond counter consists of an area of approximately 200 square millimeters and nine monocrystalline diamonds, which are very difficult to produce. All components have been developed by researches from GSI's detector laboratory and experiment electronics departments in cooperation with different universities.
It took three years to assemble CERBEROS. In Mai 2014 the system was ready and commissioned in a beamtime at the GSI accelerator. The successful measurements are now continued in the current experiments in July and August. As the concept of self-triggering readout electronics in not limited to the measurement of pions, but very flexible, parts of the system will also be used at the future international FAIR facility, e. g. in the experiments with antiprotons PANDA and with compressed nuclear matter CBM. FAIR is currently under construction and will be connected to the existing GSI accelerators. Also research facilities in Russia and Japan have already signaled their interest in the system.
]]>„Our Mission is to assist in the worldwide development of physics, to foster international cooperation in physics, and to help in the application of physics toward solving problems of concern to humanity”, it says on the IUPAP’s website. This target they pursue by sponsoring suitable international meetings and assisting in organising committees. Furthermore they foster free circulation of scientists and the preparation and the publication of abstracts of papers.
Among other things IUPAP together with its sister organisation in chemistry IUPAC (International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry) is responsible to acknowledge the discovery of a new element and to appoint the discoverers. This allowed GSI to name six new elements of the periodic system of the element after IUPAP and IUPAC rated the confirmations of other laboratories as sufficient.
In their annual meetings the participants discuss the newest developments in physics and compile the main research focuses for the next 10 to 20 years. Particpants report from Asia, Latin America, Europe, Canada and the USA. In this way they keep an overview of research activities at existing facilities and of progress at facilities under construction. In this context they visited the construction site of the new particle accelerator facility FAIR, whose main shareholder is GSI.
IUPAP is a non-governmental organisation which is financed by the contribution of their members, who are delegated by national institutes and research communities.
Braun-Munzinger leitete die bei GSI existierende ALICE-Abteilung in den Jahren von 1996 bis 2011. GSI hat von Anfang an eine führende Rolle beim Bau und beim wissenschaftlichen Programm von ALICE gespielt, zusammen mit den Universitäten Darmstadt, Frankfurt, Heidelberg und Münster und den Fachhochschulen Köln und Worms. Deutsche Forscher sind bei drei zentralen ALICE-Projekten engagiert: der Zeitprojektionskammer, dem Übergangstrahlungsdetektor sowie dem sogenannten "High Level Trigger", einem neuartiger Hochleistungsrechner, der innerhalb von Bruchteilen von Sekunden die ungeheuren Datenmengen jedes ALICE-Ereignisses analysieren kann.
Der Lise-Meitner-Preis wird seit dem Jahr 2000 alle zwei Jahre von der Europäischen Physikalischen Gesellschaft verliehen. Er ist nach der Kernphysikerin Lise Meitner benannt, die unter anderem die erste physikalisch-theoretische Erklärung der Kernspaltung veröffentlichte. Er soll die Breite und Stärke der Kernphysik in Europa darstellen und wird an Wissenschaftler aus dem europäischen Raum verliehen.
Informationen zum Lise-Meitner-Preis bei der Europäischen Physikalischen Gesellschaft
]]>Eine kleine Kugel schießt, von einer Feder angetrieben, eine Röhre bergauf. Sie trifft auf eine große Kugel und bleibt magnetisch an ihr haften. Das Fusionsspiel verdeutlicht das Prinzip, nach dem Wissenschaftler mit dem GSI-Teilchenbeschleuniger neue Elemente herstellen. In der Forschung und bei dem Fusionsspiel ist es nicht einfach, die richtige Energie zu treffen. Ist die Kugel zu langsam, überwindet sie die Steigung nicht, ist sie zu schnell, schießt sie an der großen Kugel vorbei. Doch über 60 Besuchern gelang es, ein neues Elemente zu erzeugen, das sie anschließend auch symbolisch taufen durften. So wie der Entdecker des Elements „Darmstadtium“, Sigurd Hofmann, der als „bekennender Heiner“ vor Ort war und Fragen beantwortete.
Neben dem Spiel, interessierten sich die Besucher vor allem für die Fortschritte auf der FAIR-Baustelle und die neuen Entwicklungen bei der Krebstherapie mit schweren Ionen.
Dr. Mohammad Shahab Sanjari entwickelte für seine Doktorarbeit "Resonant pickups for non-destructive single-particle detection in heavy ion storage rings and first experiments" (dt. Resonante Messgeber für zerstörungsfreie Detektion einzelner Teilchen in Schwerionenspeicherringen und erste Experimente) an der Goethe-Universität in Frankfurt ein neuartiges, nicht-destruktives Detektorsystem für Experimente mit gespeicherten Ionen und setzte es in ersten Experimenten am GSI-Speicherring ESR erfolgreich ein. Das neue System zeichnet sich durch eine extrem hohe Empfindlichkeit aus, die es erlaubt, die Umlauffrequenzen einzelner Ionen zu messen und dynamische Prozesse zu untersuchen. Aufgrund der exzellenten Nachweissensitivität wurde der Detektor bereits als Standarddiagnoseelement im ESR implementiert. Ein Einsatz an den Speicherringen der im Bau befindlichen Beschleunigeranlage FAIR ist ebenfalls geplant.
Nathalie Benedikt gratulierte dem Preisträger und sagte: „Es ist für Pfeiffer Vacuum sehr wichtig die Spitzenforschung und insbesondere den Nachwuchs zu fördern.“ Der GSI-Doktorandenpreis wurde in diesem Jahr erstmals für die beste Doktorarbeit des Jahres 2013 auf einem Gebiet der Forschung und technologischen Entwicklung für die zukünftige Beschleunigeranlage FAIR ausgeschrieben, die aktuell in internationaler Zusammenarbeit errichtet und an die bestehenden GSI-Beschleuniger angeschlossen wird. „FAIR lockt bereits jetzt junge Wissenschaftler aus aller Welt“, sagt Karlheinz Langanke. „Sie leisten mit ihrer innovativen Forschung bei HGS-HIRe wichtige Beiträge zur Entwicklung der neuen Beschleunigeranlage und der Detektoren.“
Teilnahmeberechtigt war, wer im Jahr 2013 promoviert worden ist und durch GSI im Rahmen der strategischen Partnerschaften mit den Universitäten in Darmstadt, Frankfurt, Gießen, Heidelberg, Jena, Mainz oder durch das Forschungs- und Entwicklungsprogramm gefördert wurde. Aktuell arbeiten über 350 Doktorandinnen und Doktoranden im Rahmen der Graduiertenschule HGS-HIRe (Helmholtz Graduate School for Hadron and Ion Research) an ihren Promotionsarbeiten über GSI und FAIR.
]]>Weitere Informationen in der Pressemitteilung des Hessischen Ministeriums für Wissenschaft und Kunst
]]>For young and grown-up visitors we offer experiments to take part in: Learn how scientists produce new chemical elements with a particle accelerator by using an interactive model. Trained employees - amongst them "committing Heiner" Sigurd Hofmann, who was one of the discoverers of element 110, Darmstadtium - will answer questions around GSI and FAIR.
Der Jugendkirchentag der Evangelischen Kirche Hessen und Nassau findet dieses Jahr in Darmstadt statt. Vom 19. bis zum 22. Juni kommen 13- bis 18-Jährige und ihre Betreuer aus ganz Deutschland zu der Veranstaltung, die zum siebten Mal organisiert wird. Im Begleitprogramm, für das die Plätze limitiert sind, finden sich neben dem Besuch bei GSI, eine Führung durch die Jüdische Synagoge Darmstadts, durch die Firma Merck, durch das Hessische Staatsarchiv und ein alternativer Stadtrundgang.
Die Teilnehmerinnen und Teilnehmer können außerdem Konzerte besuchen, sportlich aktiv werden, Gottesdienst feiern oder bei einer Stadtrallye Darmstadt kennenlernen – passend zum Motto: „go(o)d days & nights“. In Workshops befassen sie sich intensiver mit Tanz, Theater, Glaube, Politik oder Technik. Es finden fast 300 Veranstaltungen in Darmstadt und Umgebung statt, zu denen 4000 Jugendlich erwartet werden.
Forscher einer internationalen Kollaboration der GSI, der Technischen Universität Darmstadt, des Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), Los Alamos, USA, und des Instituts für Theoretische und Experimentelle Physik (ITEP), Moskau, Russland haben das Protonenmikroskop PRIOR (Proton Microscope for FAIR) gemeinsam aufgebaut. Für die ersten Experimente verwendeten sie einen Protonenstrahl, der mit der GSI-Beschleunigeranlage auf eine Energie von 4,5 Gigaelektronenvolt beschleunigt wurde (das entspricht etwa 98 Prozent Lichtgeschwindigkeit). Eine spezielle Anordnung aus vier Quadrupolmagneten diente als Optik, ähnlich den Glaslinsen in einem herkömmlichen Mikroskop. Sie fokussierte den Protonenstrahl, um das im Strahl befindliche Objekt vergrößert abzubilden. So durchleuchteten die Wissenschaftler unterschiedliche Gegenstände wie verschieden dicke Drähte oder eine Armbanduhr aus komplexen Einzelteilen.
Mit diesem Messaufbau gelang es Objekte und Objektstrukturen bis zu einer Größe von 40 Mikrometern aufzulösen. Damit erreichte die Anlage PRIOR an der GSI bereits bei der Inbetriebnahme vergleichbare Auflösungen wie die besten bestehenden Anlagen in den USA oder Russland. Die Forscher wollen die Auflösung in weiteren Experimenten dieses Jahr auf bis zu zehn Mikrometer verbessern. Ein weiteres Ziel ist die Aufzeichnung von Bildsequenzen von sich bewegenden Objekten. Beispielsweise sollen im Juli dieses Jahres dünne Drähte durch eine starke Stromentladung explosionsartig verdampft und diese sogenannte Plasmaexpansion mit dem Protonenstrahl untersucht werden.
Protonen durchdringen heiße, dichte Materie, die auch als Plasma bezeichnet wird. Ihr gilt das eigentliche Interesse der Forscher, denn man kann sie in Sternen oder Gasplaneten wie dem Jupiter finden. Im Labor sind solche Materiezustände kurzzeitig beispielsweise mit Lasern oder starken elektrischen Entladungen erzeugbar. Da Protonen im Gegensatz zu Strahlungsarten wie Licht oder Röntgenstrahlung diese Materie durchdringen können, bietet das Protonenmikroskop PRIOR einzigartige Untersuchungsmöglichkeiten. "Neben der Erforschung der Vorgänge im Weltraum hat die Technik auch ganz praktische Anwendungen", erklärt Dr. Dmitry Varentsov aus der GSI-Abteilung "Plasmaphysik-Detektoren". "Man könnte beispielsweise laufende Motoren durchleuchten oder sogar Diagnostik und Therapie von Tumoren damit machen. Alle diese Ansätze möchten wir verfolgen." In Vorläuferexperimenten zur Krebsdiagnostik und -therapie mit Protonen am Aufbau in Los Alamos war es den Forschern bereits im Jahr 2013 gelungen, ein Protonenbild einer Maus zu erstellen.
Eine wichtige Rolle wird die Protonenmikroskopie auch an der Beschleunigeranlage FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) spielen, die gerade in internationaler Zusammenarbeit gebaut und an die bestehende GSI Beschleunigeranlage angeschlossen wird. Dort werden noch energiereichere Protonen zur Verfügung stehen und die Experimentiermöglichkeiten für PRIOR erweitern. Nach der Fertigstellung von FAIR soll das Protonenmikroskop dorthin umziehen.
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AGATA (Advanced Gamma Tracking Array) ist ein einzigartiges Messinstrument, das Gamma-Teilchen sichtbar macht. An dem Detektor und an seiner Entwicklung arbeiten 350 Wissenschaftler aus 43 Instituten in elf Ländern. „Ein Projekt dieser Größenordnung lässt sich nur im Verbund meistern“, sagt Jürgen Gerl, Mitglied des Leitungsgremiums der AGATA-Kollaboration und Leiter der Gammaspektroskopie-Abteilung bei GSI. „Um AGATA nun effizient zu nutzen, experimentieren wir wechselnd an drei Beschleunigerlaboren.“
In den letzten zwei Jahren war GSI AGATAs Heimat. „Wir haben im Betrieb täglich bis zu fünf Terabyte an Daten gesammelt, so viel wie noch kein GSI-Experiment bisher“, sagt Gerl. „Diese Messungen bieten genug wissenschaftlich interessantes Material für etwa 20 Doktorarbeiten. Die Analysen sind allerdings sehr aufwendig, sodass mit endgültigen Ergebnissen erst in ein bis zwei Jahren zu rechnen ist.“ Zuvor war der Detektor an den Legnaro National Laboratories (LNL) in Italien im Einsatz. „Der dortige Beschleuniger lieferte uns stabile Isotope bei niedrigen Energien. Damit können ganz andere Bereiche erforscht werden als mit den instabilen Strahlen und sehr hohen Energien der GSI-Beschleuniger“, erklärt Gerl.
Nun soll AGATA zwischen zwei und vier Jahre am Grand Accélérateur National d'Ions Lourds (GANIL) in Frankreich verbringen. Dort könnte der Detektor beispielsweise mit Strahlen aus dem neuen Beschleuniger Spiral-2 beliefert werden. „Auf diese Weise nutzen wir die Leistung des Detektors maximal aus und bekommen möglichst viel Strahlzeit. Immerhin hat er bisher 12 Millionen Euro gekostet.“ Nur wenige Beschleunigerinstitute der Welt können die exotischen Kerne erzeugen, die AGATA erforschen soll. Viele Wissenschaftler bewerben sich deshalb für die rare Experimentierzeit.
AGATA vermisst Gamma-Strahlung, die entsteht, wenn exotische Atomkerne zerfallen. Exotisch heißt, dass sie entweder sehr viel mehr oder sehr viel weniger Neutronen im Kern haben als Protonen. Diese Kerne spielen zum Beispiel eine entscheidende Rolle bei der Entstehung von schweren Elementen wie Gold oder Blei in Supernovae.
Zum Start von FAIR soll AGATA zurück nach Darmstadt kommen. An der neuen Teilchenbeschleunigeranlage wird AGATA dann im Rahmen der NUSTAR-Kollaboration Nuclear Structure, Astrophysics and Reactions im HISPEC-Experiment (High-Resolution In-flight Spectroscopy) zum Einsatz kommen, um weitere fundamentale Erkenntnisse zu den Kernkräften und der Elementsynthese im Universum zu gewinnen.
]]>Für kleine und große Besucher bietet der Stand ein Experimentierprogramm zum Mitmachen: Gäste können an einem Modell erfahren, wie die Teilchenbeschleuniger bei GSI und FAIR funktionieren oder wie man durch Fusion ein neues chemisches Element herstellen kann. Vormittags gibt es Wissenschaftskino für Kinder und Erwachsene zu sehen. Ein wechselndes Programm mit Kurzvorträgen lockt ebenfalls an den Stand.
Der Standort des Gemeinschaftsstands von "Hessen schafft Wissen" befindet sich auf dem Berliner Ring und ist während des gesamten Hessentags von 10 bis 19 Uhr geöffnet. Am 7. Juni um 10:30 Uhr wird der Stand offiziell durch Boris Rhein, den Hessischen Minister für Wissenschaft und Kunst, eröffnet.
Neben GSI und FAIR präsentieren sich auch das Helmholtz International Center for FAIR und die Doktorandenschule HGS-HIRe auf dem Gemeinschaftsstand. Des Weiteren sind zahlreiche Universitäten, wissenschaftliche Einrichtungen und Wirtschaftspartner aus der Region vertreten, unter anderem die Senckenberg-Gesellschaft, die ESOC und die Firma Merck.
]]>Minister of Science Boris Rhein: “The scientific successes are a clear illustration of the potential of the two facilities. The future of Hesse is fundamentally dependent on the development of research, technology and innovation. Only by maintaining the innovation capability of our state are prosperity and sustainable growth also possible for future generations. With the new accelerator facility FAIR we, together with the German government and international partners, are establishing the sustainable basis for further chapters to be written in this scientific success story.”
An international team of scientists was recently able to prove the existence of the superheavy element with the atomic number 117 and thus confirm its discovery by a Russo-American team of scientists. This proof is the latest research success at the Hessian large-scale research center, at which the elements 107 to 112 had already been discovered. Two of these elements bear the names hassium and darmstadtium, thus honoring the state and city in which GSI is located.
Under the management of FAIR GmbH, and with significant contributions from GSI, the new international accelerator facility FAIR, one of the largest research projects worldwide, is to be erected in the coming years. FAIR will then offer 3,000 scientists from all over the world a unique research establishment, at which they can acquire new findings on the composition of matter and the development of the universe, from the big bang through to the present day. In addition to basic research, new medical therapy and diagnostic procedures, and new materials – for space flight and more energy-efficient high-performance computers for example – are to be developed at FAIR.
“In the 40 years and more since its establishment GSI has set scientific milestones which have received international recognition. We in Hesse are proud of this, and together with FAIR we look forward to exciting results in basic research and to innovative applications,” concluded Minister of Science Boris Rhein.
GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research is a research center financed by the German government and the state of Hesse, as well as by the states of Thuringia and Rhineland-Palatinate, with an annual budget of over 108 million euros and more than 1,200 employees. GSI operates a unique large-scale accelerator facility for ion beams. Each year around 1,200 scientists from all over the world use the ion beams for experiments in basic research. The research program is wide-ranging, from nuclear and atomic physics, through plasma and material research, to biophysics and medicine. GSI is the main shareholder in FAIR, and inasmuch is responsible for the construction and operation of the accelerator facility.
The international particle accelerator FAIR, which is currently being built by the Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research in Europe GmbH (FAIR GmbH), is a large-scale research facility funded by the German state and nine international partners with an investment volume of some 1.6 billion euros. FAIR is currently being erected in Darmstadt in the immediate vicinity of the GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research. FAIR will in all probability commence its research operations in 2018 and then be a magnet for more than 3,000 scientists from all over the world. 3,000 scientists from more than 50 countries are already participating in the construction of the FAIR accelerator and experiments.
]]>In Experimenten mit dem Lasersystem PHELIX an der GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH in Darmstadt gelang es Wissenschaftlern, mit einem Laser die leichtesten aller Ionen, sogenannte Protonen, zu beschleunigen und sie anschließend in eine konventionelle Beschleunigerstruktur einzukoppeln. Die Kombination aus Laser und Ionenbeschleuniger ist in Europa einmalig und ermöglicht es, besonders kurze Ionenpulse mit hohen Teilchenzahlen zu erzeugen. Sie können in Experimenten beispielsweise in der Plasmaphysik verwendet werden, um das Innere von Planeten und Sternen zu erforschen.
Die Wissenschaftler lenken den intensiven Lichtpuls des PHELIX-Lasers auf eine dünne Metallfolie. Dadurch werden Protonen von der Materialoberfläche geschleudert, die dort als Verunreinigungen in großer Zahl vorhanden sind. Auf einer Strecke von weniger als einem Zehntel Millimeter erreichen die Protonen ungefähr 15 Prozent der Lichtgeschwindigkeit. Das entspricht 44.000 Kilometern pro Sekunde - sie würden in einer Sekunde die Erde umrunden. Die Protonen verlassen die Folie jedoch in einem großen Winkelbereich und mit unterschiedlichen Geschwindigkeiten. An den Austrittspunkt schließt sich ein spezieller spulenförmiger Magnet an, der vom Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf entwickelt wurde, sowie ein 55 Zentimeter langes Stück konventioneller Linearbeschleuniger. Die Kombination der beiden erlaubt es, die Ionenpulse zu bündeln, zu formen und die Geschwindigkeiten der Protonen anzugleichen. Der so präparierte Strahl ist nun nutzbar und kann weitertransportiert und beispielsweise zu einem Experimentierplatz gelenkt werden.
"Die mit dem Laser erzeugten Teilchenpulse zeichnen sich insbesondere durch ihre Kürze und die hohe Teilchenzahl aus", erklärt Simon Busold von der Technischen Universität Darmstadt, der das Experiment im Rahmen seiner Doktorarbeit maßgeblich mit aufbaute und an der Ausführung beteiligt war. "Wir konnten in den drei Wochen Experimentierzeit reproduzierbar Pulse erzeugen, die nur wenige Nanosekunden lang sind und eine Milliarde Protonen enthalten." Pro Puls lassen sich also sehr große Teilchenzahlen erzielen, jedoch ist die Wiederholrate der Pulse nicht sehr hoch. Im Vergleich dazu liefert ein herkömmlicher Beschleuniger weniger Teilchen in einer Nanosekunde, jedoch kann er fast kontinuierlich Strahl abgeben. Beide Techniken sind komplementär und zur Untersuchung unterschiedlicher physikalischer Phänomene sinnvoll.
Die kurzen Pulse sind beispielsweise für die Forscher in der Plasmaphysik von großem Interesse. Schon jetzt erzeugen sie mit der herkömmlichen GSI-Beschleunigertechnik dichte Plasmen durch den Aufprall von schweren Ionen auf eine Materialprobe. Aufgrund der hohen Dichte dringen kaum Informationen aus dem Inneren nach außen. Ein hochintensiver, kurzer Protonenpuls, wie ihn die Laserbeschleunigung erzeugt, könnte das Plasma jedoch durchqueren und Informationen über den Zustand im Inneren liefern. Vergleichbare Plasmen findet man auch in Planeten und Sternen, weshalb die Forscher sich durch die Experimente neue Erkenntnisse über diese Materieform im Weltall versprechen.
"Die Kombination von klassischer Beschleunigertechnologie und Laserbeschleunigung bei GSI ist etwas Einzigartiges", sagt Dr. Abel Blazevic, Leiter der GSI-Abteilung Plasmaphysik-Detektoren. "Das Experiment ist wichtig für das junge Feld der Laserbeschleunigung, das sich noch im Entwicklungsstadium befindet. Wir wollen das System in nächster Zeit ausbauen. Mein Ziel ist es, dass wir irgendwann unseren Laserbeschleuniger anderen Forschern für die Durchführung ihrer Experimente anbieten können."
Für die Zukunft, insbesondere für die Nutzung an der Beschleunigeranlage FAIR, sind weitere Verbesserungen geplant: Langfristig streben die Forscher höhere Energien und Intensitäten sowie andere Ionensorten an. Alternativ zum spulenförmigen Magneten sollen auch Permanentmagnete zur Bündelung des Ionenstrahls untersucht werden. Momentan kann der PHELIX-Laser einmal in 90 Minuten einen Lichtpuls abgeben. Auch eine Erhöhung dieser Wiederholrate ist geplant.
Die Forschungsarbeit erfolgte im Rahmen der LIGHT-Kollaboration (Laser Ion Generation, Handling and Transport). LIGHT wird von der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft gefördert, Partner sind neben den Initiatoren von der Technischen Universität Darmstadt (Kollaborationssprecher: Professor M. Roth) und von GSI das Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf, die Goethe-Universität Frankfurt sowie das Helmholtz-Institut Jena.
Die Ergebnisse sind im Fachjournal Phys. Rev. ST Accel. Beams 17, 031302 veröffentlicht.
]]>A very precisely measured amount of energy is added to the proton in its trap. Was it enough to reverse the polarity of the proton’s magnetic field? At the University of Mainz an elaborate measuring equipment helps finding it out: a double Penning trap. With the help of the 6.5 centimeter long tube the scientists have now measured the magnetic moment as precisely as never before. „Our measurements’ result is a magnetic moment of 2,792847350(9) in units of the so called nuclear magneton. This is three times more precise than the previous value which is based on a measurement of several protons, parts of hydrogen atoms, taking place in 1972“, explains Dr. Wolfgang Quint, atomic physicist at GSI, who built the experiment together with scientists of the University of Mainz, the Helmholtz Institute Mainz and the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg. „It took 42 years to develop a better measuring method. The difficulty is caused by the very small magnetic moment of a single proton.“
The magnetic field, or the magnetic moment, is created by the spin, the proton’s intrinsic angular momentum. To calculate the magnetic moment’s value the scientists look for the amount of energy that is able to flip the magnetic poles. The precise result is owed to the double Penning trap technique. In one part of the trap the scientists create an inhomogeneous magnetic field to determine the direction of the proton’s magnetic field. In the other part a uniform magnetic field keeps the proton, but leaves its spin almost undisturbed to avoid falsified results. „There we systematically add amounts of energy. Then we transport the proton back into the inhomogeneous measuring part and test whether the spin flipped“, Quint explains. These steps were repeated consecutively for thirteen months adjusting the amount of energy more and more precisely. In total the proton travelled the distance between the two traps several thousand times.
Within this year an identical measuring equipment at CERN is supposed to measure an antiproton in the same way. Comparing the two values could solve the riddle of the imbalance of antimatter and matter in the universe. A difference between the magnetic moment of an antiproton and a proton could explain why after the big bang there was more matter left over than antimatter. Eventually this could solve why planets and stars were able to form at all.
Apart from the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, the Helmholtz Institute Mainz, the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg und GSI scientists of the Ulmer Initiative Research Unit at RIKEN in Japan and of the Ruprecht Karls University Heidelberg were involved.
Original scientific paper in Nature: Nature 509, 596–599 (29 May 2014), doi:10.1038/nature13388
]]>The pile-drilling work only took 15 months after the company involved had improved the pile-drilling technique on site at a very early stage. With five modern drilling rigs, among them the world’s largest such special drilling devices, which first saw service at the FAIR construction site, the construction companies were able to produce one drilled pile per rig and day.
In the course of the construction work it was also possible to rely on the geological surveys which had been conducted beforehand. “Geological surveys are always difficult, and especially at the depths at which we are working. We did not experience any surprises,” is how Dr. Florian Hehenberger, construction director at FAIR, praised the work of the surveyors. In addition, it was possible to improve the construction of the drilled piles with the effect that fewer piles than originally planned had to be set in place. As a consequence, this construction phase could be concluded more than six months earlier than planned. “Thus we have reached a milestone in this major construction project,” says a visibly pleased Hehenberger.
The heavy FAIR facility – in part with concrete walls several meters thick –requires solid foundations so that its structural works are able to settle as evenly as possible and in a calculable period of time. So as to be in a position to gage the degree of settlement, geotechnical engineers conducted extensive subgrade studies beforehand. In this respect the 250 soil samples confirmed that the subgrade primarily comprises sand, clay and silt. Such soils are compressible, which means that they change their density under great pressure. The foundation concept implemented for FAIR, which foresees that the drilled piles will have contact with the later foundation plates, lowers the degree of settlement and the settlement differences by as much as 50 per cent. The settlements are essentially expected to come to an end one year after the completion of the construction work.
The focus is now on the concluding work for this construction phase: a drilling rig recently left the construction site as an abnormal load. In the coming weeks the final three drilling rigs will be prepared for transport. The earth excavated in the course of the pile-drilling work will also be removed from the site in the near future.
The concrete mixing plant which was specially erected for the pile-drilling work is also being dismantled. As the concrete was mixed on site, the transport was less complex as only the individual parts had to be delivered to the site. Thus it was possible to mix the right amounts of concrete as needed at any given point in time. The mixing plant will also be deployed elsewhere on the site.
FAIR is to begin with the shell construction next year. By then various smaller tasks on the construction site will also have been completed. Container offices for the construction supervisors and a container with a visitor center, for example, are being established on the building zone at the northern site access point (Prinzenschneise). In addition, construction site installations have to be completed and a section of access road on the site has to be extended.
]]>“Today, lasers are universal tools to process all kinds of different materials, from automotive industry to medical technology,” said Dr. Michael Schulz from the Class 5 Photonics team. Schulz and his colleagues Dr. Franz Tavella, Dr. Robert Riedel and Dr. Mark J. Prandolini developed high power lasers with pulses in the femtosecond range. One femtosecond is a quadrillionth of a second. Shorter laser pulses allow more precise working of materials.
“In addition, these short laser pulses open up new innovative applications; for example, 3D nanostructuring. In science, this technology is also extremely important; for example, efficient table-top laser systems in the XUV range can be realised for the first time,” said Riedel.
“Our systems can provide from 10 to 100 femtosecond-short pulses at an average power from one to 100 watts,” Schulz said. During 10 femtoseconds, light travels a distance of only 0.003 millimetres. This is just about one twentieth of the width of a human hair. For their flexible high power femtosecond laser, the physicists used an innovative technology, which is much more compact than existing systems. The prototype of the new high power laser with a planned output power of 20 watts has the size of only 80 by 80 centimetres.
“First, we separate a small part from an intensive Ytterbium:YAG laser pulse,” DESY scientist Schulz illustrated the functional principle. “The smaller part of the pulse is then converted by nonlinear spectral broadening into a broadband laser pulse, the larger part of the pulse is frequency-doubled.” Subsequently, the physicists simultaneously shoot both parts of the pulse onto a nonlinear crystal, where the larger part of the pulse amplifies the smaller one.
This principle, called optical parametric amplification, does not need a classical laser medium, which must first store energy within the medium before it is discharged as a laser pulse. Optical parametric amplification also requires less maintenance for the novel high power lasers; the developers assure. Conventional titanium:sapphire lasers lose about a third of the input energy as wasted heat, which may cause strong heating of the system. “The optical parametric amplification solves this problem,” said Schulz, “there is only minimal heating.”
When all wavelengths of the amplified laser pulses are temporally superimposed, this produces an extremely short and intensive laser pulse. Moreover, the new system allows tuning over a broad wavelength range, in this case 700 to 900 nanometres. The users can then choose the most suitable wavelength for processing a particular material. “With this technology, it is possible to build a turnkey system which serves a broad spectrum with ultrashort pulses,” said Schulz. “We want our system to become a key-technology on the laser market.”
"A successful innovation and a great achievement for our young Helmholtz Institute", Professor Thomas Stöhlker, director of the Helmholtz Institute Jena, congratulates the awardees. "In only a few years we managed to give impressive impulses to fundamental research as well as applications of high-energy lasers."
With their development, the physicists won first place in the finals of the OptecNet Start-up Challenge. The prize is endowed with 10 000 euros and includes a cost-free “HansePhotonik” network membership and a company presentation in the trade journal “Photonik”.
]]>In addition to the general construction permit for the new particle accelerator facility FAIR, since 2011 the detailed construction plans for the individual buildings have been examined and approved by the authorities in the federal state of Hesse.
With the final partial construction permit – for the building for the proton linear accelerator (p-LINAC) – in terms of safety regulations the fundamental step has been taken for the corresponding updating of the construction plans and the commencement of the construction of the basic structure as planned in 2015.
The first partial construction approval was granted two years ago. Since then all the buildings and tunnel sections have been examined, for example the 1,100 meter ring accelerator, the experimental station for biophysics and material research, and the facility for the creation of new isotopes, the Super Fragment Separator.
The radiation protection department of GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH, which has been monitoring the safety of the GSI facility for more than 40 years already, is overseeing the approvals procedures on behalf of FAIR GmbH.
The particle accelerator facility FAIR, which is some 4,000 meters long and for the most part located underground, is being built on an area of 20 hectares. It will utilize the existing 400-meter-long GSI facility as a pre-accelerator. 3,000 scientists from more than 50 countries will conduct research at FAIR into the basic building blocks of matter and the development of the universe. To this end it is possible to produce particularly intensive precision beams of antiprotons and ions of all chemical elements at FAIR.
]]>Auf der Quark Matter 2014 werden die neuesten Forschungsergebnisse rund um das sogenannte „Quark-Gluon-Plasma“ präsentiert. Diese Ursuppe aus Quarks und Gluonen existierte für extrem kurze Zeit nach dem Urknall. Um sie zu erforschen, versuchen Wissenschaftler die Billionen Grad heiße Materie mit großen Teilchenbeschleunigern herzustellen.
Im Mittelpunkt stehen die Experimente am Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC, USA) des Brookhaven National Laboratory, und am LHC des europäischen Forschungszentrums CERN in Genf. Zukünftig wird Forschung auf diesem Gebiet auch an der neuen Beschleunigeranlage FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) stattfinden.
Neben der GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH und der Technischen Universität Darmstadt sind auch die Universitäten Frankfurt und Heidelberg an der Organisation beteiligt. Highlights der Veranstaltung sind der Student Day, an dem rund 250 Doktoranden bei GSI erwartet werden und der Vortrag des Physik-Nobelpreisträgers im Jahr 2004, Prof. Frank Wilczek vom Massachussetts Institute of Technology. Er spricht am Donnerstag, 22. Mai, über “Quantum Beauty”, also die Schönheit wissenschaftlicher Ideen.
This news was taken from the website of the FAIR GmbH.
]]>
The periodic table of the elements is to get crowded towards its heaviest members. Evidence for the artificial creation of element 117 has recently been obtained at the GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research, an accelerator laboratory located in Darmstadt, Germany. The experiment was performed by an international team of chemists and physicists headed by Prof. Christoph Düllmann, who holds positions at GSI, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU), and the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM). The team included 72 scientists and engineers from 16 institutions in Australia, Finland, Germany, India, Japan, Norway, Poland, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
Elements beyond atomic number 104 are referred to as superheavy elements. The most long-lived ones are expected to be situated on a so-called 'island of stability', where nuclei with extremely long half-lives should be found. Although superheavy elements have not been found in nature, they can be produced by accelerating beams of nuclei and shooting them at the heaviest possible target nuclei. Fusion of two nuclei – a very rare event – occasionally produces a superheavy element. Those currently accessible generally only exist for a short time. Initial reports about the discovery of an element with atomic number 117 were released in 2010 from a Russia-U.S. collaboration working at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in Dubna, Russia.
In a powerful example of international collaboration, this new measurement required close coordination between the accelerator and detection capabilities at GSI in Germany and the unique actinide isotope production and separation facilities at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) in the U.S. The special berkelium target material, essential for the synthesis of element 117, was produced over an 18-month-long campaign. This required intense neutron irradiation at ORNL's High Flux Isotope Reactor, followed by chemical separation and purification at ORNL's Radiochemical Engineering Development Center. Approximately 13 milligrams of the highly-purified isotope Bk-249, which itself decays with a half-life of only 330 days, were then shipped to Mainz University. There, the facilities and expertise are available to transform the exotic radioisotope into a target, able to withstand the high-power calcium-ion beams from the GSI accelerator. Atoms of element 117 were separated from huge numbers of other nuclear reaction products in the TransActinide Separator and Chemistry Apparatus (TASCA) and were identified through their radioactive decay. These measured chains of alpha-decays produced isotopes of lighter elements with atomic numbers 115 to 103, whose registration added to the proof for the observation of element 117.
In the decay chains, both a previously unknown alpha-decay pathway in Db-270 (dubnium – element 105) and the new isotope Lr-266 (lawrencium – element 103) were identified. With half-lives of about one hour and about 11 hours, respectively, they are among the longest-lived superheavy isotopes known to date. As unwanted background events are present in all superheavy element experiments, the longer-lived an isotope is, the harder is its reliable identification. The present experiment, for which TASCA was significantly upgraded to better separate unwanted background products and thus to allow more sensitive identification of superheavy nuclei, proved that their reliable identification is now possible.
"This is of paramount importance as even longer-lived isotopes are predicted to exist in a region of enhanced nuclear stability", explains Christoph Düllmann.
Prof. Horst Stöcker, Scientific Director of GSI, adds: "The successful experiments on element 117 are an important step on the path to the production and detection of elements situated on the 'island of stability' of superheavy elements."
"This is an important scientific result and a compelling example of international cooperation in science, advancing superheavy element research by leveraging the special capabilities of national laboratories in Germany and the U.S.," said ORNL Director Thom Mason.
Element 117 is yet to be named: a committee comprising members of the International Unions of Pure and Applied Physics and Chemistry will review these new findings, along with the original ones, and decide whether further experiments are needed before acknowledging the element's discovery. Only after such final acceptance, a name may be proposed by the discoverers.
The new findings have been presented in the scientific journal The Physical Review Letters (J. Khuyagbaatar et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 112, 172501 (2014)).
Work performed by Oak Ridge National Laboratory was supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science. UT-Battelle manages ORNL for DOE's Office of Science.
Download "target" – Issue 11, April 2014 (PDF, 4,1 MB, German only)
<link en press gsi_magazin_target.htm internal-link>Abonnement and target archive (German only)
]]>Lange haben Forscher an der Frage getüftelt, aus welchen Stoffen unser Universum besteht. Die Elemente, die in unserem Periodensystem aufgereiht sind, bilden die Himmelskörper, die wir direkt beobachten können. Sie machen jedoch nur etwa fünf Prozent der Gesamtmasse des Weltalls aus, wie sich aus den Bewegungen der Galaxien und Sterne berechnen lässt. Woraus die restliche Masse – dunkle Materie genannt – besteht, war bisher unklar.
Ein spektakulärer Fund bei GSI kann dieses Rätsel endlich entschlüsseln. In einem Experiment am GSI-Detektorsystem HADES entstand bei Teilchenkollisionen überraschend eine große Menge einer unbekannten Substanz, die Forscher nun als dunkle Materie identifizierten. Aufgrund der großen Menge der schwarzen, pulverförmigen Substanz konnten sogar makroskopische Eigenschaften geprüft werden.
Ein haptischer Test ergab, dass die Substanz einen krümeligen, sandartigen Charakter aufweist. Die Substanz gibt des Weiteren ein olfaktorisch deutlich wahrnehmbares und sehr angenehmes Aroma von sich. Die in Folge angestellten chemischen Versuche, wie sich die Substanz bei der Mischung mit der bekannten Materie verhält, zeigten hochinteressante Ergebnisse. Insbesondere die Zugabe von Diwasserstoffmonoxid bei ca. 373 Kelvin lieferte eine besonders außergewöhnliche Flüssigkeit. Das entstandene schwarzbraune Gebräu führte bei der Inkorporation durch freiwillige Testpersonen zu spontaner Munterkeit und guter Laune und einem signifikanten Anstieg der wissenschaftlichen Produktivität. „Ich habe noch nie so etwas Wundervolles getrunken“, erklärt Erwin Schwab, GSI-Forscher und Entdecker der dunklen Materie. „Und nach drei Tassen davon hatte ich die wissenschaftliche Veröffentlichung in nur einer Stunde zusammengeschrieben.“
Die Forscher prüfen nun, wie sich die dunkle Materie in großen Mengen herstellen und wirtschaftlich vermarkten lassen könnte. „Das Potential für die Marktwirtschaft ist einzigartig und quasi unbegrenzt“, erklärte Dr. Jürgen Henschel, der für den GSI-Technologietransfer zuständig ist. „Stellen Sie sich vor, welchen Produktivitätsschub die deutsche Wirtschaft durch die Massenanwendung der Flüssigkeit erleben würde. Die weltweiten Patente sind bereits beantragt.
Um die Experimente mit dunkler Materie zu fördern, verschenken wir GSI-Kaffeetassen! Wer uns bis Samstag, 5. April ein Kaffee-Bild auf die GSI-Facebook-Pinnwand postet oder an uns twittert, bekommt eine GSI-Kaffeetasse per Post.
]]>Interessierte Schülerinnen und Schüler ab Klasse 11 werten bei GSI Daten des ALICE-Experiments aus. Nach einer Einführung in die Teilchenphysik und die Forschung an einem Teilchenbeschleuniger wie dem LHC, besichtigen die Teilnehmer die GSI-Forschungsanlage. Danach analysieren sie eigenhändig unter fachgerechter Anleitung von Wissenschaftlern mit den Auswerteprogrammen von ALICE aktuelle Daten, die in Proton-Proton-Kollisionen und in Kollisionen von Blei-Atomkernen aufgenommen wurden. „Die Schülerinnen und Schüler vollziehen selbst nach, wie eine wissenschaftliche Entdeckung zustande kommt“, sagt Ralf Averbeck, ALICE-Wissenschaftler bei GSI und Organisator der GSI-Masterclass. „So hautnah an der Wissenschaft ist man sonst selten.“ Zum 4. Mal findet bei GSI die International Masterclass statt. Dieses Jahr werden 28 Schülerinnen und Schüler erwartet.
Grundidee des Programms ist, dass die Schüler weitgehend selbst wie ein Forscher arbeiten. Dazu gehört auch die Videokonferenz zum Abschluss des Tages. In einer Konferenzschaltung mit Schülergruppen aus anderen Ländern und dem CERN oder Fermilab (Batavia, Illinois, USA) präsentieren und diskutieren die Jugendlichen ihre Messergebnisse – genau so wie dies auch die Forscher in ihren internationalen Kollaborationen tun. So erhalten die Schüler authentische Eindrücke vom Forschungsalltag in der Teilchenphysik.
200 Universitäten und Forschungsinstitute in 40 Ländern nehmen an den International Masterclasses teil. Neu dabei sind in diesem Jahr die Länder Chile, Jamaika, Ecuador und Mexiko. Veranstalter ist die International Particle Physics Outreach Group (IPPOG), die rund 10.000 Teilnehmer erwartet. Alle Veranstaltungen finden statt in Zusammenarbeit mit Netzwerk Teilchenwelt, dem bundesweiten Netzwerk zur Vermittlung von Teilchenphysik an Jugendliche und Lehrkräfte. Die Projektleitung der International Masterclasses ist an der TU Dresden angesiedelt. Veranstalter ist IPPOG, die International Particle Physics Outreach Group, ein eigenständiges Komitee aus Vertretern der am CERN forschenden Länder sowie von CERN und DESY. Ziel der Gruppe ist es, die Teilchenphysik einer breiteren Öffentlichkeit zugänglich zu machen.
Für den Girls’Day öffnet heute das Targetlabor seine Türen und auch in der Ionenquellen-Werkstatt und der Kryogenik-Abteilung können die Girls’Day-Teilnehmerinnen mitarbeiten. In der Abteilung Beschleunigerelektronik führen sie Blechbiegearbeiten durch und löten Elektronikteile, wie sie für den Beschleuniger benötigt werden. In der IT-Abteilung werfen die Mädchen einen Blick hinter die Kulissen der GSI-Webseite, wohingegen sie am SHIP-Experiment erfahren, wie neue Elemente gemacht werden. Selbst experimentieren und Fragen stellen lautet die Devise!
Während der ganzen Zeit stehen Forscherinnen, Technikerinnen, Mechanikerinnen und weitere Mitarbeiterinnen von GSI den Zehn- bis 15-jährigen Rede und Antwort und geben Einblick in ihre Arbeit. Weitere berufliche Möglichkeiten an einem Forschungszentrum wie GSI lernen die jungen Besucherinnen beim abschließenden Rundgang durch die Beschleunigeranlage kennen.
Der GSI-Girls’Day wird vom Gleichstellungsgremium organisiert. Das Ziel des Girls'Days ist es, Mädchen bereits früh an technische Berufe heranzuführen, um ihnen ein breiteres Spektrum bei der Berufswahl aufzuzeigen.
"The departments have done a good job with the remodelling", thanked head of the project Frank Herfurth at the roofing ceremony. "We are looking forward to continuing the work and inserting the ring components into the area soon." In the reconstruction 2 000 tons of concrete have been moved. The experimental area has been increased to a size of 600 square meters. Before mounting the ring the electric installations and other infrastructure features have to be completed. On the rooftop an additional floor will be mounted to position the power supplies.
The so called CRYRING is a contribution of Sweden to FAIR that has been delivered from the Manne-Siegbahn-Laboratory in Stockholm to GSI in 2013. It has a diameter of 18 meters and will initially be assembled in cooperation with GSI for experiments and machine tests at the existing GSI accelerator facility. Among other things the control system for FAIR can be tested with CRYRING. In the long-term it is planned to use it for atomic physics experiments with slow antiprotons at FAIR.
]]>Peter Hassenbach was Administrative Director of GSI from September 2011. He reorganized the administration and had a large impact on focussing GSI to the tasks linked to the FAIR project. GSI regrets his departure. We thank him for his extraordinary work and wish all the best for his future in Berlin.
The responsibilities of the administrative directory will temporarily be assumed by Professor Horst Stöcker, Scientific Director of GSI.
]]>Dr. Fabio Farinon was awarded for the discovery of 60 neutron-rich nuclei and new lifetime measurements of alpha emitters in neutral and hydrogen like state. The measurements took place at the fragment separator at GSI in combination with the storage ring ESR. To investigate interesting exotic nuclei they have to first be created in a reaction. By suitable separation procedures they are first parted from the primary beam and the background of unwanted reaction products and then identified. In his PhD thesis Farinon has contributed new and valuable work with his isomer tagger. This setup allows identification of the rarest of nuclei. Apart from the detection of the nuclei also production cross sections were measured and thus a new area of research for these nuclei with astrophysical relevance close to the r-process has opened.
Dr. Robert Wolf conducted first mass measurements of short-lived exotic nuclei with a multi reflexion time-of-flight mass spectrometer (MR-ToF-MS) at the separator ISOLDE at CERN and found new information about nuclear structure in calcium and zinc nuclides. The results lead a path to improve the precision of predictions of theoretical models in this area. The MR-ToF-MS is a multi-purpose setup, that Wolf used successfully for the seperation of isobars for the attached Penning trap system ISOLTRAP, thus meeting the requirements for the new measurements. As the measurement times of the MR-ToF-MS are in the area of milliseconds it allowed the mass determination of very short-lived nuclei that can't be measured with the Penning setup. The exact mass measurement of 82Zn ions gives insight into the composition of neutron stars, especially the element distribution in the outer shells.
GENCO president Professor Gottfried Münzenberg (GSI) and Professor Juha Äystö (Helsinki Institute of Physics) chaired the event that started with a talk by speaker Professor Ryugo Hayano (University of Tokyo) about the pioneering experiments with exotic atoms.
Traditionally during the event the circle of GENCO members was extended with the new members Professor Dr. R. Hayano und Professor Dr. A. Heinz.
]]>The prize is awared annually by the DGMS for outstanding work in the field of mass spectrometry. It is funded by the company Thermo Fischer Scientific in Bremen and named after Mattauch and Herzog, who investigated the foundations of ion optics for mass spectroscopy and presented a novel mass spectrometer in the year 1934 that since has been known as the Mattauch-Herzog-System.
]]>Atomic nuclei can exist on different energy levels. Most possess a stable ground state the nucleus preferably resides in. By adding external energy one can "unsettle" the nucleus and lift it into an exited state. These states are usually unstable. The nucleus wants to get rid of the additional energy and decays into its ground state by emission of light. But some nuclei have a so called metastable state. They can be exited and stay on a higher energy level for quite some time without decaying. By this means energy can be stored in them similiar to a battery.
But how can you insert energy into this "nuclear battery", and how can you extract it again? "The addition of the energy could be done by an accelerator", explains Dr. Yuri Litvinov, who investigates the phenomenon at the GSI accelerator facility. "If you irradiate the metal niobium with protons, e.g. from the GSI accelerator UNILAC, the niobium nucleus can capture a proton and become molybdenum." Many molybdenum nuclei are then in an exited metastable state—the battery is charged. To make them jump into their ground state and emit their energy they can be irradiated with intense x-rays, e.g. from an x-ray free electron laser. The x-rays will lift the nucleus into an even higher, but unstable state. The nucleus immediately decays into its ground state and emits the total amount of previously fed energy by emission of light—the battery is discharged.
This second excitation of the nucleus by x-rays is very unlikely, because another effect occurs: instead of exciting the nuclei the x-rays ionize the atoms. That means they rip the electrons off of their shells. In a material sample like in the molybdenum this leads to the generation of a plasma of unbound electrons. Litvinov and his colleagues around project leader Adriana Pàlffy from the Max-Planck-Institute for Nuclear Physics have now calculated that this side effect might even be beneficial. "The nuclei recombine with the electrons", says Litvinov. "The electrons emit their surplus energy in form of light. If this energy fits the excitation energy to lift the nucleus into the unstable state, then a direct transfer of energy to the nucleus can succeed." This can serve as the trigger for the discharge. The calculations show that this effect might even be dominant, meaning its occurence is more likely then the direct excitation of the nucleus by the x-rays.
In experiments the scientists now want to verify their calculations. "We are looking for this phenomenon at the GSI facility but couldn't observe it so far", says Litvinov. "Experiments with our GSI storage ring and our laser system PHELIX are planned. Once we have understood the physics better, it might even be possible to build real batteries for our everyday life with this technology."
"At the x-ray free electron laser XFEL currently under construction in Hamburg we could learn more about nuclear excitations with electrons and photons in dense plasmas", says Pàlffy. "It is still a long way to the nuclear battery of the future, but our results show that positive and in our case reinforcing surprises may occur. The physics of metastable nuclear states stays thrilling."
]]>To measure the electron's mass scientists used a Penning trap at the university in Mainz. In the trap charged particles can be captured in a magnetic field. The particles rotate in the magnetic field and their mass can be determined from the rotational frequency. However, measuring a single electron is difficult and afflicted with a large error. Thus scientists use a trick: They couple the electron to a carbon nucleus whose behaviour in the magnetic field is well known.
While the rotational frequency of the bound electron in the trap now doesn't play any role anymore, another effect comes to the fore. We know this effect from the nursery: a toy top has a rotation round its axis. In addition we can observe that when a force is applied to it, the top will tilt and in total rotate around an invisible axis in the centre of the tilted position. This behaviour is called precession. The electrons own rotation, also know as the spin, precesses in the trap similar to the top. By measuring the precession frequency one can determine its mass.
The value for the electron mass found in the experiments is 0,000548579909067(14)(9)(2) atomic units. The numbers in the brackets give the errors the measurement is afflicted with despite its high precision. This result improves previous measurements by a factor of 13 in accuracy. "At the moment we are constructing an even larger trap to further reduce the errors", explains Dr. Wolfgang Quint from GSI's atomic physics department, who took part in the setup of the trap in Mainz. "To test quantum electrodynamics we also plan further experiments on heavy highly charged ions at the GSI experiment HITRAP."
Precise measurements of the electron mass play an important role in the tests of the standard model of elementary particles and their interactions. The number contributes, for example, to the structure and the properties of atoms and molecules and affects the fine structure constant and the tests of quantum electrodynamics. The experiment is a collaboration of the Max-Planck-Institute for Nuclear Physics and the International Max Planck Research School for Quantum Dynamics in Heidelberg, the Johannes-Gutenberg-University in Mainz, the ExtreMe Matter Institutes EMMI and the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH.
]]>In the experiment started today the scientists investigate the influence of cosmic radiation on cells and the shielding properties of various materials in cooperation with the European Space Agency, ESA. The findings are crucial for manned space flight, as astronauts are permanently exposed to cosmic radiation during space travel. With the GSI accelerator facility ion beams can be generated as they occur in space. This enables scientists to analyse their effects in the laboratory and develop precautions for space flights.
It is planned to keep the ring accelerator continuously running for 24 hours per day until the midmonth of May. Scientists from other fields, like nuclear physics, atomic physics, materials research and biophysics, will use the time for various other experiments.
The vital novelty of the construction works was the integration of a new accelerator cavity. The SIS ring now consists of three instead of two cavities. In the coming years additional construction works will take place, among them the mounting of two more cavities. With the total of five accelerator cavities the SIS will have the capacities to accelerate all kinds of elements and inject them into the FAIR facility.
]]>
The name p-Linac stands for "Proton Linear Accelerator". It is used for the acceleration of hydrogen ions, also called protons, and works with electrical fields in the range of radio-frequency. An oscillator generates the radio-frequency of 325 megahertz that is succesively amplified in the new klystron and then fed into the accelerator structure. Inside the radio-frequency accelerates the ions.
The klystron was built by the French company Thales located in Vélizy close to Paris. It is 5,2 metres long, weighs 4,2 tons and delivers an output of upt to three megawatts. The accelerator structure has been designed and produced by scientists of the Goethe university in Frankfurt. Currently it is electro-plated with a layer of copper in GSI's electro-plating shop to improve electric conductivity. Afterwards both devices, combined with additional components need for operation like a special high-voltage power supply with 110.000 Volts, will be put to operation at the GSI test facility. Here they will be thoroughly tested and pepared for the assembly in the FAIR facility in the coming months. The bidding procedure is running for the other six of the seven total modules the p-Linac consists of.
The protons pre-accelerated in the p-Linac will be further accelerated by the GSI ring accelerator and the planned FAIR accelerator SIS100. Then they impact a target for the production of antimatter. With this process antiprotons, the antimatter partners of the protons, will be generated in large numbers. Researchers want to accumulate them in a storage ring and use them in experiments afterwards. For example with the help of antimatter they try to understand how the matter that our world is made of got its mass.
]]>With a transition radiatiation detector's help it is possible to identify particles that are created in a particle accelerator experiment. The Institute for Nuclear Physics in Münster tries to find out if in comparison to the usually used foil radiators enough X-ray photons are created in foam plastic. They shoot charged particles (electrons) with ultrarelativistic speed through a block of polyethylene foam of low density. If the electrons are fast enough X-rays are created on the foam's interfaces. The X-rays' properties are determined by the structure of the foam.
The result: Foam foil radiators are as effective as classical foil radiators. But they are mechanically more stable and prices are more favourable. The transition radiation detector in the future CBM experiment at FAIR in Darmstadt therefore could have a foam foil radiator. The German Federation of Foam Plastics and Polyurethanes (FSK) has now awarded the “Innovation Prize Foam Plastics 2013” in the category “Research and Development”, which is endowed with a cash prize of 3,000 euro, to the Ph.D. student Cyrano Bergmann for his project “Creation of transition radiation in foam plastics”.
In radiotherapy it is important to aim at the tumour and spare the healthy tissue. But to distribute the irradiated dose homogenously in the tumour is equally crucial to ensure that all areas get the same amount of radiation. Irradiating one spot of the tumour twice and another not at all would result in the tumour not being destroyed and continuing to grow.
The movement of the tumour is monitored during the treatment. The beam is adjusted to the motion in real-time so that it always irradiates the right spot. Due to the complexity of the task to detect the movement of the patient and to steer the accelerator this technique is the most challenging. But it is also fast and very precise.
Especially ion beam therapy only works when the dose is applied homogenously. In the established technology developed at GSI the tumour is divided into layers. The beam scans each layer point by point, thus each millimetre-sized spot of the tumour gets the same dose. This technique has been successfully used on tumours that can be immobilized. The head of a patient can, for example, be fixed with a mask and a brain tumour can be precisely aimed at.
A comparable solution for moving tumours is the goal of medicine physicists at GSI. They examine different techniques that might offer a solution (see infobox). Dr. Christian Graeff, head of "Medicinal Physics" in the GSI biophysics department, works on a new method for compensation of movement. "Up to now a singular dot matrix for scanning the moving tumour was generated by a CAT scan. These data were converted for the different phases of the breathing motion", he explains. "But this data lacks the information about the twisting or tilting of the tumour due to the movement. The irradiation can be optimized by generating a dot matrix for every phase instead."
The tumour is irradiated several times with small doses in different phases of the breathing motion. "Hot spots" and not irradiated areas are supposed to average out to a homogenous dose distribution. But if areas remain not irradiated the tumour could survive and continue to grow.
Necessary for the method is a four-dimensional CAT scan. The fourth dimension next to the three spatial directions is the time. The breathing motion is divided into a series of pictures and a dot matrix is generated for every single picture. During the irradiation the control system in the computer knows which respiratory phase applies and adjusts the accelerator to aim for the corresponding dot matrix. With an experiment using the GSI accelerator facility the scientists could prove the functionality of the method. They irradiated a film strip mounted on a moving slide. The system compensated the motion and the dose distribution was comparably homogenous to a non-moving film.
The position of the tumour in a certain phase of the breathing motion, e. g. the short pause after exhaling, is determined. Only in this moment the irradiation is applied. Gating is technically easy to realize, but the treatment takes longer. Also if the patient breathes irregularly or very shallow the treatment moment cannot be identified.
Using data from CAT scans of lung cancer patients Graeff shows that patients could really profit from the new method in their therapy. A treatment plan for the patients was generated with the conventional technique as well as with his 4D-optimization. "The calculations show the superiority of the optimized plan. It would allow a better treatment", says Graeff. "We hope that in the future we can not only experiment with the method but really make it available to patients."
The results are published in the journal "Radiotherapy and Oncology".
]]>In total 60 such magnets are necessary for the SIS300 accelerator. The prototype is five meters long and weighs six tons. It has an especially small radius of curvature of 66,7 meters and a magnetic field of 4,5 tesla. It is cooled to its working temperature of 4,7 kelvin (that is minus 268,5 degrees celsius) with liquid helium. The scientists have developed a special new superconductor for the magent: a copper-manganese alloy between the filaments of the superconductor prevents coupling and reduces unwanted AC losses. These innovations lead to an improved ramping rate that is up to a factor 50 higher compared to customary magnets.
In the upcoming months the magnet will be tested at GSI. Apart from measuring its magnetic properties also the maximum ramping rates and the AC losses during ramping will be examined. The next generation of dipoles is already under development in Italy in cooperation with the INFN and the European nuclear research center CERN.
The SIS300 accelerator is destined to be built in the second construction stage of the modularised FAIR facility and aims at an efficient parallel operation of several parts of the facility and a further increase of the beam energy. It could for example be used in the experimental setup for research on compressed nuclear matter CBM.
]]>Bei seiner Inbetriebnahme Ende 2012 belegte SANAM in der weltweiten Rangliste der energiesparendsten Rechner Rang zwei, bei der Rechengeschwindigkeit lag er immerhin auf Rang 52. Der arabische Name „SANAM“ drückt Leistung und Effizienz aus und bezeichnete in seiner ursprünglichen Bedeutung den Kamelhöcker, in dem Fett gespeichert wird, das ausreicht um dem Kamel zwei Wochen das Überleben zu sichern.
Mit einer gesamten Rechenleistung von 532 Billionen Rechenoperationen pro Sekunde gehört „SANAM“ auch nach über einem Jahr noch zu den 100 schnellsten Computern der Welt (Platz 59), in derEnergieeffizienz liegt er mittlerweile auf Rang 11. Im Nahen Osten hält er die Spitzen-Position. „SANAM“ wird am KACST für Berechnungen in Seismik, Luftfahrt, Bioinformatik, Wetterforschung und Simulationen eingesetzt. Die Entwicklung von SANAM hat etwa drei Millionen Euro gekostet.
„SANAM“ ist eine Weiterentwicklung des Frankfurter Höchstleistungsrechners LOEWE-CSC, der bei seiner Inbetriebnahme vor drei Jahren der energiesparendste Großrechner Europas war. Er benutzt ein spezielles Kühlsystem und verwendet als Beschleuniger handelsübliche Hochleistungs-Grafikkarten, wie sie auch in Arbeitsplatzcomputern eingesetzt werden. Bei der Rechengeschwindigkeit ist „SANAM“ etwa 40 Prozent schneller als LOEWE-CSC und verbraucht dennoch pro Rechenoperation nur ein Drittel der Energie. Erreicht wurde dieser Fortschritt durch die Verwendung zusätzlicher Hochgeschwindigkeits-Grafikchips und speziell optimierte Systemsoftware.
Der Stiftungsratsvorsitzende des FIAS, Prof. Rudolf Steinberg, beglückwünschte die Partner aus Saudi-Arabien zu ihrer Entscheidung, in die Naturwissenschaften zu investieren: „In diesen Feldern liegen die Lösungen, die über unser aller Zukunft entscheiden werden. Mit der transdiziplinären Forschung am FIAS wollen wir einen Beitrag leisten, um das vernetzte Denken voranzubringen. Dazu gehört auch, der Forschung die besten Werkzeuge bereit zu stellen, ganz zentral schnellste Computer.“
Der FIAS-Vorstandsvorsitzende und Professor für Architektur von Hochleistungsrechner an der Goethe-Universität Frankfurt, Professor Volker Lindenstruth, sagte: „Die moderne Forschung ist entscheidend auf immer schnellere Supercomputer angewiesen. Sie können in Zukunft aber nur sinnvoll eingesetzt werden, wenn Energieeffizienz ein entscheidendes Kriterium ist. Wir freuen uns, dass wir in Zusammenarbeit mit einem ambitionierten Forschungsland neue Technologien für eine immer bessere Energieeffizienz entwickeln können und dabei neue Maßstäbe setzen."
Das King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology (KACST) ist eine unabhängige Forschungsorganisation, die administrativ direkt dem König von Saudi-Arabien unterstellt ist. KACST ist für die Forschungsförderung und -organisation in Saudi-Arabien verantwortlich und betreibt nationale Forschungslabors. In der Forschungsorganisation entwickelt KACST Forschungspolitik, betreibt Datensammlung, fördert externe Forschung und bietet Servicefunktionen, wie etwa das Patentbüro.
Das Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS) ist eine interdisziplinäre Forschungsinstitution zur theoretischen Erforschung von komplexen Strukturen in der Natur, die von der Goethe-Universität Frankfurt gestiftet wurde und von öffentlichen Geldgebern, Stiftungen und Privatpersonen finanziert wird. Im Mittelpunkt der Arbeiten stehen neben der Informatik Grundlagenforschung in Biowissenschaften, Hirnforschung, Chemie und Physik.
Prof. Dr. Volker Lindenstruth
Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS)
Ruth-Moufang-Str. 1
60438 Frankfurt am Main, Germany
Tel. +49 69-798 44 100
Fax +49 69-798 44 109
E-Mail: voli(at)compeng.de
fias.uni-frankfurt.de
Reiner Korbmann
Tel. +49 89 64 21 750
E-Mail: reiner.korbmann(at)scienceundmedia.de
Die Vortragsreihe "Wissenschaft für Alle" richtet sich an alle an aktueller Wissenschaft und Forschung interessierten Personen. In der Regel einmal pro Monat findet jeweils an einem Mittwoch in der Monatsmitte ein Vortrag aus der Reihe statt.
Die Themen decken ein großes wissenschaftliches Spektrum ab – nicht nur über die Forschung an GSI und FAIR wird berichtet, sondern generell über aktuelle Themen aus Physik, Chemie, Biologie, Medizin und Informatik. Ziel der Reihe ist es, die wissenschaftlichen Vorgänge für den Laien verständlich aufzubereiten und darzustellen, um so die Forschung einem breiten Publikum zugänglich zu machen. Die Vorträge werden von sowohl GSI-internen wie auch externen Rednern aus Universitäten und anderen Instituten gehalten.
Die Vorträge finden im Hörsaal der GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH, Planckstraße 1, 64291 Darmstadt, statt. Beginn ist jeweils um 14 Uhr. Der Eintritt ist frei, eine Anmeldung ist nicht erforderlich. Externe Teilnehmer werden gebeten, für den Einlass an unserer Pforte ein Ausweisdokument bereitzuhalten.
Weitere Informationen und aktuelle Ankündigungen finden Sie auf unserer Webseite www-dev.gsi.de/wfa
Dbessyi is one of 20 scientists who recently earned a PhD and get support for their start as postdocs by the Helmholtz Association. Dbessyi, so far located at the Université Paris Sud 11, changes for the project to the Helmholtz Institute Mainz (HIM), a joint venture of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH and the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz.
At HIM the Libanese will study theoretical and practical methods to analyze electromagnetic processes of nuclear reactions with the Panda experiment. For the project he will use data of the Chinese detector BES-III. Moreover he has plans for a special target and a calibration system for the Panda backward endcap calorimeter.
According to the Helmholtz press release, the seed capital is supposed to help the young scientists to establish themselves in their field and to enlarge their scientific expertise. In spring 2014 the next generation of scientists can apply for the Helmholtz Postdoc Programme.
]]>The Green IT Cube computer center is financed by the German federal and state governments via the Helmholtz Association. After the completion in 2015 it will be the central supercomputing center for the “Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research in Europe”. This is the world’s biggest fundamental research project in this decade. The international project that is under construction next to GSI includes a scientific community coming from 40 different states.
The category „Data Center Blueprints“ is known as the most prestigious of the awards as the projects are supposed to serve as a general reference and to be replicable.
The Green IT Cube Computer Center was honored for its compact, space saving design, high operating efficiency (OPEX) and economy with regard to investment costs (CAPEX). These advantages can be realized independently of location and varying availability and lead to considerable cost reduction over the total cost of ownership.
The awards applicants from Germany’s Rhein-Main area left such competitors as Digital Reality, one of the world’s biggest data center providers, and Infinity empty handed. Computer centers based upon the GreenITCube design have been distinguished by the DCD for the sixth time now within the last three years, which demonstrates the sector’s high regard for this visionary technology.
„Reliability is our highest priority when it comes to computer centers but at the same time building and operation costs are becoming more important,” said Professor Volker Lindenstruth, head of the GSI IT department.
Aside from blue-ribbon honors in the category „Blueprint“, the GSI’s Green IT Cube was awarded second place in the categories “Leadership in the Public Sector”, just behind the City of Madrid and for “Innovation in IT Optimization” after the French Customs Authority.
“We are very proud of this spectacular triple award given to our Green IT Cube by the sector’s experts”, says Horst Stöcker, scientific director of GSI. “This innovative computer center concept is one of our Helmholtz technology transfers ‘out of fundamental research into industry’. We expect it to bring tremendous advantages to numerous branches (internet service providers, banks, industry) by saving space, investment costs und a significant amount of energy.”
Der Klaus Tschira Preis KlarText! wird jedes Jahr an Doktorandinnen und Doktoranden verliehen, die einen allgemein verständlichen Artikel darüber verfassen, was sie in ihrer Doktorarbeit erforscht haben, was sie daran fasziniert oder welche Hindernisse dabei im Weg standen. Teilnehmen können alle, die ihre Promotion in der Biologie, Chemie, Informatik, Mathematik, Neurowissenschaften oder Physik abgeschlossen haben. Pro Fachgebiet winken 5 000 Euro Preisgeld von der Klaus Tschira Stiftung, ein eintägiger „Workshop Wissenschaftskommunikation“ in der Heidelberger Villa Bosch und eine Veröffentlichung in “bild der wissenschaft“.
Die Öffentlichkeitsarbeit von GSI unterstützt euch gerne bei eurer Bewerbung.
Film-Clips auf YouTube:
Bald auf YouTube:
Dieses Film-Projekt wurde vom Beilstein-Institut initiiert. Die Stiftung betreibt unter anderem ein TV-Portal, auf dem Filme von Wissenschaftlern für Wissenschaftler gezeigt werden. In Kooperation mit GSI entstanden die sechs Filme, die auch für die breite Öffentlichkeit verständlich sein sollen. Kleinste Teilchen und Magnetfelder, die bei GSI eine große Rolle spielen, hat Ilka Brosch mit ihren Zeichnungen sichtbar gemacht.
The ring accelerator SIS has a circumference of 216 meters. About 50 magnets each weighing several tons keep the particles on their path. In the coming years two additional accelerator cavities will be built in. With the total of five cavities the SIS will have the performance to accelerate all kinds of elements and inject them into the FAIR machines.
Scientists from all over the world were able to conduct a great variety of experiments in research and application – ranging from astrophysics to tumor therapy – with the SIS since its commissioning in the year 1990. Outstanding successes were e. g. the discovery of hundreds of new isotopes. A GSI scientists holds the world record on this field, he has produced the largest number of isotopes compared to his colleagues all over the word. Furthermore three new types of radioactive decay have been found with the SIS. Out of biophysics a new tumor therapy has been developed and 450 patients have been treated at GSI with great success. This method of therapy is now administered in routine operation at the facility HIT in Heidelberg with aid of a dedicated accelerator built by GSI
]]>His substantial experiences with the GSI storage ring ESR and of the planning of storage rings for the project FAIR enable him to work for the enhancement of the comparable Cooler Storage Ring (CSR) in Lanzhou and also the large-scale project High Intensity Heavy Ion Accelerator Facility (HIAF) planned in China. He has also worked in the IMP's advisory committee for many years.
]]>"Von der Vereinbarung versprechen wir uns eine langfristige und nachhaltige Sicherstellung unseres technischen Nachwuchses", erklärte Professor Dr. Dr. h.c. mult. Horst Stöcker, Wissenschaftlicher Geschäftsführer der GSI. "Gerade im Hinblick auf die neue Beschleunigeranlage FAIR, die in internationaler Zusammenarbeit gebaut und in Zukunft an die bestehende GSI-Anlage angeschlossen werden wird, sind wir auf hochqualifizierte junge Wissenschaftler und Ingenieure angewiesen, die von Hochschulen wie der THM zu uns kommen. Sie können bei uns am Puls der Forschung mitarbeiten und während des Studiums bereits Projekterfahrung sammeln. So sind sie als Absolventen bestens vorbereitet für einen Job in der Industrie oder für eine Fortsetzung ihrer Karriere bei uns."
"Die Kooperation mit der GSI ist für uns ein wichtiger Schritt, um den Kontakt mit außeruniversitären Forschungseinrichtungen zu fördern und unseren Studenten Zugang zur internationalen Spitzenforschung zu ermöglichen", so Professor Dr. rer. pol. Günther Grabatin, Präsident der THM. "Die wissenschaftlichen Errungenschaften der GSI sowie das Milliardenprojekt FAIR zeigen das Potential auf, das sich unseren Studenten durch die Kooperation erschließt. Die Zusammenarbeit ermöglicht es dem Nachwuchs, bereits während des Studiums aktiv an der Forschung und Entwicklung teilzuhaben und wichtiges Fachwissen zu erwerben."
In der unterzeichneten "Rahmenvereinbarung über die strategische Zusammenarbeit in Forschung und Entwicklung und zur Förderung des wissenschaftlichen, technischen und administrativen Nachwuchses" setzen sich die beiden Partner das Ziel, den Studierenden der THM schon während des Studiums den Erwerb von Projekterfahrung zu ermöglichen und die personelle Nachhaltigkeit für GSI und FAIR zu sichern. Gleichzeitig soll die THM durch konkrete Aufgabenstellungen, beispielsweise im Rahmen von Studien- und Abschlussarbeiten, das FAIR-Projekt bei GSI unterstützen. Dadurch soll eine ideale Kombination von Theorie und Praxis erreicht werden. GSI verpflichtet sich, Mehrkosten der THM für duales und berufsbegleitendes Studium und Werkstudententätigkeiten zu übernehmen. Infrastrukturen sollen gemeinsam genutzt werden.
Die 1971 als Fachhochschule Gießen-Friedberg gegründete THM hat Standorte in Friedberg, Gießen und Wetzlar. Wissenschaftler der THM forschen interdisziplinär und zusammen mit Partnern aus der Wirtschaft und anderen Forschungsorganisationen. Die wissenschaftliche Arbeit zielt auf innovative und praxisnahe Lösungen von Problemen in Unternehmen und den Einsatz neuer Technologien in Industrie und Handwerk. Auf dem hohen Niveau in der Forschung basieren Spitzenleistungen in der Lehre sowie moderne und anwendungsbezogene Studiengänge.
]]>Strahlung schädigt die Erbinformation von Zellen, die sogenannte DNA. Der Schaden kann so gravierend sein, dass die Zelle abstirbt. Dies kann man sich beispielsweise bei der Strahlentherapie zunutze machen, um Tumorzellen zu zerstören. Leichtere Schäden können jedoch von Reparaturmechanismen der Zelle behoben werden. Wie stark der Schaden ist, hängt von der Gesamtdosis ab, mit der die Zelle bestrahlt wurde. Aber auch der Zeitraum, in dem diese Dosis verabreicht wurde, spielt eine Rolle. Ist er zu lang, können die Reparaturmechanismen bereits greifen und eine starke Schädigung verhindern, noch bevor die gesamte Dosis eingestrahlt wurde. Die Zeitabhängigkeit nennt man Dosisrateneffekt.
Das sogenannte GLOBLE-Modell zur Berechnung der Zellschädigung durch Strahlung berücksichtigte bisher diese zeitliche Komponente nicht. Lisa Herr fügte sie dem Modell hinzu und überprüfte die Vorhersagen des Modells anhand von in Experimenten gewonnenen Daten. Sie konnte zeigen, dass die von ihr entwickelte Erweiterung des Modells konsistent mit den Messdaten ist und den Dosisrateneffekt wirklichkeitsgetreu abbildet. Durch das erweiterte Modell sind nun bessere Vorhersagen der Zellschädigung durch Strahlung möglich.
Die Mittel zur Vergabe des Preises werden aus den Erträgnissen des Philipp-Siedler-Stiftungsfonds des Physikalischen Vereins entnommen. Der Förderpreis soll an das gleichnamige Ehrenmitglied des Vereins erinnern und für hervorragende Studienabschlussarbeiten (Diplom, Master) aus allen physikalischen Disziplinen der Goethe-Universität Frankfurt verliehen werden. Prämiert werden können Arbeiten, die im Laufe des letzten Jahres abgeschlossen wurden.
]]>Insgesamt wurden etwa 330 Tweets unter dem Hashtag „ScienceTweetup“ gesendet, 200 Bilder wurden geschossen und einige Videos gedrehts. Über viele soziale Netzwerke ließen die Gäste des GSI ScienceTweetups ihre Follower-Communities an ihren Erlebnissen bei GSI teilhaben. Alle Tweets gibt es unter dem GSI #ScienceTweetup-Storify.
Nach dem ausführlichen Rundgang im Ringbeschleuniger besichtigten sie das FAIR-Baufeld und informierten sich über die neue Teilchenbeschleunigeranlage. Anschließend sahen sie ausgewählte Experimentierplätze, den Linearbeschleuniger und den Hauptkontrollraum. "Grüße von der Enterprise Brücke #Kontrollraum #sciencetweetup", twittert Tobias Liebert (@Tobbelmoppel) dazu.
Im Targetlabor erfuhren die Teilnehmer, wie die kleinen Folien hergestellt werden, auf die der Teilchenstrahl geschossen wird. Anschließend durften sie selbst ein Kohlenstoff-Target aus dem Wasserbad auf einen Rahmen aufziehen. Eico Neumann (@travelholic) berichtet begeistert: "I just build a 100nm (Nanometer!) thick carbon target for the particle beam! #sciencetweetup".
Beim Science-Speeddating stellten die Twitterer, Blogger und Podcaster im kleinen Kreis ihre Fragen direkt an Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftler. Aus der Materialforschung beantwortete Dr. Markus Bender Fragen. Besonders interessant für Lisa Leander von @weltderphysik ist die Zusammenarbeit zwischen GSI und der Raumfahrt: „Jetzt kommt das Science Speeddating, zuerst mit Markus Bender, der im Beschleuniger Strahlenschäden im Weltall nachstellt #ScienceTweetup“. Dr. Timo Dickel von der NUSTAR-Kollaboration berichtet über Astrophysik: „Science Speeddating Wissenschaftler erklären auch anhand von Detektorteilen #ScienceTweetup“ twittert Kevin Gräff für @AAW_Darmstadt dazu. „Heidi Schuldes misst bei HADES "seltsame Teilchen" wie Kaonen und Pionen #ScienceTweetup“ berichtet @weltderphysik an seine Follower. Die Fragen gehen aber auch über die Forschung hinaus: „Das Targetlabor ist sehr weiblich dominiert, sagt Dr. Lommel, am Gesamt-GSI sind es etwa 10% Frauen. #sciencetweetup“, twittert Anna Müllner (@_Adora_Belle).
Blog-Artikel von Daniel Fischer (@cosmos4u)
Fotoalbum von Tobias Liebert (@Tobbelmoppel)
Fotoalbum von Henning Krause (@ScienceTweetup)
Audio-Slideshow von Michael Büker (@emtiu)
Blog-Artikel von Tobias Liebert
Blog-Artikel von Michèle Lauer (@McLauer)
]]>Um Mädchen für traditionelle Männerberufe zu begeistern, veranstalten Betriebe und Institute bundesweit den Girls’Day. Schülerinnen der Klassen 5 bis 10 können an diesem Tag in verschiedene Berufe hineinschnuppern, selbst experimentieren und Fragen stellen.
]]>Bei den Awards werden herausragende Leistungen im Bereich Rechenzentren aus Europa, dem Mittleren Osten und Afrika prämiert. Die Verleihung der Preise findet am 12. Dezember in London statt. Der Green IT Cube wurde in diesem Jahr in drei Kategorien nominiert: „Leadership in the Public Sector“, „Data Center Blueprint“ sowie „IT-Optimization“.
Kriterien für die Vergabe in den ersten beiden genannten Kategorien sind eine sehr hohe Energieeffizienz, niedrige Investitions- und Betriebskosten bezogen auf die Anzahl und Leistungsfähigkeit der Server sowie architektonische Konzepte, die einen besonders kompakten Aufbau ermöglichen. In der Kategorie „Blueprint“ spielen auch die Design-Prinzipien des Rechenzentrums eine Rolle, und ob sie auch für andere Arten und Größen von Rechenzentren an anderen Standorten geeignet sind. In der Kategorie „IT-Optimization“ wird prämiert, wie die IT-Infrastruktur und die Rechenzentrumsinfrastruktur gemeinsam optimiert werden, um über den Lebenszyklus des Rechenzentrum deutliche Kostenvorteile zu erlangen.
Der „Green IT Cube“ besticht vor allem durch seinen kompakten Aufbau und einer weitgehenden Nutzung von Stahl, was die Kosten für den Hochbau im Vergleich zu einer klassischen Bauweise deutlich senkt. Hinzu kommt eine effiziente Infrastruktur, die die Kosten für die Kühlung um fast 90 Prozent gegenüber auf dem Markt erhältlichen Technologien reduziert und diese auch bei den dabei notwendigen Investitionen deutlich unterschreitet. Die sich daraus ergebenden Bau- und Betriebskosten pro Server sind im Markt unerreicht.
DataCenterDynamics ist eine weltweit führende Organisation, die im Bereich Rechenzentren Kongresse und Messen veranstaltet und umfangreiche Studien zum Rechenzentrumsmarkt sowie zu -technologien recherchiert und veröffentlicht. DataCenterDynamics verfügt über ein internationales Netzwerk aus Managern und Experten, die als Jury die EMEA Awards vergibt.
22.07.2011 | Green-Cube - ein neues umweltfreundliches Höchstleistungs-Computerzentrum
]]>"Saturday Morning Physics" is hosted by the physics department of the Technical University. The series of lectures is held annually aims to further the interest of young people for physics. In talks and experiments on consecutive Saturdays the pupils learn about the current research at the university. The visit to GSI is the only excursion. GSI, amongst many others, sponsors the project already from the start.
]]>Tetyana Galatyuk experimentiert am GSI-Detektor HADES. Dort stieß sie auf ein Phänomen, das DLS-Rätsel, das schon aus dem Teilchenbeschleuniger Berkeley bekannt war: Bei der Kollision von schweren Atomkernen enstanden unerwartet viele Elektron-Positron-Paare. Keines der damaligen theoretischen Modelle konnte das erklären. Galatyuk verglich in ihren Experimenten elementare Proton-Proton- und Proton-Neutron-Reaktionen mit Schwerionenreaktionen, wenn etwa Goldkerne auf Goldkerne treffen. „Sie hat dabei die große Bedeutung der Neutron-Proton-Bremsstrahlung erkannt“, sagt Professor Alfred Müller, Vorsitzender des Gutachterausschusses. „Sie ebnete damit den Weg für eine korrekte theoretische Beschreibung dieses Phänomens bei Kern-Kern-Kollisionen.“ Das habe das Gutachtergremium zur Verleihung des Preises an Galatyuk bewegt, so Müller. Es sei aber auch von der steilen Karriere von Frau Galatyuk beeindruckt, die es bereits in jungen Jahren zur Juniorprofessorin an der TU Darmstadt gebracht hat. Auch die Vorbildfunktion einer jungen dynamischen Wissenschaftlerin für Studierende und speziell für junge Frauen, die vor der Studienwahl stehen, sei ein Gesichtspunkt bei der Entscheidung für Tetyana Galatyuk gewesen.
Der Röntgen-Preis wird im Andenken an Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen verliehen. Er war ordentlicher Professor der Physik an der damaligen Ludwigs-Universität Gießen in den Jahren 1879 bis 1888. Er entdeckte die nach ihm benannte Röntgenstrahlung und erhielt als erster einen Physik-Nobelpreis. Seit 1975 verleiht die Justus-Liebig-Universität Gießen den Röntgen-Preis.
]]>Download "target" – Issue 10, November 2013 (PDF, 5,1 MB, German only)
From 21st July to 11th September 2014 students can gain insight into a scientist's everyday life, experiment on their own and socialize internationally. In 2013 summer students for example investigated beam dynamics in a collector ring or synthesized nanostructures based on ion-track technology.
Applications and recommendations must reach us before 15th February 2014. The program is integrated into the educational canon of GSI's graduate school, the Helmholtz Graduate School for Hadron and Ion Research (HGS-HIRe for FAIR).
More Informationen and application at HGS-HIRe
29.08.2013 | First PhD Science Day at GSI
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Der Christoph-Schmelzer-Preis wird jährlich vergeben und ist mit 1 500 Euro für jede Preisträgerin dotiert. Im Rahmen der Verleihung stellten sie ihre Arbeiten vor:
Dr. Daniela Kraft hat die Langzeitfolgen einer Strahlentherapie mit Kohlenstoffionen mit denen einer herkömmlichen Photonentherapie verglichen. Sie experimentierte mit humanen blutbildenden Stammzellen, da sie in Folge einer Bestrahlung mutieren und Leukämie erzeugen können. Bei ihren Experimenten an der GSI-Anlage stellte sie fest, dass die Veränderungen der Zellen bei Photonen- und Kohlenstofftherapie in gleichem Maße auftreten. Ebenfalls interessant war die Erkenntnis, dass die veränderten Zellen nicht fatal geschädigt waren und weiter ihre Aufgaben erfüllen konnten. Außerdem fand Kraft keine Anzeichen dafür, dass es zu weiteren spontanen Veränderungen kommt. Ihre Promotion reichte die Preisträgerin an der Goethe-Universität Frankfurt ein.
Dr. Ilaria Rinaldi wird für eine physikalisch-technische Arbeit geehrt, die sie am Heidelberger Ionenstrahl-Therapiezentrum (HIT) durchführte. Sie erarbeitet zwei neue Verfahren, mit denen der Ionenstrahl während der Behandlung im Gewebe abgebildet werden kann. So ist die Reichweite des Ionenstrahls noch exakter zu kontrollieren. Das Bild ist dabei von guter Qualität, wobei die Strahlendosis minimal bleibt. Rinaldi nutzte bei GSI entwickelte Detektorteile für ihre Messungen. Die Dissertation reichte sie an der Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg ein.
Christoph Schmelzer war Mitbegründer und erster Wissenschaftlicher Geschäftsführer von GSI. An der GSI-Beschleunigeranlage wurden seit 1997 über 400 Patienten mit Tumoren in der Regel im Gehirn mit Ionenstrahlen behandelt. Die Heilungsraten dieser Methode liegen bei über 90 Prozent und die Nebenwirkungen sind sehr gering. Am Heidelberger Ionenstrahl-Therapiezentrum (HIT) werden Patienten mittlerweile routinemäßig mit schweren Ionen behandelt. Das Verfahren ist von vielen Krankenkasse anerkannt.
18.01.2013 | Christoph-Schmelzer-Preis 2012
12.06.2001 | GSI trauert um ihren ersten Wissenschaftlichen Direktor
]]>Hermann von Helmholtz steht für die ganze Vielfalt der naturwissenschaftlichen Forschung und die Hinwendung zur technologischen Praxis. Er war einer der letzten wirklichen Universalgelehrten. Helmholtz vertrat eine Naturwissenschaft, die Brücken schlug zwischen Medizin, Physik und Chemie. Darüber hinaus widmete er sich der Psychologie, Musik und Philosophie.
Am Helmholtz-Tag erfahren die Schülerinnen und Schüler im GSI-Schülerlabor mehr über die vielseitige Forschung und die zahlreichen Errungenschaften des Universalgelehrten. Sie begeben sich auf die Spuren von Helmholtz. An Experimentiersets untersuchen sie die Bausteine des Atoms und verschiedene Aspekte von radioaktiver Strahlung. Darüber hinaus lernen sie Anwendungen von Radioaktivität in Medizin, Technik und Forschung kennen. Auf einem Rundgang durch die GSI-Anlagen sehen die Schüler die Messtechniken, mit denen sie selbst experimentiert haben, im großen Maßstab im Einsatz für die Grundlagenforschung wieder.
Das GSI-Schülerlabor hat zum Ziel nachhaltig das Interesse von Schülerinnen und Schülern der Klassen 9 bis 13 an Naturwissenschaften zu fördern. Seit Eröffnung im Herbst 2004 ist die Nachfrage nach dem Angebot riesig. Bis heute haben über 14.000 Schülerinnen aus über 700 Klassen sowie 25 Lehrergruppen an einem Experimentiertag teilgenommen. Bei Lehrern und Schülern findet das Schülerlabor gleichermaßen große Zustimmung. So haben zahlreiche Schulen den Besuch im GSI-Schülerlabor bereits fest in den Stundenplan integriert.
Die Idee eines Tweetups ist, wissenschaftsinteressierte Blogger und Nutzer von Social Media-Plattformen einzuladen und ihnen exklusiven Zugang zu Forschungsanlagen und WissenschaftlerInnen zu geben. Live und aus einem persönlichen Blickwinkel schildern sie ihre Eindrücke, teilen Fotos, Videos und Infos im Netz. So ermöglichen sie einer großen Gruppe, einmal hinter die Kulissen eines Forschungsbetriebs zu schauen.
Da nicht alle der bisherigen Teilnehmer zum Nachholtermin Zeit haben, sind einige wenige Plätze wieder frei geworden. Wir öffnen daher eine zweite Bewerbungsphase. Die Bewerbung für das GSI ScienceTweetup ist vom 15. bis zum 24. November 2013 möglich. Spannende Themen warten: Ist das Higgs-Teilchen das einzige Geheimnis hinter der Masse? Welche unbekannten Gebiete der Physik wird die neue Beschleunigeranlage mit ihren hohen Ionen-Intensitäten und 99 Prozent der Lichtgeschwindigkeit eröffnen? Jetzt bewerben und am 5. Dezember 2013 dabei sein!
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Wissenschaft zum Anfassen ist das Motto der Ausstellung: Mithilfe anschaulicher Exponate und interaktiver Stationen erleben die Besucher Wissenschaft, besonders Physik, die an Teilchenbeschleunigern, wie GSI und FAIR, eine Rolle spielt.
Konzipiert wurde die Ausstellung von Dr. Sascha Vogel vom Helmholtz International Center for FAIR (HIC for FAIR). Er ist Koordinator der Helmholtz-Doktorandenschule HGS-HIRe und theoretischer Physiker. Sein Ziel ist es, komplizierte Vorgänge kurz, verständlich und vor allem unterhaltsam zu vermitteln. Wissenschaft soll leichter zugänglich werden und Spaß machen. Die Ausstellung ist bis zum 12. Januar 2014 zu sehen.
Betreute Führungen für Schulklassen und Gruppen sind nach Absprache möglich.
The proposal for the symposium was submitted in a joint effort by Dr. Yuri Litvinov, GSI, and Professor Yuhu Zhang, Institute of Modern Physics in Lanzhou. It was evaluated by referees from Germany and China. The approval and a grant for 173 600 RMB (approx. 20 000 Euro) for the realization of the events as well as travel funds for 18 participants were given in September 2013. The money is given by the Sino-German Centre for the Advancement of Science funded by the German Research Foundation DFG and the National Natural Science Foundation of China. The centre’s goal is to further the scientific cooperation between China and Germany in the fields of natural, life, managment and engineering sciences.
]]>If you want to order the DIN A2 sized calendar, please contact GSI-Kalender(at)gsi.de directly and we will immediately send the calendar to you by post. Be sure to mention the following information: your name, your address and the number of calendars you wish to order. GSI employees can get a copy at the foyer or the storage.
Please understand that because of the limited edition you can only request a maximum of three calendars (while supplies last) per order.
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Now that the general approval for the new accelerator complex FAIR has been granted, the detailed construction plans for the individual buildings are currently being examined and approved by the official agencies in Hesse. In addition to the massive ring accelerator, which will have a circumference of 1100 meters, the experimental area for biophysics and material research and the facility for the creation of new isotopes, the super fragment separator, have been approved. In previous examinations a storage ring, infrastructure buildings and large sections of the beam controls were approved. The Hesse Ministry confirmed in a document that the detailed planning of the building complies with the safety regulations for the scientists and technicians working there, and also for the immediate environment.
The approval processes are being overseen by GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH on behalf of FAIR GmbH.
The international particle accelerator complex FAIR, which is some 4000 meters long and largely underground, is to be erected as an extension of the existing GSI facility, which is some 400 meters long and which will serve as an injector in the future. More than 3,000 scientists from over 50 countries will conduct research on the building blocks of matter and the development of the universe. In this respect particularly intensive precision beams of antiprotons and ions of all chemical elements can be created at FAIR.
13.06.2012 | Green Light for Construction of Accelerator FAIR
]]>Was ist ein Forscher, wie denkt er und wie sieht sein Arbeitsalltag aus? Kinder schon früh in Kontakt mit Naturwissenschaften und Technik zu bringen, ist Ziel der Bildungsinitiative „Junge Forscher“. Physik-Doktoranden von GSI erarbeiten mit Grundschülern auf spielerische Weise, was ein Teilchenbeschleuniger ist und was man mit ihm erforschen kann.
Vier ausgewählte Physikerinnen und Physiker leiteten zwei Mal den Unterricht an der Frankfurter Karmeliterschule. Sie experimentierten mit den Kindern und bauten das Modell eines Teilchenbeschleunigers. Im Vordergrund des Projektes steht der persönliche Kontakt zwischen Wissenschaftlern und den Schülern. Die jungen Physiker sollen ihre Begeisterung im Gespräch und gemeinsamen Experimentieren auf die Kinder übertragen und ihnen eine Vorstellung von der komplexen wissenschaftlichen Forschung an einer Großforschungsanlage vermitteln.
Bei der Besichtigung der GSI-Beschleunigeranlage, anschließend an den Unterricht, lernen Kinder, Eltern und Lehrer den Arbeitsplatz der Nachwuchsforscher kennen und bekommen einen direkten Einblick in den Wissenschaftsbetrieb einer großen Forschungseinrichtung.
Nicht nur die Kinder profitieren von der Kooperation, die Wissenschaftler erhalten eine pädagogische Schulung und bekommen die Chance didaktische Erfahrungen zu sammeln.
Zum dritten Mal findet das Projekt bereits statt und ist damit zu einem Teil der Bildungskette geworden, die GSI etabliert hat. Von Grundschulprojekten über das Schülerlabor für weiterführende Schulen und die Sommerschulen für Studenten bis hin zur Doktorandenschule bietet GSI Bildung für jedes Alter.
„Strahlung spielt eine große Rolle in der Medizin – sowohl in der Therapie als auch in der Diagnose“, sagt Dr. Claudia Fournier, Biophysikerin bei GSI und Organisatorin der Tagung. „Offene Fragen zur biologischen Wirkung werden mit modernen Methoden bearbeitet, gleichzeitig ergeben sich ständig neue Aspekte durch innovative Therapien und Methoden, die in der Medizin Anwendung finden. Auf der Jahrestagung werden wir aktuelle Erkenntnisse zu DNA-Reparaturmechanismen, zum Risiko von Strahlung und zur Wirkung von Strahlung in Normalgewebe und Tumoren diskutieren.“
Zur diesjährigen Veranstaltung, die gemeinsam von der Abteilung Biophysik dem GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung und dem Fachbereich Biologie der TU Darmstadt ausgerichtet wird, werden viele junge Forscherinnen und Forscher erwartet. Sie sind teilweise vom DFG-geförderten Graduiertenkolleg „Molekulare und zelluläre Reaktionen auf ionisierende Strahlung", das von GSI, der TU Darmstadt und der Goethe-Universität Frankfurt betreut wird.
Im Rahmen der Veranstaltung werden außerdem zwei Preise verliehen. Der Nachwuchspreis der GBS für junge Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftler geht an Dr. Thomas Friedrich (GSI) und Dr. Stephanie Hehlgans (Universität Frankfurt). Die Ulrich-Hagen Medaille wird für hervorragende Verdienste um die Strahlenforschung verliehen und geht an Prof. Friederike Eckhardt-Schupp (Helmholtzzentrum München).
Die GBS, die 1996 in Gießen gegründet wurde, ist die deutsche Vereinigung der Strahlenbiologen und Strahlenbiophysiker. Sie zählt etwa 200 Mitglieder aus Universitäten und Forschungsinstituten.
The membership fee is one Euro per month. With the money insurances and charges by the Betriebssportverband Hessen and the Deutschen Betriebssportverband (DBSV) will be paid. For GSI employees who become members the society will additionally receive four Euro per month as a prevention benefit for furthering the health of the employees. Donations to the society are welcome.
GSI's company-facilitated sports activities exist since 1974. Currently a variety of 15 differents sports is offered, e. g. table tennis, aikido or yoga. 170 people make use of the offer.
]]>Seit 1970 kooperiert Münzenberg mit den Kernphysikern der finnischen Universität Jyväskylä. Vor allem zum Aufbau des Beschleunigerlabors der Universität leistete er wichtige Beiträge. Von seiner Expertise im Entwurf und Betrieb von Rückstoß-Separatoren habe die Forschungsgruppe sehr profitiert, so das Institut für Physik in seinem Newsletter. Außerdem war er Mitglied beratender Ausschüsse.
Münzenberg entdeckte mit seinen Kollegen die Elemente 107, 108 und 109 am GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung. Er hat den Aufbau der SHIP-Anlage (Separator for Heavy Ion reaction Products) geleitet, mit der die neuen Elemente hergestellt wurden. Neben neuen Elementen entdeckte er auch 219 exotische Kerne, womit ist er Dritter der Weltrangliste ist. Auch vom Vereinigten Institut für Kernforschung in Dubna wurde Münzenberg bereits die Ehrendoktorwürde verliehen.
„Die Helmholtz-Nachwuchsgruppe wird relativistische Laserplasmen und Röntgenpulserzeugung theoretische und numerisch erforschen“, erklärt Thomas Stöhlker, Leiter des HI-Jena. „Das Ziel ist also die Erforschung der Wechselwirkung intensiver Lichtpulse mit Materie.“ Über fünf Jahre bekommt Rykovanov dafür jährlichen eine Förderung von 250 000 Euro. Neben der finanziellen Unterstützung, ist auch die Option auf eine unbefristete Stelle gegeben. Das erleichtert den Nachwuchsforschern den Einstieg in eine wissenschaftliche Karriere. „Bereits die Hälfte der ehemaligen Helmholtz-Nachwuchsgruppenleiter bei GSI sind mittlerweile ordentliche Professoren. Die guten Karriereperspektiven locken die jungen Forscher“, sagt Horst Stöcker, wissenschaftlicher Geschäftsführer bei GSI.
66 junge Forscherinnen und Forscher aus aller Welt hatten sich für die aktuelle Förderrunde beworben. „Die vielen qualitativ hochwertigen Bewerbungen aus international renommierten Forschungseinrichtungen wie der University of California (Berkeley) oder der Harvard University zeigen, dass es für junge Wissenschaftler sehr attraktiv ist, in Deutschland zu forschen“, sagt Jürgen Mlynek, Präsident der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft. „Diese Rekrutierungserfolge sind ein großer Gewinn für das deutsche Wissenschaftssystem.“
Dr. Thomas Friedrich works in the GSI biophysics and creates biological models for radiation damages. The computer models emulate the complex processes inside of cells, for example the differing damages inflicted on the cells by X-rays or by ion beams. By comparison with experimental data basic assumptions can be verified and the models can be refined. On the long run better predictions can be made by the models, which are e. g. used in the treatment planning for cancer therapy.
Dr. Stephanie Hehlgans is employed at the clinic for radiotherapy and oncology of the University Hospital Frankfurt. Before she was working for OncoRay - National Center for Radiation Research in Oncology in Dresden. Main topic of her research was the identification of molecular factors leading to a radiation resistance in tumor cells. She used a three-dimensional model of cell cultures that allows precise predictions of cell response. Her work forms a foundation for the development of improved diagnostical methods for the prediction of responses to therapy and the purposeful therapeutic inhibition of identifying factors of the resensibilisation of tumour cells.
]]>For the new experiment, scientists at the Institute for Nuclear Chemistry at the University Mainz took a sample of the exotic element americium, provided by the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Tennessee. They deposited an americium layer on a thin foil, which was subsequently bombarded with calcium-ions at the GSI facility. For the first time, the exploitation of a new detector system allowed registering also photons along with the alpha-decay of the new element and its daughter products. Measured photon energies correspond to those expected for X-rays from these products and thus serve as the element's fingerprint.
"This can be regarded as one of the most important experiments in the field in recent years, because at last it is clear that even the heaviest elements' fingerprints can be taken”, agree Dirk Rudolph, professor at Lund University, Sweden, and Christoph Düllmann, professor at University Mainz, and leading scientist at GSI Darmstadt and HIM Mainz, Germany. "The result gives high confidence to previous reports. It also lays the basis for future measurements of this kind."
The element 115 is yet to be named: a committee comprising members of the international unions of pure and applied physics and chemistry will review the new findings and decide whether further experiments are needed to acknowledge the element's discovery. Only after such final acceptance, a name may be proposed by the discoverers.
Besides the X-ray events, the researchers have also obtained data giving them a deeper insight into the structure and properties of the heaviest currently known atomic nuclei. This paves the way towards improved predictions for properties of nuclei beyond the border of current knowledge.
]]>The PhD students were welcomed Professor Dr. Karlheinz Langanke. head of the GSI Research Division. Afterwards some motivation words from Professor Dr. Peter Senger, Board of Collaborations at FAIR, and about career opportunities for young scientists from Inti Lehmann (FAIR GmbH) were held. Former PhD students informed the participants about their time at GSI and their experiences. 26 PhD students used the opportunity to present their research in a poster exhibition. The two best contributions by Heidi Schuldes (HADES) and Iurii Sorokin (CBM) were awarded with a certificate.
GSI PhD student Pradeep Ghosh organized the event that will be repeated annually in the future. "A joint event of GSI's doctoral candidates is important for knowing each other and staying informed about research activities at the Institute. It can help to strengthen the cooperation between the departments", he said. "GSI hosts more than 150 PhD students. Having a dedicated day is a step forward to bring all of us together and discuss science. We want to communicate, evolve, promote science and learn about recent developments and career opportunities for young researchers."
Ghosh is also one of six representatives of the Helmholtz Juniors at GSI and Spokesperson for PhD-Survey Group at Helmholtz-Juniors a network of PhD students of the whole Helmholtz Association. They plan a central event of all Helmholtz Centers in the future.
Also the 37 summer students visiting GSI were invited to join the event and to gain a broader insight into the GSI research and itsNews success stories. Ghosh hopes that it can inspire them to consider their own PhD career at GSI.
]]>Die Reihe richtet sich an alle an aktueller Wissenschaft und Forschung interessierten Personen. In der Regel einmal pro Monat findet jeweils an einem Mittwoch in der Monatsmitte ein Vortrag aus der Reihe statt.
Die Themen decken ein großes wissenschaftliches Spektrum ab - nicht nur über die Forschung an GSI und FAIR wird berichtet, sondern generell über aktuelle Themen aus Physik, Chemie, Biologie, Medizin und Informatik. Ziel der Reihe ist es, die wissenschaftlichen Vorgänge für den Laien verständlich aufzubereiten und darzustellen, um so die Forschung einem breiten Publikum zugänglich zu machen. Die Vorträge werden von sowohl GSI-internen als auch externen Rednern aus Universitäten und anderen Instituten gehalten.
Alle Vorträge finden im Hörsaal der GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH, Planckstraße 1, 64291 Darmstadt, statt. Beginn ist jeweils um 14 Uhr. Der Eintritt ist frei, eine Anmeldung ist nicht erforderlich. Externe Teilnehmer werden gebeten, für den Einlass an unserer Pforte ein Ausweisdokument bereitzuhalten. Weitere Informationen und aktuelle Ankündigungen finden Sie auf unserer Webseite.
Die Neuentwicklung LB 44 von Liebherr kommt auf der FAIR-Baustelle zum ersten Mal zum Einsatz. Mit einem maximalen Drehmoment von 510 Kilonewtonmetern und einer Leistung von 505 Kilowatt ist es stärker als die LB 36 und die BG 46 von Bauer, die schon auf der Baustelle arbeiten. Mit diesen Drehbohrgeräten sind die größten auf dem europäischen Markt erhältlichen Geräte auf der FAIR-Baustelle versammelt. Nach der Montage gestern, findet heute bereits die erste Bohrung mit der 36 Meter hohen LB 44 statt.
In wenigen Wochen wird eine zweite LB 44 geliefert. Dann ist die Riege der Drehbohrgeräte komplett. Mit ihnen setzen die Baufirmen bis zu 60 Meter lange Betonpfähle in den Untergrund. So wird er stabil genug sein, um die schweren Magnete, die Gebäude und die empfindlichen Detektoren der neuen Beschleunigeranlage zu tragen.
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Zum ersten Mal ist der GSI-Ringbeschleuniger unter strengen Auflagen für eine begrenzte Anzahl von Besuchern zugänglich. Von Astrophysik bis zur Krebstherapie wurde mit ihm schon intensiv geforscht. Jetzt wird er fit gemacht für FAIR – das größte Forschungsprojekt Europas – und ist deshalb geöffnet. Wir laden 15 Twitterer exklusiv dazu ein den Beschleunigerring zu besichtigen, Wissenschaftlern Fragen zu stellen und die Baustelle von FAIR zu besuchen, der zukünftigen Facility für Antiproton and Ion Research.
Die Idee eines Tweetups ist, wissenschaftsinteressierte Blogger und Nutzer von Social Media-Plattformen einzuladen und ihnen exklusiven Zugang zu Forschungsanlagen und WissenschaftlerInnen zu geben. Live und aus einem persönlichen Blickwinkel schildern sie ihre Eindrücke, teilen Fotos, Videos und Infos im Netz. So ermöglichen sie einer großen Gruppe, einmal hinter die Kulissen eines Forschungsbetriebs zu schauen.
Die Bewerbung für das GSI ScienceTweetup ist vom 24. Juli bis zum 6. August 2013 möglich. Spannende Themen warten: Ist das Higgs-Teilchen das einzige Geheimnis hinter der Masse? Welche unbekannten Gebiete der Physik wird die neue Beschleunigeranlage mit ihren hohen Ionen-Intensitäten und 99 Prozent der Lichtgeschwindigkeit eröffnen? Jetzt bewerben und am 27. August 2013 dabei sein!
ScienceTweetup bei der Langen Nacht der Wissenschaft in Berlin
]]>Die Ernennungsurkunde erhielt Sigurd Hofmann am 17. Juli in der Botschaft der Republik Polen in Berlin von Botschafter Jerzy Margańsk. Hofmann ist damit das 35. auswärtige Mitglied der seit 140 Jahren bestehenden Polnischen Akademie der Gelehrsamkeit. Sie beherbergt sechs Fachbereiche und zahlreiche fachbereichsübergreifende Ausschüsse interdisziplinären Charakters, die regelmäßige wissenschaftliche Sitzungen, Konferenzen, Diskussionen und Vorträge veranstalten.
Hofmann, der an der Entdeckung sechs neuer Elemente maßgeblich beteiligt war, ist eng mit Polen verbunden. Seit über 30 Jahren arbeitet er mit polnischen Kernphysikern auf dem Gebiet der schweren Elemente zusammen und ist regelmäßig persönlich in Polen.
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Hofmann sagt in seinem Grußwort über Darmstadt: „Und wo lässt sich besser über Details nachdenken und diskutieren als im Herrngarten, der nur einen Katzensprung vom Institut für Kernphysik entfernt ist? Es war eine ruhige, ja beschauliche Stimmung, die mich da umgab. Ich denke, es ist die Symbiose von Stadt und Land, was nur möglich sein kann, wenn eine Stadt eine gewisse kritische Größe nicht überschreitet. Und das ist es, was Darmstadt für mich so liebenswert macht.“
17. Mai 2013, Auf der Jagd nach schweren Elementen, Darmstädter Echo
Warum eigentlich "Darmstadtium"?, Grußwort Sigurd Hofmann
Erzeugung neuer Elemente bei GSI
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The commendation is awarded by ERRS since the year 1996. It is named after the researchers Zénon Marcel Bacq and Peter Alexander. Bacq was a Belgian radiobiologist in the 20th century who among other things investigated the possibilities of chemical protection against ionising radiation. Together with Alexander he edited the book "Fundamentals of Radiobiology".
]]>Recently the measurement of the isotopes calcium-53 and calcium-54 was successful. They were produced with aid of an accelerator and afterwards weighed in the ISOLTRAP setup. Calcium has a closed proton shell and is therefore suited for studies of the binding forces inside the nucleus. In different calcium isotopes the development from stable elements in the valley of stability up to the border of the nuclear chart can be observed. The two measured isotopes have a high number of neutrons in the nucleus, thus being very close to the border. The measurements show a new shell closure at a neutron number of 32 as it was already predicted in theoretical calculations performed by researchers from the Technical University of Darmstadt, aided by the ExtreMe Matter Institute EMMI at GSI.
Involved in the experiments were GSI, CERN, the Max-Planck-Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg and the universities of Dresden, Greifswald, Istanbul (Turkey), Leuven (Belgium) and Orsay (France).
Scientific publication in "Nature"
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Press release of the Hessian Ministry for Science and the Arts (in German)
„Die Zukunftsfähigkeit unseres Wissenschaftsstandorts zeigt sich auf eindrucksvolle Weise bei der GSI: Mit modernster Technik enthüllen Wissenschaftler aus aller Welt die Geheimnisse des Universums und liefern gleichzeitig bahnbrechende Forschungsgrundlagen etwa für die Krebstherapie“, so Bouffier. Im Rahmen der Aktionswochen Forschung hat der Regierungschef die GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH besucht. Bei seinem Rundgang informierte sich der Ministerpräsident unter anderem über den Fortschritt beim Bau der internationalen Forschungsanlage FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) und sprach mit Nachwuchswissenschaftlerinnen und Nachwuchswissenschaftlern über ihre Arbeit.
Durante is awarded "for his outstanding and seminal contributions to research topics in the field of radiation biophysics, including work in clinical and space radiobiology, particle genetic damage and therapy, and his valuable activities in the scientific community", says the prize committee.
The prize is presented to Durante in the framework of the 2013 International Nuclear Physics Conference in Florence, Italy, tomorrow on June 7, 2013.
]]>In the experiments at the accelerator facility in Los Alamos the scientists irradiated a mouse with fast protons. Tiny structures like the spine or the ribs are visible. Radiography of the human anthropomorphic phantom of the Matroshka experiment (developed by the Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt for dosimetry on the International Space Station) was also registered in Los Alamos using high-energy protons.
Protons are the atomic nuclei of hydrogen atoms. With aid of an accelerator they can be accelerated to high speeds. Similar to the already established x-rays in medicals diagnostics the protons can radiograph an object and generate an image of it. "Up to now inanimate objects have been examined with this technique. For example plasmas or explosions can be irradiated and one can gain an image of the movements inside", explains Dr. Dmitry Varentsov from the GSI Plasma physics department. In the experiments at Los Alamos now researchers from the GSI biophysics and plasma physics departments produced images and movies of biological samples for the first time.
"A direct treatment of a tumour with the same protons used for imaging is possible. One could precisely aim at the tumour and irradiate it with a dose of protons to destroy it (aim-and-shoot)", says Professor Marco Durante, head of GSI biophysics. "The images gained from the fast protons have a high resolution, small structures are visible. This would allow the differentiation between sensitive healthy tissue and tumour tissue in a treatment."
"The treatment would at the same time deliver an exact picture of the environment of the tumour to adjust the beam for the consecutive sessions. That is especially important when the tumour is close to sensitive areas like the brain stem or the spinal cord", says Dr. Matthias Prall from GSI biophysics who participated in the experiments with his colleagues. "One can carefully approach the critical organs and ensure that the tumour is destroyed and the healthy tissue is spared."
GSI has long-time experience in tumour therapy with carbon ions. This form of cancer treatment would benefit from the proton diagnostics as well. Until now information about the tumour is gained by diagnostics with x-rays (CT scan). The different types of tissue on the way to the tumour play an important role for the treatment planning. But x-rays penetrate the tissue differently from ion beams. The data gained from CT scan has to be converted for the planning of ion treatment. Using proton radiography for treatment planning in ion therapy would drastically reduce the range uncertainty and consequently allow to further reduce the margins of the target volume, thus sparing even more normal tissue.
In planned experiments in Fall 2013 in Los Alamos the GSI, TUD and LANL scientists want to irradiate other biological samples. They plan to diagnose and treat a tumour with this technique. That could be an artificial tumour inside the Matroshka phantom or a tumour in an animal.
"In the future, similar experiments will be possible at the accelerators of FAIR, that is currently built in international collaboration and will be connected with the existing GSI facilities", Durante gives as a prospect for the future. "FAIR will contain an experimental site for the joint use of the plasma physics and biophysics scientists. FAIR will produce protons with even higher energies than GSI and the facility in Los Alamos. This will improve the quality of the imaging and offer new perspectives for investigation of the tumour treatment."
Video: Radiography of a mouse with fast protons - longitudal cut
Video: Radiography of a mouse with fast protons - lateral cut
]]>Fortov received the award for his pioneering work on the thermodynamic, thermophysical, electrophysical, and electronic properties of fluids and construction materials. He studies quasi-cristalline structures in plasma, experiments took place e. g. on the space station Mir and are continued on the International Space Station (ISS).
Fortov is the chairperson of GSI's advisory committee for the PHELIX laser system as well as Russian delegate of the FAIR council. He is an honorary doctor of the Goethe university in Frankfurt.
]]>The international Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (FAIR) will be built on a 20-hectare site using 35,000 tons of steel and 600,000 cubic meters of concrete. The work horse of its modularised start version is a ring accelerator (SIS100 synchrotron) with a circumference of 1.1 km. Associated to this synchrotron is a complex system of cooler and storage rings, and large-scale experiments. The new site is located next to the GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research; their accelerators will be used as injectors.
Professor John Womersley, Chief Executive at STFC, said: “The advances in technology that will result from our scientists’ work on this hugely challenging project will be a real asset to the UK in terms of economic and societal benefits. The UK’s associate member status at FAIR will ensure that we play a leading role in the development of this ground-breaking international project, and that our researchers will have access to the latest, most advanced research facilities. STFC is the UK sponsor of nuclear physics and this milestone helps keep the UK science programme at the forefront internationally. FAIR will be the world’s most important nuclear physics research facility for many decades to come making this a very exciting time to be involved in this area of research. It will most certainly provide vital inspiration for our young nuclear physicists and engineers of the future.”
Professor Boris Sharkov, Scientific Managing Director of FAIR, expressed his satisfac-tion about the accession of the UK to FAIR: “The tremendous progress of the construc-tion of the facility, its accelerators, and experiments during the last years is very exciting. The UK joining FAIR promises further expansion of the FAIR user base.”
Professor Günther Rosner, FAIR’s Research and Administrative Managing Director, se-conded from Glasgow University to work at FAIR, says: “It is a great pleasure to wel-come the UK as the first Associate Member of FAIR, the world’s largest project in Nucle-ar Physics. The UK has been one of the driving forces of the project right from the start. Important contributions to the large-scale experiments NUSTAR and PANDA have been initiated and are being built by UK Nuclear Physics groups, all experts in their fields. So welcome on board indeed.”
Ten UK institutions contribute to two of the four large experiments at FAIR: NUSTAR and PANDA. NUSTAR (NUclear Structure, Astrophysics and Reactions) aims, for example, at finding out in detail how elements heavier than iron are produced in the Universe. This could happen in cataclysmic events such as supernovae (giant star explosions) or neu-tron star collisions. PANDA (Anti-Proton ANihilation at Darmstadt) searches, for example, for exotic hadronic matter such as heavy “glueballs” that are predicted to be formed exclusively from energy.
]]>"Wir freuen uns mit RaySearch einen starken Partner im Bereich der Therapieplanungssysteme gefunden zu haben", sagt Michael Scholz, Leiter der GSI-Forschungsgruppe Biologische Modellierung, die das LEM entwickelt hat. "Ionenstrahltherapiezentren können so dauerhaft und zuverlässig mit den neuesten biophysikalischen Modellen versorgt werden, um die Behandlungsplanung zu optimieren. Wir hoffen, dass dies der Beginn einer langfristigen Kooperation ist, die den Weg zwischen aktueller Grundlagenforschung und klinischer Anwendung verkürzen wird", so Scholz weiter.
Um möglichst viele Krebszellen durch Bestrahlung abzutöten und gesundes Gewebe so weit wie möglich zu schonen, muss die Behandlung genau geplant sein. Das LEM ermöglicht die Berechnung der optimalen Behandlungsdosis für Ionenstrahlen aller Art und wurde bei der Therapie mit Kohlenstoff-Ionen an der GSI-Beschleunigeranlage bereits erfolgreich eingesetzt.
Die Wissenschaftler nutzen als Grundlage für ihr Modell zwei wesentliche Informationen: zum einen die Kenntnis über die Zerstörung von Tumorzellen durch konventionelle Röntgenstrahlen, zum anderen die Kenntnis der nanometergenauen Verteilung der Dosisdeposition innerhalb einzelner Ionenspuren beim Durchgang durch die Zellen. Aus der Kombination dieser beiden Informationen können sie mithilfe des LEM Vorhersagen über die Wirkung von Ionenstrahlen auf Zellen und Gewebe machen.
Um die Qualität des LEM zu testen, verglichen die Wissenschaftler die Vorhersagen mit zahlreichen an verschiedenen Beschleunigeranlagen durchgeführten Experimenten. Sie konnten zeigen, dass sich die biologische Wirksamkeit der Bestrahlung damit präzise berechnen lässt. Das LEM ist mittlerweile etabliert, und die Algorithmen und das Know-how, die das Modell ausmachen, integriert RaySearch nun in sein Modul zur Optimierung von Bestrahlungsplänen für die Ionenstrahltherapie.
Das an der GSI entwickelte Verfahren zur Tumortherapie mit Ionenstrahlen ist ein sehr genaues, hochwirksames Therapieverfahren und fast ohne Nebenwirkungen. Es eignet sich vor allem für tief im Körper liegende Tumore in der Nähe von Risikoorganen, wie z.B. dem Hirnstamm. Diese Therapie wurde von 1997 bis 2008 an der GSI-Beschleunigeranlage bei rund 450 Patienten eingesetzt und zur klinischen Reife gebracht. Die Tumorkontrollrate liegt je nach Art des Tumors zwischen 75 und 90 Prozent. Die erste rein klinische Anlage am Heidelberger Ionenstrahl-Therapiezentrum wurde von GSI entwickelt und von GSI gemeinsam mit industriellen Partnern gebaut. Sie hat im Jahr 2009 den Patientenbetrieb aufgenommen. Bisher wurden dort über 1200 Patienten behandelt. Mit diesem Verfahren werden Patienten außerdem im Ionenstrahltherapiezentrum in Pavia (Italien) und in Kürze auch in Shanghai behandelt. Therapie mit Ionenstrahlen gibt es sonst nur noch in Japan und Lanzhou (China), wo mit einer anderen Bestrahlungstechnik behandelt wird.
Since its 2005 discovery by the BaBar experiment at the SLAC National Laboratory in Stanford California, the Y(4260) particle has continued to mystify researchers. While other particles that share certain similarities to the Y(4260) have long been successfully explained as examples of a charmed quark and anti-charmed quark paired together by the strong force of particle physics, attempts to incorporate the Y(4260) into this model have failed, and its underlying nature remains unknown.
In late December of 2012, the BESIII team embarked on a program of research to produce large numbers of Y(4260) particles by annihilating electrons and antielectrons (positrons) with a total energy that corresponds to the mass of the Y(4260). Once produced, the Y(4260) quickly decays, and its decay products, like the Zc(3900), are measured with the BESIII particle detector.
The anomalous particles of charmonium such as the Y(4260) and recently the Zc(3900) appear to be members of a new class of recently discovered subatomic particles, called the XYZ mesons, that are adding new dimensions to the study of the strong forces that quarks and antiquarks exert on each other. In the most widely accepted theory of these forces, quantum chromodynamics (QCD), there are in fact more possibilities for charmonium mesons than simply a charmed quark bound to an anti-charmed quark. Some theories predict that more than just a charmed and anti-charmed quark may be bound together to form "tetraquark" or molecule-like mesons. This is the preferred explanation fort he Zc states.
The unique energy resolution of the PANDA experiment at FAIR will allow to finally unravel the structure of exotic mesons such as Zc(3900) and so improve our fundamental understanding of QCD and the diversity of particles in this theory.
Since the Zc(3900) has almost the same mass as another mysterious neutral particle, the X(3872), this new observation may be the first manifestations of a multiplet of exotic mesons and is therefore an experimental breakthrough for the understanding of exotic hadronic states. The Beijing Spectrometer (BESIII) experiment at the Beijing Electron Positron Collider is composed of about 350 physicists from 50 institutions in 11 countries.
Wie schwingen die Wellen der Röntgenstrahlung? Das beschäftigt Thomas Stöhlker, Leiter der Atom- und Plasmaphysik bei GSI und des Helmholtz-Instituts Jena. Elektromagnetische Strahlung, die entweder aus dem Universum eingefangen wird oder bei einem Beschleuniger-Experiment entsteht, kann man – wie das Licht in einem Prisma – entsprechend ihrer Wellenlänge analysieren. Das gibt zum Beispiel Aufschluss darüber wie die Atome in einem Experiment angeregt wurden. Doch bei einer Supernova und in manchen Beschleunigerexperimenten entsteht vor allem hochenergetische Röntgenstrahlung, die auf Grund ihrer kurzen Wellenlänge für herkömmliche Geräte schwer analysierbar ist. „Hier hilft unser Polarimeter weiter, um herauszufinden, was die Strahlung verursacht“, so Stöhlker. „Denn je nachdem, durch welchen Mechanismus oder durch welches Ereignis auf atomarer Ebene die Röntgenstrahlung erzeugt wurde, schwingt die Welle in unterschiedlicher Richtung.“
Mit der neuen Teilchenbeschleunigeranlage FAIR werden Wissenschaftler astrophysikalische Vorgänge im Kleinen erzeugen und mit dem Polarimeter vermessen. „Die Ergebnisse helfen uns Ereignisse im All, die wir mit Teleskopen beobachten, richtig zu verstehen“, sagt Stöhlker.
Um die Polarisation zu messen, machen sich die Wissenschaftler den Compton-Effekt zu nutze. Der Detektor besteht aus einem großen Siliziumkristall, der in viele kleine Segmente unterteilt ist. Röntgenstrahlung besteht aus Photonen. Trifft eines auf den Kristall, gibt das Photon Energie an ein Elektron ab, das sich in der Hülle eines Siliziumatoms befindet. Doch nur ein Teil der Energie wird in dem Stoß übertragen, daher bewegt sich das Photon anschließend mit geringerer Energie in anderer Richtung fort. Da die Detektor-Pixel sehr klein sind, wird das gestreute Photon in einem der benachbarten Pixel gestoppt, so dass seine Bahn genau verfolgt wird. Der Streuwinkel und die Energie des Photons sind dabei die entscheidenden Informationen für die Forscher. Daraus lässt sich sowohl der Grad der Polarisation als auch die Polarisationsachse ablesen.
„An PETRAIII bei DESY, eine der modernsten Photonenquellen, haben wir unseren Detektor getestet. Dort entsteht harte RöntgenstrahlungNews, die fast zu hundert Prozent polarisiert ist. Das half uns, unser Messgerät einzustellen“, erklärt Stöhlker. Die Wissenschaftler veröffentlichten in Physical Review Letters, dass sie aus der Polarisation der beim Abbremsen von Elektronen emittierten Röntgenstrahlung erstmals auf sonst verborgene Eigenschaften der Elektronen Rückschlüsse ziehen konnten. „Das Polarimeter haben wir vor allem für atomphysikalische Experimente der SPARC-Kollaboration an der neuen Beschleunigeranlage FAIR entwickelt. Diese Kollaboration für Atomphysik an gespeicherten Teilchen kann damit nun polarisationsabhängige Phänomene genau untersuchen, wie sie auf atomarer und subatomarer Ebene auftreten“, fasst Stöhlker die Bedeutung des neuen Polarimeters zusammen.
In Gesteinsproben aus dem Meteoritenschauer, der am 15. Februar 2013 über Tscheljabinsk, Russland, niederging, haben GSI-Wissenschaftler kleine Mengen der Elemente Darmstadtium und Hassium gefunden. Diese Elemente wurden damit nicht nur zum ersten Mal in der Natur nachgewiesen, sie sind auch stabiler als die künstlich hergestellten Isotope.
Im Universum existieren Spuren der bisher ausschließlich künstlich erzeugten superschweren Elemente Darmstadtium und Hassium. Das stellten GSI-Wissenschaftler fest, die die Elemente in Proben des sogenannten Meteoriten von Tscheljabinsk fanden. Meteoriten sind Überbleibsel von Planeten und Monden aus der Frühzeit des Alls. Kurz nach dem Meteoriteneinschlag hatten Mitglieder der russischen Akademie der Wissenschaft kleinste Gesteinsbrocken am Tschebarkul-See gefunden. Chemische Analysen bestätigten, dass es sich um Material aus dem Weltall, genauer reguläre Chondriten, handelte. Sie vermuteten weitere Teile des Meteoriten im See.
Knapp zwei Wochen nach dem Einschlag stießen Taucher auf einen Einschlagskrater am Grund des Tschebarkul-Sees und brachten weitere Gesteinsproben an die Oberfläche. Diese unterschieden sich von den regulären Chondriten. Spektralanalysen zeigten den russischen Wissenschaftlern unbekannte Linien, die auf superschwere Elemente hinwiesen. Diesem Verdacht folgend schickten sie Proben zu GSI, um dort Vergleiche mit den Daten der künstlich hergestellten superschweren Elemente zu ermöglichen.
„Der Fund ist eine Sensation. Wir hätten nie für möglich gehalten, dass wir langlebige superschwere Elemente in der Natur finden können“, so Dr. Michael Block aus der Forschungsabteilung "Superschwere Elemente" bei GSI. Er und seine Kollegen aus Materialforschung und der Superschwere-Elemente-Physik unterzogen die Proben verschiedenen Tests.
In der GSI-Materialforschung wurden Spektren und Aufnahmen der Oberflächen mit dem Elektronenmikroskop erstellt. Anschließend wogen die Wissenschaftler einzelne Atomkerne aus dem Meteoriten mit der Ionenfallenanlage SHIPTRAP bei GSI. Die Ergebnisse bestätigten, dass es sich um Isotope der Elemente 110 (Darmstadtium) und 108 (Hassium) handelte. „Überrascht hat uns vor allem die lange Halbwertszeit der Isotope“, so SHIPTRAP-Experte Block. „Die Hassium-Isotope, die wir mit dem Linearbeschleuniger hergestellt haben, zerfielen bereits nach Sekunden. Doch die neuen Isotope scheinen eine besondere Kernstruktur zu haben, die zu einer erhöhten Stabilität führt . Woran das liegt, werden wir in weiteren Tests untersuchen.“
Die Elemente Hassium und Darmstadtium wurden erstmals in den Jahren 1997 bzw. 2003 künstlich bei GSI erzeugt. Sie sind nach dem Land Hessen (lat. Hassia) und der GSI-Sitzstadt Darmstadt benannt. Bisher waren nur Isotope bekannt, die nach Sekunden oder Sekundenbruchteilen wieder zerfielen. Daher nahm man an, dass die beiden Elemente auf der Erde nicht natürlich vorkommen. Der Meteoritenfund legt nahe, dass Darmstadtium und Hassium vielleicht auch industriell abgebaut oder in größeren Mengen am Beschleuniger erzeugt werden könnten. Dies würde die Möglichkeit für Werkstoffe aus den beiden Elementen bzw. aus chemischen Verbindungen mit anderen Stoffen eröffnen. Aus früheren Experimenten ist bereits bekannt, das Hassium und sehr wahrscheinlich auch Darmstadtium die Eigenschaften eines Metalls aufweisen. In weiteren Tests wollen die GSI-Wissenschaftler daher vor allem die chemischen Eigenschaften der Elemente weiter untersuchen.
]]><link start aktuelles detailseite datum erster-speicherring-fuer-fair.htm external-link-new-window>Full press release (German only)
]]>The participants identified four possible areas for cooperation, which were presented at the end of the event:
“We see major potential for the inclusion of certain areas from space research in the new accelerator facility,” stated Professor Boris Sharkov, the Scientific Director of FAIR.
Expert teams from ESA in the Netherlands (ESA/ESTEC), and also from Darmstadt (ESA/ESOC), have already been cooperating with GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH in Darmstadt in the fields of radiobiology and dosimetry since as long ago as 2008. “We are examining possibilities to also continue this cooperation at the new accelerator center. In particular radiobiology, which studies the impact of cosmic radiation on the human organism, is an important part of the preparation for the long-term planning of manned missions to the moon and beyond,” underlined ESA Director Reiter, himself a former astronaut on the international space station ISS and on Russia’s MIR station.
The extensive specialist meetings in the framework of the workshop helped experts from both sides to establish which requirements ESA currently places on application-relevant research on the new particle accelerator and could also develop in the future. Following the workshop the experts from ESA inspected the GSI accelerator facility.
]]>Penning traps are very precise scales that can be used to weigh rare particles with a high accuracy. The foundations for this method were laid by GSI scientist Professor Heinz-Jürgen Kluge. Michael Block works with Penning traps on a regular basis. He just weighed superheavy nuclei with the magical neutron number N=152 for the first time. With this method he and his team could measure the binding energies that result from special shell effects. Professor Klaus Blaum from the Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Heidelberg and Professor Yuri Novikov from Petersburg Nuclear Physics Institute made further developments with the Penning trap for other experiments and therefore were also awarded with the Flerov prize.
In a Penning trap it is possible to store a single ion by overlapping electric and magnetic fields. Inside the trap the ion moves in a circle with a characteristic cyclotron frequency. By measuring this frequency it is possible to determine the ion's mass with high precision, as long as state of charge and magnetizing force are known. Based on Einstein’s principal of mass-energy equivalence scientists can predict nuclear binding energies which are crucial for the existence of the heaviest elements.
The award will be given to the four winners in Dubna, Russia on 24 May 2013. Every two to three years the prize is awarded in memory of the physicist Georgy Nikolaevich Flerov, who significantly contributed to the synthesis of new superheavy elements and after whom the 114th chemical element was named Flerovium. This year the winners were announced on the occasion of Flerov’s 100th birthday anniversary in March.
10.08.2012 | Stabilizing shell effects in heaviest elements directly measured
]]>Für die geplante Errichtung des Kantinengebäudes sowie den ersten Abschnitt für ein neues Bürozentrum mit insgesamt 2.660 Quadratmetern Nutzfläche wurde ein interdisziplinärer Planungswettbewerb europaweit ausgeschrieben. Insgesamt 80 Teams aus Architekten und Haustechnikplanern hatten sich um die Teilnahme beworben. Zwölf Teilnehmer wurden aus dem Bewerberfeld zur Teilnahme ausgewählt. Im Dezember 2012 kürte die Jury bestehend aus Vertretern der GSI, des Bundesministeriums für Bildung und Forschung, der Stadt Darmstadt und externen Experten zwei Finalisten, aus denen nach einer Überarbeitung der Entwürfe der Gewinner bestimmt werden sollte. Im Februar 2013 kam das Preisgericht unter dem Vorsitz des Architekten Ferdinand Heide aus Frankfurt erneut zusammen und wählte das Büro Muffler Architekten, Tuttlingen, gemeinsam mit Kaufer + Passer Ingenieure auf den ersten Platz.
Ausgehend von einem eingeschossigen, lichtdurchfluteten Kantinenpavillon, der sich der Eingangspforte zuwendet, entwickelten die Muffler Architekten mit Kaufer + Passer Ingenieure einen insgesamt viergeschossigen, kammartig organisierten Büroriegel, der attraktive Arbeitsplätze anbietet. Für die zweite Runde überarbeitete das Architekturbüro Muffler das Konzept: Durch eine effizientere Flächenausnutzung und eine teilweise geänderte Raumaufteilung gegenüber dem ursprünglich eingereichten Vorschlag konnte eine Volumenreduzierung erreicht werden. Die Umgestaltung des Kantinenbereichs ermöglicht eine größere Flexibilität des Speiseraums und eine bessere Organisation der Küche. Die Geländebeschaffenheit wird durch eine Teilunterkellerung nun besser ausgenutzt.
Das Preisgericht entschied sich für den Entwurf von Muffler Architekten, da er das stärkere architektonische Konzept aufwies. Der Entwurf ermöglicht eine flexible Erweiterung um Büroflächen für die Zukunft. Auch lassen sich verschiedene Organisationskonzepte in den Büroräumen umsetzen, der Entwurf bietet insgesamt bessere Arbeitsplatzqualitäten.
Die Architekten Glück + Partner GmbH, Stuttgart mit IWP Ingenieurbüro für Systemplanungen erhielten den zweiten Platz. Für bemerkenswerte Teilleistungen wurden bereits im Dezember 2012 den nachfolgende Teilnehmern Anerkennungen ausgesprochen:
Bei GSI entsteht das neue Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research), eines der weltweit größten Projekte in der Grundlagenforschung. Schon heute sind knapp 3.000 Wissenschaftler weltweit damit beschäftigt die Experimente zu konzipieren und zu bauen, um später damit an der FAIR-Anlage zu forschen. Auch die Mitarbeiterzahl auf dem GSI-Gelände hat sich in den letzten 15 Jahren fast verdoppelt und beträgt aktuell 1.200. Deshalb sind neue Infrastruktureinrichtungen wie Kantinen- und Bürogebäude nötig.
]]>Meldung des Max-Planck-Instituts für Kernphysik (19.02.2013)
]]>A proton beam generated with a laser stands out due to its short beam pulses of few picoseconds and the large number of accelerated particles. A picosecond is the trillionth part of a second. The short pulses are of interest for researchers in material science and biophysics. They expect materials or cells to behave differently when irradiated by the short intense beams in comparison to the beam impinging over a longer time period. This might open new perspectives for example in tumour therapy with heavy ions.
The next step will be the injection of the protons accelerated by laser into existing conventional accelerator components. For this a high frequency accelerator cavity will be combined with the setup in summer 2013.
The measured nuclei play a role in the synthesis of elements in stars. In double stars for example explosive events can happen, so called x-ray bursts. In the burst new elements are formed through the capture of free protons. The production paths are not fully understood yet. By measuring the chrome nuclide 45Cr with the storage ring in Lanzhou the scientists were able to show that there is no obstacle for a continuous nucleosynthesis in neutron-deficient nuclei from calcium to chrome. The experiments were published in Astrophysical Journal Letters.
The cooperation of GSI, the Helmholtz institute Jena and the Institute of Modern Physics (IMP) in Lanzhou will in the future be enriched by the successful assignment of a Helmholtz-CAS Joint Research Group. Leading researchers are Dr. Yuri Litvinov (GSI), Professor Thomas Stöhlker (HI Jena) and Professor Xinwen Ma (IMP).
During the past years, Fritzsche has worked at Oulu University (Finland) and the Frankfurt Institute of Advanced Studies (FIAS) where his research was focused mainly on the structure and dynamics of finite quantum systems with applications in atomic, optical and nuclear physics. These topics are of great relevance for the research projects FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH in Darmstadt as well as the XFEL (X-Ray Free-Electron Laser) at DESY in Hamburg.
In the future, Fritzsche and his group plan to develop new (many-body) techniques for describing the electron dynamics of ions, atoms and plasma in strong fields.
]]>Pressemitteilung - FAIR errichtet innere Baustraßen (in German only)
Dickel received the award for his contributions in time-of-flight mass spectroscopy. In his diploma and PhD theses the physicists now working as a postdoc at GSI built an analyser for precise mass measurements of nuclei together with his colleagues. Nuclei are reflected for several times inside the analyser by electrostatic mirrors. This increases their time-of-flight difference depending on their mass. Afterwards the nuclei are measured in a detector. The system allows the separation and measurements of nuclei even if they have very small mass differences.
Currently one system is located at the university in Gießen, a second one is in operation at the GSI fragment separator. The compact size of less than one cubic metre offers a variety of new ways of utilisation. The team e. g. works on a technique for identification of tumour tissue in surgery within seconds. Also a use on board a satellite would be possible.
]]>“None of this would have been possible without my colleagues and the outstanding research opportunities offered at GSI,” Geissel says. “I’m especially grateful to our former Director, Professor Paul Kienle, who recently passed away. Professor Kienle was the one who made it possible to construct the fragment separator FRS and establish the associated research program. Until just a short time ago, he also played an active role in many experiments, especially those involving the coupling with the storage ring.” Geissel is a professor at Justus Liebig University Giessen. He also directs the research conducted with the GSI fragment separator, which was used to measure most of the newly discovered nuclides. In addition, Geissel is playing a major role in the planning process for the super fragment separator to be installed at the new accelerator facility FAIR. “The Super-FRS at FAIR will enable us to produce many new nuclides and measure their properties in a very short time,” says Geissel. “We are confident that we can improve on the world record with FAIR. We strive hard to complete the facility and make it available for our international research community.”
“The decisive factor in the discovery of a new nuclide is the publication of the measured mass and charge,” says Michael Thoennessen, whose "Discovery of Isotopes Project" compiles statistics on the history of nuclide discoveries. “When a scientist has experimentally determined these two values, we consider the discovery to have been proved, and we then add his or her name to the list.” Working together with his students, Thoennessen has summarized the discoverers of all nuclides by person and by laboratory on the basis of scientific publications. Professor Marek Pfützner of the University of Warzsaw, who is also heavily involved in GSI experiments, occupies second place on the list of persons. Gottfried Münzenberg, who was a professor at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz and a researcher at GSI, is now third. The list of the top 25 nuclide discoverers includes 22 who have carried out research at GSI. The latest results of Geissel and his colleagues were published in 2012 in the scientific journal Physics Letters B.
"Hans Geissel is an outstanding pioneer in the hunt for new nuclides produced in stellar explosions in our cosmos. He has greatly increased our understanding of 'life and death' of stars with his measurements conducted at GSI", says Professor Karlheinz Langanke, director of research at GSI and theoretical physicist at the University of Darmstadt.
All of the matter of our earth is made of atoms. All atoms with the same electric charge in their nuclei are classified as being nuclei of the same chemical element. To date, we know of 114 such chemical elements. Each element comes in different types known as isotopes, whose atomic nuclei have the same electrical charge but different masses. The discovery of a new nuclide is thus also the discovery of a new isotope. Researchers have observed more than 3,000 different isotopes, and another thousand as yet unknown ones are forecast to exist.
Scientists are particularly interested in very heavy isotopes of an element. Such isotopes play a major role in our understanding of how the elements are created in stars and in stellar explosions. However, due to their short lifetimes, they do not occur naturally on earth. That's why scientists attempt to create them artificially in the laboratory. They do this by accelerating atomic nuclei and colliding them with different materials. New isotopes occur as fragments from the collisions. The fragments can then be sorted and studied using the fragment separator at GSI.
https://www.nscl.msu.edu/~thoennes/isotopes/
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0370269312009689
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]]><link start aktuelles detailseite datum external-link-new-window>German press release
Information about guided tours: www-dev.gsi.de/besucher
<link de start aktuelles detailseite datum renate-maertin-erhaelt-foerderung.htm external-link-new-window>More (German only)
]]><link de start aktuelles detailseite datum gute-uebersetzer-gesucht.htm>More (in German only) ...
]]>Where do the ions in the accelerator come from? In two high voltage cages the chambers are located where the ions are generated. Depending on the element and its aggregate state—liquid, solid or gas—different types of ion sources are used. More ...
The accelerator system at GSI consists of 2,500 individual electrically controllable components such as magnets, vacuum pumps and measuring instruments. It would simply not be possible for the operators at the facility to individually adjust all of these components by hand. That is why all signals are brought together in the main control room. It requires great skill to generate exactly the sort of ion beam needed by the researchers. More ...
Ions clash into atoms, structures dissolve and reshape, instruments record all evidences. This is what happens inside a detector. Scientists built the HADES detector to search for quark-antiquark clouds in protons. They could give the protons their mass. More ...
]]>Der erste Regionalausscheid von FameLab 2013 fand bereits statt: In Lübeck gewann Matthias Wolff. Mit einem Luftballon als Brustzelle erklärte er, warum Rezeptoren im Kampf gegen Brustkrebs wichtig sind. Möchtet ihr gegen ihn antreten? Dann bewerbt euch bis zum 18. Februar für einen der Regionalausscheide, zum Beispiel in Karlsruhe, München oder Hamburg. Dort könnt ihr euch für das Deutschland-Finale qualifizieren. Die Regeln machen den Wettbewerb besonders: Drei Minuten Vortragszeit, bei denen nur Hilfsmittel erlaubt sind, die die Teilnehmer selbst tragen und aufstellen können; Powerpoint ist nicht zugelassen. Anschließend hat die Jury vier Minuten Zeit für Fragen und Kritik.
Neben einer Chance auf das Deutschland-Finale gibt es Gewinne, unter anderem Preisgelder, GEO-Abos und ein professionelles Medien- und Präsentationstraining für den ersten und zweiten Platz. Das Deutschland-Finale findet am 31. März 2013 in Bielefeld statt. Wer sich dort durchsetzt, darf am internationalen FameLab-Finale auf dem Cheltenham Science Festival teilnehmen.
Der Christoph-Schmelzer-Preis wird jährlich wechselnd für Diplom- und Masterarbeiten oder Promotionen vergeben. Er ist mit einem kleinen Geldpreis dotiert, den sich die Preisträger teilen. Im Rahmen der Verleihung stellten sie ihre Arbeiten vor:
Kathrin Frey hat eine neue Möglichkeit gefunden, um zu berechnen, wie Positronen-Emitter theoretisch nach einer Bestrahlung im Körper des Patienten verteilt sind. Vergleicht man die Werte mit Ergebnissen einer PET-Messung nach der Bestrahlung, kann die Behandlung optimiert werden. Ihre Masterarbeit reichte Frey an der Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg ein.
Sebastian Hild wird für seine Diplomarbeit geehrt, die er an der Fachhochschule Gießen-Friedberg einreichte. Darin prüfte er wie Tumoren in bewegten Organen am besten bestrahlt werden und quantifizierte verschiedene Strategien. Mithilfe seiner Ergebnisse können Bestrahlungspläne für bewegte Tumore weiter optimiert werden.
Christopher Kurz untersuchte im Rahmen seiner Diplomarbeit die Bestrahlung mit Sauerstoffionen. In einigen Fällen verspricht diese Therapie wirksamer zu sein als die Therapie mit Kohlenstoffionen. Kurz berechnete theoretisch, wie tief die Sauerstoffstrahlen eindringen und überprüfte seine Vorhersagen am Heidelberger Ionenstrahl-Therapiezentrum (HIT). Seine Arbeit hatte er an der Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg eingereicht.
Christoph Schmelzer war Mitbegründer und erster Wissenschaftlicher Geschäftsführer von GSI. An der GSI-Beschleunigeranlage wurden seit 1997 über 400 Patienten mit Tumoren in der Regel im Gehirn mit Ionenstrahlen behandelt. Die Heilungsraten dieser Methode liegen bei über 90 Prozent und die Nebenwirkungen sind sehr gering. Am Heidelberger Ionenstrahl-Therapiezentrum (HIT) werden Patienten mittlerweile routinemäßig mit schweren Ionen behandelt. Das Verfahren ist von vielen Krankenkasse anerkannt.
17.07.2012 | Erste Tests für Lungenkrebs-Therapie mit Schwerionen
25.11.2011 | Verleihung des Christoph-Schmelzer-Preises 2011
12.06.2001 | GSI trauert um ihren ersten Wissenschaftlichen Direktor
]]>Die Vortragsreihe "Wissenschaft für Alle" richtet sich an alle an aktueller Wissenschaft und Forschung interessierten Personen. In der Regel einmal pro Monat findet jeweils an einem Mittwoch in der Monatsmitte ein Vortrag aus der Reihe statt.
Die Themen decken ein großes wissenschaftliches Spektrum ab – nicht nur über die Forschung an GSI und FAIR wird berichtet, sondern generell über aktuelle Themen aus Physik, Chemie, Biologie, Medizin und Informatik. Ziel der Reihe ist es, die wissenschaftlichen Vorgänge für den Laien verständlich aufzubereiten und darzustellen, um so die Forschung einem breiten Publikum zugänglich zu machen. Die Vorträge werden von sowohl GSI-internen wie auch externen Rednern aus Universitäten und anderen Instituten gehalten.
Alle Vorträge finden im Hörsaal von GSI, Planckstraße 1, 64291 Darmstadt, statt. Beginn ist jeweils um 14 Uhr. Der Eintritt ist frei, eine Anmeldung ist nicht erforderlich. Externe Teilnehmer werden gebeten, für den Einlass an unserer Pforte ein Ausweisdokument bereitzuhalten.
Weitere Informationen und aktuelle Ankündigungen finden Sie auf unserer Webseite www-dev.gsi.de/wfa.
Regular automobile and bicycle traffic to FAIR/GSI and into the eastern part of Wixhausen is to continue using Messeler-Park-Strasse as the exit road from the B3. Vehicular access to the GSI car park continues to be via Messeler-Park-Strasse. The pedestrian walkway and bicycle lane next to Messeler-Park-Strasse to GSI can be used by cyclists and pedestrians in both directions.
During the construction measures at FAIR there may be temporary restrictions in Messeler-Park-Strasse. In such cases alternative access to the GSI car park for automobile traffic will be via Obere Mühlstrasse and the southern construction road. The bicycle lane in Messeler-Park-Strasse is not affected by these road closures as a rule.
Increased construction site traffic is to be expected from the first quarter of 2013 onwards as additional construction measures are beginning in preparation for the FAIR construction site. So as to create additional transport routes on the construction site, construction roads are being laid out within the construction site. Furthermore, the construction site will be fully fenced in. The existing gaps in the fence will be closed. From January 2013 onwards Prinzenschneise and Dreischläger Weg will be closed in the vicinity of the construction site. Diversions have been signposted on the prepared forest tracks. Likewise work is beginning on the construction of the bored piles on which the entire accelerator complex is based.
We would request all road users to be especially careful and show mutual consideration for one another. Please note that traffic flows in the FAIR/GSI building zone may also change at short notice.
<media 7380 - download "TEXT, FAIR Baustellenzufahrt, FAIR_Baustellenzufahrt.pdf, 137 KB">Map of the road layout (PDF)</media>
]]>Jonson is famous for discovering the halo nucleus in 1987. From experiment data gathered at BEVALAC (USA) he and his colleague Hansen suggested the existence of these nuclei with nucleons far away from the centre. Jonson is closely connected to the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung where he will spend his research period. He took part in building the GSI synchrotron SIS18 and the fragment separator. He also plays a leading role within the NuSTAR collaboration (Nuclear Structure Astrophyics and Reactions) of FAIR. He was awarded for these achievements. Moreover the research period at GSI will allow Jonson to further heavy ion research.
]]>Um Mädchen für traditionelle Männerberufe zu begeistern, veranstalten Betriebe und Institute bundesweit am 25. April 2013 den Girls’Day. Schülerinnen der Klassen 5 bis 10 können an diesem Tag in verschiedene Berufe hineinschnuppern, selbst experimentieren und Fragen stellen.
Bewerbungen jetzt an: Gleichstellung(at)gsi.de
A number of project partners from various countries were involved in the design and installation of the facility at the CNAO. Scientists and engineers from GSI played a substantial role in its construction and commissioning, with parts of the accelerator facility, e. g. the linear acceleration unit, being developed and built by GSI. The raster-scan method used to carry out the particle beam irradiation was also developed at GSI.
Carbon ion therapy utilizing the raster-scan method is an extremely precise, highly effective and also very gentle form of treatment particularly suited for tumours situated deep within the body and in close proximity to sensitive organs such as the brainstem. It was used with great success at the GSI accelerator facility from 1997 to 2008, during which time some 450 patients were treated and the procedure first reached clinical maturity. The first purely clinical facility in this field was developed and built by GSI together with partners from industry. It is located at the Heidelberg Ion-Beam Therapy Centre (HIT) and went into clinical operation in 2009. In the meantime, almost 1,000 patients have been treated.
The CNAO facility is of similar design to the HIT setup and consists of two particle accelerators, connected in series, and three treatment rooms. The CNAO has been administering proton therapy to cancer patients since September 2011 and has now started providing carbon ion therapy as well. Carbon ions are relatively heavy and can destroy tumours that would withstand proton therapy or treatment with conventional forms of radiotherapy.
To date, carbon ion therapy is only provided at clinical facilities in Japan and at the Heidelberg Ion-Beam Therapy Centre. The start of clinical operation at the CNAO marks another major step towards establishing this pioneering form of cancer therapy and making it more readily available to a wider circle of patients.
Other facilities of this kind currently under construction include the MedAustron therapy centre in Wiener Neustadt, Austria, and the Shanghai Proton & Heavy Ion Hospital in China. Both will use the raster-scan method and, for the first stage of acceleration, a linear accelerator jointly developed by GSI and the Institute of Applied Physics at the Goethe University in Frankfurt, Germany.
]]>The strange effects higgs radiataion has on living tissue makes students suspicious. To take no risk they switch off power. But it is already too late. Trapped underground in the accelerator facility they make a deadly discovery.
Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=luNueXoAw3I
We show the film exclusively before it is released on the internet. After watching the film visitors can take part in a guided tour through the accelerator facility. The entry is free.
If you want to participate please send an e-mail including your name and the number of participants to decay(at)gsi.de.
]]>Die Veranstaltungsreihe "Saturday Morning Physics" ist ein Projekt der Physikalischen Fakultät der TU Darmstadt. Sie findet jährlich statt und hat zum Ziel, das Interesse junger Menschen an Physik zu stärken. In Vorträgen und Experimenten an aufeinanderfolgenden Samstagen erfahren die Schüler Aktuelles aus der physikalischen Forschung an der Universität. Der Besuch bei GSI ist die einzige Exkursion, die innerhalb der Reihe stattfindet. Neben dem Europäischen Satellitenkontrollzentrum, der Deutschen Physikalischen Gesellschaft und dem Springer-Verlag, gehört auch die GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH bereits seit dem Start der Veranstaltungsreihe zu den zahlreichen Sponsoren und Unterstützern dieses Projektes.
Website von Saturday Morning Physics
]]>
„Es kommt darauf an, die richtigen Fragen zu stellen.“ Unter diesem Motto erforschte Hermann von Helmholtz, einer der letzten großen Universalgelehrten, zum Beispiel Phänomene der Optik, Akustik, Geologie, Meteorologie und Wärmelehre. Der von ihm entwickelte Augenspiegel zur Untersuchung der Netzhaut ist heute noch im Einsatz, und auch der Energieerhaltungssatz „Energie geht nicht verloren“, den Helmholtz in der noch heute gültigen, allgemeinen Ausführung formuliert hat, ist fester Bestandteil des Physikunterrichts. Am Helmholtz-Tag erfahren die Schülergruppen, die sich in den Schülerlaboren angemeldet haben oder direkt eingeladen wurden, mehr über die vielseitige Forschung und die zahlreichen Errungenschaften dieses Ausnahme-Talents und über die Aktivitäten, die die Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft mit ihm verbinden. Der Helmholtz-Tag findet nun einmal jährlich im November statt.
„Wir freuen uns, dass die Schülerlabore unserem Namenspatron einen speziellen Tag in ihrem Programm widmen, um Hermann von Helmholtz und seine Forschungsleistungen unter den Schülerinnen und Schülern bekannter zu machen“, sagt Prof. Dr. Jürgen Mlynek, Präsident der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft. „Helmholtz war einer der bedeutendsten Forscher des 19. Jahrhunderts und deckte die ganze Breite der Naturwissenschaften ab. Wie wir es heute in unserer Mission formuliert haben, konzentrierte sich auch Hermann von Helmholtz auf eine vorausschauende Forschung zum Wohl der Gesellschaft.“
Auch die Mission der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft zielt darauf ab, die richtigen Fragen zu stellen und Lösungen für die großen Herausforderungen von Gesellschaft, Wissenschaft und Wirtschaft zu erarbeiten. Und ebenso sollen die Schülerinnen und Schüler durch das Experimentieren im Schülerlabor lernen, die wesentlichen Fragen auszumachen, um naturwissenschaftliche Theorien besser verstehen und auch hinterfragen zu können. Die Mitarbeiterinnen und Mitarbeiter der 25 Schülerlabore in der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft vermitteln den Schülerinnen und Schülern beim Experimentieren ein Verständnis für naturwissenschaftliches Denken und geben ihnen einen Eindruck vom Arbeiten in einem wissenschaftlichen Beruf. Dadurch soll gerade bei jungen Menschen das Interesse an Naturwissenschaften geweckt oder gestärkt werden, um den Nachwuchs für die Forschung der Zukunft zu sichern.
Im Schülerlabor der GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH sind am heutigen Helmholtz-Tag 22 Schülerinnen und Schüler der Physik-AG des Freiburg-Seminars zu Gast. Das Freiburg-Seminar ist ein Programm zur Förderung besonders befähigter Schülerinnen und Schüler in Mathematik und Naturwissenschaften. Im GSI-Schülerlabor erhalten sie durch selbstständiges Experimentieren an neun verschiedenen Experimentierstationen Einblicke in naturwissenschaftliches Denken und Arbeiten. Mit Detektoren, wie Geiger-Müller-Zählrohr, Ionisationskammer und einer Nebelkammer erforschen sie die Eigenschaften von Atomen, Atomkernen, Strahlung und Radioaktivität. Auf einem Rundgang durch die GSI-Anlagen sehen die Schüler die Messtechniken, mit denen sie selbst experimentiert haben, im großen Maßstab im Einsatz für die Grundlagenforschung wieder.
„Wir möchten mit unserem GSI-Schülerlabor bereits in jungen Menschen Neugierde und Faszination für die Forschung wecken und ein realistisches Bild vom wissenschaftlichen Arbeiten vermitteln, um die Schülerinnen und Schüler für die Forschung zu begeistern,“ sagt Horst Stöcker der Wissenschaftliche Geschäftsführer der GSI. Das GSI-Schülerlabor hat zum Ziel nachhaltig das Interesse von Schülerinnen und Schülern der Klassen 9 bis 13 an Naturwissenschaften zu fördern. Seit Eröffnung im Herbst 2004 ist die Nachfrage nach dem Angebot riesig. Bis heute haben über 12.500 Schülerinnen aus über 650 Klassen sowie 25 Lehrergruppen an einem Experimentiertag teilgenommen. Bei Lehrern und Schülern findet das Schülerlabor gleichermaßen große Zustimmung. So haben zahlreiche Schulen den Besuch im GSI-Schülerlabor bereits fest in den Stundenplan integriert.
Die Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft leistet Beiträge zur Lösung großer und drängender Fragen von Gesellschaft, Wissenschaft und Wirtschaft durch wissenschaftliche Spitzenleistungen in sechs Forschungsbereichen: Energie, Erde und Umwelt, Gesundheit, Schlüsseltechnologien, Struktur der Materie sowie Luftfahrt, Raumfahrt und Verkehr. Die Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft ist mit fast 34.000 Mitarbeiterinnen und Mitarbeitern in 18 Forschungszentren und einem Jahresbudget von rund 3,4 Milliarden Euro die größte Wissenschaftsorganisation Deutschlands. Ihre Arbeit steht in der Tradition des großen Naturforschers Hermann von Helmholtz (1821-1894).
Helmholtz-Tag
]]>From 5th August to 26th September 2013 students can gain insight into a scientist's everyday life, experiment on their own and socialize internationally. In 2012 summer students for example investigated direct reactions of exotic beams from the storage ring and an accelerator magnet's design.
Applications and recommendations must reach us before 15th February 2013. The program is integrated into the educational canon of GSI's graduate school, the Helmholtz Graduate School for Hadron and Ion Research (HGS-HIRe for FAIR).
Press release of "Hessen schafft Wissen" (German)
"SANAM" nimmt auch im Vergleich zu den weniger energieeffizienten schnellsten Computern der Welt eine Spitzenstellung ein, auf der weltweiten Rangliste "Top500" belegt er Platz 52. Im Nahen Osten hält er die Spitzen-Position. Er wird am KACST für Anwendungen in Seismik, Luftfahrt, Bioinformatik, Wetterforschung und physikalische Simulationen eingesetzt. "SANAM" wird nach weiteren Hochleistungsoptimierungen und Tests am GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt in die saudi-arabische Hauptstadt Riad gebracht.
"SANAM" ist eine Weiterentwicklung des Frankfurter Höchstleistungsrechners LOEWE-CSC, der bei seiner Inbetriebnahme vor zwei Jahren der energiesparendste Großrechner Europas war. Er benutzt ein spezielles Kühlsystem und verwendet als Beschleuniger handelsübliche Hochleistungs-Grafikkarten, wie sie auch in Arbeitsplatzcomputern eingesetzt werden. In der Rechengeschwindigkeit ist "SANAM" etwa 40 Prozent schneller als der über einen Hochgeschwindigkeitslink mit ihm vernetzten LOEWE-CSC, aber verbraucht nur ein Drittel der Energie pro Rechenoperation. Erreicht wurde dies durch die Verwendung von zusätzlichen Hochgeschwindigkeits-Grafikchips in Verbindung mit optimierter Systemsoftware.
Der deutsch-arabische Supercomputer ist ein Cluster-Computer aus Standard-Servern mit einem Hochgeschwindigkeits-Netzwerk. Der Cluster besteht aus 210 Servern mit 3.360 Rechenkernen, 840 Grafikchips und 26.880 Gigabyte Hauptspeicher. Die Server vom Typ ASUS ESC4000/FDR G2 sind mit jeweils zwei Intel Xeon E5-2650 Prozessoren und acht 16 Gigabyte-Modulen (128 GB) der energie-effizienten "Samsung Green Memory" -Bauelemente bestückt. Jeder Server enthält zwei Grafikkarten des Models AMD FirePro S10000 mit insgesamt vier Grafik-Prozessoren zur Beschleunigung. Bei dem Netzwerk handelt es sich um ein FDR InfiniBand-Netz mit einer Übertragungsleistung von 56 Gigabit/s. Die Server wurden geliefert von dem Unternehmen Adtech Global.
KACST-Präsident Dr. Mohammed Al-Suwaiyel würdigte den Erfolg von "SANAM": "Dies ist ein klarer und greifbarer Beleg der Bemühungen von KACST, fortschrittlichste Technologien in das Königreich zu übernehmen." Dr. Turki Alsaud, KACST-Vizepräsident für Forschungsinstitute, ergänzte: "Computer und Elektronik sind Felder höchster Priorität im Forschungs-, Technologie- und Innovationsplan des Königreichs, der von KACST gemanagt wird. Ich freue mich, dass in diesem Projekt Teams von fünf Ingenieuren und zwei Postdocs von KACST erfolgreich mit unseren deutschen Partnern zusammengearbeitet haben, um SANAM zu entwickeln."
Führende Wissenschaftler und Manager kommentierten die Spitzenplatzierung von "SANAM". Der FIAS-Vorstandsvorsitzende und Professor für Architektur von Hochleistungsrechnern an der Goethe-Universität, Professor Volker Lindenstruth, sagte: "Die moderne Forschung ist entscheidend auf immer schnellere Supercomputer angewiesen. Sie können in Zukunft aber nur installiert werden, wenn Energieeffizienz ein entscheidendes Kriterium ist. Wir freuen uns, dass wir in Zusammenarbeit mit einem Land mit ambitioniertem Forschungsprogramm diese energieeffiziente neue Technologie entwickeln können, um damit im "Green500" Ranking neue Maßstäbe zu setzen."
Für den Halbleiter-Produzenten AMD, der die Grafikkarten für "SANAM" lieferte unterstrich John Gustafson, Chief Product Architect der Graphics Business Unit AMD: "Der Einsatz von Grafikprozessoren in Supercomputern hat innerhalb kürzester Zeit enorme Fortschritte für die Recheneffizienz gebracht. AMD entwickelt neue Hard- und Software, um diese Effizienz zu neuen Spitzenleistungen zu bringen, wie das Beispiel des SANAM-Supercomputers zeigt. Dieses System zeigt die Richtung, in die sich das Höchstleistungsrechnen in den nächsten Jahren entwickeln wird." Für Samsung, das die Speicherbausteine lieferte, sagte Yunshik Kim, Präsident von Samsung Semiconductor Europe: "Ein Spitzenplatz in den "Green500" zeigt die hohe Effizienz des Systems und aller seiner Komponenten. Dies erfordert hohe Leistung und zugleich zählt jedes Watt. Samsung hat dieses Projekt mit den "Green Memory"-Bausteinen in 30-nm-Technologie als Teil seiner Strategie unterstützt. Samsung wird auch weiterhin Spitzenlösungen für Supercomputing bieten, etwa mit den mit hochentwickelten ,grünen' DDR3- und SSD- Bauelementen in 20-nm-Technik."
Der wissenschaftliche Geschäftsführer der GSI, Professor Dr. Horst Stöcker, hebt hervor: "Diese Zusammenarbeit kam durch die Vermittlung der hessischen Landesregierung zustande. Sie hat für GSI große Bedeutung im Zusammenhang mit unserem internationalen FAIR Projekt, an dem Doktoranden und Wissenschaftler aus Saudi-Arabien in Darmstadt und Riad mitarbeiten. Sie werden an SANAM mit den Kollegen in Saudi-Arabien FAIR-spezifische Höchstleistungs-Rechnungen durchführen können."
Das King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology (KACST) ist eine unabhängige Forschungsorganisation, die administrativ direkt dem König von Saudi-Arabien unterstellt ist. KACST ist sowohl für die Forschungsförderung und -organisation in Saudi-Arabien verantwortlich, betreibt aber auch nationale Forschungslabors. In der Forschungsorganisation entwickelt KACST Forschungspolitik, betreibt Datensammlung, fördert externe Forschung und bietet Servicefunktionen, wie etwa das Patentbüro.
Das Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS) ist interdisziplinäres Forschungsinstitut zur theoretischen Erforschung von komplexen Strukturen in der Natur, die von der Goethe-Universität Frankfurt gegründet wurde und von öffentlichen Geldgebern, Stiftungen und Privatpersonen finanziert wird. Im Mittelpunkt der Arbeiten stehen neben der Informatik Grundlagenforschung in Biowissenschaften, Hirnforschung, Chemie und Physik.
Die Goethe-Universität Frankfurt ist eine forschungsstarke Hochschule in der europäischen Finanzmetropole Frankfurt. Als Stiftungsuniversität besitzt sie ein einzigartiges Maß an Eigenständigkeit. Mit 41.350 Studierenden ist sie heute die drittgrößte Universität Deutschlands.
]]>The Helmholtz Association has now awarded funding to a new collaborative project with scientists from GSI, the Helmholtz Institute Jena (HI Jena) and the IMP. In October 2012 an application was granted for creation of a Helmholtz-CAS Joint Research Group (HCJRG) in the following field: “Experiments with stored highly-charged ions at the borderline between nuclear and atomic physics”. The senior scientists are Dr. Yuri Litvinov (GSI), Professor Thomas Stöhlker (HI Jena) and Professor Xinwen Ma (IMP).
Applications to set up various HCJRGs were submitted by Helmholtz centres and their CAS partners at the beginning of the year. The funding provided by the Helmholtz Association amounts to a maximum of €120,000 a year over a period of three years. The CAS will also fund the approved projects to a sum of ¥300,000 (approximately €35.000 Euro) a year for three years. All in all a total of 22 applications were submitted, from which five were selected for funding.
“One specific aim of the project is to foster the development of young scientists and doctoral students at GSI and the IMP,” explains Dr. Yuri Litvinov. “We want to give them the opportunity to establish international contacts during their time at their home institute. To this end, we’ve been given funding for staff and travel costs.”
The research project will comprise a series of coordinated experiments conducted at the Experimental Storage Ring (ESR) at GSI and the Experimental Cooler-Storage Ring (CSRe) at the IMP. Topics under investigation include the radioactive decay of highly charged ions, the measurement of the mass of short-lived nuclides, and the dielectric recombination of exotic nuclei, a process by which the binding energy that is liberated during electron capture by an ion promotes an already bound electron into an excited state.
The research project will also have a direct bearing on the new Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research (FAIR) at GSI, which is an accelerator centre incorporating several storage rings. The project will include research for the Collector Ring (CR) and the High-Energy Storage Ring (HESR) at FAIR as well as for similar facilities at the planned Heavy-Ion Advanced Research Facility (HIAF) in China. In particular, scientists will be looking to develop and test components and measurement methods for later use at FAIR and HIAF. Of crucial importance here will be HI Jena’s expertise in the fields of laser and X-ray technology.
]]>"Mit unserer Baumpflanzaktion wollen wir zeigen, dass wir nicht nur Wald roden für den Bau dieses derzeit mit Abstand größten deutschen Forschungsvorhabens, sondern dass wir mindestens genauso viel Wald wieder pflanzen. Das ist uns wichtig, und deshalb packen wir ein Stück weit selber mit an", erklärt der Wissenschaftliche FAIR-Geschäftsführer Professor Boris Sharkov. Auf der Flur "Täubcheshöhle" an der Langener Straße / Virchowstraße werden auf 2,25 Hektar Stieleichen gemischt mit Hainbuchen und Winterlinden gepflanzt. Vogelkirschen, Feldahorne, Elsbeeren und Büsche wie Schlehe und Schneeball werden später einen gestuften Waldrand ergeben. In der Gemarkung Wembach bei Ober-Ramstadt wird - angepasst an den Standort - hauptsächlich Buche gepflanzt, die mit Vogelkirsche, Bergahorn und Elsbeere gemischt wird.
Professor Günther Rosner, Administrativer Geschäftsführer und Forschungsdirektor von FAIR, sagt: "Die Aufforstungen werden ergänzt durch ein umfangreiches Umwelt-Kompensationsprogramm, das zum Beispiel die Pflege zum Erhalt des Naturdenkmal 'Stahlberge' in Arheilgen einschließt und Schutz- sowie Rückzugseinrichtungen für Amphibien und Reptilien." So habe FAIR zum Beispiel 1,6 Kilometer Amphibienschutzzäune entlang der Baustraßen gesetzt und auf dem Gelände eines ehemaligen Kleingartens einen Lebensraum für Zauneidechsen geschaffen.
Nachdem im vergangenen Winter mit rund 16 Hektar bereits ein großer Teil des Baufelds vorbereitet worden ist, steht in diesem Herbst die Rodung der übrigen 4 Hektar an: einer ringförmige Schneise nördlich des Baufeldes, in die der unterirdische, 1,1 Kilometer lange Tunnel für den Ringbeschleuniger gebaut wird. Nach dessen Fertigstellung wird die Schneise wieder mit Bäumen bepflanzt werden. Insgesamt werden nach Fertigstellung von FAIR mehr als acht Hektar Wald auf der Rodungsfläche gepflanzt, weitere fünfeinhalb Hektar auf Baustelleneinrichtungs- und Bodenlagerflächen.
Die erste Bäume für FAIR wurden sogar schon lange vor Beginn der Rodungen für FAIR gepflanzt: 2007 entstand in der Knoblochsaue bei Riedstadt knapp 1,6 Hektar neuer Wald, der mittlerweile gut gediehen ist.
Übersicht über die Ersatzaufforstungen und Wiederaufforstungen
Umwelt-Kompensationsmaßnahmen für FAIR
Please understand that because of the limited edition you can only request a maximum of three calendars (while supplies last) per order.
]]>„Mit der Baugenehmigung bekommt die FAIR GmbH nach jahrelangen sorgfältigen Planungen das Recht, die konkreten Arbeiten in Angriff zu nehmen. Dies geschieht auf der Basis eines detaillierten Bebauungsplanes, der eine geordnete städtebauliche Entwicklung gewährleistet. Der zukünftige Betrieb der Großforschungsanlage wird eine hohe Anziehungskraft auf Wissenschaftler aus aller Welt haben und so den Ruf der Wissenschaftsstadt Darmstadt national und international weiter stärken,“ erläuterte Stadträtin Brigitte Lindscheid bei der Übergabe der Baugenehmigung.
Die Bauzeit der Großforschungsanlage wird gut sechs Jahre betragen. Bauherr ist die internationale FAIR GmbH, deren Gesellschafter die Bundesrepublik Deutschland, das Land Hessen und die Regierungen von acht Staaten aus Europa und Asien sind. Den entsprechenden völkerrechtlichen Vertrag, die FAIR-Convention, haben Deutschland, Finnland, Frankreich, Indien, Polen, Rumänien, Russland, Schweden und Slowenien unterschrieben. Die Investitionen für die gesamte Anlage belaufen sich auf über eine Milliarde Euro. Etwa die Hälfte davon fließt in den Bau. Die Kosten für die hochmodernen Teilchenbeschleuniger und Experimentieranlagen werden rund 500 Millionen Euro betragen.
Mit solchen Anlagen können Wissenschaftler die Entwicklung der Bausteine der Materie bis zum Urknall zurückverfolgen, aber auch medizinische Verfahren entwickeln. Große Erfolge wurden in Darmstadt bereits mit dem seit vierzig Jahren in Betrieb befindlichen Teilchenbeschleuniger der GSI verbucht, nicht zuletzt die Entdeckung der neuen superschweren Elemente Hassium und Darmstadtium sowie die Weiterentwicklung der erfolgreichen Krebstherapie durch Kohlenstoff-Bestrahlung.
Die neue FAIR-Anlage wird rund sechsmal größer als die bestehende GSI-Anlage sein. Die neue FAIR-Anlage grenzt an die GSI-Anlage und verwendet die in den Vorbeschleunigern der GSI erzeugten Isotope. In den FAIR-Beschleunigern werden diese bis nahe Lichtgeschwindigkeit beschleunigt und für die Herstellung von Antimaterie und extrem kurzlebigen Isotopen verwendet.
Fast 600.000 Kubikmeter Beton und über 35.000 Tonnen Stahl sowie weitere 500.000 Tonnen Restbaustoffe weisen das Bauvorhaben als Großprojekt aus. Über eine Million Kubikmeter Boden werden ausgehoben und später wieder eingebaut, denn die fertigen Bauwerke werden zu einem großen Teil unter der Erde liegen. Zur Belieferung der Baustelle und zur Entlastung der Einwohner von Wixhausen hat die FAIR GmbH bereits Umgehungsstraßen fertiggestellt und wird im Frühjahr 2013 interne Baustraßen auf dem Baufeld anlegen. Auf ihren Internetseiten unter www.fair-center.de hat die FAIR GmbH weitere detaillierte Informationen über die Maßnahmen zusammengestellt.
In Kürze wird auch mit den Gründungsarbeiten begonnen: Rund 1.500 Bohrpfähle mit einem Durchmesser von mindestens 1,20 Metern in bis zu 65 Metern Tiefe sind erforderlich, um die Gebäude auf ein tragfähiges Fundament zu stellen. In Spitzenzeiten werden bis zu 600 Bauarbeiter, Techniker und Ingenieure auf der Baustelle beschäftigt sein.
Bereits 2005 wurden in einem städtebaulichen Vertrag die Kompensationsmaßnahmen für unvermeidliche Eingriffe in Natur und Landschaft vereinbart, die durch ein ökologisches Gremium überwacht werden.
Pressemitteilung der FAIR GmbH
Die Teilchenbeschleunigeranlage FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research in Europe GmbH) ist eine weltweit einzigartige, von Deutschland, Hessen und acht internationalen Partnern getragene Großforschungsanlage. FAIR wird derzeit in Darmstadt in unmittelbarer Nachbarschaft des GSI Helmholtzzentrums für Schwerionenforschung gebaut. Sie wird 3,5 Kilometer Strahlführung und acht Kreisbeschleuniger mit bis zu 1.100 Metern Umfang haben. Die bestehenden GSI-Beschleuniger werden als Vorbeschleuniger dienen. An FAIR werden Wissenschaftler untersuchen, wie Materie im Innersten beschaffen ist und wie sich das Universum seit dem Urknall entwickelt hat. Die Anlage dient hauptsächlich der Grundlagenforschung, die ergänzt wird durch anwendungsnahe Forschung, zum Beispiel für Tumortherapien oder neue Materialien. FAIR wird voraussichtlich 2018 den Forschungsbetrieb aufnehmen und dann Anziehungspunkt für mehr als 3.000 Wissenschaftler aus aller Welt sein. Schon heute sind 3.000 Wissenschaftler aus mehr als 50 Ländern an der Planung von FAIR beteiligt.
]]>Horst Stöcker has served as the Scientific Director of GSI since August 2007. During this time, GSI cooperated with its partners in Germany and abroad to fulfil the preconditions for the start of construction of the FAIR accelerator centre, which will be linked with the existing GSI accelerator facility. The construction of FAIR, which is now under way, is one of the world's largest projects in the area of basic research in physics. In order to bring together the know-how for the research and development that will be carried out at FAIR, and to ensure a supply of new talent in the areas of science and technology, Horst Stöcker has been actively building networks with universities and research laboratories.
"The greatest challenge during my next term of office will be to work with GSI to do everything that's necessary to complete the construction of FAIR. We intend to intensely network with universities and other research laboratories as we forge ahead with our shared technical and scientific projects. A key aim is to ensure that the experiments can begin as soon as the accelerator facilities at FAIR are commissioned. To celebrate the commissioning of FAIR during my next term of office would be fantastic," says Horst Stöcker. "Another thing that's especially important to me is the reunion of the two companies FAIR and GSI, which are currently separate. Of course it was necessary to separate them because of the construction process, but in the future we want to reunite them, because they belong together."
Approximately 3,000 scientists from more than 40 countries are already working on the planning of FAIR’s experimentation and accelerator facilities. The facility will provide antiproton and ion beams of an intensity and quality that have never before been attained. In the final phase of expansion, FAIR will consist of eight circular accelerators with a circumference of up to 1,100 metres, two linear accelerators and approximately four kilometres of beamline. The existing GSI accelerators will serve as pre-accelerators. An unprecedented variety of experiments will be possible at FAIR — experiments that will give scientists from all over the world new insights into the structure of matter and the development of the universe since the Big Bang.
Horst Stöcker studied physics, mathematics and chemistry at Goethe University in Frankfurt. After receiving his doctorate in 1979, he worked as a guest researcher in Berkeley. He was then appointed to a professorship at Michigan State University and at the National Superconducting Cyclotron Laboratory in Michigan. In 1985 he was appointed to a professorship in theoretical physics at Goethe University in Frankfurt, where he was also elected Vice President three times. Since 2004 he has held the Judah M. Eisenberg Chair at Goethe University. Since its foundation he is also the Chairman of the Board of Management and a Senior Fellow of the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS). Since 2008 he has been Vice President of the Helmholtz Association, the largest scientific organization in Germany. His research areas include relativistic heavy ion and elementary particle physics as well as nuclear matter, neutron stars and black holes.
]]>Stöhlker obtained his Doctor degree in 1991 from University of Gießen. Now he is the head of Atomic Physics Division and Plasma Physics Division at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt. Meanwhile, he is a professor at the University of Jena, the director of the Helmholtz-Institut Jena and the contact person of the Stored Particle Atomic Physics Research Collaboration (SPARC) at the Facility for Antoproton and Ion Research (FAIR).
At the ceremony, Stöhlker briefly introduced the progress of the SPARC and the FAIR Project. He expressed his appreciation and promised to do his best to promote the scientific collaboration between the two institutes.
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La Tessa talked about her experiments with simulated Moon and Mars regolith in detail. La Tessa’s working group radiated the samples with ions from the GSI accelerator to test them as shielding for long term stays on Mars. Cosmic rays consist mostly of ions. The author and TV producer, who was awarded several times, for example with the FIPRESCI Award (Cannes Film Festival), Georg Büchner Prize and Grimme Award, does interviews with scientists regularly for his production company dctp.
The broadcasting date is not yet set.
Today the GSI Helmholtz Center for Heavy Ion Research sent its first tweet. From now on we distribute the latest research results and job offers also in the social networks Twitter and Facebook. We also tweet live from events like our lecture series "Wissenschaft für Alle" and publish the latest videos and images.
To reach the 14- to 29-year-olds there is no getting around social networks as 96 percent in this age range in Germany are registered in one network at least. But Twitter and Co. have gone beyond being just entertainment. In the last years they evolved to serious sources of information. Journalists, politicians and other decision makers look for information, socialize and identify trends that are not picked up by classical media.
For science communication new media are a great opportunity: Via social networks people can be inspired by research even if they don't read the science section in their daily newspaper every morning. The dialog social media lives on makes science livelier, easier to understand and to access. We are looking forward to the dialog with all social network users. Questions, opinions and suggestions are very welcome. Our Facebook page is in German. On Twitter we have an English and a German channel.
Other Helmoltz centers are active in social networks as well. All channels can be accessed in the Helmholtz Social Media Newsroom.
Visit and follow us (with account) on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.
Koonin was suggested for the award by Karlheinz Langanke, Research Director of GSI, and Horst Stöcker, Scientific Director of GSI, because of his long-time relations to GSI. Apart from his outstanding work in the area of nuclear physics Koonin is also active in other areas of research closely connected with the topics of the Helmholtz Association. For instance he investigated climate changes by analysing the light emitted from earth and reflected by the moon, wrote a book about computational physics and worked as Undersecretary in the US Department of Energy.
Besides Koonin also five other researchers receive the award. German or international researchers who are based abroad and who do not already have an employment contract with a Helmholtz Centre are eligible. Outstanding performance in a relevant scientific field is the most important criterion for the award. The scientists’ projects must complement the activities of the specific Helmholtz Centre that nominates them.
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In the Star Wars-movie Darth Vader destroys the planet Alderaan. "We can deduct from the shock wave how much force the explosion had", says Vogel. "To destroy the whole planet you would need the amount of energy emitted by the sun in two years."
Sascha Vogel is a theoretician. On several science slams he already proved that physics can be very entertaining. But he doesn't only show amusing clips. Recurringly he blends in scientific terms as conservation of momentum, law of inertia or quantum chromo dynamics – including the formulas.
Vogel also presents his top three Hollywood movies with bad physics. Rank 3: Armageddon. The two halfs of the exploded comets passing earth would cause terrible tsunamis because of their gravity. Rank 2: James Bond. And Rank 1: action movie The Core. "The worst two hours of my life as a physicist", he claims. Highlights of physics mistakes are a wrong prime number and Earth rotating in the wrong direction during the credits.
The construction of a light saber is a bit more complicated. For them to intersect like real swords you'd need an extreme light intensitiy. Otherwise they would just pass through each other like the beams of two flashlights. "Only with very high energies one could produce light sources that interact with each other", Vogel explains. "It requires intensities of 1033 Watt per square centimeter. This excites the vacuum and matter-antimatter-pairs would be created facilitating the possibility for an interaction. As a comparison: The sunshine only has an intensity of 8000 Watt per square centimeter."
A surprise waits at the end of Vogels talk. Not all seemingly absurd science fiction scenes are physically impossible. Spiderman's silk could hold a fall from 100 meter height. "Spider silk is one of the toughest materials on Earth."
]]>Following the welcome of Reinhold Stämmler, division manager for press, education and public relations of the association, the participants gained insight into GSI's research in an introductory talk. Afterwards they visited the accelerators and experiments at GSI in a guided tour through the facility.
In the afternoon they were informed about GSI's efforts in job training and apprenticeships and discussedNews further topics in the area of professional education.
]]>Das Werkzeug der Wissenschaftler am Helmholtz Institut (HI) Jena sind Laser und Spektroskope. Kombiniert mit Ionenstrahlen, die mit Teilchenbeschleunigern erzeugt werden, ergeben sich neue Forschungsfelder und breite Anwendungen. Die im Juni gegründete Graduiertenschule (engl. Research School) für Advanced Photon Science (RS-APS) soll die Doktoranden, die am HI Jena promovieren, noch gezielter fördern und unterstützen. Gerade beim Bau des XFEL (European X-Ray Free Electron Laser Facility) bei DESY in Hamburg oder beim größten Forschungsprojekt Europas FAIR werden Spezialisten für die Schnittstelle zwischen Optik und Beschleuniger gesucht – der Schwerpunkt des HI Jena.
Ein strukturiertes Promotionsprogramm an der RS-APS soll die Wissenschaftler optimal auf ihre Aufgaben vorbereiten. Dafür investiert das HI Jena laut eigenen Angaben einen erheblichen Teil seines Budgets. Das Angebot reicht von fachlichen Angeboten, die den Studenten helfen das Spezialgebiet ihrer Doktorarbeit zu vertiefen, über Vernetzung und internationale Erfahrung. Die Stipendiaten können ihre Management-Fähigkeiten trainieren oder lernen, wie man für verschiedene Zielgruppen professionell eine Präsentation hält. Auch für Reisen zu Konferenzen und Sommerschulen stehen Mittel zur Verfügung.
Das 2009 als Tochterinstitut von GSI gegründete Helmholtz-Institut Jena wird von Professor Thomas Stöhlker geleitet, der auch Leiter der Atom- und Plasmaphysik bei GSI ist.
]]>Viele Bachelorarbeiten, Diplomanden und Doktoranden hat Gisela Taucher-Scholz bereits seit 1990 bei GSI betreut. Ab dem Wintersemester 2012/2013 hält sie nun auch als Honorarprofessorin Vorlesungen an der TU Darmstadt und ist für das Mastermodul Strahlenbiophysik verantwortlich. Als Leiterin der Gruppe DNA-Reparatur wird sie den Studenten aktuellste Forschungsergebnisse über die Selbstheilungskräfte der Zelle vermitteln. Wird das Erbgut einer Zelle geschädigt, hat sie verschiedene Möglichkeiten sich zu erholen. Doch diese Reparaturmechanismen verändern sich, wenn die Zelle bestrahlt wird. Taucher-Scholz und ihre Kollegen erforschen diese Verändeurngen mit molekularen Methoden und sind darin weltweit führend.
Indem sie ein Projekt beim BMBF beantragte, legte Taucher-Scholz den Grundstein für das „Kompetenzzentrum für Strahlenbiologie“ in Darmstadt. Hier zu zählen mittlerweile zwei neue Lehrstühle. Weitere BMBF-geförderte Projekte sind das Ergebnis der intensiven Zusammenarbeit zwischen TU Darmstadt und GSI.
The European Space Agency ESA has big plans for the next years. Sending new satellites in space, bringing astronauts to the international space station ISS, landing rovers on Mars and Moon. Thomas Reiter, director of Human Spaceflight and the European Space Operations Centre ESOC in Darmstadt, talked about these topics at GSI colloquium.
Cosmic radiation from the GSI accelerator
For many of these projects ESA needs detailled knowledge on cosmic radiation and its effect on humans and materials. As cosmic rays can be simulated uniquely well at GSI and in the future with FAIR, many cooperations with ESA are possible especially in biophysics and materials research. Thomas Reiter also visited the ESA laboratory at GSI.
Living in space
He encouraged GSI employees to hand in proposals for experiments on the ISS. During his two stays in space Thomas Reiter conducted 40 experiments including plasma physics. The attendees were particularly interested in an astronaut’s everyday life. Answering the question which comfort he had missed the most, Reiter said: „Of course you have not very much free time on board the ISS. Every minute is scheduled and you have a lot of tasks to cope with. But the amazing view on Earth and the continents that pass under you within hours compensate all strains. The experience was fantastic and I never want to miss it“
An orange like back then in space
Reiter did not complain about the food but he talked very enthusiastically about a grapefruit from a transport vehicle he ate after weeks of dry food. Laughing he accepted the orange which was then spontaneously organised by the attenders.
Ein wesentlicher Baustein zur Anbindung der hessischen Universitäten und des Supercomputers LOEWE-CSC an das künftige internationale Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research), die erste Ausbaustufe des „FAIR Tera Net“, ist in Betrieb genommen worden. Bei einer kleinen Feierstunde am Standort von LOEWE-CSC drückten der Staatssekretär im Hessischen Ministerium für Wissenschaft und Kunst, Ingmar Jung und der Präsident der Goethe-Universität, Prof. Werner Müller-Esterl gemeinsam den symbolischen roten Knopf, zusammen mit dem Leiter des Center for Scientific Computing (CSC), Prof. Hans Jürgen Lüdde und LOEWE-CSC-Entwickler Prof. Volker Lindenstruth. Das Datennetz verbindet über eine Strecke von rund 100 Kilometern in der ersten Ausbaustufe die Computer des GSI Helmholtzzentrums für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt, in dessen Nachbarschaft FAIR entsteht, mit der Goethe-Universität und mit dem in Frankfurt-Höchst stehenden Höchstleistungsrechner LOEWE-CSC – mit einer Zwischenstation beim weltweit größten Internetknoten in Frankfurt.
"FAIR-Tera Net“ schafft ein Datennetz des entstehenden Beschleunigerzentrums FAIR mit den anderen Hochleistungsrechnern und Forschungsinstituten in Hessen. Es verknüpft die Hochschulen und die Forschungszentren im Rhein-Main-Gebiet mit direktem Zugriff auf die gespeicherten und bei FAIR-Experimenten erzeugten Daten. Über das „Fair Tera Net“ können die Supercomputer sich gegenseitig in ihrer Arbeit unterstützen.
Die Übertragungsgeschwindigkeit wird in der Pilotphase 120 Gigabit pro Sekunde betragen, später soll sie auf mindestens 1 Terabit pro Sekunde fast verzehnfacht werden (dies entspricht der Übertragung einer großen PC-Festplatte in sechs Sekunden). Bereits jetzt ermöglicht das „FAIR Tera Net“, dass LOEWE-CSC Berechnungen für physikalische Experimente am Europäischen Kernforschungszentrum CERN in Genf übernimmt, mit dem das GSI-Helmholtzzentrum direkt verbunden ist. In Zukunft soll für FAIR in Darmstadt das GSI-Rechenzentrum „Green IT Cube“ in Betrieb gehen und damit weitere Supercomputerkapazität für die Forschung bereitstellen. Das „FAIR Tera Net“ wurde vom GSI-Helmholtzzentrum und vom Helmholtz International Center for FAIR (HIC for FAIR) gemeinsam realisiert und ist Teil der hessischen Landes-Offensive zur Entwicklung Wissenschaftlich-ökonomischer Exzellenz (LOEWE).
In der Feierstunde wurde auch dem Frankfurter Höchstleistungscomputer LOEWE-CSC der Titel „Ausgewählter Ort“ durch die Standortinitiative „Land der Ideen“ verliehen. Die Standortinitiative zeichnet in Zusammenarbeit mit der Deutschen Bank Projekte aus, die einen besonderen Beitrag zur Zukunftsfähigkeit Deutschlands leisten. LOEWE-CSC wurde als einer der ersten CO2-neutralen Supercomputer weltweit ausgezeichnet, da er nicht nur besonders schnell und energiesparend arbeitet, sondern auch vollständig mit Strom aus regenerativen Energiequellen betrieben wird. LOEWE-CSC, vor fast zwei Jahren in Betrieb genommen, ist derzeit der fünftschnellste Computer in Deutschland.
]]>To split ions and atoms into their pieces scientists let fast ions collide with a fixed target. For every experiment a special traget is produced from certain material. This offers a lot of combinations. At GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung one of the best target laboratories is located. In the INTDS workshop and the conference made specialists from the target production, the target measurement and the target users meet. The conference was jointly organized by the Johannes Gutenberg-University, the Technical University Darmstadt and GSI, supported by Helmholtz Institute Mainz and Jena. Target makers who typically work with and for accelerator-based research and target makers who typically work with and for laser physics got an inside view in the applied techniques and problems.
]]>The tsunami and the earthquake in Japan in March 2011 demanded many victims and caused an incredible destruction. The accelerator center J-PARC (Japan Proton Accelerator Research Complex) was affected, too. Therefore GSI employees collected 3.265 Euros and donated it to J-PARC. The research complex’ management level considered many possibilities how to spend the donation. In the end they decided to give the donation to Dr. Yoshio Yamazaki, deputy head of RCS (Rapid Cycle Synchrotron), and his family. Their home stood right next to the coast and had been severly damaged by the tsunami.
On 21 August Yamazaki thanked GSI for the donations within the target conference INTDS 2012: "In the name of my family I want to thank the GSI employees. Our home had been strongly destroyed and the financial help has helped us a lot to rebuild it. I think this shows how close the international cooperation between the accelerator centers is. Also in crises they stick together. Therefore my family and are especially happy to visit GSI now for the first time for the INTDS conference."
GSI had also offered japanese students and postdocs to continue their research project in Germany as long as the japanese accelerator was unusable because of the earthquake. Two students took the chance. This cooperation was coordinated by Dr. Kei Sugita from the accelerators department.
Drei verschiedene Experimente führen die Materialwissenschaftler von GSI während der zwei Wochen Strahlzeit durch, in denen Hilbert sein Praktikum macht. „Ich schaue vor allem zu und lerne“, sagt der frischgebackene Abiturient. „Neu ist für mich die Ionoluminiszenz, die zurzeit untersucht wird.“ Bei diesem Experiment werden Kristalle mit schweren Ionen bestrahlt, erklärt Hilberts Betreuer Dr. Markus Bender weiter. Anschließend werde dann mit einem Spektrometer geprüft, ob der Kristall von den Ionen geschädigt wurde. Kristalle, die strahlungsresistent sein müssen, kommen unter anderem in Teilchendetektoren zum Einsatz.
Auf einem anderen Gebiet konnte Bender von dem „Jugend forscht“-Praktikanten sogar dazulernen. „Im ersten Experiment wollten wir herausfinden, was in kosmischen Wolken im Universum geschieht, wenn kosmische Strahlung die Bestandteile ionisiert“, erklärt Bender. „Dafür haben wir Gas, wie aus einer kosmischen Wolke, mit schweren Ionen bestrahlt. Danach konnten wir chemisch analysieren, ob neue Moleküle entstanden sind. Wie diese Analytik funktioniert, hat mir Marvin gut erklärt.“
Erfahrung mit Analytischer Chemie hat Hilbert aus seinem „Jugend forscht“-Projekt. Er fand heraus, wie verschiedene Aufbrühmethoden den Kaffee verändern. Er reichte die Arbeit, die er im Rahmen seiner Ausbildung zum Chemisch-Technischen Assistenten geschrieben hatte, bei „Jugend forscht“ ein, und belegte den vierten Platz. „Das meiste Koffein bekommt man, wenn man die Espressomaschine für den Herd zum Kaffee kochen benutzt“, fasst Hilbert seine Ergebnisse zusammen. „Am ineffizientesten extrahiert die elektrische Espressomaschine das Koffein.“
]]>So‐called “superheavy” elements owe their very existence exclusively to shell effects within the atomic nucleus. Without this stabilization they would disintegrate in a split second due to the strong repulsion between their many protons. The constituents of an atomic nucleus, the protons and neutrons, organize themselves in shells. Certain “magic” configurations with completely filled shells render the protons and neutrons to be more strongly bound together.
Long‐standing theoretical predictions suggest that also in superheavy elements, filled proton and neutron shells will give rise to extraordinarily stable and hence long‐lived nuclei: the “Island of stability“. Still, after decades of research, its exact location on the chart of nuclei is a topic of intense discussions and no consensus has yet been reached. While some theoretical models predict a magic proton number to be at element 114, others prefer element 120 or even 126. Another burning question is whether nuclei situated on the island will live “only“ hundreds or maybe thousands or even millions of years. Anyway, all presently known superheavy elements are short‐lived and none have been found in nature yet.
Precise information on the strength of shell effects that enhance binding energies of protons and neutrons for filled shells is a key ingredient for more accurate theoretical predictions. As the binding energy is directly related to the mass via Einstein’s famous equation E=mc2, the weighing of nuclei provides access to the nuclear binding energies and thus the strength of the shell effects. With the ion‐trap facility SHIPTRAP, presently the most precise balance for weighing the heaviest elements, a series of very heavy atomic nuclei in the region of the magic neutron number N=152 have now been weighed with utmost precision for the first time. The studies at hand focused on nobelium (element 102) and lawrencium (element 103). These elements do not exist in nature, so the scientists produced them at the GSI’s particle accelerator facility and captured them in the SHIPTRAP. The measurements had to be performed with just a handful of atoms: for the isotope lawrencium‐256 just about 50 could be studied during a measurement time of about 93 hours.
The new data will benchmark the best present models for the heaviest atomic nuclei and provide an important stepping stone to further refining the models. This will lead to more precise predictions on the location and extension of the “Island of stability“ of superheavy elements.
The experiments were carried out by an international team led by scientists of GSI and the Helmholtz‐Institute Mainz (HIM) in collaboration with scientists from the universities of Giessen, Granada (Spain), Greifswald, Heidelberg, Mainz, Munich und Padua (Italy), as well as the Max‐Planck‐ Institute for Nuclear Physics Heidelberg and the PNPI St. Petersburg (Russia).
E. Minaya Ramirez et al. “Direct mapping of nuclear shell effects in the heaviest elements” von, Science 2012
DOI: 10.1126/science.1225636
Link: https://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1225636
Dr. Michael Block
GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung
Planckstrasse 1
64291 Darmstadt
https://www-dev.gsi.de
Prof. Dr. Christoph E. Düllmann
Helmholtz Institut Mainz und Institut für Kernchemie
Johannes Gutenberg-Universität
55099 Mainz
https://www.helmholtz.de/en/research/promoting_research/helmholtz_institutes/helm...
https://www.kernchemie.uni-mainz.de/eng/index.php
Prof. Klaus Blaum
Max-Planck-Institut für Kernphysik
Saupfercheckweg 1
69117 Heidelberg
https://www.mpi-hd.mpg.de
Prof. Lutz Schweikhard
Institut für Physik
Ernst-Moritz-Arndt-Universität Greifswald
17487 Greifswald
https://www.physik.uni-greifswald.de/physik01
Priv. Doz. Dr. Peter G. Thirolf
Fakultät für Physik der Ludwig-Maximilians- Universität
Am Coulombwall 1
85748 Garching
https://www.en.physik.uni-muenchen.de/index.html
Dr. Wolfgang Plaß
II. Physikalisches Institut
Justus-Liebig Universität
Heinrich-Buff-Ring 14
35392 Gießen
https://pcweb.physik.uni-giessen.de/exp2
For 30 years now, the Summer Student Program gives undergraduates from all over the world the opportunity to get in touch and to learn about GSI facilities and technologies. Peter Hassenbach, administrative director of GSI, and Jörn Knoll, programme organizer, welcomed the participants at the GSI guesthouse. The Summer Student Program is organized by the graduate school HGS-HIRe (Helmholtz Graduate School for Hadron and Ion Research) and GSI.
“It is great to get the opportunity to work in such a progressive country as Germany”, says Sofya Bareaeva from the Dubna International University of Nature, Society, and Man in Russia. She is one of the participants of this year's Summer Student Program. At GSI she will join a research group investigating structures of exotic nuclei. „Working here gives me a chance to learn about my own field of research as well as getting to know new technologies.“
During his eight-week stay, Efim Rozenbaum will also join one of the GSI research groups. At home he is working on hydrogen-like ions and their reaction in laser fields. Together with GSI researchers he will study atomic physics with highly charged ions. „It is important to perform experiments in order to understand the subject“, says the student of the Saint Petersburg State University. „I have come here to see how foreign physicists work.“
Sergiy Trotsenko is Efim Rozenbaum's tutor. He will guide Rozenbaum through his project: „The participants can experience how we work. This international cooperation is important. Perhaps, they will eventually become a part of one of our research groups at GSI or FAIR.“
Besides motivating the participants for their scientific projects, Peter Hassenbach invited the students to get to know to the city of Darmstadt and the surrounding area. The students are provided with bicycles to explore the region.
40 readers took part in the introductory lecture about GSI research on August 6, and afterwards visited the accelerator facility. The tumour therapy with heavy ions and the planned facility FAIR was especially of interest to the guests.
Apart from GSI visits to the Vivarium, to the European Space Operations Centre ESOC and to the compost works are planned as well.
]]>The matter of our earth is made of atoms. All atoms with the same electric charge in their nuclei are classified as being nuclei of the same chemical element. To date, we know of 114 such chemical elements. Each element comes in different types known as isotopes, whose atomic nuclei have the same electrical charge but different masses. The discovery of a new atomic nucleus is thus also the discovery of a new isotope. Researchers have observed around 3,100 different isotopes, and another thousand as yet unknown ones are forecast to exist.
Especially heavy or especially light isotopes of an element are particularly interesting for scientists. They play a major role in our understanding of how the elements are created in stars and in stellar explosions. However, because of their short lifetimes they do not occur naturally on earth. Scientists such as Münzenberg and Geissel therefore attempt to create and analyze them in the laboratory. They do this by accelerating atomic nuclei and colliding them with material samples. New isotopes occur as fragments resulting from the collisions. These new isotopes can be sorted out and studied with the help of separators at the GSI accelerator facility.
“We started creating isotopes in 1977. We were incredibly excited as we recognized the first new nuclei on the basis of how they decayed,” says Münzenberg, who has retired since then. “We want to discover where the frontiers of the nuclide landscape lie. Where else can matter exist? And what shape are the nuclei? We want to find many of these exotic nuclei in order to get an idea of the landscape, and then to study the interesting ones.” Münzenberg was pleasantly surprised to hear of his world record. Although he knew he had made a major contribution to the field, he hadn’t kept track of the exact number of nuclei.
Third place is occupied by the pioneer of nuclear mass determination, Francis William Aston of Cambridge, who received the 1922 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his isotope discoveries. He identified many—207 in total—of the naturally occurring isotopes at the start of the 20th century. Other GSI scientists are catching up with him, however. Peter Armbruster, for example, is in fourth position. The list of the top 25 isotope discoverers includes 22 who have carried out research at GSI.
Working together with his students, Thoennessen has created a summary of the discoverers of all isotopes by person and by laboratory on the basis of scientific publications. He regards an isotope as being recognized when its mass and charge have been measured and published. The Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in Berkeley, California, is the leading laboratory in the statistics, with 635 discovered isotopes. GSI comes in second here, with 372 isotopes discovered.
Münzenberg’s world record will very probably be exceeded when the accelerator centre Fair (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) at GSI starts operating in the coming years. At Fair it will be possible to create many new isotopes within a very short time.
Additional information about Michael Thoennessen’s isotope research is available from: https://www.nscl.msu.edu/~thoennes/isotopes/
]]>Systems of opposite chirality (handedness) can – like a left and a right hand – not be transformed into their mirror image by rotation, even if they consist of the same ingredients. Due to the different configuration of their constituents their interaction with their environment varies. Atomic and molecular properties are defined by the dynamics of their electron system. Up to now there was little research of this aspect as it required development of complex experimental techniques and theoretical methods only established in the recent years by the project partners. The complementary expertise of the experimentalists in ELCH now enables the scientist to use almost all chiral probes available in nature to compare them with the numerical models of the ELCH-theorists and to answer fundamental questions concerning chirality in the dynamics of electrons.
]]>On 17 July Chiara La Tessa received the medal at Mysore, South India. Every two years the Committee on Space Research and the Russian Academy of Sciences give this award to young researchers. The medal is named after Yakov Borisovich Zeldovich, a Soviet physicist who made important contributions in astrophysics, cosmology and many other physical fields.
]]>Respiration is a very complex procedure. A person’s breathing pattern constantly changes, for example, if the individual is stressed or relaxed, coughing or even just clearing his or her throat. And in each of these situations, the diaphragm moves the lungs, and subsequently all internal organs, in and out. This means that lung tumours are constantly moving.
In order to develop a lung tumour therapy, scientists first modelled a human chest using a training skeleton. “We call the thorax model Bruce Lee,” states Dr. Robert Kaderka, biophysicist at GSI, adding that he and his team took the name from the manufacturer’s brand name for the skeleton (Skelett Bruce). The model includes skin, ribs, a spine and the target tumour. An electronic motor raises and lowers the chest to mimic respiration. “At the same time, a robot arm moves the tumour realistically in synch with the lung,” continues Kaderka.
To irradiate the tumour, the researchers first took a time-resolved CT image of the chest. This enabled them to see exactly how the tumour moved during a single breath and plan the irradiation. While the model undergoes treatment, cameras record the chest movement from outside in real time. This information is then fed into software. “The software simulates a neural network – in other words, a brain,” elaborates Associate Professor Dr. Christoph Bert, head of the medical physics group at GSI. “It learns how a specific individual breathes,” he concludes. The software then uses this data to predict the movement of the tumour in the lung and adjust the heavy ion beam in a matter of milliseconds.
The artificial tumour contains 20 ionization chambers and five radiographic films, which record whether the beam actually reaches its target to destroy harmful tumour cells. Accuracy is crucial here. If the ion beam does not hit the tumour it can damage surrounding tissue. It also means that the dose the tumour receives is too low to kill all cancer cells. The findings are still being evaluated, but the scientists are confident that the irradiation test was a success.
The cameras and software come from Milan. Matteo Seregni, PhD student at the Politecnico di Milano, and his colleagues have the necessary operational expertise. Seregni spent three months at GSI preparing the experiments. Getting a project such as this up and running in such a short space of time requires the right mix of specialists and international collaboration. The German Research Foundation and Siemens AG funded different aspects of the setup . Additional funds were provided by the EU projects European NoVel Imaging Systems for ION therapy (ENVISION) and the Union of Light-Ion Centres in Europe (ULICE).
]]>Many of them decided to visit GSI because they are interested in studying a scientific subject. Others knew GSI from Saturday Morning Physics. „I would like to study radiation protection“, one girl said.
Dr. Michael Block who is working in the superheavy elements physics department showed the students the accelerator facilities, the therapy site, the SHIP/SHIPTRAP and the HADES experiment. „To wake the students passion for science and fundamental research it is the best If a scientist shows the facilities he is working with every day and explains them in a comprehensible way“, he said.
]]>It is endowed with 5000 euro. Märtin received the prize on 19 May in Heidelberg for her work „X-ray polarimetry used to study bremsstrahlung of spin polarized electrons.“
]]>They got latest information on GSI research and the construction of FAIR. The evening’s headline was „How scientists produce gold and treat cancer with accelerators“. Among the guests was Michael Siebel, deputy SPD floor leader in the Hessian parliament and spokesman for science, art and media.
The Friedrich-Ebert-Foundation – named after the first democratically elected president Friedrich Ebert – is aimed at making political and social education accessible to everyone.
]]>Was passiert, wenn ein Stern am Ende seines Lebens noch einmal hell aufleuchtet und sich dann in einer Supernovaexplosion in einen Neutronenstern oder ein Schwarzes Loch verwandelt? Zum Verständnis dieses Vorgangs haben Karlheinz Langanke und Friedel Thielemann im Laufe ihrer Karriere herausragende Beiträge geleistet. Für diese Verdienste in der Nuklearen Astrophysik bekommen sie am 20. September 2012 den Lise-Meitner-Preis auf der Europäischen Kernphysik-Konferenz in Bukarest überreicht. Der Preis wird alle zwei Jahre vergeben.
Die langjährige Freundschaft der beiden Preisträger habe ihre Arbeit maßgeblich beeinflusst, so Karlheinz Langanke. Während sich Friedel Thielemann auf die Astrophysik spezialisierte, wurde Karlheinz Langanke zum Experten in der theoretischen Kernphysik. Wissen auf beiden Gebieten ist nötig, um die Vorgänge bei Supernovae zu verstehen. "Unsere Forschungsgebiete sind ineinander eng verzahnt", sagt Karlheinz Langanke. "Es freut mich deshalb besonders, dass ich den Lise-Meitner-Preis zusammen mit Friedel Thielemann verliehen bekomme."
"Auch an FAIR, der neuen Beschleunigeranlage, die gerade bei GSI gebaut wird, geht es um die Erforschung nuklearer und astrophysikalischer Prozesse", sagt Horst Stöcker, wissenschaftlicher Geschäftsführer von GSI. "Karlheinz Langanke und Friedel Thielemann sind die führenden Experten auf diesen Gebieten, was durch die Verleihung des Lise-Meitner-Preises erneut bestätigt wird. Ihr Wissen wird die Forschung bei FAIR entscheidend vorantreiben."
Karlheinz Langanke, geboren am 13. Februar 1951 in Bockum-Hövel studierte und promovierte in Münster. Nachdem er von 1992 bis 1996 Mitglied der Fakultät am California Institute of Technology war, nahm er einen Lehrstuhl für Theoretische Physik an der Universität Aarhus in Dänemark an. Seit 2005 ist er Professor für Theoretische Physik an der TU Darmstadt und Forschungsdirektor an der GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH. Langanke ist außerdem Senior Fellow am Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS).
Friedel Thielemann, der am 17. April 1951 in Mülheim an der Ruhr geboren wurde, studierte und promovierte an der TU Darmstadt. Wie Langanke war er am Caltech in Kalifornien und war außerdem von 1991 bis 1994 Professor in Harvard. Heute ist er Professor an der Universität Basel. Im Rahmen des Humboldt Forschungspreises, den er 2009 verliehen bekam, ist Thielemann regelmäßig bei GSI.
]]>Kontakt für Presseanfragen:
Dr. Ingo Peter
Tel: +49-6159-71-1397
E-Mail: i.peter(at)gsi.de
Originalveröffentlichung: „Superallowed Gamow-Teller Decay of the Doubly Magic Nucleus Sn-100“, Christoph B. Hinke et al., Nature, 20. Juni 2012 – DOI: 10.1038/nature11116
Nature-Artikel
For winning against a chess champion „Deep Blue“ only needed huge computing capacity – no human intelligence. Other than that Stryk’s football robots are capable of finding a ball, playing it, communicating with teammates and standing up from all kinds of positions.
Whose robots are best at sensing, planning and acting gets decided each year at “RoboCup” – the robot football championship. Oskar von Stryk and his team have won the RoboCup with their team “Darmstadt Dribblers” two times already. Videos of the first competition in 2004 showed the clumsy first tries: robots not seeing the ball and falling on the ground as soon as they try to move. Compared to this “Bruno”, the robot von Stryk brought with him, seemed very professional and almost human. The robot named after his godfather Bruno Labbadia started to move his head in search of the ball as soon as von Stryk switched him on. The robot’s weakness according to von Stryk is their dependence on their sensor systems. Robots accomplish every move in a controlled way. The new challenge is now developing robots that can move flexibly. This is supposed to be more human.
]]>Download the magazine as PDF (German only) or register for a subscription
]]><link de start aktuelles detailseite datum wie-und-warum-wirkt-eine-radontherapie.htm external-link-new-window>To the press release (German)
]]>Prior to the order being placed, a prototype magnet was successfully constructed at Babcock Noell in 2008. This prototype was thoroughly tested on the magnet test stand at GSI, where it fulfilled all the various requirements. Before construction of the prototype, GSI scientists and their colleagues from the Russian accelerator laboratory JINR in Dubna carried out years of development work. Here, they incorporated know-how about superconducting magnets that are already in operation at the accelerator in Dubna.
The magnets will be equipped with superconducting coils, whose magnetic fields can be modified very quickly. Thanks to the superconductivity, it is possible to generate high-strength fields of 1.9 Tesla (that’s equivalent to 40,000 times the strength of the earth's magnetic field) while keeping costs to a minimum. The combination of superconductivity plus the ability to change the magnetic field so quickly is unique in this form of application. Each of the 113 units is three meters long and weighs almost two tons.
FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) is one of the largest research projects worldwide. The research facility makes it possible to conduct a wide range of experiments in which physicists from all over the world can participate. It will enable scientists to gain insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe.
]]>Die Partnerschaft zwischen GSI und Kinderuni ist seit bald einem Jahr erprobt und bewährt. Zur Eröffnungsveranstaltung der Kinderuni Darmstadt am 30. April 2011 öffnete GSI ihr neues Konferenzgebäude für die etwa 200 Besucherinnen und Besucher der Kinderuni - mit dem GSI-Forschungsdirektor Professor Karlheinz Langanke als begrüßendem Gastgeber und dem Beschleunigerphysiker Jens Stadlmann als Referenten zum Thema "Rennstrecken für Atome". Auch die zweite GSI-Vorlesung "Coole Sachen" am 29. Oktober 2011 mit Piotr Kowina zeigte das lebhafte Interesse der Kinder an der Wissenschaft, speziell an der Kryotechnik und der damit verbundenen, faszinierenden Reaktion verschiedener Materialien auf extreme Kälte.
"Kinder sind von Natur aus neugierig und saugen Wissen wie ein Schwamm in sich auf. Was Kinder an Wissen, aber auch an Freude am Forschen und Erkennen lernen, das vergessen sie nicht und werden diese Begeisterung fürs Leben behalten. Dies ist ein hohes und erstrebenswertes Gut, das eine Großforschungseinrichtung wie GSI unbedingt fördern muss. Deshalb kooperieren wir gerne mit der Kinderuni Darmstadt. Neben unserem erfolgreichen Schülerlabor und Sommerstudentenprogramm rundet dies unsere Bemühungen ab, jungen Menschen die Freude des Forschens zu vermitteln", sagt Professor Karlheinz Langanke, Forschungsdirektor von GSI. Über die nun vereinbarte Kooperation hinaus unterstützt das bei GSI angesiedelte Extreme Matter Institut EMMI die Aktivitäten der Kinderuni.
Im Rahmen der Kinderuni-Vorlesungen folgen Kinder ab 8 Jahren gespannt den Ausführungen der Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftler, um durch eine anschauliche Vermittlung der Inhalte und durch Experimente mehr über die Phänomene zum Beispiel unserer Materie und der Kern- und Atomphysik zu erfahren. Ziel der wissenschaftlichen Forschung von GSI ist es, die uns umgebende Materie in ihrem Aufbau und Verhalten zu verstehen. GSI betreibt eine große, weltweit einmalige Beschleunigeranlage für Ionen. Forscher aus aller Welt nutzen die Anlage für Experimente, durch die sie faszinierende Entdeckungen in der Grundlagenforschung machen. Auch mit eigenen Vortragsreihen wie zum Beispiel "Wissenschaft für Alle" und weiteren Programmen für Schülerinnen, Schüler und Studierende bereitet GSI komplexe wissenschaftliche Inhalte informativ und anschaulich auf.
Die Kinderuni Darmstadt hat mit insgesamt sieben Vorlesungen und einem ScienceCamp allein in 2011 ein fundiertes wissenschaftliches, außerschulisches Angebot für Kinder an wechselnden Orten, mit rund 1.800 teilnehmenden Kindern und Eltern, geschaffen. Lernfördernde und vertiefende Angebote wie die im April und Mai stattfindenden Lerntrainings und Familien¬Studientage entwickeln den Spaß am Lernen und Entdecken in einer Gemeinschaft.
Weitere Informationen über die Studienangebote der Kinderuni unter: www.kinderuni-darmstadt.de
]]>The work will be carried out in two stages. The area to the east of GSI and south of Prinzenschneise is expected to be cleared by the end of February, although the time required for this task will depend greatly on the weather. In the second stage, the area north of Prinzenschneise will be cleared in the winter of 2012/2013 to make room for the underground ring accelerator.
“It will be possible to reforest a large part of the construction site once FAIR has been completed. The area to the north of Prinzenschneise, where the underground ring accelerator will be located, will once again be completely covered with woods,” explains Director Günther Rosner of FAIR GmbH. “The southern areas of the FAIR complex are also earmarked for reforestation. The construction site facilities will be located here when the building starts. In compensation, we will plant extensive forests in areas such as Arheilgen. Some of this work has in fact already been carried out. After FAIR is completed, the loss of woods will be fully offset as required by law. Once the building work is finished, the construction site will be transformed into a wooded parkland that is very similar to a natural forest.”
For safety reasons, the Prinzenschneise area will be closed to the public while the forest is being cleared. After the setting up of the construction site in the early summer of 2012, Prinzenschneise will probably be fully closed to the public for the duration of the construction work. Detour signs will be put up to steer cyclists, pedestrians, and joggers around the site. Prinzenschneise will again be fully accessible after the construction work is completed.
The FAIR accelerator will make it possible to conduct a wider range of experiments than ever before, enabling scientists from all over the world to gain new insights into the microscopic structure of matter and the evolution of the universe since the Big Bang. The FAIR accelerator center to be built in Darmstadt is one of the largest projects for basic research in physics worldwide. Roughly 3,000 scientists from more than 40 countries are already working on the plans for the accelerator and experimentation facilities. FAIR will generate antiproton and ion beams of a previously unparalleled intensity and quality. When it is completed, the compact FAIR facility will consist of eight ring accelerators up to 1,100 meters in circumference, two linear accelerators, and around 3.5 kilometers of beam pipes. The existing GSI accelerators will serve as pre-accelerators for the new facility.
]]>Die Vortragsreihe "Wissenschaft für Alle" richtet sich an alle an aktueller Wissenschaft und Forschung interessierten Personen. In der Regel einmal pro Monat findet jeweils an einem Mittwoch in der Monatsmitte ein Vortrag aus der Reihe statt.
Die Themen decken ein großes wissenschaftliches Spektrum ab - nicht nur über die Forschung an GSI und FAIR wird berichtet, sondern generell über aktuelle Themen aus Physik, Chemie, Biologie, Medizin und Informatik. Ziel der Reihe ist es, die wissenschaftlichen Vorgänge für den Laien verständlich aufzubereiten und darzustellen, um so die Forschung einem breiten Publikum zugänglich zu machen. Die Vorträge werden sowohl von GSI- und FAIR-Mitarbeitern als auch externen Rednern aus Universitäten und anderen Instituten gehalten.
Alle Vorträge finden im Hörsaal bei GSI, Planckstraße 1, 64291 Darmstadt, statt. Beginn ist jeweils um 14 Uhr. Der Eintritt ist frei, eine Anmeldung ist nicht erforderlich. Externe Teilnehmer werden gebeten, für den Einlass an unserer Pforte ein Ausweisdokument bereitzuhalten.
Weitere Informationen und aktuelle Ankündigungen finden Sie auf unserer Webseite www-dev.gsi.de/wfa
“I’m very delighted to give the official green light today for the construction of the key parts of the accelerators and experimentation systems of this unique accelerator center. We are investing in this advanced technology in order to strengthen Germany’s role in the field of science worldwide,” said Braun. The FAIR project has a total budget of about €1 billion. Germany is the main contributor, providing about €705 million in funding. In October 2010, nine countries (Germany, Finland, France, India, Poland, Romania, Russia, Sweden, and Slovenia) signed the agreement for the construction and operation of the FAIR center.
“The many years of development work have really paid off. The funds approved today will allow us to begin series production of the magnets for the central ring accelerator of FAIR’s SIS100 project as well as other components for our research programs,” said GSI Scientific Director Horst Stöcker. Many of the components for the FAIR accelerators are based on new technological concepts and have to meet the highest technical standards.
When it is completed, FAIR will consist of eight ring accelerators up to 1,100 meters in circumference, two linear accelerators, and around 3.5 kilometers of beam pipes. The existing GSI accelerators will serve as pre-accelerators for the new facility.
FAIR will make it possible to conduct a wider range of experiments than ever before, enabling scientists from all over the world to gain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe since the Big Bang. Roughly 3,000 scientists from more than 40 countries are already working on the plans for the accelerator and experimentation facilities.
]]>The lecture series "Saturday Morning Physics" is conducted by the faculty of physics of the Technical University Darmstadt. It is held annually and aims to increase the interest of young people for physics. In lectures and experiments the pupils get to know about current developments in the physical research at the university. The GSI visit is the only excursion of the series. The web site of Saturday Morning Physics: www.satmorphy.de
]]>Robert Kaderka hat im Rahmen seiner Arbeit für verschiedene Bestrahlungsmethoden die Streustrahlung ins Gewebe außerhalb des bestrahlten Tumors untersucht. Dabei hat er verschiedene Bestrahlungsmodalitäten an internationalen Behandlungszentren verglichen und gemessen. Er konnte nachweisen, dass die bei GSI entwickelte Therapiemethode die geringste Belastung des Normalgewebes herbeiführt und damit die geringsten Nebenwirkungen für Patienten hat. Robert Kaderka hat seine Doktorarbeit am Institut für Festkörperphysik der Technischen Universität Darmstadt unter Leitung von Professor Dr. Marco Durante, dem Leiter der Abteilung Biophysik bei GSI, verfasst.
Ingmar Schlampp hat in seiner Arbeit die Reaktionen im Normalgewebe von Patienten nach einer Tumortherapie mit schweren Ionen über sechs Jahre nachverfolgt, analysiert und mit konventioneller Bestrahlung verglichen. Er konnte nachweisen, dass die Dosisbelastung bei der Ionentherapie geringer und damit von Vorteil für die Patienten ist. Ingmar Schlampp hat seine Arbeit am Radiologischen Institut des Markus Krankenhaus in Frankfurt unter Leitung von Professor Dr. Daniela Schulz-Ertner angefertigt und an der Medizinischen Fakultät der Universität Heidelberg eingereicht.
]]>Bohrium, Hassium, Meitnerium, Darmstadtium, Röntgenium und kürzlich erst Copernicium – so lauten die Namen der Elemente die in Darmstadt von Forschern des GSI Helmholtzzentrums für Schwerionenforschung in den vergangenen 30 Jahren entdeckt und getauft wurden. Darmstadtium ds 110 – so heißt auch das Wissenschafts- und Kongresszentrum im Herzen Darmstadts, dessen Veranstaltungsräume konsequenterweise die Namen von chemischen Elementen tragen. Vervollständigt wird das Team durch die Merck KGaA, die weltweit zu den größten Chemieunternehmen zählt. Ein Periodensystem gibt Merck im Rahmen der Schulförderung schon seit einigen Jahren an die Darmstädter Schulen heraus. Die Idee, sich mit der GSI und dem darmstadtium zusammen zu tun, traf dennoch auf offene Ohren.
Besonders wichtig war es den Initiatoren bei einer Neuauflage des Periodensystems, auf Änderungswünsche der Lehrerinnen und Lehrer einzugehen. So standen Torsten Gürges vom GSI Schülerlabor und der Heinrich-Heine-Schule in Sprendlingen und Hubertus Volz von der Justus-Liebig-Schule in Darmstadt beratend zur Seite. Wichtig in diesem Zusammenhang war die Berücksichtigung der Normen der IUPAC (International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry). Hier unterstützte Dr. Wolfgang Baden, bei Merck für Produktdaten und interaktive Periodensysteme im WEB verantwortlich, das kleine PSE Team. Auf diesem Weg entstand ein Periodensystem, das optimal auf den hessischen Chemieunterricht abgestimmt ist. Farblich sehr ansprechend, informativ und praktisch im DIN A4 Format, wird das PSE ab sofort allen Darmstädter Schulen für die Schülerinnen und Schüler ab der Jahrgangsstufe 7, von Merck und der GSI zur Verfügung gestellt.
GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung
Jutta Leroudier,
Leiterin GSI-Schülerlabor
Phone.: +49 6159 712634
Fax: +49 6159 713010
E-mail: j.leroudier@gsi.de
Merck KGaA
Dr. Christa Jansen
Sponsoring/Schulförderung
Phone: +49 (0) 6151/726173
Fax: +49 (0) 6151/72916173
Email: christa.jansen@merck.de
Pressekontakt:
Jana Bethge-Henniger
Wissenschafts- und Kongresszentrum Darmstadt
PR Managerin
Schlossgraben 1
64283 Darmstadt
Phone: +49 6151 - 7806 103
Fax: + 49 6151 - 7806 119
E-mail: Jana.Bethge-Henniger@darmstadtium.de
]]>
Zum zweiten Jahrestag der ersten Kollisionen im LHC feiern Institute in ganz Deutschland den Tag der Weltmaschine, darunter auch das ExtreMe Matter Institute EMMI am GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt. Bei GSI findet daher am 23. November 2011 eine Abendveranstaltung mit folgendem Programm statt:
Moderation: Prof. Peter Braun-Munzinger (ExtreMe Matter Institute EMMI, GSI)
Besucher können auf www.weltmaschine.de online vorab Fragen an den Prof. Heuer stellen, die dann am Abend beantwortet werden. Nutzen Sie die Gelegenheit und stellen Sie dem CERN-Chef Ihre Fragen.
Das deutschlandweite Programm vom Tag der Weltmaschine und das Webformular für Fragen an CERN-Chef Rolf-Dieter Heuer finden Sie auf www.weltmaschine.de/tagderweltmaschine.
Weitere Informationen finden Sie auch unter www.weltmaschine.de/darmstadt und GSI.
Der Large Hadron Collider LHC ist die größte Maschine, die je für die Forschung gebaut worden ist. Der ringförmige Teilchenbeschleuniger hat einen Umfang von fast 27 Kilometern und verläuft in einem unterirdischen Tunnel 50 bis 175 Meter tief unter der französisch-schweizer Grenze nahe der Stadt Genf. Im LHC werden Protonen oder Blei-Ionen beschleunigt und bei nahezu Lichtgeschwindigkeit frontal zusammengeschossen. Mit diesen Kollisionen wollen Physiker dem Urknall näher kommen als je zuvor: Kurzzeitig wird es bei den Teilchencrashs – auf winzigem Raum – rund 100.000 Mal heißer als im Zentrum der Sonne, der LHC bietet damit den heißesten Ort der Galaxis. Aus der geballten Energie der Kollisionen entsteht ein Regen neuer Teilchen. In diesem Partikelhagel spähen Forscher nach bislang unentdeckten Teilchen und Phänomenen. Hausgroße Detektoren in riesigen unterirdischen Hallen zeichnen die Zusammenstöße auf. Am LHC und seinen Experimenten arbeiten etwa 10 000 Wissenschaftler aus aller Welt, unter ihnen mehr als 1000 von deutschen Universitäten und Forschungseinrichtungen.
Die Europäische Organisation für Kernforschung CERN ist das größte Teilchenforschungslabor der Welt. Heute sind 20 europäische Länder am CERN beteiligt. Der Jahresetat 2011 beträgt knapp 900 Millionen Euro. Deutschland ist der größte Geldgeber, rund jeder fünfte Euro kommt aus Deutschland. Seit 2009 ist der Deutsche Rolf-Dieter Heuer Generaldirektor des CERN.
Das ExtreMe Matter Institute EMMI bei GSI erforscht im Rahmen der Helmholtz-Allianz "Kosmische Materie im Labor" das Verhalten von Materie bei extremen Bedingungen von Temperatur und Druck. Mehr als 350 Forscher an den 13 nationalen und internationalen Partnerinstituten der Allianz untersuchen dabei unter anderem ultrakalte Quantengase, hochangeregte Atomzustände, Plasmen höchster Energiedichte, dichte Neutronenmaterie, sowie das Quark-Gluon Plasma, das wenige Sekundenbruchteile nach dem Urknall das Universum ausfüllte.
Die GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH ist ein vom Bund und dem Land Hessen finanziertes Forschungszentrum mit einem Jahresetat von gut 100 Millionen Euro und über 1.000 Mitarbeitern. GSI betreibt eine große, weltweit einmalige Beschleunigeranlage für Ionenstrahlen. Jährlich nutzen etwa 1.200 Wissenschaftler aus aller Welt die Ionenstrahlen für Experimente in der Grundlagenforschung. Die wohl bekanntesten Ergebnisse sind die Entdeckung von neuen chemischen Elementen und die Entwicklung einer neuartigen Krebstherapie mit Ionenstrahlen, die sich seit kurzem im Routineeinsatz an Kliniken befindet. GSI hat eine führende Rolle beim Bau und beim wissenschaftlichen Programm des Schwerionen-Experiments ALICE (A Large Ion Collider Experiment) am LHC gespielt. GSI-Wissenschaftler waren maßgeblich an der Entwicklung von zwei großen Detektorsystemen beteiligt. In den kommenden Jahren wird bei GSI das Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) mit einem Investitionsvolumen von rund 1,2 Milliarden Euro errichtet, wovon 25 Prozent durch internationale Partner getragen werden.
]]>Please understand that due to limited capacities a number of 3 calenders per order at maximum (while supplies last) is available.
For our employees, the calendar is available in the the foyer and the management floor. Additionally, copies can be picked up in the warehouse.
]]>Die Spezialpuppe ist eine Leihgabe vom Deutschen Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt (DLR). Von außen sieht die Spezialpuppe aus wie einfaches braunes Plastik. Jedoch verbirgt sich im Inneren ein komplexer Aufbau unterschiedlicher Materialdichten, die einem menschlichen Körper inklusive der Knochen und verschiedener Gewebesorten entsprechen - wie bei einem echten Menschen. Die Puppe ist aus mehr als 20 verschiedenen Schichten zusammengesetzt, die auseinander genommen werden können. Im Inneren der Schichten befinden sich Aussparungen zur Anbringung von Messgeräten. Mit ihnen können die Wissenschaftler die Strahlung im Inneren der Puppe messen. Bei einem echten Menschen eine Unmöglichkeit. "In unserem aktuellen Experiment versuchen wir ein neues Messverfahren für die Bestimmung der Position unseres Ionenstrahls bei der Tumortherapie zu entwickelt", sagt Dr. Chiara La Tessa, die das Experiment bei GSI leitet. "Ob das funktioniert, können wir nur herausfinden, weil sich die Ionenstrahlen in der Puppe genau so verhalten wie bei einem echten Patienten."
Bei der Tumortherapie mit Kohlenstoff-Ionen, wie sie von GSI entwickelt wurde, kann der Ionenstrahl millimetergenau in einen Tumor hineingebracht werden. Er entfaltet erst an seinem Stopppunkt in der Tiefe die maximale Wirkung. Die Position des Stopppunkts will La Tessa gemeinsam mit ihren Kollegen in Echtzeit während eines Therapievorgangs genau bestimmen und so eine bessere Diagnostik bei der Durchführung der Therapie erreichen. GSI arbeitet bei dem Experiment mit Forschern der Universität La Sapienza in Rom zusammen. Die italienischen Forscher bringen für die Durchführung des Experiments besondere Messgeräte mit.
Bereits im Jahr 2009 war die Spezialpuppe für ein Experiment bei GSI. Damals wurde in Zusammenarbeit mit dem DLR die Strahlenbelastung des Körpers bei verschiedenen Strahlentherapieverfahren verglichen. Dazu wurde das Phantom nicht nur bei GSI, sondern auch noch an Therapieanlagen in Schweden, Schweiz, Japan und in Frankfurt bestahlt. Das DLR stellte die Messgeräte zur Verfügung und übernahm die Datenanalyse.
Die Behandlung mit Ionenstrahlen ist ein sehr präzises, hochwirksames und gleichzeitig sehr schonendes Therapieverfahren. Ionenstrahlen dringen in den Körper ein und entfalten ihre größte Wirkung erst tief im Gewebe, hochpräzise in einem nur stecknadelkopfgroßen Bereich. Sie werden so gesteuert, dass Tumoren bis zur Größe eines Tennisballs Punkt für Punkt millimetergenau bestrahlt werden können. Das umliegende gesunde Gewebe wird weitgehend geschont. Nach erfolgreichen Studien an der GSI-Beschleunigeranlage hat GSI für den klinischen Routinebetrieb eine maßgeschneiderte Beschleunigeranlage entwickelt, die am Heidelberger Ionenstrahl-Therapiezentrum HIT im Jahr 2009 in Betrieb gegangen ist. Dort wurden mittlerweile über 500 Patienten behandelt. GSI forscht weiter an der Behandlung neuer Indikationen, beispielsweise an bewegten Tumoren in der Lunge.
]]>"Die bisher gewonnenen Daten legen nahe, dass eine Behandlung mit Partikeltherapien – also Protonen oder schweren Ionen – ein geringeres Risiko für eine spätere Krebs-Folgeerkrankung aufweist als herkömmliche Therapien mit Gammastrahlen", so Durante. "Dies gilt insbesondere auch für die Tumortherapie mit schweren Ionen, so wie sie am GSI Helmholtzzentrum entwickelt wurde." Rund 40% der Kinder und Jugendlichen, die eine Krebserkrankung dank einer Strahlentherapie überleben, leiden in einem Zeitrahmen von 30 Jahren nach der Diagnose unter lebensbedrohlichen Folgeproblemen wie beispielsweise sekundären Krebserkrankungen.
Die geringeren Langzeitfolgen der Tumortherapie mit schweren Ionen führt Durante hauptsächlich darauf zurück, dass bei der Therapie das gesunden Gewebe weniger durch die Strahlung belastet wird als bei der Gammatherapie und dass es kaum schädliche Neutronen gibt, die durch Streuung entstehen. Erste Studien belegen die Wirksamkeit der Methode bei geringen Spätfolgen. Um belastbare Aussagen zu gewinnen, müsse man allerdings noch weiter forschen, so Durante. Bis Daten von behandelten Patienten über lange Zeiträume zur Verfügung stünden, müsse man auf mathematische Modelle zurückgreifen. Weitere Verringerungen der Spätfolgen ließen sich durch Verbesserungen an den Bestrahlungsapparaturen im Allgemeinen und durch eine Reduktion der Bestrahlung durch die Diagnostik vor der eigentlichen Therapie erreichen.
Die Behandlung mit Ionenstrahlen ist ein sehr präzises, hochwirksames und gleichzeitig sehr schonendes Therapieverfahren. Ionenstrahlen dringen in den Körper ein und entfalten ihre größte Wirkung erst tief im Gewebe, hochpräzise in einem nur stecknadelkopfgroßen Bereich. Sie werden so gesteuert, dass Tumoren bis zur Größe eines Tennisballs Punkt für Punkt millimetergenau bestrahlt werden können. Das umliegende gesunde Gewebe wird weitgehend geschont. Nach erfolgreichen Studien an der GSI-Beschleunigeranlage hat GSI für den klinischen Routinebetrieb eine maßgeschneiderte Beschleunigeranlage entwickelt, die am Heidelberger-Ionentherapie-Zentrum HIT im Jahr 2009 in Betrieb gegangen ist. Dort wurden mittlerweile über 400 Patienten behandelt.
]]>"Wir freuen uns über unsere drei erfolgreichen Anträge. Somit können wir dank des Förderinstruments der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft unsere äußerst erfolgreiche Nachwuchsarbeit fortsetzen", sagt Professor Karlheinz Langanke, Forschungsdirektor von GSI und Professor an der TU Darmstadt.
"Im Rahmen des Initiativprogramms zur forschungsorientierten Gleichstellung arbeitet die TU Darmstadt intensiv an der Gewinnung und Qualifizierung von Wissenschaftlerinnen in technischen und naturwissenschaftlichen Fächern. Ich bin froh und stolz, dass mit Almudena Arcones und Tetyana Galatyuk zwei hervorragende Nachwuchswissenschaftlerinnen künftig den Fachbereich Physik der TU Darmstadt verstärken", sagt Professor Hans Jürgen Prömel, Präsident der TU Darmstadt.
"Ein wunderbarer Erfolg, der zeigt, dass wir zusammen mit der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft endlich die besten jungen Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftler aus den USA für unsere Forschungsinstitute gewinnen können", sagt Marcus Bleicher, Professor an der Goethe Universität und Fellow am Frankfurt Institute for Advance Studies (FIAS) sowie Koordinator des Helmholtz International Center for FAIR.
Mit drei genehmigten Anträgen war GSI überdurchschnittlich erfolgreich. Deutschlandweit wurden 20 Anträge aus den 17 Helmholtzzentren genehmigt. Sie wurden in einem mehrstufigen Wettbewerbsverfahren von einer interdisziplinären Jury ausgewählt. Die Nachwuchsgruppen werden zu gleichen Teilen von der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft und dem beteiligten Helmholtzzentrum finanziert.
Hannah Petersen plant einen neuen theoretischen Zugang zur dynamischen Beschreibung von Schwerionenkollisionen zu entwickeln. Ihr Ziel ist es, damit die Daten des CBM Experiments an der zukünftigen Anlage FAIR zu analysieren und so das Phasendiagramm der nuklearen Materie zu entschlüsseln. Hannah Petersen ist zurzeit an der Duke University in North Carolina tätig. Ihre zukünftige universitäre Anbindung ist am Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies und an der Goethe-Universität Frankfurt.
Tetyana Galatyuk wird sich mit ihrer Gruppe an der Weiterentwicklung des aktuellen HADES Experiments bei GSI und am Aufbau und der Durchführung des zukünftigen CBM Experiments an FAIR beteiligen. Ihr Ziel ist es, mit diesen Experimenten Signale aus dem heißen Feuerball einer Schwerionenkollision zu messen, um daraus Rückschlüsse auf die Eigenschaften von hochkomprimierter Kernmaterie, wie man sie im Inneren von Neutronensternen vermutet, zu ziehen. Tetyana Galatyuk stammt aus der Ukraine und kommt aus Berkeley nach Darmstadt. Sie experimentiert zurzeit an der RHIC-Beschleunigeranlage in Brookhaven im Bundesstaat New York. Ihre zukünftige universitäre Heimat ist die TU Darmstadt.
Almudena Arcones möchte mit ihrer Gruppe die Entstehung der schweren Elemente wie Gold oder Platin im Universum entschlüsseln. Dabei verbindet sie kernphysikalische und astrophysikalische Expertise, um explosive Nukleosyntheseprozesse, wie sie in Supernovae ablaufen, zu berechnen. Almudena Arcones ist Spanierin. Sie arbeitet zurzeit als Feodor-Lynen Stipendiatin in Basel. Ihre universitäre Anbindung wird die TU Darmstadt sein.
Weitere Informationen zu den Helmholtz-Nachwuchsgruppen finden Sie in der Pressemitteilung der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft: https://www.helmholtz.de/aktuelles/presseinformationen/artikel/artikeldetail/helmholtz_foerdert_20_neue_nachwuchsgruppen/
]]>Die Vortragsreihe "Wissenschaft für Alle" richtet sich an alle an aktueller Wissenschaft und Forschung interessierten Personen. In der Regel einmal pro Monat findet jeweils an einem Mittwoch in der Monatsmitte ein Vortrag aus der Reihe statt. Die Themen decken ein großes wissenschaftliches Spektrum ab - nicht nur über die Forschung an GSI und FAIR wird berichtet, sondern generell über aktuelle Themen aus Physik, Chemie, Biologie, Medizin und Informatik. Ziel der Reihe ist es, die wissenschaftlichen Vorgänge für den Laien verständlich aufzubereiten und darzustellen, um so die Forschung einem breiten Publikum zugänglich zu machen. Die Vorträge werden von sowohl GSI-internen wie auch externen Rednern aus Universitäten und anderen Instituten gehalten.
Alle Vorträge finden im Hörsaal von GSI, Planckstraße 1, 64291 Darmstadt, statt. Beginn ist jeweils um 14 Uhr. Der Eintritt ist frei, eine Anmeldung ist nicht erforderlich. Externe Teilnehmer werden gebeten, für den Einlass an unserer Pforte ein Ausweisdokument bereitzuhalten. Weitere Informationen und aktuelle Ankündigungen finden Sie auf unserer Webseite Wissenschaft für Alle.
Hundert Meter lange Teilchenbeschleuniger und haushohe Messinstrumente, die jährlich 1000 Wissenschaftler aus aller Welt nutzen – das alles und vieles mehr bekommen die Besucher an dem Tag zu sehen. Sie können mit Wissenschaftlern sprechen, die bei GSI versuchen, den innersten Geheimnissen der Materie und den Ursprüngen des Universums auf den Grund zu gehen. Und sie können erfahren, was Wissenschaftler in Darmstadt in Zukunft vorhaben: Der Bau des internationalen Beschleunigerzentrums FAIR steht bevor. Experten rund um das Bauvorhaben und die Wissenschaft an FAIR stehen für Fragen und Antworten bereit.
Ein weiteres Highlight bietet die Ausstellung „Weltmaschine“, die zurzeit bei GSI Station macht. In der Ausstellung „Weltmaschine" können sich die Besucher anhand von Schautafeln und vielen interaktiven Exponaten über Beschleuniger und Detektoren informieren und Einblicke in die Welt der kleinsten Teilchen erhalten, die am CERN in Genf, bei GSI und in Zukunft an FAIR erforscht wird.
"Mit dem Sommerfest möchten wir alle interessierten Bürger der Region einladen, sich direkt vor Ort über die für die Grundlagenforschung so wichtige Arbeit der GSI und FAIR zu informieren", sagt Professor Horst Stöcker, der Vorsitzende der GSI-Geschäftsführung. Neben Vorträgen von renommierten Wissenschaftlern, Führungen durch die Forschungsanlagen, Informationsständen und der Fotoausstellung „Forschung im Fokus“ runden ein Kinderprogramm und Live-Musik sowie ein vielfältiges kulinarisches Angebot das Programm ab.
Das Sommerfest findet statt bei der GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH, Planckstraße 1 in 64291 Darmstadt. Zur Anreise ist ein Busverkehr zum S-Bahnhof Wixhausen und zur Straßenbahnstation Dreieichweg in Arheilgen eingerichtet. Eine begrenzte Zahl an Parkplätzen bei GSI ist ebenfalls vorhanden. Ausführliche Informationen zum Sommerfest, wie das genaue Programm und die Anreisemöglichkeiten, befinden sich im Internet unter: www-alt.gsi.de/sommerfest
]]>Peter Hassenbach, geboren 1964, studierte Volkswirtschaftslehre in Mainz und in Bonn. Nach seinem Studium war er bis zum Jahr 1999 für das Bundesministerium für Forschung und Technologie bzw. das Bundesministerium für Bildung, Wissenschaft, Forschung und Technologie in Bonn als Referent tätig. Anschließend arbeitete er unter anderem bei der DaimlerChrysler AG, Stuttgart, im Bereich Verkehrstelematik. Im Jahr 2003 kehrte Hassenbach als Referent zurück in das Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung in Berlin. Im Jahr 2009 erhielt er die Leitung des Referats "Ernährung und erneuerbare Rohstoffe", seit dem Jahr 2010 bis heute war er Leiter des Referats "Gesundheitswirtschaft".
]]>Anhand von Originalbauteilen, Modellen und Schautafeln wird die Funktionsweise des größten Teilchenbeschleunigers der Welt, des Large Hadron Colliders LHC, gezeigt, zu dem mehr als 10.000 Wissenschaftler beigetragen haben. Spannende Vorträge, regelmäßige Führungen und Modelle zum Bestaunen und zum Anfassen – die Ausstellung bietet für jeden etwas. Vom Querschnitt durch einen Detektor über Nebel- und Funkenkammer bis zum Beschleunigermodell zum selbst Probieren wird die Physik „begreifbar“. Zusätzlich zu den regulären und Gruppenführungen sind Physiker als Ansprechpartner stets vor Ort und gern bereit, Fragen der Besucher zu beantworten.
Der LHC am europäischen Forschungszentrum CERN ist seit Ende 2009 in Betrieb.
GSI hat eine führende Rolle beim Bau und beim wissenschaftlichen Programm des Schwerionen-Experiments ALICE (A Large Ion Collider Experiment) gespielt, zusammen mit den Universitäten Darmstadt, Frankfurt, Heidelberg und Münster und den Fachhochschulen Köln und Worms. GSI-Wissenschaftler waren maßgeblich an der Entwicklung von zwei großen Detektorsystemen beteiligt. Derzeit führen sie mit ihren Kollegen die Auswertung der Daten durch. Diese erfolgt über speziell entwickelte, weltweit vernetzte Computersysteme, von denen eines bei GSI betrieben wird. ALICE ist eines der vier großen Experimente am LHC und ist ein Forschungsschwerpunkt des Bundesministeriums für Bildung und Forschung. Insgesamt gehören mehr als 1.000 Wissenschaftler aus 33 Ländern zur ALICE-Kollaboration.
Gastgeber der Weltmaschine-Ausstellung ist das Extreme Matter Institute EMMI, das bei GSI angesiedelt ist. EMMI wurde im Rahmen der Helmholtz-Allianz „Kosmische Materie im Labor" gegründet und wird von der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft gefördert. Bei GSI in Darmstadt wird in den kommenden Jahren das neue Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) gebaut, eine Teilchenbeschleunigeranlage der nächsten Generation.
Die Ausstellung Weltmaschine ist vom 27. August bis 11. September 2011 täglich von 10 bis 19 Uhr, mittwochs und donnerstags bis 20 Uhr geöffnet. Führungen werden unter der Woche um 16 Uhr und 17.30 Uhr angeboten, am Wochenende ganztägig. Außerdem können unter der Telefonnummer 06159-711709 Gruppenführungen zu individuellen Terminen gebucht werden. An den Wochenenden finden allgemeinverständliche Vorträge statt. Die Vortragsreihe startet am 27. August um 15.00 Uhr mit einem besonders für Kinder und Jugendliche geeigneten Vortrag von Johannes Wessels: „Die Urknallmaschine“.
Aktuelle Informationen rund um die Ausstellung, unter anderem über das Vortragsprogramm, befinden sich im Internet unter www.weltmaschine.de/darmstadt.
]]>GSI, FAIR und das Planungsteam stehen für Informationen und Fragen rund um das FAIR-Projekt zur Verfügung. Der Informationsabend findet statt am
Mittwoch, 24. August 2011, 18:30 – 20:00 Uhr
GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung
Großer Hörsaal
Planckstraße 1, 64291 Darmstadt.
Das Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR ist eines der größten Forschungsvorhaben weltweit und wird in internationaler Zusammenarbeit errichtet. Im Oktober letzten Jahres haben die internationalen Partner das entsprechende völkerrechtliche Abkommen unterzeichnet. An FAIR können Wissenschaftler aus aller Welt eine nie da gewesene Vielfalt an Experimenten durchführen. Sie erwarten grundlegende neue Erkenntnisse über den Aufbau der Materie und die Entwicklung des Universums seit dem Urknall. Darüber hinaus entstehen aus der Grundlagenforschung regelmäßig überraschende neue Anwendungen, wie die Entwicklung einer neuen Krebstherapie mit Ionen an der GSI-Beschleunigeranlage zeigt. Ein weiteres bekanntes Ergebnis aus der GSI-Forschung ist die Entdeckung neuer chemischer Elemente wie zum Beispiel des Darmstadtiums.
]]>„Die Fertigstellung des Magnets ist ein Beispiel für die gelungene Zusammenarbeit von Deutschland und Russland im Rahmen des Fair-Projekts“, sagt Carsten Mühle, Leiter der GSI-Magnettechnik. Russland, das sich mit knapp 180 Millionen Euro am Fair-Projekt beteiligt, ist nach Deutschland der größte Projektpartner. Neben dem Budker-Institut kooperieren noch 23 weitere russische Einrichtungen mit Fair.
Nach Vorgaben der GSI-Wissenschaftler hatte das Budker-Institut den neuen Magnet in den letzten 4 Jahren berechnet, konstruiert, in Russland aufgebaut und auf seine Spezifikationen getestet. Anschließend transportierten sie den Magnet in zerlegtem Zustand nach Deutschland. Ein Konstrukteur, ein Physiker und zwei Monteure aus Russland bauten ihn gemeinsam mit GSI-Mitarbeitern zusammen. Dabei assistierte eine Dolmetscherin. Die GSI-Fachleute haben dabei gelernt, wie der Magnet montiert werden muss, und sind auf den Zusammenbau von weiteren Magneten vorbereitet. Der Magnet steht zurzeit in der so genannten Testing-Halle von GSI, in der neue Komponenten aufgebaut und überprüft werden können.
Christina Will, Leiterin der Projektleitung Maschinenbau von GSI, erläutert das weitere Vorgehen: „In den nächsten Monaten trainieren die GSI-Mitarbeiter den Einbau in den Super-Fragmentseparator von FAIR. Aufgrund der engen Raumverhältnisse kann der Magnet nicht von den Mitarbeitern direkt eingebaut werden. An manchen Stellen werden nur zehn Zentimeter Platz zur umgebenden Betonwand zur Verfügung stehen. Mithilfe einer ferngesteuerten Einbauprozedur durch Lastkräne heben sie den Magnet von oben an seinen Bestimmungsort im Teilchenbeschleuniger.“ Diese Vorgehensweise müssen sie vorher „auf dem Trockenen“ in der Testing-Halle üben. Der dort eingebaute Lastkran ist in der Lage, die Einzelteile des Magnets zu tragen.
Insgesamt drei gleichartige Magnete werden für den Aufbau des Super-Fragmentseparators benötigt. In Experimenten mit dem Super-Fragmentseparator wollen die Wissenschaftler interessante Teilchen für die weitere Untersuchung aussortieren, die zu Messapparaturen weitergeleitet werden sollen. Uninteressante Bruchstücke hingegen landen in Teilchenfängern.
Eine Besonderheit des Magnets ist der völlige Verzicht auf organische Stoffe wie etwa Epoxidharze als Klebstoff. Da manchmal Teilchen aus dem Beschleuniger im Betrieb auch durch den Magnet hindurch fliegen, müssen die Materialien besonders widerstandsfähig sein. Organische Stoffe zersetzen sich zu schnell. Durch den Verzicht erreichen die Wissenschaftler eine lange Haltbarkeit und Einsatzdauer. Gleichzeitig mussten sie durch den Wegfall herkömmlicher Materialien andere Techniken wie beispielsweise ein neuartiges indirektes Kühlsystem entwickeln.
]]>Das Helmholtz-Institut Mainz (HIM) wurde im Juni 2009 gegründet, um die langjährige Zusammenarbeit zwischen dem GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt und der Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz weiter zu stärken und zu institutionalisieren. Im Helmholtz-Institut Mainz werden die Kompetenzen des Instituts für Physik, des Instituts für Kernphysik und des Instituts für Kernchemie an der Universität Mainz mit denen von GSI in Darmstadt zusammengeführt, um gemeinsam Fragen zur Struktur, Symmetrie und Stabilität von Materie und Antimaterie zu erforschen. Von der Bündelung dieser Kräfte ergibt sich für die Partner eine strategische und langfristige Perspektive für die gemeinsame Forschung, insbesondere im Hinblick auf die künftigen Experimente am internationalen Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR. "Schwerpunkte unserer Forschung am HIM sind zum Beispiel die Erzeugung und Erforschung superschwerer Elemente an GSI und die Vorbereitung der Forschung mit Antimaterie an FAIR", sagt Professor Frank Maas, Direktor von HIM und leitender Wissenschaftler bei GSI.
Das Helmholtz-Institut Mainz hat ein Budget von gut 11 Millionen Euro pro Jahr und beruft seine leitenden Wissenschaftler gemeinsam mit der Universität. Am HIM sind unter anderem zwei Helmholtz-Nachwuchsgruppen tätig und rund 20 Doktoranden, die Mitglied in der Helmholtz-Graduate School for Hadron and Ion Research for FAIR (HGS-HIRe) organisiert sind.
Helmholtz-Institute geben strategischen Partnerschaften zwischen Helmholtz-Zentren und Universitäten eine besondere Intensität. Durch die Gründung einer Außenstelle eines Helmholtz-Zentrums auf dem Campus der Universität entsteht die Grundlage für eine dauerhafte enge Zusammenarbeit auf spezifischen Forschungsfeldern, die für beide Institutionen besonderes Gewicht haben.
Die Pressemitteilung des Wissenschaftsrats finden Sie unter: www.wissenschaftsrat.de/index.php?id=380&L
]]>Das Ziel des neuen Instituts für Nukleare Astrophysik ist es, die besondere Interdisziplinarität dieses Forschungsfeldes zwischen experimenteller und theoretischer Kernphysik, Astrophysik und astronomischer Beobachtung zu koordinieren und in enger Zusammenarbeit der Wissenschaftler aus den verschiedenen Forschungszweigen grundlegende Fragen zur Entstehung der chemischen Elemente im Universum zu beantworten. Das Institut ist deshalb besonders wichtig, weil es in den kommenden Jahren bei GSI und besonders am zukünftigen internationalen Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR zum ersten Mal möglich sein wird, die Kerne, die an den astrophysikalischen Prozessen bei der Elementerzeugung beteiligt sind, herzustellen und ihre Eigenschaften experimentell zu bestimmen.
Der zukünftige Sprecher des Instituts ist Dr. Gabriel Martinez-Pinedo (GSI). Zuständig für die Forschungskoordination sind Professor Thomas Aumann (TU Darmstadt) in der experimentellen Kernphysik sowie Professor Hans Feldmeier (GSI) in der theoretischen Kernphysik.
Die Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft verstärkt durch die Förderung von Helmholtz Virtuellen Instituten die Vernetzung mit den Hochschulen und anderen Partnern im Wissenschaftssystem und schafft einen unbürokratischen Rahmen, um neue Forschungsvorhaben voran zu treiben, die das Potenzial haben, sich zu größeren, strategischen Vorhaben zu entwickeln. Ein Helmholtz Virtuelles Institut führt im Kern die Kompetenzen eines oder mehrerer Helmholtz-Zentren mit einer oder mehreren Hochschulen zusammen, um auf einem wichtigen Forschungsgebiet ein Kompetenz-Zentrum von internationaler Bedeutung und Attraktivität zu schaffen. Auch internationale Forschungsinstitute sind als Partner an Helmholtz Virtuellen Instituten beteiligt, was die Expertise auf dem jeweiligen Forschungsfeld aber auch die internationale Sichtbarkeit weiter erhöht.
Helmholtz Virtuelle Institute verfügen über eine eigene Führungs- und Managementstruktur und erarbeiten besondere Konzepte zur Qualifizierung ihrer wissenschaftlichen Nachwuchskräfte. Sie werden über drei bis fünf Jahre mit maximal 600.000 Euro jährlich aus dem Impuls- und Vernetzungsfonds gefördert und können zur Vorbereitung größerer Verbünde wie etwa der Helmholtz-Allianzen genutzt werden.
Link zur Pressemitteilung der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft: https://www.helmholtz.de/
aktuelles/presseinformationen/artikel/artikeldetail/helmholtz_foerdert_
zusammenarbeit_mit_universitaeten_in_zwoelf_neuen_virtuellen_instituten/
Das Proton besitzt, wie andere Teilchen auch, einen Eigendrehimpuls, den Spin. Mit dem Spin geht ein entsprechendes Magnetfeld, das magnetische Moment, einher. Es ist mit einem winzigen Stabmagneten vergleichbar. Ein Spin-Quantensprung entspricht dem Umklappen der Magnetpole. Der direkte Nachweis des Spins an einem einzelnen Proton ist allerdings eine große Herausforderung. Während beim Elektron und seinem Antiteilchen, dem Positron, bereits in den 1980er Jahren die Spins und damit die magnetischen Momente gemessen und verglichen wurden, ist dies bei einem Proton bislang nicht gelungen. Bisher konnten Wissenschaftler den Protonenspin nur indirekt in Teilchenensembles bestimmen.
Die besondere Schwierigkeit liegt darin, dass das magnetische Moment des Protons etwa 660-mal kleiner ist als das des Elektrons. Das Mess-Signal ist also wesentlich schwächer. Die Forscherkollaboration hat in siebenjährigen Vorarbeiten ein Präzisionsexperiment entwickelt, das nun die Feuerprobe bestanden hat.
Damit ist der Weg frei für direkte Hochpräzisionsmessungen des magnetischen Moments sowohl eines Protons als auch eines Antiprotons - Letztere dann voraussichtlich am CERN, dem europäischen Labor für Teilchenphysik in Genf, oder am geplanten Forschungszentrum FAIR bei GSI in Darmstadt. Das magnetische Moment des Antiprotons ist gegenwärtig lediglich auf drei Nachkommastellen bekannt. Die in den Mainzer Labors angewandte Messmethode stellt eine millionenfache Verbesserung der Messgenauigkeit in Aussicht. Dies ermöglicht einen hochempfindlichen Test der CPT-Symmetrie, welche für das physikalische Weltbild fundamental ist. Die erstmalige Beobachtung von Spin-Quantensprüngen eines einzelnen Protons ist ein Durchbruch auf dem Weg zu diesem großen Ziel.
Die Materie-Antimaterie-Symmetrie ist einer der wichtigsten Grundpfeiler des Standardmodells der Elementarteilchenphysik. Nach diesem Modell verhalten sich Teilchen und Antiteilchen nach simultaner Anwendung von Ladungsumkehr, Ortsspiegelung und Zeitumkehr - als CPT-Transformation bezeichnet - identisch. Hochpräzise Vergleiche der fundamentalen Eigenschaften von Teilchen und Antiteilchen ermöglichen den empfindlichen Test dieses Symmetrieverhaltens und geben Hinweise auf eine Physik jenseits des Standardmodells. Die Messung einer Abweichung der magnetischen Momente von Proton und Antiproton würde das Fenster zu dieser "neuen Physik" öffnen.
Originalveröffentlichung:
S. Ulmer, C.C. Rodegheri, K. Blaum, H. Kracke, A. Mooser, W. Quint, J. Walz
Observation of Spin Flips with a Single Trapped Proton, Phys. Rev. Lett. 106, 253001 (2011)
Link zur wissenschaftlichen Veröffentlichung in 'Physical Review Letters': https://link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRevLett.106.253001
Die Arbeit wird außerdem von American Physical Society als Viewpoint vorgestellt unter: https://physics.aps.org/pdf/Physics.4.49.pdf
]]>Im Mittelpunkt des Wissenschaftsjahres stehen die Stärkung der Spitzenforschung durch den Ausbau institutioneller Zusammenarbeit, der wissenschaftliche Nachwuchs und der bilaterale Austausch von WissenschaftlerInnen als Bindeglied der Partnerschaft sowie der internationale Fortschritt durch Freundschaft.
]]>The scientists taking part in the recent experiment directed an extremely powerful laser pulse onto a material sample. As a result, protons were expelled from the material. What makes the test unique is the fact that it was conducted in the central area of the GSI accelerator facility, and not just at the laser itself. This made it possible to inject the ions that had been pre-accelerated by the laser into the existing accelerator systems. In other words, it will soon be possible to combine the two accelerator concepts for the first time.
Over the last few years, lasers have been regarded as a promising tool for accelerating particles. However, this approach is still in the development stage. “One big advantage of lasers is that they allow us to save a lot of space, because their acceleration sections are very short. On the other hand, they also create certain challenges with regard to beam transport and focusability — challenges that don’t arise in this form when conventional accelerator beams are used,” says Thomas Stöhlker, who is in charge of the PHELIX laser at GSI and Director of the Helmholtz Institut Jena.
To better understand this approach to particle acceleration and make the resulting particle beams usable, the scientists have initiated a project called “LIGHT” (Laser Ion Generation, Handling and Transport). Besides the GSI Helmholtzzentrum and Technische Universität Darmstadt, the participants in the project include the Goethe University in Frankfurt, the Helmholtz Institut in Jena, and the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf.
“The next step will involve focusing the laser-accelerated ion beams using a magnet coil and injecting them into a conventional accelerator system,” says Bernhard Zielbauer, the LIGHT project coordinator from the Helmholtz Institut in Jena. “This will make it possible to adapt the ion beam’s quality to the needs of the various experiments.”
The researchers want to make laser-accelerated ions available for a variety of applications in the future, including treatment of tumors and examination of radiation damage to electronic components designed for applications in space. As far as the latter are concerned, the new proton beam is particularly well suited because of its great similarity to solar proton storms in spectral terms. The scientists are now also planning to accelerate other types of atoms besides hydrogen ions.
One of the world’s most powerful lasers, the PHELIX (Petawatt High-Energy Laser for Ion Experiments) is capable of generating laser pulses with energies of up to 1,000 joules and outputs of up to half a petawatt. This output is a quintillion (1018) times that of a laser pointer or the laser in a CD player.
The GSI Helmholtzzentrum is currently the only site worldwide where particle accelerator facilities can be combined with such a powerful laser pulse.
]]>In the section "GSI stellt sich vor" we portray one of our departments. In this issue the department for electroplating which is responsible, among other things, for the copper plating of our accelerator components.
What’s more? Nobel Laureate visits GSI // Interview with international doctoral students // Future of tumor therapy // GSI and the World Wide Grid // and much more ... Subscription & Download
]]>Das Ziel des Girls'Days ist es, Mädchen bereits früh an technische Berufe heranzuführen, um ihnen ein breiteres Spektrum bei der Berufswahl aufzuzeigen.
]]>The measured nuclei lie along the so-called rp-process path, the process which is believed to power energetic X-ray bursts observed in space. Such explosive events occur on the surface of neutron stars... Learn more
]]>The day started with introductory talks about the phyics at the LHC. After a guided tour to the HADES-detector the data analysis started. Finally the findings were discussed with other Masterclass-participants in a video conference hosted by CERN.
]]>Bohrium was produced by nuclear fusion by firing chromium ions onto a bismuth foil. The element breaks down after a split second and can only be detected with very sensitive methods of analysis.
Element 107 was given the name of the Danish physicist and Nobel Prize winner Niels Bohr (1885-1962). Therefore, it should also be named Nielsbohrium at first, but in 1994 the IUPAC decided that Bohrium is its official denomination.
]]> Science photographer 2010 – Exhibition at Hessen Design e.V.
Designhaus Darmstadt, Eugen-Bracht-Weg 6, 64287 Darmstadt
Open from Thu to Sun, 12 to 6 p. m.
Copernicium is 277 times heavier than hydrogen and therefore the heaviest element officially recognized in the periodic table. It was produced at an over 100 m long accelerator at GSI, while the researchers fired charged zinc atoms onto a lead foil. The fusion of two atomic nuclei produced an atom of the new element 112.
The name Copernicium follows a longstanding tradition of choosing an accomplished scientist as eponym. Nicholas Copernicus's astronomical work was a starting point for our modern worldview, which states that the sun is the center of our solar system.
Follow the link to the YouTube video Copernicium - Periodic Table of Videos or learn more about the Creation of New Elements on GSI.de.
Eine der Grundfragen der Kosmologie ist warum es nach dem Urknall mehr Materie als Antimaterie gab, so dass außer bloßer Strahlung überhaupt etwas übrig geblieben ist, um Galaxien, Sterne, Planetensysteme, Lebewesen und schließlich unsere eigene Existenz zu ermöglichen. Das Verständnis hierzu ist mit den Eigenschaften von Neutrinos verbunden. Neutrinos sind Elementarteilchen, die auch als Geisterteilchen bezeichnet werden, da sie nur extrem schwach mit der uns bekannten „gewöhnlichen“ Materie in Wechselwirkung treten und diese nahezu ungehindert durchdringen. Dementsprechend sind noch viele Eigenschaften von Neutrinos unbekannt.
So wird zum Beispiel vermutet, dass ein Neutrino sein eigenes Antiteilchen sein könnte (sog. Majorana-Fermion), ein noch niemals beobachtetes Phänomen. Neutrinos entstehen natürlicherweise in bestimmten radioaktiven Zerfällen von Atomkernen. Beim radioaktiven Zerfall wandelt sich ein Atomkern, der Mutterkern, in einen anderen, den Tochterkern, um. Ein möglicher Nachweis, ob das Neutrino sein eigenes Antiteilchen ist, wäre die Beobachtung einer bestimmten radioaktiven Zerfallsart, des so genannten neutrinolosen Doppel-Elektroneneinfangs. Bei diesem sehr seltenen Zerfallsprozess werden zwei Elektronen aus der Hülle von Protonen im Atomkern eingefangen und es entstehen normalerweise zwei Neutrinos. Wenn nun das Neutrino mit seinem Antiteilchen identisch wäre, würde kein Neutrino ausgesendet werden, deshalb die Bezeichnung neutrinolos.
Dieser neutrinolose Zerfallsprozess ist allerdings experimentell, wenn überhaupt, nur nachweisbar, wenn die Masse des Mutterkerns zwar größer ist als die des Tochterkerns, sich dabei aber so gering wie möglich unterscheidet. Um auch noch geringste Massenunterschiede messen zu können, benutzten Wissenschaftler die Ionenfalle Shiptrap. Mit Shiptrap können die Wissenschaftler Massen mit höchster Genauigkeit messen. Mit der Genauigkeit könnten sie theoretisch nachweisen, ob in einem voll beladenen Jumbo-Jet ein Passagier eine 1 Euro Münze im Portemonnaie hat oder nicht.
Mit Shiptrap untersuchten die Wissenschaftler nun systematisch die Massen von möglichen Atomkernen, um den besten Kandidaten für den neutrinolosen Doppel-Elektroneneinfang zu bestimmen. Sie fanden heraus, dass das Gadolinium-Isotop mit der Massenzahl 152 (Gadolinium-152), welches in das Isotop Samarium-152 zerfällt, der zurzeit vielversprechendste Kandidat ist. Es ist somit das geeignete Isotop, um in zukünftigen Neutrino-Experimentaufbauten wie zum Beispiel in Gran Sasso untersucht zu werden mit dem Ziel, bei dessen Zerfall erstmalig die Vernichtung zweier Neutrinos nachzuweisen.
Über die Messung der Halbswertszeit von Gadolinium-152, die im Bereich von 10 hoch 26 Jahren liegt, ließen sich auch Grenzen für die Masse der Neutrinos bestimmen. Erst seit kurzem ist bekannt, dass Neutrinos überhaupt eine Masse haben, die allerdings sehr klein ist und noch nie direkt gemessen werden konnte. Der Ansatz über den Zerfall von Gadolinium-152 Informationen über die Masse der Neutrinos zu erhalten, ist komplementär zu anderen Experimentaufbauten in der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft wie Katrin am KIT in Karlsruhe.
An den Experimenten bei GSI waren unter Federführung des Max-Planck-Instituts in Heidelberg 17 Wissenschaftler aus 11 Instituten beteiligt: Max-Planck-Institut für Kernphysik, Heidelberg, Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg, GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, Darmstadt, Ernst-Moritz-Arndt-Universität, Greifswald, Institute for Theoretical and Experimental Physics Moskau Russland, PNPI Gatchina, St. Petersburg, Russland, Helmholtz-Institut Mainz, Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz, St. Petersburg State University, Russland, Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, Dubna, Russland, Comenius University Bratislava, Slowakei, Technische Universität Dresden.
Bitte beachten Sie: Es handelt sich um eine aktualisierte Version der Pressemitteilung. Absatz drei und vier wurden zum jetzigen Absatz drei zusammengefasst.
Original publication
S. Eliseev, C. Roux, K. Blaum, M. Block, C. Droese, F. Herfurth, H.-J. Kluge, M.I. Krivoruchenko, Yu.N. Novikov, E. Minaya Ramirez, L. Schweikhard, V.M. Shabaev, F. Simkovic, I.I. Tupitsyn, K. Zuber, and N.A. Zubova
Link to the 'Physical Review Letters' release:https://dx.doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.106.052504
Link to the German press release of the MPI Heidelberg.
Link to the German press release of the Universität Greifswald.
]]>From 2004 till 2009 Gemmel worked at the Department of Biophysics at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in the field of “moving targets“. The research was carried out with support of Siemens Healthcare.
]]>We look forward to seeing you here! Program Wissenschaft für Alle 2011
]]>Die Vortragsreihe "Wissenschaft für Alle" richtet sich an alle an aktueller Wissenschaft und Forschung interessierten Personen. In der Regel einmal pro Monat findet jeweils an einem Mittwoch in der Monatsmitte ein Vortrag aus der Reihe statt.
Die Themen decken ein großes wissenschaftliches Spektrum ab - nicht nur über die Forschung an GSI und FAIR wird berichtet, sondern generell über aktuelle Themen aus Physik, Chemie, Biologie, Medizin und Informatik. Ziel der Reihe ist es, die wissenschaftlichen Vorgänge für den Laien verständlich aufzubereiten und darzustellen, um so die Forschung einem breiten Publikum zugänglich zu machen. Die Vorträge werden von sowohl GSI-internen wie auch externen Rednern aus Universitäten und anderen Instituten gehalten.
Alle Vorträge finden im Hörsaal von GSI, Planckstraße 1, 64291 Darmstadt, statt. Beginn ist jeweils um 14 Uhr. Der Eintritt ist frei, eine Anmeldung ist nicht erforderlich. Externe Teilnehmer werden gebeten, für den Einlass an unserer Pforte ein Ausweisdokument bereitzuhalten.
Weitere Informationen und aktuelle Ankündigungen finden Sie auf unserer Webseite Wissenschaft für Alle.
This research is only possible because the University of Frankfurt was able to produce samples of specific human tumors for the first time. The patient-derived tumor tissue is prepared in a way that keeps the tissue sample vital for several weeks. The fact that these samples are consistent with their natural environment allows the scientists to observe the effects of the radiation that occur in the treatment of patients. One of the points the researchers are examining is the so-called “bystander effect” — the effect that the irradiated cells have on their neighboring cells. Previous tests on artificial cell samples and animal experiments were very limited in this respect.
This cancer therapy developed at GSI has already proven highly effective, with very few side effects. “However, every tumor reacts differently to irradiation: some are more sensitive, stop growing or perish, others are more resistant and remain unaffected by the therapy. The effectiveness of the therapy varies from patient to patient”, says Professor Marco Durante, head of the biophysics department at GSI Helmholtzzentrum. “The irradiation and subsequent analysis of a tissue sample taken from the patient allows us to find out about the tumor’s characteristics. And based on this knowledge, the attending physician can optimize the tumor therapy for the individual patient.”
Human tissue samples are typically obtained during surgery. A new method now makes it possible to keep those tissue samples vital in the laboratory over several weeks. “These so-called tissue slice cultures are used as a model system for biological studies, because they allow us to look beyond the events that occur in a single cell and help us study the tumor cells in their natural environment surrounded by other cells”, explains professor Ingo Bechmann, who helped develop this new system at Charité in Berlin and Frankfurt University and who now holds a professorship at Leipzig University. Dr. Kosta Schopow, the Frankfurt-based physician and curator of the Senckenberg Foundation, had the idea of using tissue slice cultures for the research at GSI.
The first research results from the irradiation of tissue slice cultures at GSI have already been published:
- Modeling radiation effects at the tissue level / The European Physical Journal D (2010), DOI: 10.1140/epjd/e2010-00030-y, Müller et al
- Tissue slice cultures from humans or rodents: a new tool to evaluate biological effects of heavy ions / Radiation and Environmental Biophysics (2010), DOI: 10.1007/s00411-010-0293-1, Merz et al
Please note that applications and recommendations must reach us before February 15, 2011. Learn more and apply now! https://hgs-hire.de/summer-program/
]]>Nuclear physicists are working to understand the origin, evolution and nature of matter that constitutes nearly 100 per cent of visible matter in the universe. As the home of GANIL, GSI, CERN and a wide network of closely collaborating facilities, Europe is world-leader in the field. During the decade ahead researchers are going to build on tackling the big questions: how did matter in the Universe evolve into what we see today and whether this knowledge can be used to help solve energy, health and environmental problems.
More information: Press Release of the ESF
]]>Anna Constantinescu beschäftigte sich in ihrer Masterarbeit mit einer Methode, durch die die Behandlung mit Ionenstrahlen in Zukunft auch bei Tumoren in beweglichen Körperteilen, wie Lunge oder Leber, möglich werden soll. Rebecca Grün befasste sich in ihrer Diplomarbeit mit der Bestrahlungsplanung und verifizierte das bei aktuellen Behandlungen zugrunde liegende Rechenmodell.
Als Festredner konnte Privatdozent Dr. med. Dipl.-Ing. Gerd Straßmann von der Klinik für Strahlentherapie und Radioonkologie des Universitätsklinikums Gießen und Marburg gewonnen werden. Er berichtete über den Status und die Perspektiven der Strahlentherapie in Marburg. Dort befindet sich derzeit eine neue klinische Anlage für die Tumortherapie mit Ionenstrahlen im Bau.
Die am GSI Helmholzzentrum entwickelte Therapiemethode mit Ionenstrahlen wurde seit 1997 am GSI zur Behandlung von Patienten mit Tumoren im Kopf- und Halsbereich sowie seit 2006 auch an der Prostata eingesetzt. Sie ist ein sehr genaues, hochwirksames und gleichzeitig sehr schonendes Therapieverfahren. Ionenstrahlen dringen in den Körper ein und entfalten ihre größte Wirkung erst tief im Gewebe, hochpräzise in einem nur stecknadelkopfgroßen Bereich. Sie werden so gesteuert, dass Tumoren bis zur Größe eines Tennisballs Punkt für Punkt und millimetergenau bestrahlt werden können. Das Verfahren eignet sich bislang vor allem für Tumore in der Nähe von Risikoorganen, wie z.B. dem Sehnerv, dem Hirnstamm oder des Darms.
Aufgrund der guten Resultate des Therapieverfahrens wurde im November 2009 eine spezielle Anlage für Ionenstrahl-Therapie an der Radiologischen Klinik in Heidelberg in Betrieb genommen, das Heidelberger Ionenstrahl Therapiezentrum (HIT). Die Beschleunigeranlage und die Bestrahlungstechnik für HIT haben GSI-Wissenschaftler und -Techniker entwickelt und gebaut. Dort können pro Jahr etwa 1.300 Patienten behandelt werden. Zwei weitere Anlagen in Marburg und Kiel befinden sich im Bau.
]]>The lecture series "Saturday Morning Physics" is conducted by the faculty of physics of the Technical University Darmstadt. It is held annually and aims to increase the interest of young people for physics. In lectures and experiments the pupils get to know about current developments in the physical research at the university. The GSI visit is the only excursion of the series.
Next to Lufthansa Systems, the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft und the publisher Springer-Verlag also the GSI Helmholtzzentrum is among the sponsors and supporters of the project from the start. The web site of Saturday Morning Physics: www.satmorphy.de
]]>Roentgenium, 272 times heavier than hydrogen, was created through nuclear fusion by bombarding a bismuth film with nickel ions. The element decays after a split second and can only be detected with very sensitive methods of analysis.
Its name honors the physicist and the first Nobel Prize winner Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen (1845-1923). Learn more: German Press Release Naming Ceremony and YouTube video: Rg - The Periodic Table of Videos
A novelty of this edition is the special feature on "Super Heavy Elements", which gives an overview of the search and discovery of heavier elements. Learn more about how a new atom is discovered and how long the path is to the naming of an element.
What's more? Minor planet ‘Darmstadt’ discovered and named by GSI employee // ROSATOM visit at GSI // LOEWE-CSC mainframe // Memorandum of Understanding between EMMI and HI-Jena // Annual Meeting of the Helmholtz Association // And much more... Subscription & Download
]]>"Die Schülerlabore stellen eine enorme Bereicherung des Schulunterrichts dar. Wir begrüßen die Initiative und das Engagement außerschulischer Einrichtungen wie des GSI, bei der Ausbildung unserer Kinder mitzuwirken und gleichzeitig Wege für den wissenschaftlichen Nachwuchs zu bereiten", sagte Ministerialdirigent Martin Günther, Leiter der Abteilung Allgemein bildende Schulen und Internationale Angelegenheiten des Hessischen Kultusministeriums.
„Die GSI-Schülerlabore bieten Versuche an, die in der Schule gar nicht durchführbar sind, da sie zu aufwändig sind oder weil die entsprechenden Mittel fehlen“, so Dr. Axel Gruppe, der Pädagogische Leiter des GSI-Schülerlabors und Lehrer am Lessing-Gymnasium in Frankfurt. "Wir sind sehr froh, dass wir mit dem neuen BASIC-Labor nun unser Angebot auch für Schüler mittlerer Jahrgangsstufen ausbauen konnten." Gemeinsam mit Schülern des Lessing-Gymnasiums präsentierte Axel Gruppe bei der Eröffnung die neuen Experimente. Die Schüler können mehr über die verschiedenen radioaktiven Strahlungsarten erfahren, Abschirmtechniken erforschen und natürliche radioaktive Strahlungsquellen untersuchen.
Die Versuche des BASIC-Labors richten sich im Schwierigkeitsgrad an Schüler der 9. Jahrgangsstufe des Gymnasiums bzw. der 10. Jahrgangsstufe von Real- und Gesamtschulen. Das bereits seit 2004 bestehende Schülerlabor (ab sofort EXPERT-Labor) wurde bereits von 8.000 Schülern besucht. Es richtet sich vorrangig an Schüler der Oberstufe. Ein vierköpfiges Lehrer-Team unter der pädagogischen Leitung von Dr. Axel Gruppe betreut die teilnehmenden Schulklassen an drei Wochentagen. Das BASIC-LABOR und das EXPERT-Labor sind in denselben Räumlichkeiten untergebracht und werden im Wechsel betrieben.
Weitere Informationen unter Schülerlabor
]]>“ALICE is specially-designed for the collision of heavy nuclei. By colliding lead nuclei, we want to recreate for the smallest instant the extremely hot and dense plasma state of quarks and gluons that occurred in first split seconds after the big bang.”, explains professor Peter Braun-Munzinger, director of the ExtreMe Matter Institute EMMI at GSI Helmholtzzentrum. “The measurements will give us new and unique access to so far unexplored realms of physics.”
ALICE is composed of a number of individual components and all of them are working faultlessly. Its detector is 25 meters long, 16 meters wide and 16 meters high. It functions like a three-dimensional camera and takes snapshots of the heavy ion collisions, which create thousands of new particles. Its resolution of 600 million pixels is equivalent to 750 megabyte of digital information. With a readout speed of 17.5 terabyte per second, many thousand events can be recorded every second.
From the beginning of the project on, GSI had a leading role in the construction and in the design of the scientific program for ALICE. The work is a collaboration of GSI and the universities of Darmstadt, Frankfurt, Heidelberg and Münster as well as the universities of applied science Cologne and Worms. Today, more than 1,000 scientists from 30 countries contribute to the ALICE collaboration. 41 of the more than 100 scientists from Germany are Ph.D. students. German researchers are involved in three of the central ALICE projects: the time projection chamber, which encloses the collision zone over a length of five meters and up to a radial distance of two and a half meters; the surrounding Transition Radiation Detector; and the so-called High Level Trigger, a new high performance computer, that is able to analyze the vast amount of information produced by each ALICE event in just a split second.
]]>Zuvor fand ein Briefwechsel zwischen den Grundschülern und Wissenschaftlern statt. Die Studierenden und Doktoranden stellten sich vor, erläuterten, was sie an der Physik fasziniert, und beschrieben, was sie am GSI erforschen. In einem Antwortbrief stellten sich die Schüler vor und formulierten erste Fragen an die Studierenden. Diese Fragen werden in den ersten Unterrichtsstunden von den jungen Forschern aufgegriffen. Mit einem einfachen Experiment erfahren Schüler mehr über kleine Teilchen und die Forschungsthemen der Studierenden. In weiteren Unterrichtseinheiten bauen die Studierenden gemeinsam mit den Kindern ein einfaches Modell eines Teilchenbeschleunigers. Das Experiment ist speziell entwickelt worden, um den Kindern auf spielerische Weise eine Beschleunigeranlage zu erklären. Dabei steht Forschendes Lernen im Vordergrund.
Zum Abschluss des Projekts am Montag, den 15. November werden die Schüler gemeinsam mit ihren Eltern das GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt besuchen und eine Führung durch die Großforschungsanlage erhalten. So lernen Kinder und Eltern den Arbeitsplatz der jungen Forscher kennen und bekommen einen direkten Einblick in den Wissenschaftsbetrieb einer großen Forschungseinrichtung. Herausragende Resultate am GSI sind die Entdeckung von sechs neuen chemischen Elementen und die Entwicklung einer neuartigen Krebstherapie mit Ionenstrahlen.
Die Agentur two4science hat in enger Abstimmung mit Lehrkräften der Pestalozzischule die Experimentiereinheiten und Unterrichtsmaterialien für den ersten Projektdurchlauf erstellt. Sie bereitet die Studierenden auf den Unterrichtseinsatz vor und wird den Besuch am GSI begleiten. Die Stiftung Polytechnische Gesellschaft und das GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung möchten die Naturwissenschaften stärker in die Grundschulen tragen. Dabei steht der persönliche Kontakt zwischen jungen Wissenschaftlern und den Schülern im Vordergrund. Die jungen Physiker sollen ihre Begeisterung im Gespräch und gemeinsamen Experimentieren auf die Kinder übertragen und ihnen eine Vorstellung von der komplexen wissenschaftlichen Forschung an einer Großforschungsanlage vermitteln.
Die Pestalozzischule eignet sich besonders für das Pilotprojekt "Junge Forscher - wer wir sind und was wir tun", da die Schule einen hohen Anteil an Schülern aus bildungsungewohnten Elternhäusern verzeichnet. Insbesondere die Kinder, die in ihrem Umfeld keinen Kontakt zu Wissenschaftlern haben, sollen auf diesem Weg für Naturwissenschaften und Technik begeistert werden. Mit der Pestalozzischule hat die Stiftung Polytechnische Gesellschaft bereits mehrere ihrer Projekte verwirklicht, wie das "Diesterweg-Stipendium", die "StadtteilDetektive" und den "DeutschSommer".
Für die Stiftung Polytechnische Gesellschaft ist das Pilotprojekt Teil einer "Bildungskette" mit dem Ziel, junge Menschen an Naturwissenschaften und Technik heranzuführen. Dazu zählen die Förderung des Goethe-Schülerlabors Physik & Chemie und die Mathematik AG an der Goethe-Universität, die Junior-Ingenieur-Akademie, sowie das MainCampus-Stipendiatenwerk. Das GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung möchte auf diesem Wege sein Angebot an die breite Öffentlichkeit erweitern. Zurzeit nutzen viele tausend Menschen pro Jahr das bestehende Angebot, die Forschungsanlage zu besichtigen oder im Schülerlabor zu experimentieren, das sich insbesondere an Schüler der Oberstufe richtet.
]]>More information about cancer therapy with ion beams:
Ion-Beam Radiotherapy in the Fight against Cancer and Website HIT
Please understand that because of the limited edition you can only request a maximum of 3 calendars (while supplies last) per order.
For our staff, the calendar is already available in the GSI Helmholtzzentrum e.g. the library, the foyer and the CEOs floor. Additionally, copies can be picked up in the warehouse.
Best regards,
Public Relations Department
GSI-Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung
“FAIR will enable us to produce cosmic matter in the laboratory, and scientists from all over the world will be able to explore new dimensions of matter, including antimatter and hot stellar matter. They will develop innovative high-performance computers for their basic research and expect to achieve breakthroughs for new nanomaterials and biomedical applications,” says Professor Horst Stöcker, Scientific Director of GSI.
The establishment of the company FAIR GmbH, which is also part of the agreement, was likewise completed today. “We will coordinate the construction of the accelerator and experiment facilities. The participating countries will contribute their technical and scientific expertise to the project, in addition to their financial and in–kind input,” says Professor Boris Sharkov, the first Scientific Director of FAIR GmbH, which will be based at the GSI Helmholtz Center in Darmstadt.
The FAIR accelerator center to be built in Darmstadt is one of the largest projects for basic research in physics worldwide. Roughly 3,000 scientists from more than 40 countries are already working on the planning of the experiment and accelerator facilities. FAIR will generate antiproton and ion beams of a previously unparalleled intensity and quality. When completed, FAIR will comprise eight ring accelerators of up to 1,100 metres in circumference, two linear accelerators and around 3.5 kilometres of beam pipes. The existing GSI accelerators will serve as preaccelerators for the new facility.
FAIR will make it possible to conduct a wider range of experiments than ever before, enabling scientists from all over the world to gain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe since the Big Bang.
Researchers working at FAIR will therefore have the opportunity to investigate antimatter with a view to solving the mystery of why the universe is almost completely devoid of antimatter except for minuscule traces, whereas normal matter — the matter that makes up our bodies and the world around us — is “privileged”.
Researchers working at FAIR are also hoping to discover new forms of matter and thus track down the mystery of dark matter in the universe. Although dark matter makes up a much greater percentage of the universe than the matter with which we are familiar, scientists have still not succeeded in observing it directly.
Researchers at the forthcoming facility will also be able to investigate how stars explode and which processes are involved. According to our present understanding of the universe, the chemical elements came into being as a result of powerful stellar explosions, and they continue to be formed in this way. This means that in the final analysis virtually all matter, including ourselves, consists of stardust — the remains of exploded stars.
FAIR will be able to generate ion beams, which occur naturally in cosmic radiation. This will enable scientists to study the effects of ion beams on materials and tissue samples. They hope this will enable them to test components for satellite technology and to conduct radiobiological studies for manned space missions or new applications in medicine.
On this topic please read also the German Federal Ministry for Education and Research (in German): https: www.bmbf.de/press/2959.php
GSI is a research center with more than 1,000 employees, financed by the German federation and the German state of Hesse with a budget of some 100 million euros. GSI operates a one-of-a-kind accelerator facility for ion beams, i.e. beams of charged atoms. Every year, more than 1,200 guest scientists from all over the world use the accelerator facility for fundamental research. GSI’s research program comprises a broad range of fields from nuclear and atomic physics to plasma and materials research as well as biophysics and medicine. GSI’s most famous advancements are the discovery of new chemical elements and the development of a novel cancer therapy using ion beams, which recently started routine operation at clinics. Over the coming years, the new accelerator facility FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) will be built at GSI with an investment of 1.2 billion euros (with international partners bearing 25% of the costs).
]]>Mit zwei genehmigten Anträgen war GSI überdurchschnittlich erfolgreich. Deutschlandweit wurden 18 Anträge aus den 16 Helmholtzzentren genehmigt. Sie wurden in einem mehrstufigen Wettbewerbsverfahren von einer interdisziplinären Jury ausgewählt. Die Nachwuchsgruppen werden zu gleichen Teilen von der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft und dem beteiligten Helmholtzzentrum finanziert.
Die Gruppe um Miriam Fritsch wird einen so genannten Luminositätsmonitor mit aufbauen, eine Messapparatur, die ein wichtiger Bestandteil des geplanten Experimentaufbaus „Panda“ an der zukünftigen Beschleunigeranlage FAIR sein wird. Wissenschaftler aus aller Welt möchten mit Panda Experimente mit Teilchenstrahlen aus Antimaterie durchführen, um die elementaren Bausteine der Materie und die Starke Kraft, die sie zusammenhält, besser zu verstehen.
Jan Dvorak wird mit seiner Nachwuchsgruppe eine Messapparatur entwickeln, einen so genannten Isotopen-Separator, um neue, sehr neutronenreiche Atomkerne zu entdecken. Mehrere tausend derartige Atomkerne werden theoretisch vorhergesagt. Die Untersuchung neutronenreicher Atomkerne ist ein zentrales Forschungsgebiet an FAIR. Sie spielt eine entscheidende Rolle zum Verständnis der Entstehung von Elementen im Universum, die letztendlich unsere Existenz erst ermöglicht hat.
Weitere Informationen zu den Helmholtz-Nachwuchsgruppen finden Sie in der Pressemitteilung der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft: https://www.helmholtz.de/aktuelles/presseinformationen/artikel/artikeldetail/brain_gain_fuer_deutschland/
]]>Christiane Neumann war seit Oktober 2008 kaufmännische Geschäftsführerin von GSI. GSI bedauert ihren Weggang sehr und dankt ihr für ihre hervorragende Arbeit. Wir wünschen ihr für ihre neuen Aufgaben in Berlin alles Gute.
Die Position des Kaufmännischen Geschäftsführers bei GSI ist neu ausgeschrieben.
GSI ist ein vom Bund und dem Land Hessen finanziertes Forschungszentrum mit einem Jahresetat von gut 100 Millionen Euro und über 1.000 Mitarbeitern. GSI betreibt eine große, weltweit einmalige Beschleunigeranlage für Ionenstrahlen, das heißt Strahlen aus geladenen Atomen. Jährlich nutzen etwa 1.200 Wissenschaftler aus aller Welt die Ionenstrahlen für Experimente in der Grundlagenforschung. Das Forschungsprogramm umfasst ein breites Spektrum, das von Kern- und Atomphysik über Plasma- und Materialforschung bis hin zur Biophysik und Medizin reicht. Die wohl bekanntesten Ergebnisse sind die Entdeckung von neuen chemischen Elementen und die Entwicklung einer neuartigen Krebstherapie mit Ionenstrahlen, die sich seit kurzem im Routineeinsatz an Kliniken befindet. In den kommenden Jahren wird bei GSI das Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) mit einem Investitionsvolumen von rund 1,2 Milliarden Euro errichtet, wovon 25 Prozent durch internationale Partner getragen werden.
]]>DESY’s new X-ray source PETRA III has taken up operation for the international science community. At the 2.3-kilometres long synchrotron source of the third generation, the first external users were welcomed, thus starting the first official measuring period. “Already the first PETRA III user period is overbooked,” says Professor Helmut Dosch, Chair of the Board of Directors of DESY. “This shows the enormous interest of the user community for our new synchrotron radiation source.”
For further information: Press Release DESY.
„Durch das GSI Sommer-Studenten-Programm lerne ich Menschen aus aller Welt und unterschiedlichen Kulturen kennen. Ich finde es großartig, wie sie gemeinsam mit großem Einsatz und Begeisterung an der Beschleunigeranlage forschen“, sagt Gabriele Babini aus Pavia in Italien.
Die Studenten lernen zum Beispiel, wie neue superschwere Elemente erzeugt werden oder wie im Labor die Bedingungen in den ersten Mikrosekunden nach dem Urknall studiert werden. Ebenso wird untersucht, wie es im Inneren von Neutronensternen oder der Sonne aussehen könnte. Andere Studenten beschäftigen sich mit kernphysikalischen Präzisionsexperimenten, die helfen, das Alter unseres Universums zu bestimmen. Biophysikalisch-medizinische Arbeiten, die sich mit der Tumortherapie mit Ionenstrahlen beschäftigen, oder mehr technisch orientierte Arbeiten in der Beschleunigerentwicklung und Computer- und Messtechnik sind ebenfalls Teil des Studentenprogramms. Die Ergebnisse aller Projekte werden am Ende der acht Wochen präsentiert und in einem Bericht publiziert.
Das GSI-Studenten-Programm findet bereits zum 30. Mal statt und war eines der ersten seiner Art. Inzwischen bieten fast alle Großlabors in Europa ähnliche Programme in den Sommer-Semesterferien an. Seit diesem Jahr ist das Studenten-Programm erstmals in das Programm der Graduiertenschule des GSI und seiner Partner-Universitäten (Helmholtz Graduate School for Hadron and Ion Research, HGS-HIRe) aufgenommen. Das Studenten-Programm, an dem bisher insgesamt über 1.000 Studenten teilnahmen, ist ein wesentlicher Bestandteil der Nachwuchsförderung am GSI. Studenten, die bereits ihre Vorprüfungen abgeschlossen haben, sollen eine Orientierungshilfe auf ihrer Suche nach einem Fachgebiet und möglichen Studien-, Master- und später auch Doktorarbeiten erhalten. Viele Teilnehmer von früheren Programmen haben sich anschließend für eine Diplom- oder Doktorarbeit am GSI oder an ihren Heimatinstituten im Rahmen von Kooperationen mit GSI-Projekten entschieden. Viele haben darüber hinaus ihre berufliche Karriere in der Wissenschaft eingeschlagen, bis hin zur Physik-Professur.
Die am aktuellen Programm teilnehmenden Studenten sind noch bis zum Freitag, den 24. September 2010 am GSI. Wenn Sie Interesse an einer weitergehenden Berichterstattung haben, können Sie gerne mit uns Kontakt aufnehmen. Wir vermitteln Ihnen Studenten für Interviews und Fotos am Arbeitsplatz.
]]>Die Vortragsreihe "Wissenschaft für Alle" richtet sich an alle an aktueller Wissenschaft und Forschung interessierten Personen. Die Themen decken ein großes wissenschaftliches Spektrum ab - nicht nur über die Forschung an GSI und FAIR wird berichtet, sondern generell über aktuelle Themen aus Physik, Chemie, Biologie, Medizin und Informatik. Ziel der Reihe ist es, die wissenschaftlichen Vorgänge für den Laien verständlich aufzubereiten und darzustellen, um so die Forschung einem breiten Publikum zugänglich zu machen. Als Redner konnten sowohl GSI-Mitarbeiter als auch externe Referenten aus Universitäten und anderen Instituten gewonnen werden.
Alle Vorträge werden im Hörsaal des GSI Helmholtzzentrums für Schwerionenforschung, Planckstraße 1, 64291 Darmstadt, gehalten. Sie finden in der Regel einmal pro Monat jeweils Mittwochs in der Monatsmitte um 14:00 Uhr statt. Der Eintritt ist frei, eine Anmeldung ist nicht erforderlich. Externe Teilnehmer werden gebeten, für den Einlass an unserer Pforte ein Ausweisdokument bereitzuhalten.
Weitere aktuelle Informationen finden Sie auf unserer Website Wissenschaft für Alle
Element 112 was discovered by an international team of scientists headed by professor Sigurd Hofmann at GSI. The new element has officially carried the name copernicium and the symbol “Cn” since February 19, 2010. Naming the element after scientist Nicolaus Copernicus follows the longstanding tradition of choosing an accomplished scientist as eponym. Copernicus’ work in astronomy is the basis of our modern world view, which states that the Sun is the center of our solar system with the Earth and all the other planets circling around it.
On February 9, 1996, Sigurd Hofmann and his team produced an atom of the element copernicium for the first time. Using the 100 meter long GSI accelerator, they fired charged zinc atoms, i.e. zinc ions, onto a lead foil. The fusion of the atomic nuclei of the two elements produced an atom of the new element 112. This atom was only stable for a fraction of a second; the scientists were able to identify the new element by measuring the radiation emitted during its decay.
Further independent experiments at other research facilities confirmed the discovery of the element. Last year, IUPAC officially recognized the existence of element 112, acknowledged the GSI team’s discovery and invited them to propose a name.
Copernicium is the sixth chemical element that GSI scientists discovered and named. The other elements carry the names bohrium (element 107), hassium (element 108), meitnerium (element 109), darmstadtium (element 110), and roentgenium (element 111).
21 scientists from Germany, Finland, Russia, and Slovakia collaborated in the GSI experiments that led to the discovery of element 112.
The goal of GSI scientists is to determine the heaviest element in the world and identify the limit of the periodic table of elements, in order to enhance their knowledge about the structure of matter and to learn about the genesis of life.
GSI is a research centre with more than 1000 employees, financed by the German federation and the German state of Hesse with a budget of some 100 million euros. GSI operates a one-of-a-kind accelerator facility for ion beams, i.e. beams of charged atoms. Every year, more than 1200 guest scientists from all over the world use the accelerator facility for fundamental research. GSI’s research program comprises a broad range of fields from nuclear and atomic physics to plasma and materials research as well as biophysics and medicine.
GSI’s most famous advancements are the discovery of new chemical elements and the development of a novel cancer therapy using ion beams, which recently started routine operation at clinics. Over the coming years, the new accelerator facility FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) will be built at GSI with an investment of 1.2 billion euros (with international partners bearing 25% of the costs).
„Physik umgibt und betrifft uns alle. Im Schülerlabor am GSI Helmholzzentrum versuche ich zusammen mit meinen Kollegen, Schülerinnen und Schülern den Schulstoff an einem faszinierenden und authentischen Lernort näher zu bringen“, sagt Axel Gruppe.
Axel Gruppe hat das GSI-Schülerlabor mit Hilfe von GSI-Wissenschaftlern über ein Jahr lang geplant und aufgebaut bevor es im Schuljahr 2004/05 seinen Betrieb aufnahm. Inzwischen sind fünf Lehrkräfte im Schülerlabor beschäftigt, das an drei Tagen in der Woche geöffnet hat. Bislang haben rund 7.000 Schüler das Schülerlabor genutzt.
Neben seiner Tätigkeit im Schülerlabor ist Axel Gruppe nach wie vor als Lehrer und Fachbereichsleiter für die naturwissenschaftlichen Fächer im Lessing-Gymnasium in Frankfurt tätig. Er promovierte am kernphysikalischen Institut der Goethe-Universität Frankfurt mit einer Forschungsarbeit, die er an der Beschleunigeranlage bei GSI durchführte.
Mit dem Schülerlabor möchte das GSI Helmholtzzentrum eine Brücke schlagen zwischen der naturwissenschaftlichen Ausbildung an Schulen und der aktuellen Forschung. Es leistet einen Beitrag zur Förderung des naturwissenschaftlichen Nachwuchses und gibt Schülerinnen und Schülern für ihre spätere Studien- und Berufswahl eine Entscheidungshilfe an die Hand. Durch die unmittelbare Nachbarschaft zu den Forschungsanlagen des GSI wird es auch zum Ort der Begegnung zwischen Schülern, Forschern und Lehrern.
Das Schülerlabor richtet sich, abgestuft in verschiedenen Schwierigkeitsgraden, an Kurse der Gymnasialen Oberstufe und an Klassen der 9. und 10. Jahrgangsstufe an Gymnasium und Realschule. Die angebotenen Versuche und die damit verbundenen Aufgabenstellungen sind mit dem Lehrplan für hessische Schulen abgestimmt. Jeder Besuchstag im Schülerlabor ist mit einer Besichtigung der GSI-Beschleuniger- und Forschungsanlagen verbunden. Dort sehen die Schüler die Messtechniken, mit denen sie im Schülerlabor zuvor noch selbst experimentiert haben, im großen Maßstab und im Einsatz für die Grundlagenforschung wieder.
Neben dem Angebot für Schulklassen wird das Schülerlabor für Lehrerfortbildungen genutzt. Diese sind über das Institut für Qualitätsentwicklung (IQ) des Hessischen Kultusministeriums als offiziell akkreditierte Lehrerfortbildungen anerkannt.
Die Carl Wilhelm Fück-Stiftung verleiht jährlich den Carl Wilhelm Fück-Preis für besondere Verdienste in der naturwissenschaftlichen Lehre und Nachwuchsförderung. Namensgeber der Stiftung ist der 1936 verstorbene Maurermeister und Architekt Carl Wilhelm Fück. Er hat vor allem während der Zeit der Baukonjunktur 1890-1914 in den Frankfurter Stadtteilen Bornheim und Seckbach viele typische Gründerzeit-Häuser entworfen und deren Bau begleitet, wobei er besonderen Wert auf die typischen roten Sandsteinverzierungen gelegt hat. Die Stiftung wurde mit dem gemeinnützigen Zweck "Förderung der Naturwissenschaft" als Stiftung von Todes wegen von Fücks Enkelin Dr. Annelore Fück gegründet. Nach deren Tod im Jahre 2007 wurde die Stiftung eingerichtet und als gemeinnützig anerkannt.
]]>With the new TASCA setup, the research team led by Christoph Düllmann observed 13 atoms of element 114 during the course of their four week long experiment. Despite being a small number of atoms, it corresponds to the highest ever measured production rate for element 114. This paves the way for future in-depth chemical, atomic, and nuclear physics studies. Based on the radiation emitted during the element’s decay, the scientists were able to identify two different isotopes of element 114 with the mass numbers 288 and 289. The measured half-lives are of the order of one second.
“TASCA is currently the world's most efficient system for detecting superheavy elements produced with particle accelerators. This high efficiency is the key to future experiments, where we will also conduct chemical analyses of superheavy elements in the vicinity of element 114, to determine their correct position in the periodic table of the elements”, says Christoph Düllmann from GSI, head of the collaboration. Düllmann also works at the newly founded Helmholtz Institute Mainz, based at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz.
Using the 120-meter long GSI particle accelerator, the scientists fired charged calcium atoms (called calcium ions) onto a plutonium-coated foil. In the course of the experiments, a calcium and a plutonium nucleus undergo fusion to form a nucleus of the new element. The element's atomic number (the number of protons in the atomic nucleus) is 114, hence its preliminary name “element 114”. Its atomic number corresponds to the sum of those of the reacting elements: calcium with 20 and plutonium with 94 protons.
The gas-filled separator TASCA separated the atoms produced by the accelerator with high selectivity from other reaction products. The atoms of element 114 then implanted into a special semiconductor detector, where they were subsequently identified based on the radiation emitted during their decay.
Initial reports on the observation of element 114 were published about 10 years ago from the research center in Dubna, Russia. However, the commission of the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) in charge has not yet officially recognized the discovery claim. Almost simultaneously to the GSI experiment, two atoms of element 114 were observed at a research center in Berkeley, USA. The results from GSI, Darmstadt, and Berkeley, USA now essentially confirm the results from Dubna.
Recently, IUPAC officially recognized element 112, discovered at GSI, as the heaviest element thus far. Russian reports on the creation of elements up to atomic number 118 are yet unconfirmed.
The TASCA experiment on the production of element 114 at GSI was led by scientists from GSI, the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz and the Technische Universität München. The collaboration also includes researchers from Berkeley (USA), Jyväskylä (Finland), Kolkata (India), Liverpool (UK), Lund (Sweden), Oslo (Norway) und Warsaw (Poland).
To read the original publication please visit Physical Review Letters.
]]>What's more? Opening of Helmholtz-Institute Mainz // Three Memoranda of Understanding // Seldom late effects of cancer therapy with ion beams // Upgrade of ring accelerator facilities for FAIR // Info on collaboration and co. // And much more ... Subscription & Download
]]>The honorary doctorate was awarded for his outstanding research, primarily within subatomic physics but also in atomic physics and applications within space research and tumor therapy. This research has a distinct engineering element as he has designed the fragment separator FRS, which is a necessary instrument to create the exotic atomic nuclei, one of the primary fields of research at GSI. Similar instruments are used at other world-leading facilities such as RIKEN (Tokyo, Japan), MSU (Michigan, USA) and in the future with the Super-FRS at FAIR. The most prominent research results have been achieved with stored ions and include precision mass measurements of very short-lived nuclides, the first experimental observation of atomically bound beta decay and the discovery of deeply bound pionic conditions in lead and tin isotopes. Thus, the first proof of the long-sought double-magic-nucleus 100-Sn was one of his research results. Linked to this award is the international recognition of the entire experimental program at the FRS.
Hans Geissel is head of the FRS group at the research facility GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt, Germany and professor of physics at Justus-Liebig-Universität in Gießen. Besides this he is the project leader of the new Super-FRS separator, one of the central research instruments of the NuSTAR-Colloaboration at FAIR. He has collaborated closely for many years with the division of subatomic physics at the department of fundamental physics and also acted as an expert and supervisory resource for a number of PhD students at Chalmers who spend certain periods at GSI during the course of their research. To support young, promising researches he launched the "GSI Exotic Nuclei Community" (GENOC) together with coworkers.
]]>
More information: GENCO andNUSTARhttps://gsi.de/fair/experiments/NUSTAR/index.html
]]>Learn more: (German) Press release of the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz
]]>The energy per particle impact achieved today was 7 tera-electron volts – over 3500 times more than the impact partner’s rest mass. Upon conclusion of the current experiment cycle, the energy will be increased to the targeted maximum energy.
ALICE is one of the four large international experiments at the LHC. It is the only LHC experiment that researches collisions of heavy nuclei at extremely high energy. The experiment cycle that was started today mainly explores proton collisions and will continue for around 18 months. Protons are the nuclei of hydrogen and thus the lightest projectiles used in the LHC. The collision of lead nuclei is also schedule with an experiment cycle of four weeks each in the fall of 2010 and 2011. Lead nuclei are around 200 times heavier than protons.
„ALICE is specifically designed for the collision of heavy nuclei. By colliding lead nuclei, we try to recreate the extremely hot and dense plasma state of quarks and gluons – the building blocks of matter – which existed for only fractions of seconds after the Big Bang”, explains professor Peter Braun-Munzinger, director of the ExtreMe Matter Institute EMMI at the GSI Helmholtz Centre. “These experiments will allow us to gain a new and unique insight into yet unexplored fields of particle physics.”
ALICE is composed of a multitude of components. The detector is 25 meters long, 16 meters wide and 16 meters high. The large magnet that is used to create the magnetic field to analyze the paths of the particles weighs 80,000 tons alone. Right from the start, GSI has played a significant role in the construction as well as the scientific program of ALICE, collaborating with the universities of Darmstadt, Frankfurt, Heidelberg and Münster and the universities of applied science in Köln and Worms. Today, more than 1,000 scientists from 30 countries contribute to ALICE. Among them are around 100 scientists from Germany, 30 of which are doctoral candidates. German researchers are involved in three central ALICE projects: the giant time projection chamber, which encloses the collision zone over a length of 5 meters with up to 2.5 meters radial distance; the adjacent transition radiation detector; and the High Level Trigger, a high-performance computer, which evaluates the information content of the events in the space of a few milliseconds.
]]>"With Hartmut Eickhoff, we have won over a personality with strong leadership qualities, but also an experienced accelerator expert. With his support as Technical Director GSI is prepared for the next steps in the technical implementation of FAIR”, says Horst Stöcker.
Eickhoff received his doctorate in the field of nuclear physics in Munster. Since 1980 he worked on the design for the heavy ion synchrotron SIS18 and the ESR storage ring at the accelerator department of the GSI Helmholtz Centre and furthermore enhanced these accelerator sections. 1995 Eickhoff took responsibility for the modification of the accelerator for GSI’s pilot project in tumour therapy with carbon ions in Darmstadt. From 1998 to 2005 he headed the accelerator project for the ion beam therapy centre of Heidelberg (HIT), at the University Hospital of Heidelberg. For now four years, since 2005, Hartmut Eickhoff is head of the accelerator division at the GSI Helmholtz Centre.
]]>IUPAC accepted the name proposed by the international discovering team around Sigurd Hofmann at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum. The team had suggested “Cp” as the chemical symbol for the new element. However, since the chemical symbol “Cp” gave cause for concerns, as this abbreviation also has other scientific meanings, the discoverers and IUPAC agreed to change the symbol to “Cn”. Copernicium is 277 times heavier than hydrogen, making it the heaviest element officially recognized by IUPAC.
The suggested name “Copernicium” in honor of Nicolaus Copernicus follows the tradition of naming chemical elements after merited scientists. IUPAC officially announced the endorsement of the new element’s name on February 19th, Nicolaus Copernicus’ birthday. Copernicus was born on February 19, 1473 in Toruń, Poland. His work in the field of astronomy is the basis for our modern, heliocentric world view, which states that the Sun is the center of our solar system with the Earth and all the other planets circling around it.
An international team of scientists headed by Sigurd Hofmann was able to produce the element copernicium at GSI for the first time already on February 9, 1996. Using the 100 meter long GSI accelerator, they fired zinc ions onto a lead foil. The fusion of the atomic nuclei of the two elements produced an atom of the new element 112. This atom was only stable for the fraction of a second. The scientists were able to identify the new element by measuring the alpha particles emitted during the radioactive decay of the atom with the help of highly sensitive analytical procedures.
Further independent experiments confirmed the discovery of the element. Last year, IUPAC officially recognized the existence of element 112, acknowledged the GSI team’s discovery and invited them to propose a name.
Copernicium is the sixth chemical element GSI scientist named. The other elements carry the names Bohrium (element 107), Hassium (element 108), Meitnerium (element 109), Darmstadtium (element 110), and Roentgenium (element 111).
21 scientists from Germany, Finland, Russia, and Slovakia collaborated in the GSI experiments that lead to the discovery of element 112.
*IUPAC - International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry
]]>GSI had invited Prof. Poliakoff and video journalist Brady Haran, after the website of the video project "The Periodic Table of Videos" already presented all elements discovered at GSI in form of short films. The tour through the GSI research facility brought Poliakoff and Haran also to the points at which atomic nuclei smash together at incredibly high speeds, and where through the process of nuclear fusion new elements might be formed.
Since the 1980s, experiments at the GSI accelerators have led to the discovery of six heavy chemical elements - Meitnerium, Hassium, Darmstadtium, Roentgenium, Bohrium and Copernicium (tentative name) - with atomic numbers 107 to 112.
The film about the GSI visit on YouTube:
Super Heavy Elements - Periodic Table of Videos in Darmstadt
The teaser about the GSI visit on YouTube:
Darmstadt Sneak Preview - Periodic Table of Videos
Using the Kα emission linescopper, test measurements were done first to characterize the spectrometer and to enable then for the first time the direct measurement of the inner shell transition 1s2p3P2 → 1s2s3S1 in helium-like uranium. Studying x-ray transitions in highly charged ions is of high interest to check the QED as well as relativistic and electron correlation effects in strong Coulomb fields.
The Philipp Seilder Scientific Award will be awarded up to three times a year for outstanding graduate works from allphysical disciplines of the Goethe University Franfkurt, it is endowed with 1,000 Euro.
]]>An international team of scientists headed by Michael Block was able to trap atoms of the element 102, nobelium, in an ion trap. This is the first time in history that a so-called super heavy element had been trapped. Trapping the element allowed the research team to measure the atomic mass of Nobelium with unprecedented accuracy. The atomic mass is one of the most essential characteristics of an atom. It is used to calculate the atom’s binding energy, which is what keeps the atom together. The atom’s binding energy determines the stability of an atom. With the help of the new measuring apparatus, scientists will be able to identify long-lived elements on the so called islands of stability that can no longer be assigned by their radioactive decay . The island of stability is predicted to be located in the vicinity of the elements 114 to 120.
„Precisely measuring the mass of nobelium with our Shiptrap device was a successful first step. Now, our goal is to improve the measuring apparatus so that we can extend our method to heavier and heavier elements and, one day, may reach the island of stability”, says Michael Block, head of the research team at the GSI Helmholtz Centre.
For their measurements, Michael Block and his team built a highly complex apparatus, the ion trap “Shiptrap”, and combined it with “Ship”, the velocity filter which was already used in the discovery of six short-lived elements at GSI. To produce nobelium, the research team used the GSI accelerator to fire calcium ions onto a lead foil. With the help of Ship, they then separated the freshly produced nobelium from the projectile atoms. Inside the Shiptrap apparatus, the nobelium was first decelerated in a gas-filled cell, then the slow ions were trapped in a so-called Penning trap.
Held inside the trap by electric and magnetic fields, the nobelium ion spun on a minuscule spiral course at a specific frequency. This frequency was used to calculate the atomic mass. With an uncertainty of merely 0,000005 per cent, this new technique allows determining the atomic mass and binding energy with unprecedented precision and, for the first time, directly without the help of theoretical assumptions.
The experiment was a collaboration between GSI, the Max-Planck-Institut für Kernphysik Heidelberg, the Universities Gießen, Greifswald, Heidelberg, Mainz, Munich, Padua (Italy), Jyväskylä (Finland) and Granada (Spain) as well as the PNPI (Petersburg Nuclear Physics Institute) and the JINR (Joint Institute for Nuclear Research) in Russia.
Link to the nature release: www.nature.com/nature/journal/v463/n7282/full/nature08774.html
Link to the summary for the layman: www.nature.com/nature/journal/v463/n7282/full/463740a.html
]]>The lecture series „Wissenschaft für Alle“ addresses all persons interested in current science and research. Approximately once per month (excluding the summer holidays) on a Wednesday in the middle of the month a talk of the series will be held.
The topics cover a large scientific spectrum – not only information about research at GSI and FAIR will be given, but also about current physics, chemistry, biology, medicine and computer science. The series aims to prepare scientific processes in a way that is comprehensible to the layman, and to make science accessible for the broader public. The talks are held by both GSI-employees and external speakers of universities and other institutes.
Because of construction works in the lecture hall and the foyer of GSI the lecture series had to pause during the last term.
| 17.02.2010 | „FAIR“ zwischen Mars und Jupiter – Wie der Kleinplanet Nr. 204873 zu seinem Namen kam Erwin Schwab, GSI |
| 17.03.2010 | Physik mit Spannung und Spaß – 5 Jahre GSI-Schülerlabor Axel Gruppe, GSI |
| 21.04.2010 | Extreme Materie: Vom Heißesten, Kältesten und Dichtesten im Universum Carlo Ewerz, ExtreMe Matter Institute EMMI |
| 19.05.2010 | FAIR – Das Großprojekt – Ein Blick hinter die Kulissen Simone Richter, GSI/FAIR |
| 16.06.2010 | Keine Angst vor Rissen! – Risslängenbestimmung mit Ultraschall und Wirbelstrom an Aluminium-Flugzeugstrukturen Uwe Salecker, Lufthansa Technik AG |
All talks will be held in German.
]]>The events will take place at lecture hall of the GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research and start at 2 p.m. and end at about 3 p.m. Please note that the lectures are all in German.
We are looking forward to welcome you at the lectures!
German program of "Wissenschaft für Alle"
]]>
The work of Dr. Andrea Mairani and Dr. Hiroyuki Nose will enable better planning for the treatment of cancer at the Heidelberg Ion Beam Therapy Centre (HIT). Mairani's work focused on the calculation of the biological aspects of nuclear physical side effects of this exceptional treatment, whereas Nose dealt with the scattering effects of the ion beam, both theoretically and experimentally.
Dr. Stephanie Combs, Director of Neuro-Radiology and Oncology Group at the Department of Radiation Oncology and Radiotherapy at the University of Heidelberg, acted as the guest speaker (orator). In her speech she talked about the role of particle therapy in the modern radio-oncology.
Since 1997, the novel treatment developed at the GSI Helmholtz Centre for Heavy Ion Research has been used for patients with head and neck tumors. In 2006, the treatment was extended to include patients with prostate tumors. Ion beam therapy is a very precise, yet gentle therapy method. Ion beams penetrate the body and only exert their full impact deep within the tissue, in a spot the size of a pinhead. The ion beams are steered with precision so exact, that a tumor the size of a tennis ball can be irradiated point by point with millimeter accuracy. The ion beam treatment is particularly suited for deep-seated tumors that are close to vital or important organs such as the brain stem, the optic nerve, the bladder or the intestine.
As the new form of treatment provided very good results, the Radiology Department of Heidelberg University Hospital opened a special Ion Therapy Centre in November 2009. A yearly number of 1,300 patients can be treated at the Heidelberg Ion Beam Therapy Centre (HIT). Its accelerator facility and irradiation technology were developed and built by GSI scientists and engineers. Two more facilities are currently under construction in Marburg and Kiel, Germany.
]]>"NanoBiC" stands for "Nano, Bio, Chemistry and Computing" and deals with procedures in molecular dimensions externally stimulated by focused particle beams. The joint research project focuses on the principles that determine the self-organization of matter at the tiniest dimensions after very localized external disturbance. "The driving forces in the development of nanotechnology", the spokesman for the research group Prof. Michael Huth, Institute of Physics, at the University of Frankfurt, describes the fundamental aspects of the research activities, "is the fascination of the very small and the realization that the assembly of even just a few atoms can lead to interesting properties."
One important research aim of NanoBiC is to decompose specifically molecules with electron or ion beams to place precisely residues or to trigger chemical modifications on surfaces. This takes place at magnitudes of about 1 nanometer up to 100 nanometers – as a comparison: the thickness of a human hair is about 100,000 nanometers. In technical applications ultrafine sensors, ultra high density data storage as well as novel micro-magnetic or light-emitting components could be created. An additional goal of NanoBiC is to understand the effects of ion and electron beams on living cells at nanoscale.
Under the Beilstein-Institut funding, grants will be awarded for 20 scientists – both at postgraduate or postdoctoral level - who will work on the project at the participating institutions. The Beilstein-Institut is a non-profit foundation for the advancement of chemical sciences located in Frankfurt am Main, Germany. NanoBiC complements the foundation’s aim to support the field of nanotechnology. In addition to NanoBiC, the Beilstein-Institut will publish the "Beilstein Journal of Nanotechnology" – an online open access journal. Moreover, in May 2010, the international Beilstein Symposium "Functional Nanoscience" will take place in Bozen, Italy.
]]>Through the affiliated auditorium it is now possible to present scientific findings through workshops, conferences and seminars again. Even the popular series "Science for All" starts again on February 17. More information on "Science for All" you will find later on our website.
We invite you, take a virtual look at our foyer! Picture Gallery
By the way, the new coffee bar is open from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.!
]]>"Ziel ist es, für FAIR, eines der größten Forschungsvorhaben in der Grundlagenforschung weltweit, die Fachkompetenz, Infrastrukturen und Personalkapazitäten der Universitäten gerade im Rhein-Main-Gebiet durch verstärkte Zusammenarbeit mit der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft international sichtbar hervorzuheben und den wissenschaftlichen Nachwuchs fördern. Mit dem geschlossenen Vertrag bauen wir die traditionell enge Zusammenarbeit zwischen Goethe-Universität Frankfurt und GSI in bestem Sinne aus", sagt Professor Horst Stöcker, der Wissenschaftliche Geschäftsführer von GSI.
Die Vereinbarung sieht vor, die Forschungs- und Entwicklungsaktivitäten im Rahmen des FAIR-Projekts abzustimmen. Die Universität Frankfurt, das Land Hessen und GSI werden für FAIR zwölf neue Professuren einrichten und gemeinsam berufen. Darüber hinaus gewähren sich beide Partner gegenseitig Zugang zu ihren technischen Anlagen und werden Programme zur Förderung wissenschaftlichen Nachwuchses etablieren. In der Graduiertenschule "Helmholtz Graduate School for Hadron and Ion Research" (HGS-Hire) an der mehrere Universitäten beteiligt sind, werden die etwa 250 Doktoranden zentral koordiniert, die sich mit der Forschung an GSI und FAIR befassen.
Der Kooperationsvertrag basiert auf einer Rahmenvereinbarung über die strategische Zusammenarbeit beim Aufbau und der wissenschaftlichen Nutzung von FAIR aus dem November 2008. Neben der Goethe-Universität Frankfurt und GSI sind das Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies und die Universitäten Darmstadt, Gießen, Heidelberg und Mainz weitere Partner.
Das Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR, das an der GSI errichtet wird, ist weltweit eines der größten Forschungsvorhaben für die physikalische Grundlagenforschung, an dem bereit jetzt 3000 Wissenschaftler aus über 40 Ländern an der Planung arbeiten. FAIR ist eine Beschleunigeranlage, die Antiprotonen- und Ionenstrahlen mit bisher unerreichter Intensität und Qualität liefern wird. FAIR besteht im Endausbau aus acht Kreisbeschleunigern mit bis zu 1100 Metern Umfang, zwei Linearbeschleunigern und rund 3,5 Kilometern Strahlführungsrohren. Die bereits existierenden GSI-Beschleuniger werden als Vorbeschleuniger dienen. FAIR ermöglicht eine nie dagewesene Vielfalt an Experimenten, durch die Forscher aus aller Welt neue Einblicke in den Aufbau der Materie und die Entwicklung des Universums seit dem Urknall erwarten.
]]>In the copper-coated steel tanks the 130 accelerator electrodes (drift tubes) of the Wideroe structure are connected similar to links in a chain. When the ions come out of the perforated metal cylinders, they feel the accelerating high voltage field until they enter the next cylinder. The length of each drift tube is exactly so that the high-frequency electric field always has the correct polarity, when the ions are located between the electrodes. Because of that the ions will always be "pushed" a bit forward by the field and speed up to 5% of the speed of light.
]]>Learn more and apply now!
Applications and recommendations must reach us before January 31, 2010.
]]>Die Vereinbarung sieht vor, die Forschungs- und Entwicklungsaktivitäten
im Rahmen des FAIR-Projekts abzustimmen und exzellente, international
anerkannte Wissenschaftler, unter anderem auf den Feldern der
Beschleunigerphysik und Biophysik gemeinsam zu berufen. Darüber hinaus
gewähren sich beide Partner gegenseitig Zugang zu ihren technischen
Anlagen und werden Programme zur Förderung wissenschaftlichen
Nachwuchses etablieren. Dazu gehören Promotionsförderungen ebenso wie
die gemeinsame Vergabe von Auszeichnungen und Forschungspreisen.
Der Kooperationsvertrag basiert auf einer Rahmenvereinbarung über die
strategische Zusammenarbeit beim Aufbau und der wissenschaftlichen
Nutzung von FAIR aus dem November 2008. Neben der TU Darmstadt und
dem GSI sind das Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies und die
Universitäten Frankfurt, Gießen, Heidelberg und Mainz weitere Partner.
Das Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR, das an der GSI errichtet wird, ist weltweit
eines der größten Forschungsvorhaben für die physikalische
Grundlagenforschung, an dem bereit jetzt 3000 Wissenschaftler aus über
40 Ländern an der Planung arbeiten. FAIR ist eine Beschleunigeranlage,
die Antiprotonen- und Ionenstrahlen mit bisher unerreichter Intensität und
Qualität liefern wird. FAIR besteht im Endausbau aus acht
Kreisbeschleunigern mit bis zu 1100 Metern Umfang, zwei
Linearbeschleunigern und rund 3,5 Kilometern Strahlführungsrohren. Die
bereits existierenden GSI-Beschleuniger werden als Vorbeschleuniger
dienen. FAIR ermöglicht eine nie dagewesene Vielfalt an Experimenten,
durch die Forscher aus aller Welt neue Einblicke in den Aufbau der Materie
und die Entwicklung des Universums seit dem Urknall erwarten.
"The fact that ion radiation shows a very low probability for late effects in prostate tumors suggests that this is also true for other types of tumors. This is an additional convincing argument for using of the ion beam therapy. To be able to benefit from these remarkable features, the GSI Helmholtzzentrum developed and implemented an entirely new irradiation process", says Professor Marco Durante, head of the biophysics department at GSI.
"We tested the blood cells of prostate cancer patients for damage on the chromosomes. The number of damages on the chromosomes was lower in patients who received ion beam treatment than in the patients who were treated with conventional radiation methods. Chromosome damage is an indicator for the probability of late effects, such as the development of secondary tumors", says Sylvia Ritter, project head at GSI’s biophysics department.
In any type of radiation treatment, the radiation beam affects healthy tissue while traveling through the body to reach the tumors cells. While the intensely damaging effect on the tumor tissue is absolutely intended, harm to the surrounding healthy tissue should be kept to a minimum. Compared to X-ray treatment, irradiation with ion beams provides a high radiation dose in the tumor while the surrounding healthy tissue receives a much lower radiation load.
Experts at GSI already predicted that the late effects of ion beam therapy are much lower than those of the well-established radiation treatments. Now, so-called molecular cytogenetic assays confirmed their prediction. Only one comparable study on secondary damages from ion-beam therapy was conducted in Japan in the year 2000. Testing patients with uterine or esophagus tumors, this study also determined a low probability of late effects from ion beam therapy.
GSI researchers tested blood samples from 20 prostate cancer patients who received a combination of ion and X-ray treatment or X-ray radiation only. For their tests, the GSI experts used white blood cells. As part of the blood, the white blood cells travel through the entire body, which makes them particularly suitable for determining damage to the chromosomes caused by radiation therapy and for predicting the probability of late effects.
To determine the increase in chromosome damage caused by radiation therapy, the patients’ blood samples were taken before, during and after the treatment. The blood samples were then compared to those of healthy patients. Chromosomes carry our genetic information and are located in the cell nucleus of every single human cell. To render the chromosomes visible, the scientists applied a method called mFISH (multicolor fluorescent in situ hybridization). The mFISH method is used to stain the genetic material in different colors and to depict the chromosomes as a so-called karyogram. This color coding allows the scientists to determine damages caused by radiation in a very safe and quick way.
Scientists from GSI and the Department of Radiology at the Heidelberg University Hospital participated in this research. The study was supported by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) under the contracts no. 02S8203 and no. 02S8497.
Scientific Publication:
„Radiotherapy and Oncology“:doi:10.1016/j.physletb.2003.10.071
Since 1997, the novel treatment developed at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung has been used for patients with head and neck tumors. In 2006, the treatment was extended to include patients with prostate tumors. Ion beam therapy is a very precise, yet gentle therapy method. Ion beams penetrate the body and only exert their full impact deep within the tissue, in a spot the size of a pinhead. The ion beams are steered with precision so exact that a tumor the size of a tennis ball can be irradiated point by point with millimeter accuracy. The ion beam treatment is particularly suited for deep-seated tumors that are close to vital or important organs, like the brain stem, the optic nerve, the bladder or the intestine.
As the new treatment form showed very good results, the Radiology Department of Heidelberg University Hospital opened a special Ion Therapy Center in November 2009. A yearly number of 1,300 patients can be treated at the Heidelberg Ion Therapy Center (HIT). Two more facilities are under construction in Marburg and Kiel, Germany.
About the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung
GSI is a research Center of the Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft in Darmstadt, Germany. It is financed by the German federation and the German state of Hesse with a budget of 90 million euros. GSI’s research goal is to create a comprehensive picture of our surrounding nature. In this spirit, GSI’s over 1,000 employees operate a one-of-a-kind accelerator facility for ion beams. More than 1,000 guest scientists from all over the world use the accelerator facility for their fundamental research. GSI’s research program comprises a broad range of fields from nuclear and atom physics to plasma and materials research to biophysics.
GSI’s most prominent advancements are the discovery of new chemical elements and the development of a novel cancer therapy using ion beams. With these cutting-edge innovations and many more scientific novelties, GSI is a global leader in ion beam research. With the construction of the new international accelerator facility FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) at GSI, the center will be able to continue its world-class research. The new FAIR facility will give researchers the opportunity to conduct a variety of experiments, with which they hope to gain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe.
]]>Ever since it opened its doors in fall 2004, the pupils’ lab is in high demand and is fully booked for several months ahead. A waiting time of nearly one year is the rule rather than the exception. To date, more than 6,000 pupils from more than 300 different classes as well as 20 teacher groups have spent a day experimenting at the lab. The lab is as popular among the pupils as it is among the teachers and many schools have already integrated a visit to the GSI pupils’ lab into their syllabus.
By extending the opening hours, GSI responds to this great interest in the lab. Beginning with the new school term, the laboratory for pupils will be open during 3 days per week: Monday, Tuesday and Thursday (in accordance with the Hessian school term dates). The pupils will be supervised part-time by four teachers, who will also continue to work at their respective schools. Kai Zimmer from the Schuldorf Bergstraße in Seeheim-Jugenheim and Dietrich Voigt from the Claus-von-Stauffenbergschule in Rodgau newly joined the supervision team and will spend a fifth of their teaching time at the GSI pupils’ lab. Axel Gruppe from the Lessing-Gymnasium in Frankfurt and Torsten Gürges from the Heinrich-Heine-Schule in Sprendlingen have been supervising the pupils’ lab for the past two years and will continue to take care of the pupils on two days per week.
With its laboratory for pupils, GSI aims to promote the interest in the natural sciences in pupils between the age of 14 and 19 (9th to 13th grade). Being able to experiment independently, the participants learn how to work and think like a scientist. Based on the syllabus for physics lessons, the pupils can choose between nine different experiments to explore the constituents of matter and the phenomena of radioactivity. Using cutting-edge measuring and analysis technology, they discover the properties of atoms, atomic nuclei and their fundamental constituents, the quarks.
For further information please visit laboratory for pupils.
As of now, we accept bookings for the additional day. To schedule your visit, please contact the manager of the laboratory for pupils Jutta Leroudier at lab for pupils. Please note that due to the large number of requests the processing of your inquiry may take some time.
]]>In addition to current events at GSI and FAIR we take a look at the founding years of the centre, at that time known as Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung, in this issue. "A Research Laboratory For All" gives you a brief insight into the early years of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum, which writes Physics history since December 17, 1969. Subscription & Download
For our staff: "target" is already available in the GSI Helmholtzzentrum e.g. the library, the guesthouse and the CEOs floor or ask your team assistant after the newest issue.
Best regards, your "target"-Team
]]>Elsässer received the award for his work on modelling of radiation-damage in heavy ion cancer therapy. The Behnken-Berger Prize was presented to a young researcher of GSI in order for the second time in a row to a GSI-stage researcher. Last year Christoph Bert won the prize for his outstanding achievements in the further development of GSIs" tumor therapy in the area of moving target volumes. The Behnken-Berger Foundation awards the prize annually to young scientists. The prize money for 1st Price, received by Elsässer, is " 10,000. The Behnken-Berger Foundation goes back to the German physicist Hermann Behnken and his wife Traute Behnken-Berger. The foundation's purpose is to promote science and research in the field of radiation-protection with special emphasis on the promotion of young scientists.
To achieve the foundation"s purpose every year two junior scientists, who have made outstanding achievements in their fields of research, are awarded with the Behnken-Berger Prize, selected by a Board of Trustees.
]]>Please understand that because of the limited edition you can only request a maximum of 3 calendars (while supplies last) per order.
For our staff, the calendar is already available in the GSI Helmholtzzentrum e.g. the library, the guesthouse and the CEOs floor. Additionally, copies can be picked up in the storage.
Best regards,
your Public Relations Department
GSI-Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung
From the start GSI together with the universities of Darmstadt, Frankfurt, Heidelberg and Münster was and will be involved in the construction and the scientific program of ALICE (A Large Ion Collider Experiment) in a leading role. Furthermore the World Wide Grid, an enhancement of the World Wide Web, was developed in collaboration with GSI to cope with the huge amounts of data that occur during LHC experiments. During the commissioning of the accelerator GSI employees were directly involved likewise.
Current information on the ALICE experiment can be found directly at CERN: https://aliceinfo.cern.ch/Public/en/Chapter1/news.html
]]>Prior to the visit GSI-physicist Prof. Dr. Peter Braun-Munzinger answered some thrilling questions in his talk "Der Urknall im Labor": Does a transition between "normal" nuclear matter and a state similar to plasma exist in atomic nuclei at a certain temperature? If so, how can an experimentalist understand and influence this system? Afterwards Prof. Dr. Dieter Hoffman gave an overview about the GSI facilities.
The lecture series "Saturday Morning Physics" is conducted by the faculty of physics of the Technical University Darmstadt. It is held annually and aims to increase the interest of young people for physics. In lectures and experiments the pupils get to know about current developments in the physical research at the university. The GSI visit is the only excursion of the series.
Next to Lufthansa Systems, the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft und the publisher Springer-Verlag also the GSI Helmholtzzentrums from the start is among the sponsors and supporters of the project.
The web site of Saturday Morning Physics: www.satmorphy.de
]]>From now on, a yearly number of 1,300 patients can be treated at HIT. Since 1997, 440 patients, most of them with tumours at the base of the skull, have been treated with carbon ion beams at the GSI facility. Clinical studies proved the success of the therapy, documenting a cure rate of up to 90 percent. Ion beam treatment is now an accepted therapy with health insurance providers refunding the costs.
The heart of HIT is an accelerator facility tailored to therapeutic use and adapted to medical routine operation. The HIT accelerator is significantly smaller than the therapy facility used at GSI. The GSI accelerator spans several hundred meters and is mainly used for heavy ion experiments in fundamental nuclear and atomic physics research. Before administering the first treatment, GSI scientists had carried out fundamental research on the radiobiological effects of ions on cells for several decades, developing an irradiation technique that allows targeting the tumour with the ion beam in the most precise and safe way.
“Since the 1970s, we have systematically examined the effects of ion beams on over 100,000 cell cultures, always looking to optimize ion therapy. When we first started, most people didn’t think it possible that we could develop the technology to make the excellent biological-medical qualities of ion beams useful for therapy. We succeeded thanks to the interdisciplinary cooperation of nuclear and atom physics, radiobiology and radiation therapy, accelerator physics, computer science and many more fields”, says Gerhard Kraft, initiator and pioneer of ion beam therapy and holder of a Helmholtz professorship in the field of biophysics at GSI. ”With the opening of the HIT, the vision professor Kraft and his team had 40 years ago finally comes true: routinely treating patients with up to now incurable tumours with the help of ion beams. This form of therapy offers an increased chance of curing the cancer with shorter treatment cycles and fewer side effects. Ion beam therapy is a great example for a successful transfer of fundamental research to applied technology for the benefit of mankind”, says Horst Stöcker, scientific director of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum and vice president of the Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft.
HIT comprises an accelerator facility with a 5 meter long linear accelerator and a ring accelerator with a diameter of 20 meters. Three treatment spaces are located adjacent to the accelerators, two of which are a continued development of the technology used at GSI. The third treatment space features a rotating ion beam guidance system, a so-called gantry. This gantry is a direct advancement of the prototype developed at GSI. The gantry allows aiming the ion beam at the patient’s tumour at any angle, thus enhancing the treatment options tremendously. HIT uses ions, i.e. positively charged carbon or hydrogen atoms for the treatment.
Ion beams penetrate the body and exert their full impact deep within the tissue, where they hit a spot the size of a pinhead. To reach the tumour tissue, the ions are accelerated inside the accelerator facilities to about three quarters of the speed of light. That is almost 1 billion kilometres per hour. The ion beams are steered with precision so exact that a tumour the size of a tennis ball can be irradiated point by point with millimetre accuracy. The surrounding healthy tissue remains mostly unaffected. Therefore, this method is particularly suited for treating deep-seated tumours that are close to vital or important organs like the brain stem or the optic nerve.
The development of ion beam therapy is a joint project of the Universitätsklinikum and the Deutsche Krebsforschungszentrum in Heidelberg, the Forschungszentrum Dresden-Rossendorf, and the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung.
The GSI Helmholtzzentrum has been conducting fundamental research in the field of radiobiology, nuclear physics and accelerator technology for therapeutic use since 1980. In 1993, the construction of the therapy facility at GSI, Darmstadt, began. Since 1997, approx. 440 patient have been treated by the teams of the collaborating partners GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, Universitätsklinikum Heidelberg, Deutsches Krebsforschungszentrum in Heidelberg, and Forschungszentrum Dresden-Rossendorf. At the same time, plans were made for the clinical facility HIT, to introduce ion beam therapy as a regular component of patient care. HIT represents a direct transfer of technology from the GSI pilot project.
The GSI pilot project produced the following unique innovations:
GSI is a research centre of the Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft in Darmstadt, Germany. It is financed by the German federation and the German state of Hesse with a budget of 90 million euros. GSI’s research goal is to create a comprehensive picture of our surrounding nature. In this spirit, GSI’s over 1,000 employees operate a one-of-a-kind accelerator facility for ion beams. More than 1,000 guest scientists from all over the world use the accelerator facility for their fundamental research. GSI’s research program comprises a broad range of fields from nuclear and atom physics to plasma and materials research to biophysics.
GSI’s most prominent advancements are the discovery of new chemical elements and the development of a novel cancer therapy using ion beams. With these cutting-edge innovations and many more scientific novelties, GSI is a global leader in ion beam research. With the construction of the new international accelerator facility FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) at GSI, the centre will be able to continue its world-class research. The new FAIR facility will give researchers the opportunity to conduct a variety of experiments, with which they hope to gain new insights into the structure of matter and the evolution of the universe.
Vorrausetzung für das Erreichen so hoher Intensitäten sind die Entwicklung und der Einbau innovativer Beschleunigerkomponenten, der Einsatz neuartiger Materialien, sowie ein besonderer Anschluss ans Stromnetz, der 2006 in Betrieb genommen wurde. Im jüngsten Experiment ist es Wissenschaftlern des GSI gelungen Uran-Atome, denen 27 Elektronen aus der Hülle entfernt wurden, in Paketen von je zehn Milliarden Teilchen auf mehr als halbe Lichtgeschwindigkeit zu beschleunigen.
Die Erhöhung der Intensität stellt die Grundlage für viele Forschungsprogramme dar. So werden immer empfindlichere Experimente ermöglicht, immer schwerer zugängliche Phänomene aufgespürt. Forscher aus aller Welt erwarten dadurch neue Erkenntnisse über den Aufbau der Materie und die Entwicklung des Universums. Aktuell nutzen die Wissenschaftler die neuen Ionenstrahlen bereits für Untersuchungen über die Entstehung der chemischen Elemente in Sternen.
Die nun erreichten Strahleigenschaften der GSI-Beschleuniger sind ein entscheidender Schritt auf dem Weg zur Realisierung der geplanten Beschleunigeranlage FAIR. Damit dort die bestehende GSI-Anlage als Vorbeschleuniger eingesetzt werden kann, wird durch die nächsten Ausbaustufen in den kommenden drei Jahren eine weitere Steigerung der Intensität um den Faktor Zehn erfolgen.
]]>In der neuen Halle werden verschiedene Teststände für FAIR aufgebaut, daher der Name "Testing-Halle". Vorgesehen sind zum Beispiel Teststände für Hochfrequenz-Komponenten, mit denen Ionen in der Beschleunigeranlage beschleunigt werden. Auch spezielle Elektro-Magnete werden in eigenen Testständen Funktionsprüfungen unterzogen. Diese Magnete funktionieren wie Weichen, mit denen die Ionenstrahlen in die Beschleunigerringe von FAIR eingespeist und nach der Beschleunigung wieder ausgelenkt werden.
Die Testing-Halle bietet darüber hinaus Platz für die Vor- und Endmontage von Vakuumkomponenten für die Beschleunigeranlagen. Weil die Teilchen sich während des gesamten Beschleunigungsvorgangs im Vakuum befinden, spielt Vakuumtechnik eine zentrale Rolle.
Außerdem werden in dem Gebäude modernste Hochtechnologie-Labors für die Entwicklung und den Bau von Detektoren eingerichtet. Detektoren heißen die Messgeräte, mit denen die Teilchenreaktionen an der Beschleunigeranlage untersucht werden. In Reinräumen werden für FAIR verschiedene hochempfindliche Detektortypen entwickelt: Gasdetektoren, Halbleiterdetektoren und Diamantdetektoren. Darüber hinaus werden hier neuartige Mikro-Chips entwickelt und erprobt, um die enormen Datenmengen, die an den FAIR-Experimenten zu erwarten sind, in extrem kurzer Zeit aus den Messgeräten auszulesen und weiterzuverarbeiten.
]]>"Die neuen Buslinien werden unseren Gästen, Mitarbeiterinnen und Mitarbeitern den gut eineinhalb Kilometer langen Fußweg zur nächsten Haltestelle ersparen. Wir rechnen damit, dass nun viele auf die Anfahrt mit dem eigenen PKW verzichten und auf Busse und Bahnen umsteigen", sagt Horst Stöcker, Wissenschaftlicher Geschäftsführer des GSI Helmholtzzentrums. Mit dem nun gestarteten 14-monatigen Probebetrieb mit der HEAG Mobibus GmbH soll auch ermittelt werden, wie hoch das tatsächliche Fahrgastaufkommen ist. In Zukunft ist geplant, die beiden Linien in das öffentliche Nahverkehrsnetz zu integrieren.
Die Fahrpläne finden Sie im Internet unter: Anreise mit Bus & Bahn
]]>"Wir wollen erstmalig systematisch den Einfluss der Energie der Ionenstrahlen auf deren Wirkung auf Mikroelektronik untersuchen. Die GSI-Beschleunigeranlage bietet dazu optimale Voraussetzungen. Hier können wir hochenergetische Ionen, von den leichtesten bis zu den schwersten Elementen, erzeugen. Damit decken wir das gesamte Spektrum an Ionenstrahlung ab, wie es im Universum permanent auftritt", sagt Stefan Metzger, der Projektleiter vom Fraunhofer-Institut. Neben der fachlichen Expertise unterstützt das INT das Projekt mit spezieller Mess-Infrastruktur, mit der sich Strahlenschäden in elektronischen Bauteilen feststellen lassen.
In einem ersten Experiment haben Wissenschaftler einen von der ESA bereit gestellten Mikrochip mit Gold-Ionen bestrahlt. Die Analyse bestätigte die Vermutung, dass die Störanfälligkeit des Chips stark von der Energie der Ionen abhängt. Für eine genaue Untersuchung sind in den nächsten Jahren weitere systematische Bestrahlungen verschiedener Bauteile unter dem Einfluss unterschiedlicher Ionen und Energien vorgesehen.
"Ionenstrahlen machen einen Großteil der kosmischen Strahlung aus und haben die größte Wirkung auf die Mikroelektronik. Eine genaue Kenntnis ihrer Wirkung ist die Grundvoraussetzung, um in Zukunft gezielt Elektronik für Raumfahrt optimieren zu können", sagt Marco Durante, Leiter der Abteilung Biophysik am GSI und Kooperationspartner von Stefan Metzger. Bereits ein einzelnes Ion kann in mikroelektronischen Bauteilen Schäden verursachen. Durch die hohe elektrische Ladung und die Energie des Ions können in den Halbleitermaterialen des Mikrochips freie Ladungsträger erzeugt werden. Die unerwünschten Ladungsträger können zu kleinen elektrischen Stromflüssen führen, die Funktionsfehler oder einen Ausfall des Chips verursachen können.
In der Raumfahrttechnik wird die Elektronik derzeit durch Abschirmungen geschützt. Für manche Bauteile wird darüber hinaus Ersatzelektronik mitgeführt. Durch genauere Kenntnis des Einflusses kosmischer Strahlung auf die Funktionsfähigkeit von Mikroelektronik könnte dies vermieden oder zumindest reduziert werden. Dadurch ließe sich Platz und Gewicht sparen und die Lebensdauer der Elektronik erhöhen, alles maßgebende Faktoren in der Raumfahrt.
]]>Professor Dr. Dr. h. c. Horst Stöcker, Jahrgang 1952, studierte Physik, Chemie, Mathematik und Philosophie an der Goethe-Universität in Frankfurt am Main und wurde dort 1979 promoviert. Nach mehrjährigen Forschungsaufenthalten am GSI und an der University of California in Berkeley, USA, wurde Stöcker 1982 zum Professor für Theoretische Physik an das National Superconducting Cyclotron Laboratory sowie an die Michigan State University, USA, berufen. 1985 folgte er einem Ruf an die Goethe-Universität Frankfurt. Dort hat er die Judah M. Eisenberg - Stiftungsprofessur inne. Von 2000-2003 und 2006-2007 war er Vizepräsident der Goethe-Universität Frankfurt. Seit 1999 ist Horst Stöcker Senior Fellow am Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS). Seit 2007 ist er wissenschaftlicher Geschäftsführer des GSI Helmholtzzentrums für Schwerionenforschung in Darmstadt.
]]>“After IUPAC officially recognized our discovery, we – that is all scientists involved in the discovery – agreed on proposing the name “copernicium” for the new element 112. We would like to honor an outstanding scientist, who changed our view of the world”, says Sigurd Hofmann, head of the discovering team.
Copernicus was born 1473 in Torun; he died 1543 in Frombork, Poland. Working in the field of astronomy, he realized that the planets circle the Sun. His discovery refuted the then accepted belief that the Earth was the center of the universe. His finding was pivotal for the discovery of the gravitational force, which is responsible for the motion of the planets. It also led to the conclusion that the stars are incredibly far away and the universe inconceivably large, as the size and position of the stars does not change even though the Earth is moving. Furthermore, the new world view inspired by Copernicus had an impact on the human self-concept in theology and philosophy: humankind could no longer be seen as the center of the world.
With its planets revolving around the Sun on different orbits, the solar system is also a model for other physical systems. The structure of an atom is like a microcosm: its electrons orbit the atomic nucleus like the planets orbit the Sun. Exactly 112 electrons circle the atomic nucleus in an atom of the new element “copernicium”.
Element 112 is the heaviest element in the periodic table, 277 times heavier than hydrogen. It is produced by a nuclear fusion, when bombarding zinc ions onto a lead target. As the element already decays after a split second, its existence can only be proved with the help of extremely fast and sensitive analysis methods. Twenty-one scientists from Germany, Finland, Russia and Slovakia have been involved in the experiments that led to the discovery of element 112.
Since 1981, GSI accelerator experiments have yielded the discovery of six chemical elements, which carry the atomic numbers 107 to 112. The discovering teams at GSI already named five of them: element 107 is called bohrium, element 108 hassium, element 109 meitnerium, element 110 darmstadtium, and element 111 is named roentgenium.
Please visit www-alt.gsi.de/portrait/Pressemeldungen/10062009_e.html for our press release about the official recognition of element 112.
]]>Already in 1996, Professor Sigurd Hofmann’s international team created the first atom of element 112 with the accelerator at GSI. In 2002, they were able to produce another atom. Subsequent accelerator experiments at the Japanese RIKEN accelerator facility produced more atoms of element 112, unequivocally confirming GSI’s discovery.
To produce element 112 atoms, scientists accelerate charged zinc atoms – zinc ions for short – with the help of the 120 m long particle accelerator at GSI and “fire” them onto a lead target. The zinc and lead nuclei merge in a nuclear fusion to form the nucleus of the new element. Its so-called atomic number 112, hence the provisional name “element 112”, is the sum of the atomic numbers of the two initial elements: zinc has the atomic number 30 and lead the atomic number 82. An element’s atomic number indicates the number of protons in its nucleus. The neutrons that are also located in the nucleus have no effect on the classification of the element. It is the 112 electrons, which orbit the nucleus, that determine the new element’s chemical properties.
Since 1981, GSI accelerator experiments have yielded the discovery of six chemical elements, which carry the atomic numbers 107 to 112. GSI has already named their officially recognized elements 107 to 111: element 107 is called Bohrium, element 108 Hassium, element 109 Meitnerium, element 110 Darmstadtium, and element 111 is named Roentgenium.
]]>Der Aufbau der neuen Experimentanlagen war eine strategische Entscheidung der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft, die Materialforschung mit Ionenstrahlen am GSI zusammenzuführen. Die Materialforschung am Ionenstrahllabor des Helmholtz-Zentrums Berlin wurde im Zuge dieser Entscheidung eingestellt. Etliche Komponenten wurden von dort zu GSI verlagert. An den neuen Experiment-Aufbauten werden in Zukunft gemeinsame Kompetenzen gebündelt und effizient genutzt. Die Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft hat die Zusammenführung der Materialforschung mit Ionenstrahlen am GSI mit etwa 700.000 Euro gefördert. Zusätzlich haben die Universitätsgruppen, die künftig am GSI forschen werden, neue Komponenten entwickelt und aufgebaut.
Wissenschaftler werden an den neuen Messplätzen die Wirkung von Ionenstrahlen auf verschiedene Materialien untersuchen. Dies ist zum Beispiel wichtig, um herauszufinden, welche Materialien für Satellitentechnik und Raumfahrt geeignet sind. Beim Einsatz im All sind die Materialien ununterbrochen der kosmischen Strahlung ausgesetzt. Ihre Funktionsfähigkeit darf dadurch nicht beeinträchtigt werden. Dies ist auch für Materialien von großer Bedeutung, die für die zukünftige Beschleunigeranlage FAIR bei GSI eingesetzt werden sollen. Auch dort sind bestimmte Bauteile einer Bestrahlung mit Ionen ausgesetzt.
Die Herstellung von Nanostrukturen ist ein weiteres Forschungsfeld in der Materialforschung. Mit Ionenstrahlen können zum Beispiel extrem dünne und lange Kanäle, mit einem Durchmesser von etwa zehn Nanometern und einer Länge von bis zu 100 Mikrometern hergestellt werden. Wissenschaftler wollen die Eigenschaften und mögliche Anwendungsgebiete dieser und anderer Nanostrukturen untersuchen.
Forschergruppen aus etwa zehn Ländern, darunter zehn deutsche Universitäten, haben knapp 50 Anträge für Experimente an den neuen Messaufbauten gestellt. Sie werden von einem internationalen Gutachtergremium am 12. und 13. März begutachtet.
]]>Der 5555ste Teilnehmer wurde aus den zwanzig Schülern des Oberstufenkurses durch ein Quiz ermittelt. Die Schüler mussten die folgende Frage beantworten: Wie lange dauert es, um am Beschleuniger des GSI ein Gramm Gold herzustellen? Die richtige Antwort lautet knapp 50 Millionen Jahre. Felix Brech wurde aus sieben Schülern mit der richtigen Antwort ausgelost.
Im GSI-Schülerlabor haben Schulklassen aus ganz Deutschland die Möglichkeit, einen Tag lang zu den Themen Radioaktivität und Strahlung an neun aufeinander abgestimmten Versuchen zu experimentieren. Das Angebot ist eine praxisbezogene Ergänzung des Unterrichts, da solche Experimente an Schulen nicht möglich sind. "Wir freuen uns, dass wir die Möglichkeit haben, mit unseren Schülern an diesem qualitativ wirklich hoch stehenden Schülerpraktikum teilnehmen zu können. Es ist für unsere Gruppe eine ausgezeichnete Ergänzung unseres Unterrichts", sagte der Kursleiter Hannes Friedemann.
Die Resonanz auf das Angebot ist groß. Im vergangenen Jahr nutzten 1450 Schüler und Lehrer das Angebot des Schülerlabors und sorgten für eine Auslastung von 100 Prozent. Das Schülerlabor hat während der hessischen Schulzeiten zweimal in der Woche immer dienstags und donnerstags geöffnet. Bis zu den Sommerferien ist das Labor bereits ausgebucht. Vereinzelte Voranmeldungen reichen bereits bis zum Februar 2010. Eröffnet wurde das Schülerlabor im Schuljahr 2004/05.
]]>Die DNA, die das gesamte menschliche Erbgut enthält, ist in mehreren so genannten Chromosomen zusammengefasst. Die GSI-Wissenschaftler haben nun beobachtet, dass Proteine, die für die Reparatur verantwortlich sind, zur Schadensstelle hinwandern. Größere Bewegungen der Chromosomen sind für die Reparatur daher nicht nötig. Deshalb ist die Wahrscheinlichkeit am größten, dass es bei Reparaturfehlern zu einem Austausch von DNA-Bruchstücken zwischen benachbarten Chromosomen kommt. Dies führt zu einer Veränderung der Chromosomen - eine häufige Ursache für die Entstehung von Krebs.
Ionenstrahlen, die DNA-Schäden verursachen, schädigen diese in einem räumlich begrenzten Bereich. Daher können die Wissenschaftler anschließend die Reparaturvorgänge in der Zelle an dieser Stelle genau beobachten. Andere Strahlungsarten, wie zum Beispiel Röntgenstrahlung, erzeugen Schäden, die über die gesamte Zelle verteilt sind. Dadurch wird es für die Wissenschaftler im Einzelnen schwieriger nachzuvollziehen, wie der Reparaturvorgang an einem Schadenspunkt vor sich geht.
Die GSI-Wissenschaftler benutzen für ihre Beobachtungen einen neu entwickelten Messplatz am Beschleuniger des GSI. Dort können sie kultivierte lebende menschliche Zellen mit Ionen bestrahlen. Mit speziellen Mikroskopen beobachten sie die Reparaturvorgänge in den geschädigten Zellen unmittelbar nach der Bestrahlung mehrere Stunden lang. Dazu werden die Proteine, die für die Reparatur verantwortlich sind, so mit speziellen fluoreszierenden Farbstoffen versehen, dass sie im Mikroskop sichtbar sind.
Die Ergebnisse sind im Fachjournal "Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA" publiziert. B. Jakob, J. Splinter, M. Durante and G. Taucher-Scholz, Live cell microscopy analysis of radiation-induced DNA double-strand break motion. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA (2009)
]]>"Mit FAIR entsteht in einer internationalen Kollaboration weltweit eines der größten Forschungsvorhaben für die physikalische Grundlagenforschung. Umso entscheidender ist es für das Land Hessen, eine international führende Rolle hessischer Universitäten und hessischer Forschungseinrichtungen an dieser Einrichtung zu sichern und international anerkannte Exzellenz in der physikalischen Grundlagenforschung dauerhaft in Hessen zu etablieren“, sagte Staatsministerin Lautenschläger. Die Vereinbarungen zwischen GSI, FIAS und den Universitäten Darmstadt und Frankfurt seien dazu ein wichtiger Schritt. Sie erinnerte daran, dass das Land dieses Projekt im Rahmen seines Forschungsförderungsprogramms LOEWE mit rund 15 Millionen Euro unterstütze.
"Ich begrüße es, dass mit der Förderung im Rahmen der Helmholtz-Allianz „Kosmische Materie im Labor“ die Zusammenarbeit zwischen den Universitäten Darmstadt und Frankfurt, dem FIAS und der GSI vertieft und ausgeweitet wird. Es ist ein besonderes Anliegen des Bundesforschungsministeriums, Nachwuchswissenschaftlern und wissenschaftlerinnen die Durchführung von Forschungsarbeiten an exzellenten Forschungsinfrastrukturen zu ermöglichen", sagte Andreas Storm.
Der von GSI und FIAS unterzeichnete Vertrag ist das erste bilaterale Abkommen auf der Basis des Ende 2008 unterzeichneten Rahmenvertrags zwischen den beiden Institutionen sowie den Universitäten Darmstadt, Frankfurt, Gießen, Heidelberg und Mainz. Am FIAS werden sieben leitende Wissenschaftler in die Entwicklungs- und Forschungsprojekte für FAIR eingebunden sowie zwei zusätzliche Professuren eingerichtet. Daneben werden fünf Nachwuchsforschergruppen für etwa 20 jüngere Wissenschaftler neu geschaffen. Doktoranden, die für FAIR arbeiten, werden über die Helmholtz Graduiertenschule (HGS-HiRe) koordiniert, die vom FIAS geleitet wird.
Die Zusammenarbeit wird in drei übergeordnete Förderprogramme eingebettet: Das Helmholtz-International Center (HIC) for FAIR, gefördert durch das hessische Förderprogramm Loewe, die Helmholtz-Allianz "Kosmische Materie im Labor" mit dem Extreme Matter Institute (EMMI) und die Helmholtz-Graduiertenschule (HGS-HiRe), beide gefördert aus dem Impuls- und Vernetzungsfonds der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft. Zur Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft gehören 15 Forschungszentren, die jeweils zu 90 Prozent vom Bund und zu 10 Prozent vom jeweiligen Bundesland gefördert werden.
Das Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research), das an der GSI errichtet wird, ist weltweit eines der größten Forschungsvorhaben für die physikalische Grundlagenforschung. FAIR ist eine Beschleunigeranlage, die Antiprotonen- und Ionenstrahlen mit bisher unerreichter Intensität und Qualität liefern wird. FAIR besteht im Endausbau aus acht Kreisbeschleunigern mit bis zu 1100 Metern Umfang, zwei Linearbeschleunigern und rund 3,5 Kilometern Strahlführungsrohren. Die bereits existierenden GSI-Beschleuniger werden dabei als Vorbeschleuniger dienen. An FAIR wird eine nie dagewesene Vielfalt an Experimenten möglich sein, durch die Forscher aus aller Welt neue Einblicke in den Aufbau der Materie und die Entwicklung des Universums vom Urknall bis heute erwarten.
]]>
In den seit November laufenden Tests bei GSI hat der Magnet die entscheidenden Anforderungen für den Einsatz in einem Kreisbeschleuniger von FAIR erfüllt. Wichtigste Anforderung ist, dass der Magnet sich besonders schnell regeln lässt. In nur einer Sekunde kann er von Null auf die maximale Feldstärke von 2 Tesla gleichmäßig hoch und wieder herunter gefahren werden. Die Feldstärke von 2 Tesla ist fast hunderttausend Mal stärker als die Feldstärke des Erdmagnetfelds, in dem sich eine Kompassnadel bewegt.
Außerdem konnten die unvermeidbaren Wechselstrom- und Wärmeverluste minimiert werden. Dies ist besonders wichtig, da der Magnet supraleitend ist und mit flüssigem Helium auf minus 269 Grad Celsius gekühlt wird. Das sind vier Grad über dem absoluten Nullpunkt. Zu hohe Verluste würden die Temperatur erhöhen und die Supraleitung zunichte machen.
In zukünftigen Tests muss nun weiter überprüft werden, ob der Magnet Langzeitbelastungen standhält. Die Magnete werden bei ihrem Einsatz im FAIR-Beschleuniger jahrzehntelang fast ohne Unterbrechung rund um die Uhr betrieben. Aufbauend auf den Testergebnissen soll für die weitere Entwicklung ein zweiter verbesserter Prototyp gebaut werden. Daran soll die Produktion einer Vorserie anschließen.
Das Magnet-Design wurde in den letzten vier Jahren von GSI in Zusammenarbeit mit dem JINR (Joint Institute for Nuclear Research) in Dubna / Russland entwickelt. Gefertigt wurde er von der Firma Babcock Noell in Würzburg. Im August wurde der Magnet zu GSI geliefert. Diese Art von Magneten wird innerhalb der FAIR-Anlage am größten Kreisbeschleuniger eingesetzt werden, der einen Umfang von 1100 Metern besitzt.
FAIR steht für "Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research". Es ist weltweit eines der größten Forschungsvorhaben für die physikalische Grundlagenforschung. FAIR ist eine Beschleunigeranlage, die Antiprotonen- und Ionenstrahlen mit bisher unerreichter Intensität und Qualität liefern wird. Die FAIR-Anlage wird aus acht Kreisbeschleunigern, von denen die beiden größten einen Umfang von 1100 Metern besitzen, zwei Linearbeschleunigern und rund 3,5 Kilometern Strahlführungsrohren bestehen. Die bereits existierenden GSI-Beschleuniger werden dabei als Vorbeschleuniger dienen. An FAIR wird eine nie dagewesene Vielfalt an Experimenten möglich sein, durch die Forscher aus aller Welt neue Einblicke in den Aufbau der Materie und die Entwicklung des Universums, vom Urknall bis heute, erwarten.
]]>Fine Fiedler hat in ihrer Doktorarbeit gezeigt, dass für Helium-Ionen die Lage des Strahls im Patienten mit der Positronen-Emissions-Tomographie (PET) präzise überwacht und kontrolliert werden kann. Damit hat sie die Möglichkeit eröffnet, die Tumortherapie auch mit Helium-Ionen durchzuführen. Bislang wird die Therapie bei GSI mit Kohlenstoff-Ionen durchgeführt, andere Verfahren weltweit benutzen Strahlen aus Protonen. Das PET-Verfahren leistet einen wesentlichen Beitrag zur Patientensicherheit.
Gabriele Kragl beschäftigte sich in ihrer Diplomarbeit mit der Verbesserung der Bestrahlungsplanung für die Therapie mit Ionenstrahlen. Dabei untersuchte sie den Einfluss von unterschiedlichen Gewebedichten auf die Wirkung des Kohlenstoff-Strahls. Die Bestrahlungsplanung ist ein wichtiges Instrument der Qualitätssicherung der Ionenstrahltherapie.
An der Beschleunigeranlage des GSI Helmholtzzentrums wurden seit 1997 über 400 Patienten mit Tumoren beispielsweise im Gehirn mit Ionenstrahlen behandelt. Die Heilungsraten liegen bei über 90 Prozent. Die Nebenwirkungen sind sehr gering. Die Therapie steht heute an der Schwelle zu einer breiten klinischen Anwendung. Ab 2009 werden am Universitätsklinikum Heidelberg Patienten mit der am GSI Helmholtzzentrum entwickelten Methode behandelt. Weitere Anlagen, etwa am Universitätsklinikum Gießen-Marburg, befinden sich im Bau.
]]>Gerhard Kraft wird damit für seine langjährige Zusammenarbeit mit der Universität Gießen und seine Verdienste um die Tumortherapie mit Ionenstrahlen geehrt. Seit der ersten Tumorbehandlung mit Ionenstrahlen im Jahr 1997 am GSI wird das Therapieverfahren mit großem Erfolg eingesetzt und steht heute an der Schwelle zu einer breiten klinischen Anwendung.
Die Meldung der Universität Gießen finden Sie unter: https://idw-online.de/pages/de/news293671
]]>FAIR ist weltweit eines der größten Forschungsvorhaben für die physikalische Grundlagenforschung, an dem 3000 Wissenschaftler aus über 40 Ländern schon jetzt an der Planung arbeiten. "Mit der getroffenen Vereinbarung wollen wir in der Region Fachkompetenz, Infrastrukturen und Personalkapazitäten bündeln und den wissenschaftlichen Nachwuchs fördern. Nur so können wir FAIR stemmen und alle gemeinsam von diesem fantastischen Projekt profitieren", sagt Horst Stöcker, der wissenschaftliche Geschäftsführer der GSI.
Seit Jahrzehnten bestehen bereits vielfältige Kooperation zwischen GSI und den Universitäten. Die Partner haben nun vereinbart, die schon bestehenden Kooperationen weiter auszubauen und besser zu koordinieren. Geplant ist beispielsweise die gemeinsame Nutzung von technischen Anlagen und Ausrüstung, um Komponenten für FAIR zu entwickeln und zu bauen. Weiterhin sollen exzellente Professoren verstärkt gemeinsam berufen werden. Auch um den wissenschaftlichen Nachwuchs wollen sich die Partner gemeinschaftlich bemühen. Voraussichtlich werden sich etwa 600 Doktoranden in den nächsten sechs Jahren mit der Forschung an GSI und FAIR befassen. In der Graduiertenschule "HGS Hire" (Helmholtz-Graduate School for Hadron and Ion Research) wird die Doktorandenausbildung koordiniert werden.
Die Partner der Vereinbarung sind: GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung GmbH, Darmstadt, Technische Universität Darmstadt, Goethe-Universität Frankfurt, Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies FIAS, Justus-Liebig-Universität Gießen, Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg, Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz.
FAIR steht für "Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research". Es ist weltweit eines der größten Forschungsvorhaben für die physikalische Grundlagenforschung. FAIR ist eine Beschleunigeranlage, die Antiprotonen- und Ionenstrahlen mit bisher unerreichter Intensität und Qualität liefern wird. Die FAIR-Anlage wird aus acht Kreisbeschleunigern, von denen die beiden größten einen Umfang von 1100 Metern besitzen, zwei Linearbeschleunigern und rund 3,5 Kilometern Strahlführungsrohren bestehen. Die bereits existierenden GSI-Beschleuniger werden dabei als Vorbeschleuniger dienen. An FAIR wird eine nie dagewesene Vielfalt an Experimenten möglich sein, durch die Forscher aus aller Welt neue Einblicke in den Aufbau der Materie und die Entwicklung des Universums, vom Urknall bis heute, erwarten.
]]>Der Preis wird von der Behnken-Berger-Stiftung jährlich an junge Nachwuchswissenschaftler vergeben. Den diesjährigen Preis erhält Christoph Bert gemeinsam mit Frau Ala Yaromina (Dresden) und Thorsten Johnson (München). Die Preisträger erhalten jeweils 5000 Euro Preisgeld. Die Preisverleihung findet im Rahmen der Jahrestagung der Berlin-Brandenburgischen Gesellschaft für Nuklearmedizin in Potsdam statt.
]]>Der Physik-Nobelpreisträger von 2005, Professor Theodor W. Hänsch vom Max-Planck-Institut in Garching, ist Hauptredner des Festkolloquiums am Dienstag, den 18. November. Es findet zu Ehren des 100. Geburtstags von Christoph Schmelzer (geb. 18.11.1908, gest. 2001) statt. Christoph Schmelzer war von 1969 bis 1978 der erste wissenschaftliche GSI-Geschäftsführer. Er entwickelte mit seiner Arbeitsgruppe in Heidelberg das Konzept für die GSI-Beschleunigeranlage, das die Gründung von GSI erst möglich und GSI bis heute zu einem weltführenden Beschleunigerlabor machte.
Im Rahmen des Symposiums wird am Mittwoch, den 19. November der Lise-Meitner-Preis 2008 für Kernphysik der Europäischen Physikalischen Gesellschaft an Professor Walter Greiner und Professor Reinhard Stock überreicht. Beide sind seit ihrer Emeritierung als Senior Fellows am Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies FIAS an der Goethe-Universität tätig. Sie werden ausgezeichnet für ihre Pionierarbeiten über die relativistische Schwerionenphysik, die am LHC und an FAIR in neue Dimensionen vorstoßen wird. Sie haben beide die Entwicklung der GSI von Anfang an maßgeblich mitbestimmt. Walter Greiner ist einer der Gründungsväter. Reinhard Stock war langjähriger Vorsitzender des Wissenschaftlichen Rats.
Außerdem wird das Symposium zum Anlass genommen, Professor Hans Gutbrod (GSI) zu würdigen, der seit 2001 die Projektgruppe FAIR leitet. Er hat in leitender Funktion dazu beigetragen, die politischen und wissenschaftlichen Voraussetzungen für das internationale Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR bei GSI zu schaffen.
Das Symposium wird organisiert und gesponsert von: Helmholtz International Center for FAIR (HIC for FAIR), Helmholtz Allianz "Cosmic Matter in the Laboratory" (EMMI), Helmholtz Graduate School for Hadron and Ion Research (HGS-HIRe) und GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, Darmstadt.
Weitere Informationen mit detailliertem Programm befinden sich unter: ISHIP
]]>Christiane Neumann, geboren 1953, hat in Frankfurt und Berlin Jura studiert. Nach mehreren Jahren als selbständige Rechtsanwältin arbeitete sie als Referentin in der Berliner Senatsverwaltung für Jugend und Familie.
1992 übernahm sie die Administrative Geschäftsführung des Wissenschaftszentrums Berlin für Sozialforschung (WZB), einem Mitglied der Leibniz-Gemeinschaft. Als deren Administrative Vizepräsidentin fungierte sie über zwei Amtsperioden von 1999 bis 2003. Seit 2005 hat sie als Geschäftsführerin die Hertie School of Governance in Berlin mit aufgebaut, eine stiftungsfinanzierte Hochschule für Politik. Frau Neumann ist Mitglied des Vorstands der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Bildungsverwaltung.
]]>"Wir zeigen mit der Umbenennung, dass wir zur starken Gemeinschaft der Helmholtz-Zentren gehören und uns mit den gemeinsamen Zielen identifizieren." erklärt Professor Horst Stöcker, der wissenschaftliche Geschäftsführer des GSI Helmholtzzentrums. "Die Helmholtz-Zentren sind federführend in fast allen Bereichen der naturwissenschaftlichen Forschung tätig."
Die Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft ist mit 28.000 Mitarbeiterinnen und Mitarbeitern in 15 Forschungszentren und einem Jahresbudget von rund 2,4 Milliarden Euro die größte Wissenschaftsorganisation Deutschlands. Die Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft leistet Beiträge zur Lösung großer und drängender Fragen von Gesellschaft, Wissenschaft und Wirtschaft durch wissenschaftliche Spitzenleistungen in sechs Forschungsbereichen: Energie, Erde und Umwelt, Gesundheit, Schlüsseltechnologien, Struktur der Materie, Verkehr und Weltraum. Ihre Arbeit steht in der Tradition des großen Naturforschers Hermann von Helmholtz (1821-1894).
Das Ziel der wissenschaftlichen Forschung des GSI Helmholtzzentrums für Schwerionenforschung ist, die uns umgebende Welt in ihrem Aufbau und Verhalten zu verstehen. Das GSI betreibt eine große, weltweit einmalige Beschleunigeranlage für Ionenstrahlen. Über 1.200 Forscher aus aller Welt nutzen die Anlage für Experimente, durch die sie neue und faszinierende Entdeckungen in der Grundlagenforschung machen. Darüber hinaus entwickeln sie immer wieder neue und eindrucksvolle Anwendungen. Die wohl bekanntesten Resultate sind die Entdeckung von sechs neuen chemischen Elementen und die Entwicklung einer neuartigen Tumortherapie mit Ionenstrahlen. Mit diesen und einer Vielzahl anderer wissenschaftlicher Resultate nimmt das GSI Helmholtzzentrum eine international führende Position in der Forschung mit Ionenstrahlen ein. In den nächsten Jahren wird am GSI Helmholtzzentrum das neue internationale Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR entstehen, eines der größten Forschungsprojekte Europas. Dort erwarten Wissenschaftler Antworten auf grundlegende bisher ungelöste Fragen zum Aufbau der Materie und der Entwicklung des Universums.
]]>Marco Durante wird die Forschung an der Tumortherapie fortsetzen mit dem Ziel, die Behandlungsmethode auch bei anderen Indikationen einzusetzen. Darüber hinaus entsteht, basierend auf dem Hauptarbeitsgebiet von Marco Durante, ein neuer Schwerpunkt der Abteilung: die Wirkung von kosmischer Strahlung auf den menschlichen Körper, wie sie etwa bei längeren Aufenthalten von Astronauten im Weltall auftritt. Zu diesem Zweck wurde bereits Anfang des Jahres eine Zusammenarbeit mit der European Space Agency (ESA) vereinbart.
Der 43-jährige Marco Durante stammt aus Neapel, Italien, und hat dort Physik studiert. Er promovierte am Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory in Berkeley, USA, und wechselte im Anschluss zurück an die Universität Neapel. Nach seiner Zeit als Post-Doktorand am Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center der NASA in Houston, Texas, und am National Institute for Radiological Sciences in Chiba, Japan, war er ab 2000 bei der NASA in verschiedenen Positionen tätig. Parallel zur Leitung der GSI-Abteilung Biophysik übernimmt Marco Durante eine Professur für Biophysik an der Technischen Universität Darmstadt. Weiterhin ist er als außerordentlicher Professor an der Universität von Philadelphia, USA, tätig.
]]>Der LHC besteht aus einem Ring von 27 Kilometern Umfang und kann Protonen und schwere Ionen auf bisher unerreichte Energien beschleunigen. Durch Kollisionen dieser Teilchen kann der Zustand des Universums simuliert werden, wie er Sekundenbruchteile nach dem Urknall, vor etwa 14 Milliarden Jahren, herrschte. In vier hausgroßen Experimentieraufbauten vermessen Physiker die Spuren der Teilchenkollisionen und können somit den Urknall erforschen.
Insgesamt sind am LHC und den dazugehörigen Experimenten etwa 10 000 Menschen aus 85 Ländern beteiligt.
ALICE steht für "A Large Ion Collider Experiment". Hauptziel von ALICE ist es, zu erforschen, wie die Materie im Universum Sekundenbruchteile nach dem Urknall aussah. Damals herrschten unvorstellbar hohe Temperaturen und Drücke, unter denen die uns heute bekannte Materie nicht existieren konnte. Es existierte ein so genanntes Quark-Gluon-Plasma, eine Art Ursuppe, in der alle Materiebausteine frei und ungebunden vorliegen. Durch Kollisionen von schweren Ionen aus Blei soll am LHC das Quark-Gluon-Plasma erzeugt und mit ALICE untersucht werden.
Der ALICE-Experimentaufbau wiegt 10 000 Tonnen. Er ist 26 Meter lang und hat einen Durchmesser von 16 Metern. Wissenschaftler der GSI und deutscher Universitäten sind seit mehr als 15 Jahren an der Entwicklung neuer Messinstrumente und am wissenschaftlichen Programm von ALICE beteiligt. Sie entwickelten federführend die so genannte Zeitprojektionskammer TPC (Time Projection Chamber), den Übergangsstrahlungsdetektor TRD (Transition Radiation Detector) sowie die dazugehörige Mikroelektronik und den "High Level Trigger", die elektronische Steuerung der Messdatenerfassung. Im Detektorlabor der GSI wurden unter Reinraumbedingungen über 200 Gasdetektoren gebaut, die bis zu 2 Meter x 3 Meter groß sind.
Die Auswertung der Messdaten wird ein Schwerpunkt am kürzlich bei GSI gegründeten Institut EMMI (Extreme Matter Institute) sein. "Der LHC wird zuerst Protonenstrahlen liefern. Den Schwerionenstrahl aus Blei erwarten wir in etwa einem Jahr. Dann wollen wir das Quark-Gluon-Plasma erzeugen und zum ersten Mal sehen, wie das Universum eine millionstel Sekunde nach dem Urknall aussah", sagt Professor Peter Braun-Munzinger, Direktor von EMMI und Forschungsbereichsleiter an der GSI.
"Nach jahrzehntelanger gemeinsamer Vorbereitung, das heißt der wissenschaftlichen und technischen Planung, der Entwicklung und dem Bau von ALICE - mit allen Höhen und Tiefen - können wir es nun kaum erwarten, die ersten Messungen mit ALICE durchzuführen", sagt Professorin Johanna Stachel von der Universität Heidelberg, die Sprecherin des Forschungsschwerpunkts des Bundesministeriums für Bildung und Forschung BMBF, der alle deutschen ALICE-Aktivitäten umfasst.
Insgesamt sind mehr als 1000 Wissenschaftler, Techniker und Ingenieure aus 30 Ländern an ALICE beteiligt. Aus Deutschland sind beteiligt: Technische Universität Darmstadt, Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universität Frankfurt, Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg, Fachhochschule Köln, Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster, Fachhochschule Worms und Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung GSI, Darmstadt.
Mehrere Mitarbeiter aus dem Beschleunigerbereich der GSI sind an der Inbetriebnahme des LHC direkt beteiligt. Seit Ende 2006 haben sie dort verschiedene Softwarepakete zur Steuerung des Beschleunigers mitentwickelt. In den 1990er Jahren hat die GSI einen linearen Vorbeschleuniger für schwere Ionen gebaut, der seitdem am CERN eingesetzt wird. Er wird in Zukunft den LHC mit schweren Ionen speisen.
Um die enormen Datenmengen zu bewältigen, die an den LHC-Experimenten entstehen, wurde das World-Wide-Grid aufgebaut, eine Weiterentwicklung des World-Wide-Web. Dabei werden über das Internet mehrere zehntausend Rechner der am LHC beteiligten Forschungsinstitute zusammengeschaltet. Physiker und Informatiker der GSI haben das Grid in den letzten Jahren mitentwickelt. Das Rechenzentrum der GSI wird ein fester Bestandteil des Grid für die Datenauswertung des ALICE-Experiments sein. Bei ALICE wird eine Datenmenge von etwa zwei Millionen Gigabyte pro Jahr erwartet. Das entspricht ungefähr drei Millionen CDs.
Ziel am LHC ist es, Teilchenstrahlen mit höchster Energie zu erzeugen. Im Gegensatz dazu wird die geplante Beschleunigeranlage FAIR an der GSI Teilchenstrahlen mit höchster Intensität liefern. Höchste Intensität bedeutet hier möglichst viele Teilchen pro Sekunde. Damit lassen sich Teilchenstrahlen, beispielsweise aus Antiprotonen oder einer Vielzahl neuer Atomkerne, herstellen. Materie, wie sie im Universum vorkommt, aber nicht auf der Erde.
Die Experimente am LHC versuchen eine Simulation des Universums möglichst kurz nach dem Urknall. An FAIR kann die darauf folgende Entwicklung des Universums, vom Urknall bis heute, nachvollzogen werden. Somit ergänzt sich die Forschung an den beiden Beschleunigeranlagen LHC und FAIR.
]]>Für den Einsatz an FAIR liefert der Magnet hohe magnetische Feldstärken von bis zu 1,9 Tesla. Dies ist fast hunderttausend Mal stärker als das Magnetfeld der Erde, in dem sich eine Kompassnadel bewegt. Die besondere Eigenschaft des neuen Magneten ist, dass sich sein Magnetfeld in weniger als einer Sekunde kontrolliert hoch- und runterregeln lässt. Der neue Magnet ist supraleitend und wird deshalb mit flüssigem Helium auf minus 269 Grad Celsius gekühlt, das sind vier Grad über dem absoluten Nullpunkt.
Ab September werden Ingenieure und Physiker der GSI die Eigenschaften des Magneten über mehrere Monate testen. Dazu haben sie einen eigenen neuen Teststand eingerichtet. Nach den Tests werden sie entscheiden, ob die Serienproduktion der Magnete, insgesamt 108 Stück, beginnen kann.
Der Magnet wurde in den letzten vier Jahren vom JINR (Joint Institute for Nuclear Research) in Dubna / Russland und der GSI entwickelt. Gefertigt wurde er von der Firma Babcock Noell in Würzburg. Diese Art von Magneten wird innerhalb der FAIR-Anlage am größten Kreisbeschleuniger eingesetzt werden, der einen Umfang von 1100 Metern besitzt.
Die Aufgabe von Magneten im Kreisbeschleuniger ist es, die Teilchen auf einer Kreisbahn zu halten. Auf der Kreisbahn durchlaufen die Teilchen eine kurze Beschleunigerstrecke und werden dort bei jedem Umlauf weiter beschleunigt. Für die Magnete gibt es zwei wichtige Anforderungen. Sie müssen eine hohe Magnetfeldstärke erreichen, denn je höher das Magnetfeld desto höhere Teilchengeschwindigkeiten lassen sich erreichen. Außerdem müssen sich die Magnete extrem schnell ansteuern lassen, denn von Umlauf zu Umlauf werden die Teilchen schneller und dementsprechend müssen die Magnetfelder erhöht werden, bis zu einer Millionen Mal pro Sekunde.
FAIR steht für "Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research". Es ist weltweit eines der größten Forschungsvorhaben für die physikalische Grundlagenforschung. FAIR ist eine Beschleunigeranlage, die Antiprotonen- und Ionenstrahlen mit bisher unerreichter Intensität und Qualität liefern wird. Die FAIR-Anlage wird aus acht Kreisbeschleunigern, von denen die beiden größten einen Umfang von 1100 Metern besitzen, zwei Linearbeschleunigern und rund 3,5 Kilometern Strahlführungsrohren bestehen. Die bereits existierenden GSI-Beschleuniger werden dabei als Vorbeschleuniger dienen. An FAIR wird eine nie dagewesene Vielfalt an Experimenten möglich sein, durch die Forscher aus aller Welt neue Einblicke in den Aufbau der Materie und die Entwicklung des Universums, vom Urknall bis heute, erwarten.
]]>In den ersten abgeschlossenen klinischen Studien konnten Heilungsraten von 75 bis 90 Prozent, je nach Art des Tumors, beobachtet werden. Gleichzeitig sind die Nebenwirkungen verschwindend gering. Für die Behandlung an der GSI wird die mehrere hundert Meter große Beschleunigeranlage benutzt, die für die physikalische Grundlagenforschung konzipiert ist. Für einen klinischen Routinebetrieb hat die GSI eine maßgeschneiderte Beschleunigeranlage entwickelt, die am Heidelberger-Ionentherapie-Zentrum HIT demnächst den Patientenbetrieb aufnehmen wird.
Im Rahmen eines Kooperationsvertrags mit der GSI bietet Siemens Therapieanlagen, nach dem Vorbild der Anlage in Heidelberg, schlüsselfertig auf dem Medizinmarkt an. Die ersten Anlagen an den Universitätskliniken in Marburg und in Kiel befinden sich bereits im Bau.
Die Behandlung mit Ionenstrahlen ist ein sehr präzises, hochwirksames und gleichzeitig sehr schonendes Therapieverfahren. Ionenstrahlen dringen in den Körper ein und entfalten ihre größte Wirkung erst tief im Gewebe, hochpräzise in einem nur stecknadelkopfgroßen Bereich. Sie werden so gesteuert, dass Tumoren bis zur Größe eines Tennisballs Punkt für Punkt millimetergenau bestrahlt werden können. Das umliegende gesunde Gewebe wird weitgehend geschont. Das Verfahren eignet sich vor allem für tiefliegende Tumore in der Nähe von Risikoorganen, wie z.B. dem Sehnerv oder dem Hirnstamm.
Projektpartner der Therapie mit Ionenstrahlen an der GSI sind das Universitätsklinikum und das Deutsche Krebsforschungszentrum in Heidelberg, das Forschungszentrum Dresden Rossendorf und die GSI.
]]>An der EU-weiten Bewerbersuche nahmen über 90 Ingenieur- und Architekten-Teams teil. Zielvorgabe waren Lösungskonzepte für die speziellen Anforderungen an Gebäude und technische Einrichtungen des FAIR-Zentrums. Die Bauten müssen optimal auf die Beschleunigeranlagen und Experimentiereinrichtungen abgestimmt sein und sich gleichzeitig an bestehende GSI-Gebäude sowie die umgebende Landschaft anpassen. Die neue Anlage soll eine Nutzfläche von 83.705 Quadratmeter aufweisen. Das breite Aufgabenspektrum reicht von der Gebäudeplanung über Starkstromanlagen bis hin zu kältetechnischen Anlagen. Jedes der zwölf Planungsfelder wurde getrennt nach dem VOF-Verfahren ausgeschrieben.
Mit der Errichtung von FAIR, einer der größten Beschleunigeranlagen der Welt, wird ein einmaliges Instrument für die Forschung zur Verfügung stehen. An ihr wird Forschung in einer neuen Qualität und Vielfalt möglich sein, durch die Physiker neue Einblicke in die Struktur der Materie und die Evolution des Universums erwarten. Mit der Beauftragung der Ingenieur- und Architektur-Büros ist die GSI einen wichtigen Schritt auf dem Weg zur Realisierung von FAIR vorangekommen.
]]>EMMI ist eine Allianz, die zwölf Partnerinstitutionen verbindet, die zusammen weitere 54 Millionen Euro für die Allianz aufbringen werden. Die Partner sind die GSI, die TU Darmstadt, die Universitäten Frankfurt, Heidelberg und Münster, das Max-Planck-Institut für Kernphysik in Heidelberg, das FIAS Frankfurt, das Forschungszentrum Jülich, die Universität Paris VI (Frankreich), die Universität Tokio/RIKEN (Japan), das Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (USA) und das Joint Institute for Nuclear Astrophysics (USA). Als so genannte assoziierte Partner wurden weltweit führende Wissenschaftler gewonnen, darunter die Physik-Nobelpreisträger Frank Wilczek (2004) und Wolfgang Ketterle (2001). Sprecher der Allianz sind die GSI-Wissenschaftler und Professoren der TU Darmstadt Professor Peter Braun-Munzinger und Professor Karlheinz Langanke.
An EMMI werden 18 neue Professuren eingerichtet, insgesamt werden um die 100 Wissenschaftler aus verschiedenen Fachgebieten tätig sein. Unter einem Dach sollen unterschiedliche Kompetenzen gebündelt werden und in interdisziplinärer Zusammenarbeit die Vielfalt der kosmischen Materie und ihre verschiedenen Aspekte ergründet werden – von extrem heißer Urknallmaterie bis zu ultra kalten Quantengasen. Die am EMMI-Institut gewonnenen Erkenntnisse werden wichtige Impulse für das wissenschaftliche Programm an dem zukünftigen internationalen Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR liefern.
Der Antrag für EMMI wurde im November 2007 von der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft als einer von vieren unter 30 eingegangen Anträgen ausgewählt. Siehe dazugehörige Pressemeldung unter: More information
Die Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung (GSI) in Darmstadt ist ein vom Bund und dem Land Hessen finanziertes Forschungszentrum der Grundlagenforschung. Sie ist Mitglied der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft. Der Bau und Betrieb von Beschleunigeranlagen sowie die Forschung mit schweren Ionen sind Aufgabe der rund 1050 Mitarbeiter. Jährlich kommen über 1.000 Wissenschaftler, denen die GSI ihrer Aufgabe entsprechend, den Zugang zur ihren Forschungsanlagen ermöglicht. Die GSI verfügt über eine hervorragende und weltweit einmalige Beschleunigeranlage für Ionenstrahlen. Das Forschungsprogramm der GSI umfasst ein breites Spektrum, das von Kern- und Atomphysik über die Plasma- und Materialforschung bis hin zur Tumortherapie reicht. Die wohl bekanntesten Resultate sind die Entdeckung von neuen chemischen Elementen und die Entwicklung einer neuartigen Tumortherapie mit Ionenstrahlen. Mit diesen und einer Vielzahl anderer wissenschaftlicher Resultate nimmt die GSI eine international führende Position in der Forschung mit Ionenstrahlen ein. Bis 2015 soll bei GSI das neue internationale Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ionen Research) für die Forschung mit Ionen- und Antiprotonenstrahlen entstehen. Dort erwarten Wissenschaftler Antworten auf grundlegende bisher ungelöste Fragen zum Aufbau der Materie und der Entwicklung des Universums. Weitere Informationen unter: GSI
]]>"HIC for FAIR" ist eine Kooperation der Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universität Frankfurt (Federführung), der Technischen Universität Darmstadt, der Justus-Liebig-Universität Gießen, dem Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS) und der GSI. Die Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft Deutscher Forschungszentren stellt eine zusätzliche Fördersumme von 3,5 Millionen Euro bereit.
Die Partner wollen im "Helmholtz International Center for FAIR" gemeinsam ihre Stärken für die Planung und Entwicklung für das zukünftige Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR einbringen und ausbauen. Im Vordergrund stehen die Entwicklung von theoretischen Modell- und Simulationsrechnungen, die Konzeption und der Bau von Beschleuniger- und Experiment-Anordnungen sowie die Entwicklung von Elektronik- und Datenanalyse-Systemen für FAIR.
FAIR steht für "Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research". Es ist weltweit eines der größten Forschungsvorhaben für die physikalische Grundlagenforschung. FAIR ist eine Beschleunigeranlage, die Antiprotonen- und Ionenstrahlen mit bisher unerreichter Intensität und Qualität liefern wird. Die FAIR-Anlage wird aus acht Kreisbeschleunigern, von denen die beiden größten einen Umfang von 1100 Metern besitzen, zwei Linearbeschleunigern und rund 3,5 Kilometern Strahlführungsrohren bestehen. Die bereits existierenden GSI-Beschleuniger werden dabei als Vorbeschleuniger dienen. An FAIR wird eine nie dagewesene Vielfalt an Experimenten möglich sein, durch die Forscher aus aller Welt neue Einblicke in den Aufbau der Materie und die Entwicklung des Universums, vom Urknall bis heute, erwarten.
Die Pressemitteilung der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft finden Sie unter:
https://www.helmholtz.de/aktuelles/pressemitteilungen/
Die Helmholtz-Graduiertenschule wird gemeinsam betrieben werden von der GSI, der Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universität Frankfurt, der Technischen Universität Darmstadt, der Justus-Liebig-Universität Gießen, der Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg, der Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz und dem Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS). Koordination und Leitung liegen in der Hand von Professor Harald Appelshäuser von der Universität Frankfurt und Dr. Henner Büsching von FIAS.
Die neue Helmholtz-Graduiertenschule möchte die besten Köpfe weltweit für Doktorarbeiten an FAIR gewinnen. Sie wird zentrale Anlaufstelle für Bewerber sein und die Durchführung von experimentellen und theoretischen Doktorarbeiten koordinierend begleiten. Sie garantiert den Doktoranden eine exzellente wissenschaftliche Ausbildung an den weltweit einmaligen Forschungsanlagen von GSI und FAIR. Die Doktoranden können sich neben ihrer fachspezifischen Arbeit in Graduiertenkollegs der beteiligten Universitäten interdisziplinär und universitätsübergreifend weiterbilden. Darüber hinaus bietet die Schule Möglichkeiten, die über das wissenschaftliche Angebot hinausgehen. In einem speziellen Kursangebot, zum Beispiel über Teamfähigkeit, Diskussionsführung und Wissenschaftskommunikation, wird die Persönlichkeit der Studenten systematisch gefördert und auf eine erfolgreiche Karriere in Wissenschaft oder Wirtschaft vorbereitet. Zum Abschluss ihrer Arbeit werden die Studenten wie bisher an ihrer jeweiligen Universität promovieren.
FAIR steht für "Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research" (Übers.: Anlage für Antiprotonen- und Ionenforschung). Es ist weltweit eines der größten Forschungsvorhaben für die physikalische Grundlagenforschung. FAIR ist eine Beschleunigeranlage, die Antiprotonen- und Ionenstrahlen mit bisher unerreichter Intensität und Qualität liefern wird. Herzstück ist ein Doppelringbeschleuniger mit 1100 Metern Umfang. An diesen schließt sich ein komplexes System von Speicherringen und Experimentierstationen an. Die bereits existierenden Beschleunigeranlagen der GSI werden dabei als Vorbeschleuniger dienen. Insgesamt wird die FAIR-Anlage aus acht Kreisbeschleunigern und zwei Linearbeschleunigern bestehen. An dieser Anlage wird eine nie dagewesene Vielfalt an Experimenten möglich sein, durch die Forscher aus aller Welt neue Einblicke in den Aufbau der Materie und die Entwicklung des Universums vom Urknall bis heute erwarten.
Die Pressemitteilung der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft finden Sie unter:
https://www.helmholtz.de/aktuelles/presseinformationen/artikel/artikeldetail/helmholtz_investiert_in_doktorandenausbildung/
Der neue Laser Phelix (Petawatt High-Energy Laser for Ion Experiments) gehört zu den stärksten Lasern weltweit. Er kann Laserpulse mit Energien bis zu 1000 Joule und Laserpulse mit Leistungen bis zu einem halben Petawatt liefern. Die Leistung ist Trillionen Mal, das heißt Milliarden mal Milliarden Mal, höher als bei einem Laserpointer oder einem Laser in einem CD-Spieler.
Phelix hat solche Ausmaße, dass er in einem eigenen Gebäude von der Größe eines zweistöckigen Wohnhauses komplett unter Reinraumatmosphäre untergebracht ist. Der Laserstrahl, der einen Durchmesser von 30 cm besitzt, wird mit Spezial-Spiegeln zum Experimentierplatz am Ionenbeschleuniger geleitet und dort auf einen Punkt verdichtet. Nur etwa alle 1 ½ Stunden kann ein Laserpuls erzeugt werden.
Der Aufbau erfolgte in internationaler Zusammenarbeit unter Führung der GSI. Die Bauzeit betrug etwa acht Jahre. Während der Bauphase traten unerwartete technische Probleme auf, die das Projekt verzögerten, zum Beispiel bei der Produktion der großflächigen Spezial-Spiegel, mit denen der Laserstrahl geführt wird.
"Wir sind froh, dass wir alle technischen Problemen gemeistert haben und es nun geschafft haben, das erste Experiment durchzuführen, in dem wir Hochenergie-Laserstrahlen mit Ionenstrahlen kombinieren konnten. Wir freuen uns auf die vielen spannenden Experimente in den kommenden Jahren", sagt Professor Klaus Witte, der Phelix-Projektleiter an der GSI.
Mit dem Laser Phelix können in Kombination mit der Beschleunigeranlage für Ionen an der GSI weltweit einzigartige Experimente durchgeführt werden. Ziel ist es, Materie zu erforschen, wenn sie als so genanntes Plasma vorliegt. Plasma ist ein Aggregatzustand neben den bekannteren Aggregatzuständen fest, flüssig und gasförmig, die Materie auf der Erde annehmen kann. Dabei ist die Atomhülle ganz oder teilweise von den Atomkernen getrennt. Dies ist nur unter Extrembedingungen, das heißt vor allem hohen Temperaturen möglich, wie sie in Sternen oder im Inneren des Jupiter vorherrschen. Aus dem Alltag sind uns weniger energiereiche Plasmen bekannt, wie zum Beispiel eine Kerzenflamme oder Blitze bei einem Gewitter.
Im jüngsten Experiment beschossen Wissenschaftler der GSI und der TU Darmstadt mit dem Laser Phelix eine Materialprobe aus Kohlenstoff, sodass sich der Kohlenstoff in ein Plasma umwandelte. Bruchteile von Sekunden später beschossen sie das Plasma mit Ionenstrahlen aus Schwefel. Die Analyse der dabei auftretenden Reaktionen erlaubt es, die Eigenschaften des Plasmas zu erforschen. Auch das Umgekehrte ist in Zukunft geplant: die Erzeugung eines Plasma mit Ionenstrahlen und die Analyse mit Laserstrahlen.
]]>Die Behandlung mit Ionenstrahlen ist eine sehr präzise, hochwirksame und gleichzeitig sehr schonende Therapie. Der Vorteil liegt darin, dass die größte Wirkung des Ionenstrahls direkt auf den Tumor gerichtet werden kann. Dadurch wird das umliegende gesunde Gewebe weitgehend geschont. Bisher wurden an der GSI über 400 Patienten mit Tumoren im Kopf- und Halsbereich mit großem Erfolg behandelt. Die Heilungsraten liegen, je nach Art des Tumors, bei 75 bis 90 Prozent. Die Therapie ist schmerzlos und Nebenwirkungen sind verschwindend gering.
Gerhard Kraft ist der Initiator und Wegbereiter der Therapie mit Ionenstrahlen an der GSI und damit in Europa. Bereits Anfang der 1980er Jahre baute er die biophysikalische Forschungsabteilung an der GSI auf. Inspiriert wurde er durch einen Forschungsaufenthalt in Berkeley, USA, wo weltweit zum ersten Mal Patienten mit Ionenstrahlen behandelt wurden. Seitdem hatte er bei seinen wissenschaftlichen Arbeiten an der GSI immer das visionäre Ziel vor Augen, eines Tages an der GSI Menschen mit Ionenstrahlen zu behandeln. Seine Vision war es, ein extrem präzises Bestrahlungsverfahren zu entwickeln, bei dem die Vorteile des Ionenstrahls, das heißt dessen Präzision und hohe biologische Wirkung, voll zum Tragen kommen. Auch wenn die Vorteile der Ionenstrahlen auf der Hand lagen, erschien vielen Wissenschaftlern dieses Bestrahlungsverfahren aus technischen Gründen undenkbar. Die Bestrahlungen in Berkeley, die technisch bei weitem nicht ausgereift waren, wurden unterdessen wieder eingestellt.
Dank der Initiative, der Weitsichtigkeit und Überzeugungskraft von Gerhard Kraft ist das Therapieverfahren seit zehn Jahren an der GSI im Einsatz. Die technische Leistung ist enorm: In nur wenigen Sekunden legen Ionenstrahlen in den GSI-Beschleunigern mehrere zehntausend Kilometer zurück und erreichen schließlich etwa die halbe Lichtgeschwindigkeit (150.000 Kilometer pro Sekunde). Erst dann können sie ins Gewebe eindringen und millimetergenau in den Tumor geschossen werden.
Der Aufbau des Behandlungsplatzes an der GSI war vor allem eine Gemeinschaftsarbeit der Abteilungen Biophysik, Materialforschung, Experiment-Elektronik, Informationstechnologie, und des Beschleunigerbereichs. Projektpartner waren das Universitätsklinikum und das Deutsche Krebsforschungszentrum in Heidelberg sowie das Forschungszentrum Rossendorf.
Parallel zu den laufenden Behandlungen hat die GSI bereits 1998 ein Konzept für eine maßgeschneiderte Beschleunigeranlage vorgeschlagen, die für den klinischen Routinebetrieb geeignet ist. Sie wurde am Universitätsklinikum Heidelberg aufgebaut und steht kurz vor der Inbetriebnahme. Dort werden über 1000 Patienten pro Jahr behandelt werden können. Weitere Kliniken dieser Art entstehen zurzeit am Universitätsklinikum Marburg und Universitätsklinikum Schleswig-Holstein in Kiel.
Gerhard Kraft ist Jahrgang 1941. Er studierte Physik in Heidelberg und Köln und arbeitete zunächst auf den Gebieten Atom- und Kernphysik. Im Jahr 1973 kam er zur GSI in die Forschungsabteilung Atomphysik. Nach Forschungsaufenthalten in Straßburg und Berkeley, USA, baute er ab 1981 die Abteilung Biophysik auf, die er bis heute leitet. Seit 1994 ist Gerhard Kraft Honorarprofessor an der Universität Kassel und seit 1997 Honorarprofessor an der TU Darmstadt.
]]>The aim of the planned research activities is to quantitatively examine the biological effects of ion beams on the human genome and to determine how these effects would manifest themselves over time. For these tests, scientists will irradiate molecules and cell and tissue samples. The results of the research could then be used to develop optimized radiation shields for space exploration, which are a prerequisite for conducting safe missions to Mars.
The ion beams found in space have a wide variety of sources and can be derived from all types of elements, ranging from the lightest, hydrogen, to the heaviest, uranium. GSI’s accelerator facility can generate all types of ion beams, making it particularly well-suited for the planned research project. The research possibilities will be greatly expanded in the future by the FAIR accelerator facility, which will be able to produce even more energetic and intense ion beams.
Scientists are invited by ESA to submit proposals for experiments at GSI. The internationally leading scientists on the Biophysics & Radio-Biology Program Advisory Committee will begin reviewing initial applications in May, and the first experiments could be conducted as early as the end of this year.
]]>Die Vorträge in der Reihe "Wissenschaft für Alle" werden in der Regel von GSI-Forscherinnen und Forschern gehalten, aber auch von externen Rednern aus Universitäten und anderen Instituten. Die Referenten berichten über die Forschung, die sie selbst betreiben, und stellen sie einem breiten Publikum allgemein verständlich dar. Die Themen decken ein großes wissenschaftliches Spektrum ab. In erster Linie wird über die Forschung an GSI und FAIR berichtet, darüber hinaus über aktuelle Themen aus anderen Gebieten der Physik, Chemie, Biologie, Medizin und Informatik. In den Vorträgen bei "Wissenschaft für Alle" können sich interessierte Laien aus erster Hand einen Eindruck über aktuelle Forschung machen.
Im aktuellen Vortrag sprach der Wissenschaftliche Geschäftsführer der GSI Professor Horst Stöcker über "Das kleine schwarze Loch – Abfalleimer und Energielieferant". Er erläuterte dem Publikum, wie man kleine schwarze Löcher zur Müllvernichtung verwenden und dabei noch Energie gewinnen könnte – eine Methode, auf die er sogar ein Patent angemeldet hat!
Gleichzeitig mit der Preisübergabe kann die Vortragsreihe "Wissenschaft für Alle" ein Jubiläum feiern: Sie existiert seit 20 Jahren. Im Jahr 1988 fand der erste Vortrag im Hörsaal der GSI statt. Highlights der letzten Jahre waren unter anderem ein 3D-Vortrag sowie Vorträge über physikalische Phänomene in populären Filmen und Literatur, wie "James Bond", "2001 – Odyssee im Weltraum" und "Per Anhalter durch die Galaxis". Auch astronomischen Ereignissen wie etwa dem Venusdurchgang 2004 wurde ein Vortrag mit Teleskopbeobachtung gewidmet. Die spannend aufbereitete Wissenschaft hat so in den 20 Jahren insgesamt etwa 20.000 Zuhörer angelockt.
Die bundesweite Veranstaltungsreihe "365 Orte im Land der Ideen" stellt im Schaltjahr 2008 365 plus 1 Orte vor, in denen Zukunft gemacht wird. Der Begriff der "Orte" bezeichnet Initiativen und Institutionen, Vereine und Verbände, in denen Innovationen entwickelt und Ideen kreiert werden, zum Beispiel öffentliche und private Einrichtungen, Universitäten und Forschungsinstitute, Unternehmen sowie soziale und kulturelle Projekte. Eine 17-köpfige Jury hat die Sieger aus rund 1.500 Bewerbern ausgewählt.
Ausgelobt wird der Wettbewerb von der Initiative "Deutschland – Land der Ideen". Sie ist die gemeinsame Standortinitiative von Bundesregierung und deutscher Wirtschaft, vertreten durch den Bundesverband der Deutschen Industrie (BDI). Schirmherr der Initiative ist Bundespräsident Horst Köhler. Ihr Ziel ist es, ein positives Deutschlandbild im In- und Ausland zu vermitteln und darüber hinaus die Stärken des Wirtschaftsstandortes Deutschland zu betonen.
Die Termine der Vortragsreihe "Wissenschaft für Alle" im ersten Halbjahr 2008:
Die Vorträge finden jeweils im Hörsaal der GSI statt. Der Eintritt ist frei. Mögliche Änderungen und die noch nicht feststehenden Termine für das zweite Halbjahr 2008 erscheinen rechtzeitig unter. Wissenschaft für Alle
]]>Die Behandlung mit Ionenstrahlen ist ein sehr präzises, hochwirksames und gleichzeitig sehr schonendes Therapieverfahren. Ionenstrahlen dringen in den Körper ein und entfalten ihre größte Wirkung erst tief im Gewebe, dort wo sie in einem nur stecknadelkopfgroßen Bereich stecken bleiben. Sie können so gesteuert werden, dass Tumoren bis zur Größe eines Tennisballs Punkt für Punkt millimetergenau bestrahlt werden können. Das umliegende gesunde Gewebe wird weitgehend geschont. Das Verfahren eignet sich vor allem für tiefliegende Tumore in der Nähe von Risikoorganen, wie z.B. dem Sehnerv oder dem Hirnstamm.
Ionen sind elektrisch geladene Atome. Bei der Behandlung an der GSI werden Ionen des Kohlenstoffatoms verwendet. Damit sie ins Tumorgewebe eindringen können, werden sie in den mehreren hundert Meter langen Beschleunigeranlagen der GSI auf sehr hohe Geschwindigkeiten, etwa 50 Prozent der Lichtgeschwindigkeit, gebracht. Die Beschleunigeranlagen müssen dafür vielfach durchlaufen werden, sodass der insgesamt in nur wenigen Sekunden zurückgelegte Weg der Ionen etwa 50.000 Kilometer beträgt, bevor sie in den Tumor geschossen werden.
Die Behandlung an der GSI geschieht unter medizinischer Leitung der Radiologischen Universitätsklinik Heidelberg. In den ersten abgeschlossenen klinischen Studien wurden Patienten mit Tumoren an der Schädelbasis behandelt. Nachfolgende Beobachtungen über fünf Jahre haben gezeigt, dass das Wachstum der bestrahlten Tumore, je nach Art des Tumors, bei 75 bis 90 Prozent der Patienten gestoppt werden konnte. Nur in sehr seltenen Fällen traten behandlungsbedürftige Nebenwirkungen auf. Aufgrund der überzeugenden Ergebnisse ist die Therapie für mehrere Indikationen inzwischen als Heilverfahren anerkannt. In neuen noch nicht abgeschlossenen Studien werden Patienten mit Tumoren an der Wirbelsäule und mit Prostatakrebs behandelt.
In der Regel kommen die Patienten an 20 aufeinander folgenden Tagen zu einer etwa 30-minütigen Behandlung. Dank der geringen Nebenwirkungen kann die Behandlung ambulant durchgeführt werden. Ein stationärer Aufenthalt im Krankenhaus ist nicht nötig.
Im Moment gibt es neben dem Behandlungsplatz an der GSI nur in Japan die Möglichkeit einer Therapie mit Ionenstrahlen. Die präzise punktgenaue Bestrahlung ist dort jedoch nicht möglich. Im Hinblick auf Präzision bei der Bestrahlung und Schonung des gesunden Gewebes ist das bei GSI entwickelte und bei HIT zum Einsatz kommende Bestrahlungsverfahren deutlich überlegen.
Um die neue Methode einer größeren Patientenzahl im klinischen Routine-betrieb zugänglich zu machen, baut die Universitätsklinik Heidelberg unter zentraler Mitwirkung der GSI das Heidelberger-Ionentherapie-Zentrum HIT. Denn die Beschleunigeranlage der GSI, die außerdem für Grundlagenforschung in der Kern- und Atomphysik genutzt wird, ist für einen klinischen Routinebetrieb nicht geeignet, u.a. ist sie überdimensioniert.
HIT ist hingegen eine für die Therapie mit Ionenstrahlen maßgeschneiderte Anlage, die nächstes Jahr in Betrieb genommen wird. HIT wird damit die erste marktreife Anlage für die Therapie mit Ionenstrahlen. Bei Behandlungskosten von etwa 20.000 Euro werden dort über 1000 Patienten pro Jahr behandelt werden.
HIT besteht aus einer kompakten Beschleunigeranlage und drei daran angeschlossenen Behandlungsplätzen, die eine optimale Auslastung der Beschleunigeranlage ermöglichen. Zwei Behandlungsplätze sind direkte Weiterentwicklungen der an der GSI verwendeten Technik. Dort kommen erstmalig kooperierende Roboter zur Positionierung der Patienten und der digitalen Röntgendiagnostik in die klinische Anwendung. Ein dritter Behandlungsplatz ist ebenfalls weltweit einzigartig. Er besitzt ein drehbares Strahlführungssystem für Ionenstrahlen, eine so genannte Gantry, welche aus einem bei der GSI entwickelten Prototypen hervorgegangen ist. Diese erlaubt es, den Ionenstrahl aus jeder beliebigen Richtung in den Körper des Patienten zu lenken, was die Behandlungsmöglichkeiten erheblich erweitert.
Die Anlage des HIT wurde von der GSI maßgeblich entwickelt. Mehr als 40 Patente sind aus diesen Entwicklungen hervorgegangen. Im Rahmen eines Kooperationsvertrags mit der GSI bietet Siemens Medical Solutions Therapieanlagen nach dem Vorbild von HIT schlüsselfertig auf dem Medizinmarkt an. Die erste Anlage am Universitätsklinikum in Gießen und Marburg befindet sich bereits im Bau.
Eine präzise Bestrahlung komplex geformter Tumoren erlaubt das bei GSI entwickelte und erstmals in der Strahlentherapie eingesetzte Rasterscanverfahren. Der Schwerionenstrahl wird mit Hilfe von Magnetfeldern seitlich abgelenkt und die Eindringtiefe über die Energie der Ionen von Puls zu Puls eingestellt. Zur Intensitätsregelung verweilt der Strahl so lange auf jedem Punkt, bis die berechnete Solldosis erreicht ist. Es stellt eine erhebliche Verbesserung im Vergleich zu herkömmlichen Bestrahlungsmethoden dar.
]]>Während des Besuchs konnte sich Storm über die konzeptionelle Ausrichtung des Schülerlabors in Gesprächen mit Jutta Leroudier und Dr. Axel Gruppe informieren. Schülerinnen und Schüler haben bei der GSI die Chance an neun aufeinander abgestimmten Versuchen zu den Themen Radioaktivität und Strahlung einen ganzen Tag zu experimentieren. So konnte Storm Schülerinnen und Schülern des Grundkuses der 13. Klasse der Liebigschule in Frankfurt während des Experimentierens über die Schulter schauen. Ziel des Schülerlabors sei das Heranführen junger Menschen an die Naturwissenschaften mit Möglichkeiten, die in Schulen so nicht zur Verfügung stünden. „Dies ist insbesondere für die naturwissenschaftliche Ausbildung und nachhaltige Nachwuchsförderung gerade in Hinblick auf das am 7. November gestartete FAIR-Projekt von großer Bedeutung“, betonten Stöcker und Storm. Bereits jetzt sei die GSI eine Ausbildungsschmiede für Wissenschaftler und Ingenieure. So seien nahezu 300 Doktoranden in Wixhausen am Forschen.
Die Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung (GSI) in Darmstadt ist ein vom Bund und dem Land Hessen finanziertes Forschungszentrum der Grundlagenforschung. Sie ist Mitglied der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft. Der Bau und Betrieb von Beschleunigeranlagen sowie die Forschung mit schweren Ionen sind Aufgabe der rund 1050 Mitarbeiter. Jährlich kommen über 1.000 Wissenschaftler, denen die GSI ihrer Aufgabe entsprechend, den Zugang zur ihren Forschungsanlagen ermöglicht. Die GSI verfügt über eine hervorragende und weltweit einmalige Beschleunigeranlage für Ionenstrahlen. Das Forschungsprogramm der GSI umfasst ein breites Spektrum, das von Kern- und Atomphysik über die Plasma- und Materialforschung bis hin zur Tumortherapie reicht. Die wohl bekanntesten Resultate sind die Entdeckung von neuen chemischen Elementen und die Entwicklung einer neuartigen Tumortherapie mit Ionenstrahlen. Mit diesen und einer Vielzahl anderer wissenschaftlicher Resultate nimmt die GSI eine international führende Position in der Forschung mit Ionenstrahlen ein. Bis 2015 soll bei GSI das neue internationale Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ionen Research) für die Forschung mit Ionen- und Antiprotonenstrahlen entstehen. Dort erwarten Wissenschaftler Antworten auf grundlegende bisher ungelöste Fragen zum Aufbau der Materie und der Entwicklung des Universums. Weitere Informationen unter: GSI
]]>Herr Kurz war vom 1. April 2005 bis zum 30. November 2007 kaufmännischer Geschäftsführer der GSI. Unter seiner Verantwortung wurden die administrativen Vorrausetzungen für das zukünftige internationale Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR geschaffen. Der Projektstart konnte am 7. November 2007 offiziell gefeiert werden.
Die GSI bedauert den Weggang von Herrn Kurz sehr. Sie dankt ihm für seine hervorragende Arbeit und wünscht ihm für seine neuen Aufgaben in Karlsruhe alles Gute. Für eine Übergangszeit wird Herr Kurz der GSI weiterhin beratend zur Seite stehen.
Der Weggang von Herrn Kurz ist die zweite Veränderung in der Führungsspitze der GSI innerhalb kurzer Zeit. Am 1. August hat Horst Stöcker die Nachfolge von Walter Henning als wissenschaftlicher Geschäftsführer und Vorsitzender des Direktoriums angetreten.
Alexander Kurz, Jahrgang 1961, studierte Rechtswissenschaften in Regensburg und Tübingen. Er promovierte an der Deutschen Hochschule für Verwaltungswissenschaften in Speyer. Von 1989-2000 hatte er verschiedene Positionen am Forschungszentrum Karlruhe inne. Danach wechselte er zum europäischen Kernforschungszentrum CERN nach Genf. Dort war er bis 2005 Leiter der Zentralabteilung Industrielle Dienste. Von 2005 bis 2007 war er kaufmännischer Geschäftsführer der GSI in Darmstadt.
]]>Katarzyna Psonka untersuchte in ihrer Doktorarbeit die Wirkung von Ionenstrahlen auf die DNA-Struktur von Tumorzellen. Dabei untersuchte sie insbesondere Doppelstrangbrüche der DNA, die Voraussetzung zum Absterben eines Tumors sind.
Florian Sommerer beschäftigte sich in seiner Doktorarbeit mit der Weiterentwicklung der so genannten Positronen-Emissions-Tomographie (PET). Mit dem PET-Verfahren lässt sich die Bestrahlung mit Ionenstrahlen messtechnisch überwachen. Es ist wesentlicher Bestandteil der Qualitätskontrolle dieser Therapieform. Das Verfahren basiert auf der Messung von Strahlung von Positronen, die bei der Behandlung mit Ionenstrahlen entstehen.
An der Beschleunigeranlage der GSI werden seit vielen Jahren Patienten mit Tumoren z. B. im Gehirn mit Ionenstrahlen behandelt. Die Heilungsraten liegen bei über 90 Prozent. Die Nebenwirkungen sind, wenn überhaupt, sehr gering.
Weitere Informationen zum Verein zur Förderung der Tumortherapie mit schweren Ionen finden Sie unter: www-alt.gsi.de/informationen/verein-tuthe/
]]>An EMMI werden 18 neue Professuren eingerichtet, insgesamt werden dort um die 100 Forscherinnen und Forscher der Allianz-Partner aus verschiedenen Fachgebieten tätig sein. Unter einem Dach sollen unterschiedliche Kompetenzen gebündelt werden und in interdisziplinärer Zusammenarbeit die Vielfalt der kosmischen Materie, das heißt die unterschiedlichen Erscheinungsformen von Materie unter extremen Bedingungen von Temperatur und Druck ergründet werden. Dabei werden auch wichtige Ergebnisse zur Theorie und für die Planung der Experimente an der zukünftigen Anlage FAIR erwartet. Das Institut soll weltweit führend auf seinem Gebiet werden.
EMMI ist eine von vier bewilligten Allianzen, die unter mehr als 30 Anträgen ausgewählt wurden. Sie verbindet zwölf Partnerinstitutionen, die zusammen weitere 54 Millionen Euro für die Allianz aufbringen. Die Partner sind neben der GSI, die TU Darmstadt, die Universitäten Frankfurt, Heidelberg und Münster, das Max-Planck-Institut für Kernphysik in Heidelberg, das FIAS Frankfurt, das Forschungszentrum Jülich, die Universität Paris VI (Frankreich), die Universität Tokio/RIKEN (Japan), das Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (USA) und das Joint Institute for Nuclear Astrophysics (USA). Als assoziierte Partner wurden weltweit führende Wissenschaftler gewonnen, darunter die Physik-Nobelpreisträger Frank Wilczek (2004) und Wolfgang Ketterle (2001). Sprecher der Allianz sind die GSI-Wissenschaftler Professor Peter Braun-Munzinger und Professor Karlheinz Langanke.
]]>Researchers working at FAIR will have an opportunity to carry out new experiments to investigate matter and the nature of the universe. "FAIR will bring the physics of the universe into the laboratory. This new international accelerator facility will offer researchers from around the world the possibility to explore new dimensions of matter, including antimatter and hot stellar matter," said Horst Stöcker, Scientific Director of GSI.
Researchers working at FAIR will therefore have an opportunity to investigate antimatter with a view to solving the mystery as to why the universe is almost completely devoid of antimatter, except for minuscule traces, whereas matter itself is "privileged" and constitutes everything else, including our bodies and the world around us.
Researchers at the forthcoming facility will also be able to investigate how stars explode and which processes are involved. According to our present understanding of the universe the chemical elements came into being as a result of powerful stellar explosions — and continue to be formed in this way. This means that in the final analysis all matter, including ourselves, consists of stardust — the remains of exploded stars.
Researchers working at FAIR will also be hoping to discover new forms of matter and thus track down the mystery of dark matter in the universe. Although dark matter makes up more than 90 percent of the matter of the universe, scientists have still not succeeded in observing it directly.
FAIR — the abbreviation stands for "Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research" — will feature an accelerator capable of generating antiproton and ion beams of an unparalleled intensity and quality. At the heart of the facility is a double-ring accelerator, 1,100 meters in circumference. Connected to this is a complex system of storage rings and experimental stations. The current GSI accelerators will serve as preaccelerators for the new facility.
GSI first submitted the proposal for FAIR back in 2001. This was produced in cooperation with 700 scientists from universities and research institutes in Germany and abroad. The Scientific Council assessed the project on behalf of Germany’s Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and recommended that it should receive funding. In 2003 the BMBF gave the go-ahead under the condition that at least 25 percent of the costs come from international partners.
In the period since 2003 much progress has been made in completing the scientific, technological, and political groundwork for the international accelerator project FAIR. During the preparatory phase, when over 2,500 scientists from Germany and abroad were already working on the development and planning of the new accelerator and experimental facilities, the partner countries were integrated in the FAIR project via a memorandum of understanding.
These international preparations have now led to a communiqué concerning the joint construction of FAIR, which was signed on November 7, 2007. The total costs for the construction of FAIR will amount to €1.2 billion. Germany, the State of Hesse, and the remaining 14 partner countries have initially agreed to release funding of €940 million for the start phase, with Germany bearing 65 percent of those costs, the State of Hesse 10 percent, and the partner countries jointly 25 percent. The partner countries are China, Germany (incl. the State of Hesse), Finland, France, Georgia, UK, India, Italy, Austria, Poland, Rumania, Russia, Sweden, Slovenia, and Spain. As a result the project can now get underway and construction should be completed on schedule. Construction work is due to start in the winter of 2008/09, with the project to be completed by 2015/16.
]]>Conducted in the context of the symposium, the festive event was attended by government dignitaries, including among others Andreas Storm, Parliamentary State Secretary of the Federal Ministry of Education and Research, and Ralph Alexander Lorz, State Secretary of Higher Education, Research and the Arts of Hesse. They paid tribute to Henning’s achievements and promised Stöcker continuing support for the future of GSI and the planned new FAIR accelerator facility.
"Implementing FAIR, the international Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research, at GSI is one of my most important tasks," noted Horst Stöcker. His predecessor Walter Henning played a key role in getting FAIR off the ground — from the generation of the original concept to obtaining expert opinions and securing pledges of financial support from the Federal Ministry of Education and Research, the federal state of Hesse, and the Helmholtz Association of German Research Centers. The negotiations he initiated are currently under way regarding the participation of foreign partners in FAIR.
Horst Stöcker conducts research as the Judah M. Eisenberg Professor Laureate for Theoretical Physics at Johann Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt and at FIAS, the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies. Hundreds of his frequently cited scientific papers in international technical publications relate directly to heavy ion research at GSI and FAIR.
Walter F. Henning is joining the scientific staff at the U.S. Department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory to head up Argonne's efforts to build a proposed exotic beam facility for nuclear physics research.
]]>Die Teilnehmer des Sommer-Studenten-Programms studieren zum Großteil Physik oder aber benachbarte naturwissenschaftlich-technische Studiengänge. Die Studenten, die bereits ihre Vorprüfungen abgeschlossen haben und sich im Hauptstudium befinden, bekommen eine gute Orientierungshilfe auf ihrer Suche nach einem Fachgebiet und möglichen Studien- oder Diplomarbeiten. Die GSI erhofft sich, Nachwuchs für die Forschung an der bestehenden Beschleunigeranlage und an der zukünftigen Beschleunigeranlage FAIR zu gewinnen, die in internationaler Zusammenarbeit in den nächsten Jahren an der GSI entstehen wird. Etwa 50 Teilnehmer aus den letzten fünf Jahren, das heißt etwa jeder vierte, haben sich anschließend für eine Diplom- oder Doktorarbeit an der GSI oder an ihren Heimatinstituten im Rahmen von Kooperationen mit GSI-Projekten entschieden. Etliche Teilnehmer an früheren Programmen haben inzwischen ihre berufliche Karriere in der Wissenschaft eingeschlagen, bis hin zum Physik-Professor.
Die Teilnehmer am Sommer-Studenten-Programm werden für ihren achtwöchigen Aufenthalt möglichst ihren Wünschen entsprechend auf die verschiedenen Forschungsgruppen an der GSI verteilt. Dort werden sie individuell betreut und können überschaubare Forschungsarbeiten selbstständig durchführen. Das ist zum Beispiel die unmittelbare Teilnahme an Experimenten mit dem Beschleuniger, die Computer-Auswertung von Messdaten, die Eichung von Messgeräten im Labor oder Berechnungen für die Planung und Auslegung von zukünftigen Experimentaufbauten an FAIR. Begleitend zu ihren Arbeiten erhalten sie ein vollständiges Vorlesungsprogramm über die vielfältigen Forschungsgebiete und die Beschleunigerentwicklung an der GSI und für FAIR. Ihre Forschungsarbeiten müssen sie am Ende des Programms in einer Abschlussarbeit präsentieren.
Neben der Forschungstätigkeit bietet das Programm den Studenten die Möglichkeit, untereinander internationale Kontakte zu knüpfen und sich mit anderen gleich gesinnten Studenten auszutauschen. Dies wird unter anderem dadurch gefördert, dass die Studenten gemeinsam in den Gästeunterkünften der GSI untergebracht sind und dass an den Wochenenden gemeinsame Freizeitaktivitäten geplant werden.
Das Sommer-Studenten-Programm der GSI war eines der ersten seiner Art. Dem Beispiel der GSI sind viele gefolgt, inzwischen bieten fast alle Großlabors in Europa ähnliche Programme in den Sommer-Semesterferien an.
Weitere Infos über das Studentenprogramm befinden sich unter Summer Student Program. Dort erscheinen schon demnächst die Bewerbungsinformationen für das nächste Programm im Sommer 2008.
Die am aktuellen Programm teilnehmenden Studenten sind noch bis zum Freitag, den 28. September 2007 an der GSI. Sie haben den Großteil ihrer Arbeit schon hinter sich und verfassen im Moment ihre Abschlussberichte und -präsentationen.
Wenn Sie Interesse an einer weitergehenden Berichterstattung haben, können wir gerne Kontakt zu den Studenten für Interviews und Fotos am Arbeitsplatz herstellen.
Firmenprofil
Die Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung (GSI) in Darmstadt ist ein vom Bund und dem Land Hessen finanziertes Forschungszentrum der Grundlagenforschung. Sie ist Mitglied der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft. Der Bau und Betrieb von Beschleunigeranlagen sowie die Forschung mit schweren Ionen sind Aufgabe der rund 1050 Mitarbeiter. Jährlich kommen über 1.000 Wissenschaftler, denen die GSI ihrer Aufgabe entsprechend, den Zugang zur ihren Forschungsanlagen ermöglicht. Die GSI verfügt über eine hervorragende und weltweit einmalige Beschleunigeranlage für Ionenstrahlen. Das Forschungsprogramm der GSI umfasst ein breites Spektrum, das von Kern- und Atomphysik über die Plasma- und Materialforschung bis hin zur Tumortherapie reicht. Die wohl bekanntesten Resultate sind die Entdeckung von neuen chemischen Elementen und die Entwicklung einer neuartigen Tumortherapie mit Ionenstrahlen. Mit diesen und einer Vielzahl anderer wissenschaftlicher Resultate nimmt die GSI eine international führende Position in der Forschung mit Ionenstrahlen ein. Bis 2015 soll bei GSI das neue internationale Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ionen Research) für die Forschung mit Ionen- und Antiprotonenstrahlen entstehen. Dort erwarten Wissenschaftler Antworten auf grundlegende bisher ungelöste Fragen zum Aufbau der Materie und der Entwicklung des Universums. Weitere Informationen unte: GSI
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Die beiden Forscher entwickelten neuartige Methoden zur Bestrahlungsplanung und -überwachung für die Tumortherapie mit Ionenstrahlen. Vorteil dieser neuen Behandlungsmethode ist die gezielte Wirkung der Ionenstrahlung in der Tiefe des Körpers und somit direkt im Tumor. Umliegendes gesundes Gewebe wird so weitestgehend geschont.
Über 350 Patienten mit Tumoren im Kopf- und Halsbereich wurden bisher an der Beschleunigeranlage der GSI behandelt. Die Heilungsraten sind sehr hoch. Sie liegen – je nach Art des Tumors – zwischen 75 und 90 Prozent.
Dr. Dieter Schardt hat die physikalischen Prozesse beim Eindringen des Ionenstrahls in den Körper des Patienten und ins Tumorgewebe untersucht. Seine präzisen Messungen bilden die Grundlage für die Bestrahlungsplanung bei der Tumortherapie mit Ionen. Professor Wolfgang Enghardt entwickelte ein neuartiges Verfahren zur Überwachung der Eindringtiefe der Ionen mit Hilfe der Positronen-Emissions-Tomographie.
Der Preis ist mit 5.000 Euro dotiert. Er wird von der IBA Group gestiftet und alle zwei Jahre durch die European Physical Society (EPS) verliehen.
Firmenprofil
Die Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung (GSI) in Darmstadt ist ein vom Bund und dem Land Hessen finanziertes Forschungszentrum der Grundlagenforschung. Sie ist Mitglied der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft. Der Bau und Betrieb von Beschleunigeranlagen sowie die Forschung mit schweren Ionen sind Aufgabe der rund 1050 Mitarbeiter. Jährlich kommen über 1.000 Wissenschaftler, denen die GSI ihrer Aufgabe entsprechend den Zugang zur ihren Forschungsanlagen ermöglicht. Die GSI verfügt über eine hervorragende und weltweit einmalige Beschleunigeranlage für Ionenstrahlen. Das Forschungsprogramm der GSI umfasst ein breites Spektrum, das von Kern- und Atomphysik über die Plasma- und Materialforschung bis hin zur Tumortherapie reicht. Die wohl bekanntesten Resultate sind die Entdeckung von neuen chemischen Elementen und die Entwicklung einer neuartigen Tumortherapie mit Ionenstrahlen. Mit diesen und einer Vielzahl anderer wissenschaftlicher Resultate nimmt die GSI eine international führende Position in der Forschung mit Ionenstrahlen ein. Bis 2015 soll bei GSI das neue internationale Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR für die Forschung mit Ionen- und Antiprotonenstrahlen entstehen. Dort erwarten Wissenschaftler Antworten auf grundlegende bisher ungelöste Fragen zum Aufbau der Materie und der Entwicklung des Universums. Weitere Informationen unter: GSI
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Ein internationales Forscherteam um Professor Sigurd Hofmann hatte das Element 111 im Jahr 1994 erstmals nachgewiesen. Damals wurden in Experimenten an der Beschleunigeranlage der GSI drei einzelne Atome des neuen Elements beobachtet. In weiteren Experimenten an der GSI und im Beschleunigerlabor RIKEN in Japan konnten seitdem weitere Atome des Elements 111 nachgewiesen werden, die die Entdeckung zweifelsfrei bestätigten.
Daraufhin hat der internationale Chemikerverband IUPAC* im Jahr 2003 das Element 111 offiziell anerkannt und die GSI als Erstentdecker aufgefordert einen Namensvorschlag zu machen. Im Jahr 2004 wurde der Name Roentgenium mit dem chemischen Symbol Rg akzeptiert. Heute, fast auf den Tag genau 111 Jahre nach der Entdeckung der Röntgenstrahlen, wurde das Element 111 auf den Namen Roentgenium getauft. Roentgenium ist zurzeit das schwerste offiziell anerkannte chemische Element. Es ist 272-mal schwerer als Wasserstoff.
Das neue Element wurde von Bundesministerin Annette Schavan getauft. "Mit dieser wissenschaftlichen Leistung hat die GSI erneut und eindrucksvoll ihre internationale Spitzenstellung im Bereich der physikalischen Grundlagenforschung unter Beweis gestellt", sagte Schavan zur Entdeckung des Elements 111.
Die Taufe des neuen Elements vollzog Ministerin Schavan, indem sie Roentgenium, symbolisiert durch einen Würfel mit der Aufschrift Rg, an die noch vakante 111. Stelle in ein großes - als Hintergrund aufgebautes - Periodensystem der Elemente einsetzte. Musikalisch eingestimmt wurden die Besucher durch das Lied "The Elements" gesungen von Tom Lehrer nach einer Musik von Sir Arthur Sullivan. In dem Lied werden in schneller Abfolge die Namen der über hundert chemischen Elemente vorgetragen. Zeitgleich dazu lief ein Trickfilm ab, in dem sich passend zum Text - Element für Element - das Periodensystem aufbaute.
Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen, der Namensgeber für das neue Element, entdeckte die nach ihm benannten Strahlen im November 1895 an der Universität Würzburg. Er erhielt dafür 1901 den ersten Nobelpreis für Physik überhaupt. Wie wir heute wissen, entstehen Röntgenstrahlen durch atomare Prozesse. Ihre Entdeckung markiert den Beginn der Erforschung der atomaren Struktur unserer Materie.
Die Struktur der Materie erforschen, diesem Ziel haben sich über tausend Forscher aus aller Welt verpflichtet, die jährlich an der Beschleunigeranlage für Ionenstrahlen an der GSI experimentieren. Die Entdeckung und Untersuchung neuer Elemente ist dabei nur ein, gleichwohl bedeutendes Forschungsfeld im wissenschaftlichen Programm der GSI.
Um das Element 111 herzustellen, müssen die Forscher einen Atomkern erzeugen, der aus 111 Protonen besteht. Denn aus der Anzahl der Protonen ergibt sich die Elementnummer, die so genannte Ordnungszahl. Deshalb verwendeten die Forscher bei der GSI die zwei Elemente Nickel und Bismut (früher: Wismut), die zusammen genommen 111 Protonen besitzen. Mit dem 120 Meter langen Ionenbeschleuniger der GSI beschleunigten sie elektrisch geladene Nickel-Atome, kurz Nickel-Ionen, auf hohe Geschwindigkeiten, etwa 30.000 Kilometer pro Sekunde. Die Nickel-Ionen schossen sie auf eine dünne Folie aus Bismut. Durch die hohe Geschwindigkeit wird die Abstoßung zwischen den Atomkernen der beiden Elemente überwunden und sie können zu einem Atom des Elements 111 verschmelzen. Dies geschieht allerdings extrem selten. Es entsteht im Mittel nur ein Atom Roentgenium in einer knappen Woche. Insgesamt konnte die GSI bisher sechs Atome des Elements Roentgenium herstellen.
Roentgenium ist nicht stabil. Es zerfällt nach wenigen tausendstel Sekunden und wandelt sich über radioaktiven Zerfall in mehreren Stufen in andere leichtere Elemente um. Dabei sendet es jeweils ein Alpha-Teilchen aus. Mit einem empfindlichen Nachweis-Detektorsystem können die Forscher diese ausgesandten Alpha-Teilchen exakt vermessen und erst somit das neue Element eindeutig identifizieren.
Die Wissenschaftler an der GSI möchten herausfinden, welches das schwerste Element überhaupt ist und wo das Periodensystem endet. So können sie grundlegende Erkenntnisse über den Aufbau der Materie und die Entstehung des Lebens gewinnen.
Die chemischen Elemente sind die Bausteine aller Stoffe und die Grundlage für unser Leben. Im Universum begann die Entstehung der chemischen Elemente vor über zehn Milliarden Jahren. Sie vollzieht sich seither im Inneren von Sternen und in gewaltigen Sternexplosionen. So verdanken auch wir Menschen unsere Existenz den Elementen, die in früheren Generationen von Sternen geschaffen wurden. Denn wie alle Materie um uns herum, so stammt auch jedes Atom unseres eigenen Körpers aus Sternenstaub und wurde in früheren Sterngenerationen geschaffen.
*IUPAC: International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry: www.iupac.org
Taufe des Elements 111 - Roentgenium
Freitag, den 17. November 2006
Besichtigung des Beschleunigerrings u.a.
Ministerin, Geschäftsführer GSI und Presse
Begrüßung
Grußansprache
Annette Schavan, Bundesministerin für Bildung und Forschung
Grußwort
Jochen Partsch, Stadtrat der Wissenschaftsstadt Darmstadt
Taufe des Elements Roentgenium
Musikalisches und filmisches Zwischenspiel zum Periodensystem "The Elements"
Element-Taufe durch Annette Schavan
Festvorträge
Das neue Element 111
Sigurd Hofmann, Leiter des Schwere Elemente Programms der GSI
Röntgens Ingenium „Ich dachte nicht, ich untersuchte!“
Albrecht Fölsing, Röntgen-Biograph
anschließend Empfang im Foyer der GSI
Die Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung (GSI) in Darmstadt ist ein vom Bund und dem Land Hessen finanziertes Forschungszentrum der Grundlagenforschung. Sie ist Mitglied der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft. Der Bau und Betrieb von Beschleunigeranlagen sowie die Forschung mit schweren Ionen sind Aufgabe der rund 1050 Mitarbeiter. Jährlich kommen über 1.000 Wissenschaftler, denen die GSI ihrer Aufgabe entsprechend, den Zugang zur ihren Forschungsanlagen ermöglicht. Die GSI verfügt über eine hervorragende und weltweit einmalige Beschleunigeranlage für Ionenstrahlen. Das Forschungsprogramm der GSI umfasst ein breites Spektrum, das von Kern- und Atomphysik über die Plasma- und Materialforschung bis hin zur Tumortherapie reicht. Die wohl bekanntesten Resultate sind die Entdeckung von neuen chemischen Elementen und die Entwicklung einer neuartigen Tumortherapie mit Ionenstrahlen. Mit diesen und einer Vielzahl anderer wissenschaftlicher Resultate nimmt die GSI eine international führende Position in der Forschung mit Ionenstrahlen ein. Bis 2015 soll bei GSI das neue internationale Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR für die Forschung mit Ionen- und Antiprotonenstrahlen entstehen. Dort erwarten Wissenschaftler Antworten auf grundlegende bisher ungelöste Fragen zum Aufbau der Materie und der Entwicklung des Universums. Weitere Informationen unter: www-dev.gsi.de
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Die Besucher sind eingeladen auf drei verschiedenen Rundgängen - den "Entdeckungsreisen" Alpha, Beta und Gamma - die GSI zu erkunden. Zu sehen sind z.B. der Linearbeschleuniger, einer der beiden Beschleunigerringe sowie der Hauptkontrollraum. Viele Experimentierplätze, darunter alle Großexperimente und der Experimentierplatz, an dem sechs neue Elemente – unter anderem Darmstadtium – entdeckt wurden, können ebenfalls besichtigt werden.
Darüber hinaus können sich die Besucher über die zwei großen Beschleunigeranlagen informieren, die unter maßgeblicher Beteiligung der GSI geplant und gebaut werden.
Dies ist zum einen HIT, eine speziell für die Krebstherapie mit Ionenstrahlen ausgelegte Beschleunigeranlage. Sie befindet sich zurzeit am Universitätsklinikum Heidelberg im Bau. Dort wird ab dem nächsten Jahr die an der GSI entwickelte Therapieform im Routinebetrieb möglich sein, um eine breite Patientenversorgung zu gewährleisten.
Zum anderen ist dies das große internationale Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR. Eine Anlage für die Grundlagenforschung – eines der größten Forschungsprojekte Europas –, die bis 2015 an der GSI entstehen wird. Zu den Vorhaben gibt es ein Informationsforum, auf dem sich die Besucher über den aktuellen Stand informieren können. Ein Modell von FAIR im Maßstab 1:500 wird dort erstmals der Öffentlichkeit präsentiert.
An insgesamt über 20 Stationen bieten GSI-Forscher und -Mitarbeiter Führungen an und stehen den Besuchern für Fragen und Diskussionen zur Verfügung. Zusätzlich zu den Besichtigungen bieten GSI-Forscher Vorträge über zentrale Themen der GSI an: das geplante Forschungszentrum FAIR, die Erforschung neuer Elemente und Atome, die Krebstherapie mit Ionenstrahlen und neueste Entwicklungen in der Informationstechnologie.
Die Besucher können an einem Wissens-Quiz mit attraktiven Preisen teilnehmen. Der erste Preis ist ein Rundflug über die GSI, die weiteren Preise sind GSI-Fanartikel aus dem für den Tag der offenen Tür neu eröffneten GSI-Shop. Für das leibliche Wohl wird im Festzelt "Zum schnellen Ioni" und an der Cafebar "Quark-Teilchen" gesorgt.
Der Tag der offenen Tür findet am Sonntag, den 10. September 2006 von 10 17 Uhr statt. Die GSI liegt in der Planckstraße 1 in 64291 Darmstadt-Wixhausen. Alle Informationen über den Tag der offenen Tür inklusive einer ausführlichen Anfahrtsbeschreibung befinden sich im Internet unter: www-dev.gsi.de/tdot
Die GSI betreibt eine große, weltweit einmalige Beschleunigeranlage für Ionenstrahlen. Forscher aus aller Welt nutzen die Anlage für Experimente, durch die sie neue und faszinierende Entdeckungen in der Grundlagenforschung machen. Darüber hinaus entwickeln sie immer wieder neue und eindrucksvolle Anwendungen. Die wohl bekanntesten Resultate sind die Entdeckung von sechs neuen chemischen Elementen, darunter das Darmstadtium, und die Entwicklung einer neuartigen Tumortherapie mit Ionenstrahlen. In den nächsten Jahren wird an der GSI das neue internationale Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR entstehen, eines der größten Forschungsprojekte Europas. An ihm wird eine nie dagewesene Vielfalt an Experimenten möglich sein, durch die Physiker neue Einblicke in die Struktur der Materie und die Evolution des Universums erwarten.
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Zentrale Aufgabe des zukünftigen Beschleunigerzentrums FAIR ist es, Teilchenstrahlen mit bisher unerreichter Intensität zu liefern. Die Intensität eines Teilchenstrahls ergibt sich aus der Anzahl beschleunigter Teilchen pro Zeiteinheit (z.B.: pro Sekunde). Grundvoraussetzung, um höchste Strahlintensitäten mit FAIR zu erreichen, ist das Umstellen der existierenden GSI Beschleuniger in einen neuen Betriebsmodus, in dem sie in Zukunft als Vorbeschleuniger für FAIR eingesetzt werden.
Aufgrund der erfolgreichen Tests während der letzten Betriebsperiode wird es nun möglich sein, Ionenstrahlen mit einer Taktrate von 1 Hertz (Hz) zu erzeugen. Das heißt, einmal pro Sekunde kann ein Teilchenpaket, bestehend aus etwa 4 Milliarden Teilchen, beschleunigt und zu Experimentierstationen geliefert werden. Dies bedeutet eine Intensitätserhöhung um mehr als den Faktor 3 im Vergleich zu der bisher möglichen Taktrate von 0,3 Hz (bzw. einem Teilchenpaket in etwas mehr als 3 Sekunden).
Im endgültigen Betriebsmodus als Vorbeschleuniger für FAIR müssen Teilchenpakete aus 200 Milliarden Teilchen mit einer Taktrate von bis zu 4 Hz beschleunigt werden. Dieser Schritt ist für 2010 geplant. Bis dahin müssen weitere Ein- und Umbauten am Netzanschluss und Beschleuniger vorgenommen werden.
Die vorhandene Beschleunigeranlage der GSI besteht in der letzten Stufe aus einem Ringbeschleuniger des Typs Synchrotron. Nur mit dem neuen Netzanschluss ist es möglich, das Synchrotron letztlich in dem Betriebsmodus mit erhöhter Taktrate zu fahren. Dies liegt daran, dass das Synchrotron u.a. mit Elektromagneten betrieben wird. Diese Magnete können Magnetfeldstärken von bis zu 1,8 Tesla (T) erreichen. Zum Vergleich: Ein herkömmlicher Permanentmagnet, der z.B. für Magnettafeln benutzt wird, hat eine Magnetfeldstärke von nur einigen tausendstel Tesla (mT). Wenn die Elektromagnete des Synchrotrons mehrfach pro Sekunde hoch und runter gefahren werden, bedeutet dies innerhalb kürzester Zeit eine starke elektrische Leistungsaufnahme beim Hochfahren und einen großen Leistungsrückfluss beim Runterfahren. Der neue Netzanschluss stellt sicher, dass diese Anforderungen erfüllt werden, und verhindert gleichzeitig Rückwirkungen auf das öffentliche Stromnetz.
Die anvisierten hohen Strahlintensitäten von FAIR sollen es ermöglichen, neue Phänomene und Effekte in den Naturgesetzen zu finden. Denn je höher die Strahlintensität, desto größer wird die Wahrscheinlichkeit, dass ein unbekanntes Phänomen auftritt bzw. ein kleiner Effekt zu beobachten ist. Forscher aus aller Welt erwarten dadurch neue Erkenntnisse im Aufbau der Materie und der Evolution des Universums.
Mit dem Bau des neuen Netzanschlusses an der HSE-Umspannanlage Leonhardstanne wurde im November 2004 begonnen. Er konnte planmäßig nach gut eineinhalb Jahren Bauzeit in Betrieb genommen werden. Die Auslegung des Netzanschlusses ist so konzipiert, dass er für den späteren Betrieb von FAIR geeignet ist. Die Konzeption, Planung und Ausführung des Netzanschlusses wurden gemeinsam von HSE (HEAG Südhessische Energie AG), RWE Power AG und RWE Transportnetz Strom in Zusammenarbeit mit der GSI durchgeführt. Die Maßnahmen wurden durch umfangreiche Berechnungen der Universität Dortmund unterstützt.
]]>Ziel des Schülerlabors ist es, einerseits als außerschulischer Lernort die Möglichkeit des naturwissenschaftlichen Unterrichts auf einem Gebiet zu erweitern, für das in der Regel keine vergleichbaren Angebote an Schulen existieren. Dies liegt am hohen technischen Aufwand und auch an den hohen Kosten für die notwendigen experimentellen Einrichtungen. Andererseits sollen die Schüler in moderne Experimentiermethoden der Kern- und Elementarteilchenphysik eingeführt werden. Die GSI erhofft sich damit, das Interesse der Schüler an experimenteller Forschung, wie sie an der GSI betrieben wird, nachhaltig zu steigern und somit den naturwissenschaftlichen Nachwuchs zu fördern. Dies ist besonders im Hinblick auf das zukünftige internationale Beschleunigerzentrum FAIR, das in den nächsten Jahren an der GSI entstehen wird, von großer Bedeutung.
Das Schülerlabor hat während der hessischen Schulzeiten zweimal in der Woche immer dienstags und donnerstags geöffnet. Die Schulklassen werden von GSI-Mitarbeitern und von zwei Lehrkräften betreut, die jeweils mit ihrem halben Lehrdeputat vom Hessischen Kultusministerium freigestellt sind, die andere Hälfte weiterhin in ihren Schulen unterrichten: Dr. Axel Gruppe vom Lessing-Gymnasium in Frankfurt und Torsten Gürges von der Heinrich-Heine-Schule in Sprendlingen.
Das Schülerlabor richtet sich, abgestuft in verschiedenen Schwierigkeitsgraden, an Schulklassen der Gymnasialen Oberstufe und der 10. Klasse an Gymnasium und Realschule. Die angebotenen Versuche und die damit verbundenen Aufgabenstellungen sind mit dem Lehrplan für hessische Schulen abgestimmt. Der Besuch des Schülerlabors kann und soll somit in den Schulunterricht eingebettet werden, indem die Vor- und Nachbereitungen im Schulunterricht vorgenommen werden. Jeder Besuchstag im Schülerlabor ist mit einer Besichtigung der GSI-Beschleuniger- und Forschungsanlagen verbunden. Dort sehen die Schüler die Messtechniken, mit denen sie selbst experimentiert haben, im großen Maßstab im Einsatz für die Grundlagenforschung wieder.
"Der Tag im Schülerlabor erzielt den gleichen Lernerfolg wie fünf Wochen Unterricht“, sagte Herr Eisfeld, Physik-Lehrer der Lahntalschule in Lahnau einige Wochen nach seinem Besuch mit seiner 10ten Klasse.
Neben dem Angebot für Schulklassen wird das Schülerlabor für Lehrerfortbildungen genutzt. Diese sind über das Institut für Qualitätsentwicklung (IQ) des Hessischen Kultusministeriums als offiziell akkreditierte Lehrerfortbildungen anerkannt. Außerhalb der regulären Besuchszeiten wird das Schülerlabor von Schülerpraktikanten und im Rahmen von Sonderveranstaltungen wie Girls' day oder Mädchen-Schnuppertage genutzt.
Das Angebot des Schülerlabors wird im nächsten Schuljahr um einen Versuch zur so genannten Rutherford-Streuung erweitert. Dies ist die Grundlage von Experimenten an Beschleunigern zur Untersuchung des Aufbaus der Materie.
Das Schülerlabor der GSI ist eines der Schülerlabore der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft Deutscher Forschungszentren. Es wurde von der Hessischen Kultusministerin Karin Wolff am 27. September 2004 eröffnet. Bisher betragen die Kosten für das Schülerlabor etwa 500.000 Euro. Es wurde aus Mitteln des so genannten Impuls-Fonds der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft mit 380.000 Euro gefördert.
Weitere Informationen über das Schülerlabor wie die Experimente, das pädagogische Konzept, Anmeldungsmöglichkeiten usw. befinden sich unter: Schülerlabor der GSI
]]>Der beschlossene Bebauungsplan für FAIR umfasst eine Fläche von 68 ha östlich der bestehenden GSI in Darmstadt-Wixhausen. Die darin vorgesehene bebaubare Fläche beträgt 11,7 ha. Während der Bauphase werden zwischenzeitlich bis zu 20,85 ha Wald gerodet. Davon werden anschließend 15,5 ha auf dem Gelände selbst wieder aufgeforstet werden. Für die verbliebenen 5,35 ha sind Ersatzaufforstungen außerhalb des Geländes schon festgelegt und genehmigt. Bestandteil des Kompensationskonzeptes sind neben den Ersatzaufforstungen vor allem Maßnahmen zur ökologischen Aufwertung von bestehenden Wald- und Grünflächen sowie Dach- und Fassadenbegrünung der FAIR-Gebäude.
Die Kosten für die Errichtung von FAIR betragen etwa eine Milliarde Euro. Das BMBF hat Ende Februar beschlossen, seinen Anteil von 65 Prozent im Bundeshaushalt sicherzustellen (Pressemitteilung des BMBF vom 22.2.06 / Nr.29). Neben dem Land Hessen, das 10 Prozent übernehmen wird, verhandeln zurzeit elf weitere Länder über ihren finanziellen Anteil an FAIR. Die Verhandlungen sollen dieses Jahr abgeschlossen werden.
Die Partnerländer werden ihren Finanzierungsbeitrag auf Basis detaillierter technischer Spezifikationen für den Bau festlegen können. Die GSI erarbeitet zurzeit den "FAIR Baseline Technical Report". Er beinhaltet sowohl die Spezifikationen für den Bau der Beschleunigeranlage und der Experimentaufbauten als auch für den Bau der Gebäude. Der Report wird in den nächsten Wochen fertig gestellt werden.
FAIR ist eine Beschleunigeranlage für die Forschung mit Antiprotonen- und Ionenstrahlen. Herzstück ist ein Doppelringbeschleuniger mit 1100 Metern Umfang. An diesen schließt sich ein komplexes System von Speicherringen und Experimentierstationen an. Die bereits existierenden GSI-Beschleuniger dienen dabei als Vorbeschleuniger. FAIR wird Ionen- und Antiprotonenstrahlen in bisher unerreichter Intensität und Qualität liefern. Damit werden neue Experimente möglich, die unser Verständnis von der Entwicklung des Universums und dem Aufbau der Materie weiter voranbringen. Die Kosten zur Errichtung von FAIR betragen etwa eine Milliarde Euro. FAIR wird rund 2.500 Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftlern aus dem In- und Ausland einzigartige Forschungsmöglichkeiten bieten
Zum Besuchsprogramm gehörte auch die Besichtigung des Behandlungsplatzes zur Krebstherapie mit Ionenstrahlen, die an der GSI entwickelt wurde und seit einigen Jahren erfolgreich eingesetzt wird. Für diese neue Form der Krebstherapie hat die GSI inzwischen eine maßgeschneiderte Beschleunigeranlage für den klinischen Routinebetrieb entwickelt. Die Rhön-Klinikum AG, seit kurzem Betreiber des Universitätsklinikums Gießen und Marburg, wird bis 2012 die erste derartige Anlage in Hessen und eine der ersten weltweit errichten.
FAIR ist ein Beschleunigerkomplex, dessen Herzstück ein großer Doppelringbeschleuniger mit 1100 Metern Umfang ist. An diesen schließt sich ein komplexes System von Speicherringen und Experimentierstationen an. Die bereits existierenden GSI-Beschleuniger dienen dabei als Vorbeschleuniger. FAIR wird Ionen- und Antiprotonenstrahlen in bisher unerreichter Intensität und Qualität liefern. Damit werden neue Experimente möglich, die unser Verständnis von der Entwicklung des Universums und dem Aufbau der Materie weiter voranbringen. Die Kosten zur Errichtung von FAIR betragen etwa eine Milliarde Euro. FAIR wird rund 2.500 Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftlern aus dem In- und Ausland einzigartige Forschungsmöglichkeiten bieten.
]]>"Diese Bundesregierung wird so viel für Forschung und Entwicklung tun wie keine Bundesregierung vor ihr“, sagte Storm. Um 6 Milliarden Euro will die Bundesregierung ihre Ausgaben für Forschung und Entwicklung in dieser Legislaturperiode steigern, kündigte der Staatssekretär an. Das Geld sollte vor allem für zukunftsträchtige Technologien ausgegeben werden.
"Die Bundesregierung wird den Bau der beschlossenen Großgeräte, wie zum Beispiel FAIR bei der GSI in Darmstadt, auf eine sichere finanzielle Basis stellen", bekräftigte Storm.
FAIR (Facility for Antiproton and Ion Research) ist eine Anlage für die Forschung mit Strahlen von Antiprotonen und Ionen. Die Kosten zur Errichtung der Anlage betragen etwa eine Milliarde Euro. Das Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung hat nach einer Begutachtung durch den Wissenschaftsrat im Jahr 2003 eine Förderung unter der Voraussetzung zugesagt, dass mindestens 25 Prozent von europäischen Partnern beigetragen werden.
Bis jetzt haben zwölf Länder ein "Memorandum of Understanding" unterzeichnet und ihre Absicht erklärt, gemeinsam die Anlage FAIR an der GSI in Darmstadt zu bauen und zu betreiben: China, Deutschland, Finnland, Frankreich, Griechenland, Großbritannien, Indien, Italien, Polen, Russland, Schweden und Spanien.
Der Wissenschaftliche Geschäftsführer der GSI, Professor Dr. Walter F. Henning, zeigte sich erfreut über die Zusage des Ministeriums. "Wir sehen dies als Verpflichtung an, die in uns gestellten Erwartungen zu erfüllen. Mit FAIR wollen wir eine internationale Spitzenstellung in der Forschung mit Ionen- und Antiprotonenstrahlen auf Jahrzehnte hinaus einnehmen. Für unsere Erkenntnis vom Aufbau der Materie und der Entwicklung des Universums erwarten wir mit FAIR entscheidende Fortschritte. Hunderten Diplomanden und Doktoranden wollen wir an FAIR exzellente Ausbildungsmöglichkeiten bieten."
Zur Realisierung von FAIR müssen neue Technologien entwickelt werden. Ein wesentlicher Bestandteil ist zum Beispiel die Entwicklung von leistungsstarken, pulsierenden supraleitenden Magneten, die für den Beschleunigerbetrieb besonders schnell an- und abgeschaltet werden müssen.
Der Staatssekretär besichtigte den dafür kürzlich fertig gestellten Magnet-Teststand. An ihm können Neu- und Prototypentwicklungen verschiedener Magnete für FAIR betrieben werden, um eine spätere Serienfertigung zu ermöglichen. Insgesamt werden über tausend Magnete von bis zu einigen Metern Länge und mehreren Tonnen Gewicht für die Beschleuniger von FAIR benötigt.
Außerdem besuchte der Staatssekretär einen weiteren Teststand, an dem zurzeit sechs Magnete für den Einsatz in der klinischen Beschleunigeranlage überprüft werden, die ab 2007 den Betrieb für Krebstherapie mit Ionenstrahlen in Heidelberg aufnehmen soll.
Die Krebstherapie mit Ionenstrahlen ist an der GSI nach langjährigen Forschungsarbeiten aufgebaut worden und wird seit 1997 mit großem Erfolg eingesetzt. Inzwischen hat die GSI eine maßgeschneiderte Beschleunigeranlage für den klinischen Routinebetrieb entwickelt. Diese wird zurzeit am Universitätsklinikum in Heidelberg aufgebaut und ab 2007 den ersten Patienten zur Verfügung stehen. Pro Jahr werden dort über 1000 Patienten behandelt werden können.
Darüber hinaus hat die GSI einen Kooperationsvertrag mit Siemens geschlossen mit dem Ziel, dass Siemens klinische Beschleunigeranlagen für Protonen- und Ionentherapie schlüsselfertig auf dem Weltmarkt anbieten kann.
Die an der GSI entwickelte Krebstherapie mit Ionenstrahlen ist ein besonders markantes Beispiel für den gelungenen Transfer von Grundlagenforschung in eine neue zukunftsweisende industrielle Anwendung.
FAIR ist ein Beschleunigerkomplex, dessen Herzstück ein großer Doppelringbeschleuniger mit 1100 Metern Umfang ist. An diesen schließt sich ein komplexes System von Speicherringen und Experimentierstationen an. Die bereits existierenden GSI-Beschleuniger dienen dabei als Vorbeschleuniger. FAIR wird Ionen- und Antiprotonenstrahlen in bisher unerreichter Intensität und Qualität liefern. Damit werden neue Experimente möglich, die unser Verständnis von der Entwicklung des Universums und dem Aufbau der Materie weiter voranbringen. Die Kosten zur Errichtung von FAIR betragen etwa eine Milliarde Euro. FAIR wird rund 2.500 Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftlern aus dem In- und Ausland einzigartige Forschungsmöglichkeiten bieten.
]]>Krebstherapie mit Ionenstrahlen wird an der Beschleunigeranlage der GSI mit einem einzigartigen Verfahren, das eine hochpräzise tumorkonforme Bestrahlung ermöglicht, seit 1997 erfolgreich eingesetzt. Über 300 Patienten sind seitdem mit großem Erfolg behandelt worden. Die Heilungsrate liegt je nach Tumorart zwischen 80 und 100 Prozent. Nebenwirkungen treten nur in wenigen Fällen auf und sind äußerst gering. Neben der GSI gibt es weltweit nur noch in Japan die Möglichkeit Patienten mit Ionenstrahlen zu behandeln.
Um eine breitere Patientenversorgung zu ermöglichen hat die GSI eine maßgeschneiderte Beschleunigeranlage für die Therapie entwickelt. Sie wird zurzeit an der Radiologischen Universitätsklinik in Heidelberg aufgebaut und soll 2007 in Betrieb gehen.
Mit Siemens Medical Solutions hat die GSI vor zwei Jahren einen Kooperationsvertrag geschlossen. Er ermöglicht es, dass Siemens mit Know-how der GSI schlüsselfertige Beschleunigeranlagen für die Therapie mit Protonen- und Ionenstrahlen auf dem Weltmarkt anbieten wird.
Weitere ähnliche Vorhaben befinden sich zurzeit in der Entwicklung wie zum Beispiel in München, Pavia in Italien, Caen und Lyon in Frankreich, Wiener Neustadt in Österreich oder Stockholm in Schweden.
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Insgesamt wollen nunmehr zwölf Länder gemeinsam die Anlage FAIR an der GSI in Darmstadt realisieren: China, Deutschland, Finnland, Frankreich, Griechenland, Großbritannien, Indien, Italien, Polen, Russland, Schweden und Spanien.
Mit der Absichtserklärung, dem "Memorandum of Understanding", haben sich die Unterzeichner-Länder im Wesentlichen zwei Ziele gesetzt: Zum einen eine Organisations- und Finanzierungsstruktur zur Durchführung des Projekts zu entwickeln. Zum anderen einen detaillierten Zeit- und Kostenplan für die technische Realisierung zu erarbeiten.
Für die Realisierung von FAIR sollen mindestens 25 Prozent der benötigten Finanzmittel aus dem Ausland beigesteuert werden. An diese Auflage war die Förderzusage des Bundesministeriums für Bildung und Forschung für das FAIR-Vorhaben im Februar 2003 geknüpft. Im Laufe des nächsten Jahres sollen die vertraglichen Vereinbarungen über Art und Umfang der Beteiligung der Partnerländer geschlossen werden.
Mit Universitäten und Forschungszentren in China und Indien pflegt die GSI seit Jahrzehnten eine intensive Zusammenarbeit in der Forschung mit Ionenstrahlen. Bereits in den 1980er Jahren absolvierten die ersten chinesischen und indischen Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftler Forschungsaufenthalte an der GSI. Seitdem bestehen enge Kooperationen mit beiden Ländern. Am Institute of Modern Physics (IMP) in Lanzhou / China wurde mit Unterstützung der GSI eine Beschleunigeranlage gebaut, die zurzeit in Betrieb genommen wird.
Die Beteiligung von China und Indien an FAIR ist eine konsequente Weiterführung der langjährigen Zusammenarbeit mit der GSI. Die Beteiligung der beiden Länder dokumentiert die über Europa hinausgehende internationale Ausstrahlung des Vorhabens.
FAIR ist ein Beschleunigerkomplex, dessen Herzstück ein großer Doppelringbeschleuniger mit 1100 Metern Umfang ist. An diesen schließt sich ein komplexes System von Speicherringen und Experimentierstationen an. Die bereits existierenden GSI-Beschleuniger dienen dabei als Vorbeschleuniger. FAIR wird Ionen- und Antiprotonenstrahlen in bisher unerreichter Intensität und Qualität liefern. Damit werden neue Experimente möglich, die unser Verständnis von der Entwicklung des Universums und dem Aufbau der Materie weit voranbringen. Die Gesamtkosten für FAIR betragen circa 980 Mio. Euro. FAIR wird rund 2.500 Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftlern aus dem In- und Ausland einzigartige Forschungsmöglichkeiten bieten.
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Trotz steigender Zahlen ist der Frauenanteil in der Physik noch immer sehr gering. Nur etwa 14 Prozent der Absolventinnen sind Frauen. An der Spitze der Karriereleiter ist die Situation noch dramatischer. Nicht einmal fünfzig Professorinnen gibt es unter den bundesweit rund 1100 Universitäts-Professoren, das sind gerade mal 4 Prozent. Deutschland gehört damit international zu den Schlusslichtern. Die Öffentlichkeit nimmt selbst von herausragenden Forscherinnen kaum Notiz. Dokumentiert wird das durch die Ausstellung im Rahmenprogramm „Von der Antike bis zur Neuzeit – der verleugnete Anteil der Frauen an der Physik“.
Das Programm der Tagung bietet ein physikalisches Spektrum, das von Teilchenphysik bis hin zur Physik der Atmosphäre reicht. Darüber hinaus gibt es soziologische Vorträge über den weiblichen Nachwuchs in Naturwissenschaften sowie Vorträge über Berufsperspektiven für Physikerinnen. Im Mittelpunkt stehen die wissenschaftliche Diskussion und der Erfahrungsaustausch. Ein weiteres Anliegen der Tagung ist es Netzwerke aufzubauen und Vorbilder zu schaffen, die dazu beitragen, die Gleichberechtigung von Frauen durchzusetzen und damit das Studium und den Beruf für Frauen attraktiver zu machen.
Den Auftakt macht der Eröffnungsvortrag von Prof. Dr. Caren Hagner von der Universität Hamburg über die „Höhepunkte der Neutrinophysik“. Frau Hagner ist verantwortliche Wissenschaftlerin bei OPERA – zurzeit eines der wichtigsten Neutrino-Experimente - und hat hochkarätige Beiträge geleistet zu dem Nachweis, dass Neutrinos eine Masse besitzen. Eines der meist beachteten physikalischen Ergebnisse der vergangenen Jahre.
Höhepunkte der Tagung sind die Vorträge von Prof. Dr. Mildred Dresselhaus über Kohlenstoff-Nanoröhren und Auszüge aus ihrem Leben. Frau Dresselhaus ist Professorin für Physik und Elektrotechnik am Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) und trägt den Titel „Institute Professor“, der bisher nur einem Dutzend Professoren verliehen wurde. Außerdem war sie Präsidentin der „American Physical Society“ und Direktorin des wissenschaftlichen Büros des US-Energieministeriums unter Präsident Clinton.
Der humoristische Höhepunkt der Tagung ist der Auftritt des Kabarettisten Vince Ebert bei der Eröffnungsveranstaltung. Er zeigt Auszüge aus seinem erfolgreichen Programm „Urknaller – Physik ist sexy“.
Die Tagung steht unter der Schirmherrschaft der Bundesministerin für Bildung und Forschung Edelgard Bulmahn und wird vom „Hedwig Kohn-Verein zur Förderung von Frauen und Mädchen in der Physik“ veranstaltet.
Die Technische Universität Darmstadt (TUD) bietet in einem breiten Fächerkanon aus Ingenieur-, Natur-, Geistes- und Sozialwissenschaften exzellente Forschung auf höchstem Niveau. Ein Anteil von 18 Prozent ausländischen Studierenden sowie Kooperationen mit mehr als 65 Partneruniversitäten unterstreichen die Internationalität in Forschung und Lehre. Interdisziplinarität ist selbstverständlich. Professoren und Studierende verschiedener Fachbereiche arbeiten in Sonderforschungsbereichen, Graduiertenkollegs und Forschergruppen zusammen, zum Beispiel im Zentrum für Interdisziplinäre Technikforschung, dem Forschungszentrum Computational Engineering sowie dem Biotechnik-Zentrum Darmstadt. Seit Januar 2005 ist die TUD die erste autonome Universität Deutschlands. Dadurch hat sie weit reichende Handlungsspielräume bei der Personalauswahl einschließlich der Berufung von Professoren. Unter den aktuell 279 Professoren sind 26 Frauen. Bei den wissenschaftlichen Mitarbeitern machen die Frauen 22,33 Prozent aus. Der Frauenanteil an Studierenden im Fachbereich Physik lag im Wintersemester 2004/2005 bei 20,7 Prozent, hochschulweit bei 29,3 Prozent. Zur Erhöhung des Frauenanteils traf die TUD Zielvereinbarungen mit dem Land Hessen. Schnuppertage für Schülerinnen, ein „Mentorinnen-Netzwerk für Studentinnen der Natur- und Ingenieurwissenschaften“ und „FemTec.Network“, ein Programm zur Vorbereitung von Studentinnen auf Fach- und Führungstätigkeiten, sind weitere Bausteine der Frauenförderung.
Die Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung (GSI) in Darmstadt ist ein vom Bund und dem Land Hessen finanziertes Forschungszentrum der Grundlagenforschung. Der Bau und Betrieb von Beschleunigeranlagen sowie die Forschung mit schweren Ionen sind Aufgabe der rund 850 Mitarbeiter. Jährlich kommen über 1.000 Wissenschaftler denen die GSI, ihrer Aufgabe entsprechend, den Zugang zur ihren Forschungsanlagen ermöglicht. Die GSI verfügt über eine hervorragende und weltweit einmalige Beschleunigeranlage für Ionenstrahlen. Das Forschungsprogramm der GSI umfasst ein breites Spektrum, das von Kern- und Atomphysik über die Plasma- und Materialforschung bis hin zur Tumortherapie reicht. Die wohl bekanntesten Resultate sind die Entdeckung von sechs neuen chemischen Elementen mit den Ordnungszahlen 107 - 112 und die Entwicklung einer neuartigen Tumortherapie mit Ionenstrahlen. Mit diesen und einer Vielzahl anderer wissenschaftlicher Resultate nimmt die GSI eine international führende Position in der Forschung mit Ionenstrahlen ein. In den nächsten Jahren soll bei GSI ein neues internationales Beschleunigerzentrum für die Forschung mit Ionen- und Antiprotonenstrahlen entstehen. Dort sollen grundlegende bisher ungelöste Fragen vom Aufbau der Materie und der Entwicklung des Universums beantwortet werden.
]]>Deutschland, Finnland, Frankreich, Griechenland, Großbritannien, Italien, Polen, Russland, Schweden und Spanien haben das Memorandum of Understanding für FAIR unterzeichnet. Daneben haben China, Indien, Ungarn und die USA einen so genannten Beobachterstatus. Es ist wahrscheinlich, dass sich diese und noch weitere Länder an FAIR beteiligen werden.
Mit dem Memorandum of Understanding haben sich die Unterzeichner-Länder im Wesentlichen zwei Ziele gesetzt: Zum einen eine Organisations- und Finanzierungsstruktur zur Durchführung des Projekts zu entwickeln, zum anderen einen detaillierten Zeit- und Kostenplan für die technische Realisierung zu erarbeiten. Dies soll bis Ende 2005 geschehen. 2006 sollen dann vertragliche Vereinbarungen über Art und Umfang der Beteiligung der Partnerländer am Bau des neuen internationalen Beschleunigerzentrums geschlossen werden.
Staatssekretär Catenhusen erklärte dazu heute: "Die heute vorgelegte Vereinbarung ist ein wichtiger Schritt für den FAIR-Beschleuniger. Nun kommt es darauf an, dass gemeinsam ein Projektkonzept entwickelt wird, das allen Beteiligten gerecht wird."
FAIR ist ein Beschleunigerkomplex, dessen Herzstück ein großer Doppelringbeschleuniger mit 1100 Metern Umfang ist. An diesen schließt sich ein komplexes System von Speicherringen und Experimentierstationen an. Die bereits existierenden GSI-Beschleuniger dienen dabei als Vorbeschleuniger. FAIR wird Ionen- und Antiprotonenstrahlen in bisher unerreichter Intensitätund Qualität liefern. Damit werden neue Experimente möglich, die unser Verständnis von der Entwicklung des Universums und dem Aufbau der Materieweit voranbringen. Das gesamte Investitionsvolumen für FAIR beträgt etwa 700 Mio. Euro. FAIR wird rund 2.500 Wissenschaftlern aus dem In- und Ausland einzigartige Forschungsmöglichkeiten bieten.
]]>Der Auftrag hat ein Volumen von 2,5 Millionen Euro. Bis Ende 2005 soll der Anschluss für den neuen, mit 700 Millionen Euro Investitionsmitteln veranschlagten Schwerionenbeschleuniger der GSI fertig sein. Er wird die Anlage mit Spitzenleistungen von 30 Megawatt versorgen. Das entspricht in etwa dem Leistungsbedarf von 30.000 Haushalten – doch im Gegensatz zu einem herkömmlichen Netzanschluss wird die Energie von dem versorgten Teilchenbeschleuniger nicht verbraucht, sondern ständig in Impulsen wieder ins Netz zurückgegeben. Mehrmals pro Sekunde gelangen also rund 30 Megawatt zurück ins Netz. „Diese Impulse sind für sich genommen recht unspektakulär. Doch wenn ständig neue Impulse dazu kommen, können diese sich gegenseitig überlagern und so immer stärker werden – ähnlich wie wenn man Steine in eine Pfütze wirft und die Wellenringe sich überlagern und verstärken – irgendwann schwappt die Pfütze über“, erklärt HSE-Projektleiter Klaus Andres den Effekt. Um das öffentliche Stromnetz vor dem Einfluss dieser Impulse zu schützen, muss der Anschluss für den Teilchenbeschleuniger getrennt vom übrigen Netz erfolgen.
Dazu muss in einem ersten Schritt der 110-Kilovolt-Bereich der HSE-Umspannanlage (UA) Leonhardstanne in Wixhausen erweitert werden. Abgestimmt mit der Stadt Darmstadt und Hessen-Forst werden dafür bereits in den kommenden Wochen einige Bäume gefällt. Als Ausgleich pflanzt die HSE neue Bäume im Bereich des Gehaborner Hofs. In einem zweiten Schritt wird ein neues Leitungssystem von der UA Leonhardstanne zur UA Urberach der RWE errichtet. Der Anschluss erfolgt also von der GSI über die UA Leonhardstanne zur UA Urberach und damit direkt ans europaweite Höchstspannungs-Verbundnetz (220 Kilovolt). „Die Impulse gehen also direkt ins Verbundnetz, wo sie kaum spürbar sind. Vergleichbar den Wellen, die Steine auslösen, die ins Meer geworfen werden“, erklärt Andres.
Damit ermöglicht die HSE den Anschluss einer Anlage, von denen es weltweit nur etwa vier oder fünf vergleichbare gibt. „Wir sind stolz darauf, den technischen Herausforderungen gewachsen zu sein und damit das neue Beschleunigerprojekt der GSI unterstützen zu können. Damit tragen wir zur Sicherung des Standortes Darmstadt als Wissenschaftsstadt bei“, sagt Dr. Wawrzik.
Für die GSI ist es wichtig, schon in dieser frühen Phase des Vorhabens einen geeigneten Netzanschluss zu erhalten. Denn mit dem neuen Netzanschluss wird es möglich sein, die bestehende Beschleunigeranlage in einem Modus zu betreiben, in dem sie später als Vorbeschleuniger für die neue Anlage FAIR dient. Aber auch die Forschungsmöglichkeiten an der bestehenden Anlage werden schon davon profitieren. Die für den neuen Betriebsmodus notwendigen Maschinenentwicklungen und -tests können somit schon frühzeitig erfolgen. Der neue Stromanschluss ist außerdem so ausgelegt, dass er bei der späteren Inbetriebnahme der neuen Beschleuniger von FAIR problemlos angepasst werden kann.
Mit dem neuen Stromanschluss ist die GSI einen wichtigen Schritt auf dem Weg zur Realisierung von FAIR vorangekommen.
]]>Press Release of GSI (in German)...
Press Release of IUPAC...
Die Experimente im Schülerlabor gehen in ihrer Art und Zusammenstellung deutlich über das hinaus, was Schulen für das Gebiet Radioaktivität und Strahlung in der Regel anbieten können. Die Schülerinnen und Schüler können sich durch selbstständiges Arbeiten mit den grundlegenden Experimentiertechniken vertraut machen, die Forscher aus aller Welt an der Beschleunigeranlage bei der GSI anwenden.
Das Schülerlabor richtet sich, entsprechend den Lehrplänen, an Gymnasialklassen der Jahrgangsstufe 10 und 13 sowie an Realschulklassen der Jahrgangsstufe 9. (Im Gymnasium nach Verkürzung der Gymnasialzeit eine Jahrgangsstufe früher). Es wird nach den Herbstferien den Regelbetrieb aufnehmen und wöchentlich zwei bis drei Schulklassen offen stehen. Verschiedene pädagogische Lernkonzepte lassen sich darin verwirklichen, wie das Expertenpuzzle oder das Stationenlernen. Neben der Durchführung eines Experiments sind die computergestützte Auswertung der Messdaten sowie die schriftliche und mündliche Präsentation der Messergebnisse wesentlicher Bestandteil des Konzepts. Die Vor- und Nachbereitungen eines Besuchs im Schülerlabor sind am Lehrplan orientiert und können in den Unterricht in der Schule eingebunden werden.
Das Hessische Kultusministerium und das Staatliche Schulamt Frankfurt haben das Projekt durch die Freistellung eines Fachlehrers nachhaltig unterstützt, der sowohl die Aufbauphase als auch den kommenden Betrieb federführend betreut. Finanziell wird das Schülerlabor mit 380.000 EUR durch den Impuls-Fond der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft Deutscher Forschungszentren gefördert.
Mit dem Schülerlabor möchte die GSI eine Brücke schlagen zwischen der naturwissenschaftlichen Ausbildung an Schulen und der aktuellen Forschung. Es soll einen Beitrag leisten zur Förderung des naturwissenschaftlichen Nachwuchses und soll Schülerinnen und Schülern für ihre spätere Studien- und Berufswahl eine Entscheidungshilfe an die Hand geben. Durch die unmittelbare Nachbarschaft zu den Forschungslaboren der GSI soll es auch zum Ort der Begegnung zwischen Schülern, Forschern und Lehrern werden.
Weitere Informationen zum Schülerlabor finden Sie im Internet unter: Schülerlabor der GSI
]]>Eine internationale Forschergruppe konnte das Element mit der Ordnungszahl 111 im Jahr 1994 zum ersten Mal an der Beschleunigeranlage der GSI nachweisen. Seitdem wurde es mehrfach in unabhängigen Experimenten an der GSI und am RIKEN Institut in Japan bestätigt. Eine gemeinsame Arbeitsgruppe der IUPAC und der "International Union for Pure and Applied Physics" (IUPAP) hat daraufhin die Entdeckung des Elements 111 dem GSI-Forscherteam um Professor Sigurd Hofmann zuerkannt und die Gruppe im Herbst 2003 aufgefordert, einen Namensvorschlag einzureichen.
Basierend auf dem Namensvorschlag der GSI-Entdeckergruppe hat die Abteilung für Anorganische Chemie der IUPAC nun eine vorläufige Empfehlung für die Benennung des Elements 111 veröffentlicht. Es wird empfohlen, das bei GSI erzeugte Element nach Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen zu benennen, der im Jahre 1895 die nach ihm benannten Röntgenstrahlen entdeckte und dafür im Jahre 1901 mit dem ersten Nobelpreis für Physik ausgezeichnet wurde.
Die endgültige Benennung des Elements 111 erfolgt durch das "IUPAC Bureau", das im Oktober tagen wird. Die Zeitspanne bis dahin ist vorgesehen, damit der Namensvorschlag Roentgenium in der wissenschaftlichen Welt diskutiert werden kann.
Dem GSI Forscherteam um Professor Sigurd Hofmann war im Jahr 1994 auch die Entdeckung des Elements 110 gelungen, das im Dezember 2003 in Anlehnung an den Entdeckungsort, den Sitz der GSI in Darmstadt, auf den Namen Darmstadtium getauft wurde. Die Wissenschaftler sehen nun mit Spannung und Freude der Taufe von Element 111 entgegen.
Siehe auch https://iupac.org/publications/pac/76/12/2101/ und die nächste Ausgabe des IUPAC News Magazins "Chemistry International"
Die Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung (GSI) in Darmstadt ist ein vom Bund und dem Land Hessen finanziertes Forschungszentrum der Grundlagenforschung. Der Bau und Betrieb von Beschleunigeranlagen sowie die Forschung mit schweren Ionen sind Aufgabe der rund 850 Mitarbeiter. Jährlich kommen über 1.000 Wissenschaftler denen die GSI, ihrer Aufgabe entsprechend, den Zugang zur ihren Forschungsanlagen ermöglicht. Die GSI verfügt über eine hervorragende und weltweit einmalig Beschleunigeranlage für Ionenstrahlen. Das Forschungsprogramm der GSI umfasst ein breites Spektrum, das von Kern- und Atomphysik über die Plasma- und Materialforschung bis hin zur Tumortherapie reicht. Die wohl bekanntesten Resultate sind die Entdeckung von sechs neuen chemischen Elementen mit den Ordnungszahlen 107 - 112 und die Entwicklung einer neuartigen Tumortherapie mit Ionenstrahlen. Mit diesen und einer Vielzahl anderer wissenschaftlicher Resultate nimmt die GSI eine international führende Position in der Forschung mit Ionenstrahlen ein. Bis 2012 soll bei GSI ein neues internationales Beschleunigerzentrum für die Forschung mit Ionen- und Antiprotonenstrahlen entstehen. Dort sollen grundlegende bisher ungelöste Fragen vom Aufbau der Materie und der Entwicklung des Universums beantwortet werden.
Weitere Informationen unter: GSI
]]>Die Klinikanlage entsteht auf dem Gelände der Radiologischen Universitätsklinik in Heidelberg und wird voraussichtlich 2007 mit dem Patientenbetrieb beginnen. Jährlich können dort 1000 Patienten mit schweren Ionen bestrahlt werden. Die Kosten für die Errichtung der Klinik von 72 Millionen Euro werden zu gleichen Teilen vom Bund und der Radiologischen Universitätsklinik getragen.
Für den Bau und die Inbetriebnahme der Bestrahlungstechnik ist die GSI verantwortlich. Zum einen ist das die Beschleunigeranlage, bestehend aus einem 5 Meter langen Linearbeschleuniger und einem daran anschließenden Ringbeschleuniger (Synchrotron) mit 20 Metern Durchmesser, die die benötigten Kohlenstoff-Ionen auf bis zu 50 Prozent der Lichtgeschwindigkeit beschleunigt. Zum anderen sind dies drei Bestrahlungsplätze, die sich dadurch auszeichnen, dass der weltweit einmalige Rasterscanner den beschleunigten Ionenstrahl millimetergenau und dreidimensional über jedes beliebig geformte Tumorvolumen rastert (das so genannte intensitätsgesteuerte Rasterscanverfahren). Zwei Bestrahlungsplätze entstehen mit horizontaler Strahlführung, ähnlich wie der zurzeit bei der GSI eingesetzte, an dem hauptsächlich Patienten mit Kopftumoren behandelt werden. Ein weiterer erhält eine um den Patienten drehbare Strahlführung, mit der Tumoren auch in anderen Körperregionen, wie zum Beispiel dem Rumpfbereich, zugänglich werden. Für diese weltweit erste scannende Gantry für schwere Ionen wurde ein Teil des Prototyps bei GSI erfolgreich erprobt.
Die Therapie mit Ionenstrahlen bei der GSI ist gemeinsam von GSI, dem Deutschen Krebsforschungszentrum, dem Universitätsklinikum Heidelberg und dem Forschungszentrum Rossendorf entwickelt worden. Basierend auf den langjährigen physikalischen, biologischen und technischen Vorarbeiten der GSI haben die Kooperationspartner in einem Pilotprojekt eine medizinische Bestrahlungseinheit an der Beschleunigeranlage der GSI in Darmstadt aufgebaut. Nach vierjähriger Bauzeit konnte dort 1997 mit der Bestrahlung der ersten Patienten begonnen werden. Bisher sind in Darmstadt mit dieser Methode über 200 Patienten mit inoperablen Tumoren im Kopf-, Hals- und Hüftbereich mit sehr großem Erfolg behandelt worden. Auch in Zukunft werden Patienten bei der GSI bestrahlt – mindestens so lange, bis die neue Klinikanlage in Heidelberg in Betrieb geht.
Die Therapie mit Ionenstrahlen zeichnet sich einerseits durch sehr hohe Heilungsraten von über 90 Prozent aus. Andererseits sind die beobachteten Nebenwirkungen äußerst gering. Nur in Einzelfällen wurden leichte Hautrötungen oder leichte Schleimhautreizungen festgestellt. Der Grund liegt in der hohen biologischen Wirkung von Ionenstrahlen und ihrem günstigen Dosisprofil, das eine hohe Dosis am Ende ihrer Reichweite aufweist. Über eine Beschleunigeranlage werden die Ionen auf eine sehr hohe Geschwindigkeit gebracht und in den Tumor geschossen. Der Rasterscanner erlaubt die punktgenaue Bestrahlung komplex geformter Tumore, auch in der Nähe von Risikoorganen, wie zum Beispiel dem Hirnstamm oder dem Sehnerv. So werden den Tumorzellen irreparable Schäden zugefügt und gleichzeitig das umliegende gesunde Gewebe stark geschont. Die Patienten kommen in der Regel zur ambulanten Behandlung; ein stationärer Aufenthalt im Krankenhaus ist nur in Ausnahmefällen nötig.
Weltweit gibt es nur noch zwei weitere Einrichtungen für die Therapie mit Ionenstrahlen in Japan. Die Bestrahlungstechnik unterscheidet sich erheblich von der bei der GSI und in der neuen Klinikanlage. Das intensitätsgesteuerte Rasterscanverfahren wird dort nicht eingesetzt, was zu einer höheren Belastung des gesunden Gewebes und zu stärkeren Nebenwirkungen bei den Patienten führt.
Nach über zwanzig Jahren physikalischer und biologischer Grundlagenforschung am Ionenbeschleuniger der GSI und einem erfolgreich durchgeführten Pilotprojekt wird nun mit dem Bau der Klinikanlage ein wichtiger Schritt vollzogen, um ein Ergebnis aus der Grundlagenforschung in eine breite Routine-Anwendung zu überführen. Schätzungen zufolge könnten allein in Deutschland jährlich etwa 10.000 Patienten von dieser Therapieform profitieren.
Eine präzise Bestrahlung komplex geformter Tumoren erlaubt das bei GSI entwickelte und erstmals in der Strahlentherapie eingesetzte Rasterscanverfahren. Der Schwerionenstrahl wird mit Hilfe von Magnetfeldern seitlich abgelenkt und die Eindringtiefe über die Energie der Ionen von Puls zu Puls eingestellt. Zur Intensitätsregelung verweilt der Strahl so lange auf jedem Punkt, bis die berechnete Solldosis erreicht ist. Es stellt eine erhebliche Verbesserung im Vergleich zu herkömmlichen Bestrahlungsmethoden dar.
Film zum Rasterscanverfahren
Die Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung (GSI) in Darmstadt ist ein vom Bund und dem Land Hessen finanziertes Forschungszentrum der Grundlagenforschung. Der Bau und Betrieb von Beschleunigeranlagen sowie die Forschung mit schweren Ionen sind Aufgabe der rund 850 Mitarbeiter. Jährlich kommen über 1.000 Wissenschaftler denen die GSI, ihrer Aufgabe entsprechend, den Zugang zur ihren Forschungsanlagen ermöglicht. Die GSI verfügt über eine hervorragende und weltweit einmalig Beschleunigeranlage für Ionenstrahlen. Das Forschungsprogramm der GSI umfasst ein breites Spektrum, das von Kern- und Atomphysik über die Plasma- und Materialforschung bis hin zur Tumortherapie reicht. Die wohl bekanntesten Resultate sind die Entdeckung von sechs neuen chemischen Elementen mit den Ordnungszahlen 107 - 112 und die Entwicklung einer neuartigen Tumortherapie mit Ionenstrahlen. Mit diesen und einer Vielzahl anderer wissenschaftlicher Resultate nimmt die GSI eine international führende Position in der Forschung mit Ionenstrahlen ein. Bis 2012 soll bei GSI ein neues internationales Beschleunigerzentrum für die Forschung mit Ionen- und Antiprotonenstrahlen entstehen. Dort sollen grundlegende bisher ungelöste Fragen vom Aufbau der Materie und der Entwicklung des Universums beantwortet werden.
Weitere Informationen unter: GSI
]]>Die GSI hat das chemische Element 110 am Dienstag, den 2. Dezember 2003 zu Ehren der Stadt Darmstadt offiziell auf den Namen Darmstadtium mit dem chemischen Symbol Ds getauft. Damit ist Darmstadt die erste deutsche Stadt, nach der ein chemisches Element benannt ist. Die Taufpaten waren die Bundesministerin für Bildung und Forschung, Edelgard Bulmahn, und der Oberbürgermeister der Stadt Darmstadt, Peter Benz. Zur Taufe haben Schüler der Tanz-AG und Musiklehrer der Georg-Büchner-Schule in Darmstadt eigens eine Aufführung über die "Geburt der chemischen Elemente" entworfen und präsentiert.
Das 1994 durch ein internationales Forscherteam um Professor Sigurd Hofmann bei GSI entdeckte Element Darmstadtium ist nun das schwerste chemische Element mit einem offiziellen Namen. In weiteren Experimenten konnten die GSI und andere Labore weltweit die Entdeckung bestätigen. Daraufhin hat der internationale Chemikerverband IUPAC der GSI im Jahr 2001 das Entdeckerrecht zugesprochen und sie aufgefordert einen Namensvorschlag zu machen. Am 15. August 2003 hat die IUPAC den Namensvorschlag Darmstadtium akzeptiert. In einem Festakt am 2. Dezember 2003 wurde das Element 110 offiziell auf den Namen Darmstadtium mit dem chemischen Symbol Ds getauft.
Zur Namenstaufe zeigte die Tanz-AG der Georg-Büchner-Schule eine Aufführung über die "Geburt der chemischen Elemente". Musiklehrer Ulrich Steffen choreografierte die Darbietung und studierte sie mit Schülerinnen der 7. Klasse ein. Dabei entstanden aus großdimensionalen Würfeln mosaikartig Bilder, die die spannende Geschichte über die Entstehung der Elemente und die Entdeckung des Elements 110 illustrierten. Der Erzähler bei dieser Uraufführung war der Schüler Tim Strübig. Die musikalische Begleitung für Cello und Schlagzeug komponierte und spielte der Musiklehrer Ulrich Pietsch mit seiner Frau Margit Pietsch.
Die Entstehung der chemischen Elemente begann vor über zehn Milliarden Jahren und vollzieht sich seither im Inneren von Sternen und in gewaltigen Sternexplosionen. Die chemischen Elemente sind die Bausteine aller Stoffe und die Grundlage für unser Leben. So verdanken auch wir Menschen unsere Existenz der Element-Entstehung in den Sternen. Denn wie alle Materie um uns herum, so stammt auch jedes Atom unseres eigenen Körpers aus Sternenstaub und wurde in früheren Sterngenerationen geschaffen.
Im Periodensystem sind alle bekannten chemischen Elemente in einer Tabelle zusammengefasst. Die Wissenschaftler interessieren sich dafür, welches das schwerste Element ist und wo das Periodensystem endet. Aus diesem Grund versuchen sie neue superschwere Elemente zu erzeugen, viel schwerer als die, die auf der Erde vorkommen. So können sie grundlegende Erkenntnisse über den Aufbau der Materie und die Kernreaktionen im Inneren von Sternen gewinnen.
Um das Element 110 zu erzeugen verwendeten die Forscher bei der GSI die zwei Elemente Nickel und Blei. Deren Atomkerne besitzen zusammen genommen 110 Protonen. Mit dem 120 Meter langen Ionenbeschleuniger der GSI beschleunigten sie geladene Nickel-Atome, das heißt Nickel-Ionen, auf hohe Geschwindigkeiten, etwa 30.000 Kilometer pro Sekunde. Die Nickel-Ionen schossen sie dann auf eine dünne Folie aus Blei. Durch die hohe Geschwindigkeit kann die Abstoßung zwischen den Nickel- und Blei-Kernen überwunden werden und in sehr seltenen Fällen verschmelzen beide zu Element 110. Das neue Element ist nicht stabil. Es zerfällt in Bruchteilen von Sekunden und wandelt sich in mehreren Stufen in andere leichtere Elemente um. Dabei sendet es jeweils ein Alpha-Teilchen aus. Mit einem empfindlichen Nachweis-Detektorsystem konnten die Forscher diese ausgesandten Alpha-Teilchen exakt vermessen und somit das neue Element eindeutig identifizieren.
Die Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung (GSI) in Darmstadt ist ein vom Bund und dem Land Hessen finanziertes Forschungszentrum der Grundlagenforschung. Sie ist Mitglied der Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft. Der Bau und Betrieb von Beschleunigeranlagen sowie die Forschung mit schweren Ionen sind Aufgabe der rund 850 Mitarbeiter. Jährlich kommen über 1.000 Wissenschaftler denen die GSI, ihrer Aufgabe entsprechend, den Zugang zur ihren Forschungsanlagen ermöglicht. Die GSI verfügt über eine hervorragende und weltweit einmalig Beschleunigeranlage für Ionenstrahlen. Das Forschungsprogramm der GSI umfasst ein breites Spektrum, das von Kern- und Atomphysik über die Plasma- und Materialforschung bis hin zur Tumortherapie reicht. Die wohl bekanntesten Resultate sind die Entdeckung von sechs neuen chemischen Elementen mit den Ordnungszahlen 107 - 112 und die Entwicklung einer neuartigen Tumortherapie mit Ionenstrahlen. Mit diesen und einer Vielzahl anderer wissenschaftlicher Resultate nimmt die GSI eine international führende Position in der Forschung mit Ionenstrahlen ein. Bis 2012 soll bei GSI ein neues internationales Beschleunigerzentrum für die Forschung mit Ionen- und Antiprotonenstrahlen entstehen. Dort sollen grundlegende bisher ungelöste Fragen vom Aufbau der Materie und der Entwicklung des Universums beantwortet werden. Weitere Informationen unter: GSI
]]>Herr Henning leitet die GSI seit dem 1. Oktober 1999. In seiner Amtszeit wurde das Zukunftsprojekt vorgeschlagen, ein Doppelring-Beschleuniger von 1100 Metern Umfang mit einem anschließenden komplexen System aus Speicherringen und Experimentierplätzen. Der Wissenschaftsrat hat das Projekt evaluiert und als förderungswürdig bewertet. Der Bund und das Land Hessen haben daraufhin eine Förderungszusage gemacht. Das Projekt hat ein Finanzvolumen von 675 Mio EUR und soll 2012 fertig gestellt werden. "Das Voranbringen des Zukunftsprojekts mit dem ersten Spatenstich und dabei den laufenden Experimentierbetrieb an der existierenden Anlage möglichst wenig zu beeinträchtigen" sowie "die Inbetriebnahme des Therapiebeschleunigers am Universitätsklinikum in Heidelberg, dessen Baubeginn unmittelbar bevorsteht" nennt Henning seine wichtigsten Ziele in der kommenden Amtszeit.
Walter F. Henning, Jahrgang 1939. Studium der Physik in Darmstadt und München. 1968 Promotion mit einer kernphysikalischen Arbeit an der TU München. 1969-76 Wissenschaftlicher Assistent am Physikdepartment der TU München. 1976 Habilitation über ein kernphysikalisches Thema. 1973-75 Visiting Scientist und 1977-1986 Staff Physicist am Argonne National Laboratorium in den USA. 1983 Professor an der Universität von Chicago. 1986 Professor an der Universität Mainz und Bereichsleiter bei der GSI Darmstadt. 1992 Direktor der Physics Division am Argonne National Laboratorium. Seit 1999 Professor an der Universität Frankfurt und Wissenschaftlicher Geschäftsführer der GSI. Hauptarbeitsgebiet: Untersuchung von Kernreaktionen und Struktur von Atomkernen.
]]>Die Partikeltherapie mit Schwerionen ist ein sehr präzises und biologisch hochwirksames Therapieverfahren. Über eine Beschleunigeranlage werden die Schwerionen auf eine sehr hohe Geschwindigkeit gebracht und in den Tumor geschossen. Dort fügen die Schwerionen den Tumorzellen irreparable Schäden zu. Durch die exakt berechenbare Reichweite und mithilfe einer millimetergenauen Steuerung lässt sich der Tumor punktgenau bestrahlen, wodurch das umliegende gesunde Gewebe geschont wird. Ein stationärer Aufenthalt im Krankenhaus ist bei dieser Behandlung nur in Ausnahmefällen nötig, da bisher außer leichten Hautrötungen kaum Nebenwirkungen auftraten. "Die Ergebnisse haben unsere Erwartungen übertroffen, da wir eine sehr schnelle und auch dauerhafte Tumorreaktion in diesen Patienten gesehen haben. Wir möchten diese Art der Bestrahlung auch an anderen Tumoren und größeren Patientenzahlen einsetzen", sagte PD Dr. Dr. Jürgen Debus, ärztlicher Direktor der Klinischen Radiologie Heidelberg.
Die Kooperation von Siemens mit der GSI stellt für das ehrgeizige Projekt der Partikeltherapie mit Schwerionen einen entscheidenden Schritt nach vorne dar: Denn diese neue und effektive Methode zur Behandlung von Tumoren soll durch den Wissensaustausch zwischen Forschung und Industrie einer großen Zahl an Patienten zugänglich gemacht werden. "Die Anerkennung als Heilverfahren haben wir bereits für einige Indikationen. Daher ist es nun wichtig, weitere Möglichkeiten für klinische Erprobungen auch auf anderen Tumorgebieten zu erhalten", erläuterte Professor Dr. Walter F. Henning, Wissenschaftlicher Direktor der GSI. "Die Behandlung mit Schwerionen ist eine Therapiemaßnahme mit großen Zukunftschancen, welche wir als ganzheitlicher Lösungsanbieter für Diagnose und Therapie gerne in unser Produkt-Spektrum aufnehmen, um so unsere Stellung in der Onkologie weiter ausbauen zu können", erklärte Dr. Hermann Requardt, Mitglied des Bereichsvorstandes, Siemens Medical Solutions.
Finanziert aus Mitteln des Bundesministeriums für Bildung und Forschung (BMBF) und dem Land Hessen hat die GSI gemeinsam mit dem Deutschen Krebsforschungszentrum, dem Universitätsklinikum Heidelberg und dem Forschungszentrum Rossendorf die Therapie mit Schwerionen entwickelt. In einer klinischen Studie konnten seit 1997 etwa 200 Patienten mit dieser Methode erfolgreich bei der GSI behandelt werden. "Schwerionentherapie ist ein Quantensprung in der Entwicklung der Strahlentherapie: Ionenstrahlen sind ein neues Skalpell in der Hand des Arztes, das besonders scharf und präzise geführt werden kann. Die Schwerionentherapie hat eine gute Chance sich zu einer unblutigen Strahlen-Chirurgie zu entwickeln mit allen positiven Folgen für den Patienten: höhere Heilungschancen, kürzere Behandlungsdauer und weniger Nebenwirkungen. Die bisherige klinische Studie hat diesen Trend voll bestätigt", sagte Professor Gerhard Kraft, Abteilungsleiter Biophysik der GSI. "Mit der Serien-Produktion von Ionen-Therapie-Anlagen durch Siemens wird diese Entwicklung in absehbarer Zeit für mehr Patienten zugänglich sein."
Die Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung (GSI) in Darmstadt ist ein vom Bund und dem Land Hessen finanziertes Forschungszentrum der Grundlagenforschung. Der Bau und Betrieb von Beschleunigeranlagen sowie die Forschung mit schweren Ionen sind Aufgabe der rund 850 Mitarbeiter. Jährlich kommen über 1.000 Wissenschaftler denen die GSI, ihrer Aufgabe entsprechend, den Zugang zur ihren Forschungsanlagen ermöglicht. Die GSI verfügt über eine hervorragende und weltweit einmalig Beschleunigeranlage für Ionenstrahlen. Das Forschungsprogramm der GSI umfasst ein breites Spektrum, das von Kern- und Atomphysik über die Plasma- und Materialforschung bis hin zur Tumortherapie reicht. Die wohl bekanntesten Resultate sind die Entdeckung von sechs neuen chemischen Elementen mit den Ordnungszahlen 107 - 112 und die Entwicklung einer neuartigen Tumortherapie mit Ionenstrahlen. Mit diesen und einer Vielzahl anderer wissenschaftlicher Resultate nimmt die GSI eine international führende Position in der Forschung mit Ionenstrahlen ein. Bis 2012 soll bei GSI ein neues internationales Beschleunigerzentrum für die Forschung mit Ionen- und Antiprotonenstrahlen entstehen. Dort sollen grundlegende bisher ungelöste Fragen vom Aufbau der Materie und der Entwicklung des Universums beantwortet werden. Weitere Informationen unter: GSI
Siemens Medical Solutions (Siemens) ist weltweit einer der größten Anbieter im Gesundheitswesen. Der Bereich steht für innovative Produkte und Komplettlösungen sowie für ein umfangreiches Angebot von Dienst- und Beratungsleistungen. Abgedeckt wird das gesamte Spektrum über bildgebende Systeme für Diagnose und Therapie, die Elektromedizin und die Audiologie bis hin zu IT-Lösungen. Mithilfe dieser Lösungen ermöglicht Siemens seinen Kunden, sichtbare Ergebnisse sowohl im klinischen, als auch im administrativen Bereich zu erzielen - so genannte "Proven Outcomes". Innovationen aus dem Hause Siemens optimieren Arbeitsabläufe in Kliniken und Praxen und führen zu mehr Effizienz in der Gesundheitsversorgung. Siemens Med beschäftigt weltweit rund 31 000 Mitarbeiter und ist in 120 Ländern präsent. Im Geschäftsjahr 2002 (30. September) erzielte Siemens Med einen Umsatz von 7,6 Mrd. EUR sowie einen Auftragseingang von 8,4 Mrd. EUR. Das Bereichsergebnis betrug 1 Mrd. EUR. Weitere Informationen unter: https://www.siemens.com/medical
GSI
Dr. Ingo Peter
Tel. 06159 - 71 2598
E-Mail: Ingo Peter
Siemens Medical Solutions
Melanie Schmude
Tel. 09131 - 84 8335
E-Mail: Melanie Schmude
Für medizinische Fragen:
PD Dr. Dr. J. Debus
Tel. 06221 - 568200
E-Mail: Jürgen Debus
Eine internationale Forschergruppe konnte das Element im Jahr 1994 zum ersten Mal an der Beschleunigeranlage der GSI nachweisen. Seitdem wurde es mehrfach in weiteren unabhängigen Experimenten bestätigt. Auf ihrer letzten Sitzung im Jahr 2001 hat die IUPAC der GSI das Entdeckerrecht zugesprochen und sie aufgefordert einen Namen vorzuschlagen.
Der Name "Darmstadtium" mit dem Sysmbol Ds wurde zu Ehren der Stadt Darmstadt gewählt und steht in der langen Tradition, chemische Elemente nach ihrem Entdeckerort zu benennen. Noch in diesem Jahr wird die GSI gemeinsam mit der Stadt Darmstadt in einem Festakt die offizielle Taufe vornehmen.
*IUPAC – International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry
Vom 23. April bis 24. Mai zeigt die Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung GSI im Weißen Turm in Darmstadt die Fotoausstellung Forschung im Fokus mit Bildern von Achim Zschau. Der Fotograf dokumentiert seit 30 Jahren Instrumente, die zur Erforschung der Materie von den Wissenschaftlern benötigt werden. Dabei berücksichtigt Achim Zschau ganz unterschiedliche Aspekte: Der komplexe, technische Aufbau, die ungewöhnlichen Formen und Symmetrien sowie das Zusammenspiel von Licht und Farbe. Im Vordergrund steht jedoch nicht nur die technische Funktionalität der Objekte. Achim Zschau gelingt es die ästhetische Ausstrahlung der Motive einzufangen. Die etwa 30 großformatigen Fotografien zeigen ein weit reichendes Spektrum vom Bau der Anlagen über einzelne Komponenten bis hin zu haushohen Detektoren.
Der Fotograf Achim Zschau ist seit seinem 12. Lebensjahr auf Motivsuche. Zunächst war die Fotografie ein Hobby, dem er auf Radtouren und Sportveranstaltungen nachging. Mitte der 60er Jahre wurde es zu seinem Beruf, wobei er seinen Schwerpunkt schon früh auf technische Motive ausrichtete.
Die GSI ist ein Forschungszentrum im Norden von Darmstadt. Sie betreibt eine weltweit einmalige Beschleunigeranlage für Ionen. Experimente mit den bis auf 90% der Lichtgeschwindigkeit beschleunigten Atomkernen haben die Forscher immer wieder zu neuen faszinierenden Entdeckungen in der Grundlagenforschung geführt.
Ausstellung im Weißen Turm, 23. April bis 24. Mai
Ernst - Ludwig – Straße in Darmstadt
Mittwochs von 15:00 bis 21.00 Uhr
Donnerstags von 16:30 bis 20:30 Uhr
Samstags von 11:00 bis 16:00 Uhr.
Während ihrer Amtszeit in den vergangenen vier Jahren sei es gelungen, auch die Förderung von Wissenschaft und Forschung außerhalb der Hochschulen deutlich zu verbessern. Im laufenden Haushaltsjahr seien dafür 104,6 Mio. Euro vorgesehen - gut vier Millionen Euro mehr als im Jahr 2002 (100,4 Mio. Euro). "Wissenschaft und Forschung sind wesentliche, für die Zukunftsfähigkeit des Landes unerlässliche Innovationskräfte. Das vom Wissenschaftsrat begutachtete und empfohlene GSI-Projekt ist dafür ein besonders eindrucksvolles Beispiel," sagte Wagner. Entsprechend den vertraglichen Vereinbarungen mit dem Bund habe das Land Hessen bereits fest zugesagt, zehn Prozent der ge schätzten Gesamtkosten in Höhe von 675 Mio. Euro zu übernehmen. Diese Zusage sei eine wichtige Voraussetzung für die Grundsatzentscheidung des Bundes gewesen, 65 Prozent der Kosten zu tragen. Die restlichen 25 Prozent sollten bei europäischen Kooperationspartnern eingeworben werden.
"Die jetzt von mir bewilligte Fördersumme von einer Mio. Euro hilft der GSI dabei, das technisch sehr komplizierte Projekt ausführungsreif vorzubereiten", so Wagner. Sie wies darauf hin, dass der Bund bisher nur eine Absichtserklärung abgegeben habe. Das Land Hessen dagegen habe seine aktuelle Fördersumme von einer Mio. Euro bereits im Haushalt 2003 fest verankert.
Die Ministerin begrüßte die Ankündigung des Bundes, sich finanziell an diesem Vorhaben zu beteiligen. Gleichzeitig aber kritisierte sie, dass der Bund bereits gegebene Förderzusagen für die außeruniversitäre Forschung nun doch nicht einhalten wolle. "Bund und Länder haben sich im Sommer 2002 darauf verständigt, dass die gemeinsam finanzierten Forschungseinrichtungen im Jahr 2003 Haushaltszuwächse zwischen zweieinhalb und dreieinhalb Prozent erhalten. Wir haben die Mittel im Landeshaushalt 2003 auch entsprechend veranschlagt. Die Komplementärmittel, die das Land in der Gemeinschaftsfinanzierung aufzubringen hat, stehen also nach den Vereinbarungen vom Sommer 2002 zur Verfügung. Der Bund dagegen hat nach der Bundestagswahl einseitig Kürzungen vorgenommen, die zu einem realen Minus bei allen Einrichtungen führen werden, denn nach den Landeshaushaltsordnungen müssen alle Länder die Auszahlungen in der institutionellen Förderung ebenfalls entsprechend reduzieren. Die Bundesregierung vernachlässigt 2003 die Forschung - die bisherige Landesregierung in Hessen dagegen ist bereit, obwohl die Finanzlage in Hessen nicht besser ist, Forschungspolitik auch in schwierigen Zeiten die nötige Priorität einzuräumen", betonte Ministerin Wagner. Von den Kürzungen des Bundes sei auch das laufende Budget der GSI mit 1,7 Mio. Euro negativ betroffen. "Deshalb habe ich Ministerpräsident Roland Koch und meinem Nachfolger im Amt des Wissenschaftsministers, Udo Corts, empfohlen, die im Landeshaushalt 2003 veranschlagten Mittel projektbezogen in voller Höhe für Forschungszwecke in Hessen einzusetzen", sagte Wagner.
Die GSI erbringe Spitzenleistungen nicht nur als Zentrum naturwissenschaftlicher Grundlagenforschung, sondern habe es in Zusammenarbeit mit dem Universitätsklinikum sowie dem Krebsforschungszentrum Heidelberg auch ermöglicht, dass die Schwerionenphysik für die Zerstörung bisher nicht therapierbarer Tumore eingesetzt werde. "Aufgrund der mit Hilfe des GSI-Beschleunigers erzielten offenkundigen Behandlungserfolge wird jetzt in Heidelberg eine auf medizinische Anwendungen spezialisierte Beschleunigeranlage für schwere Ionen geplant, an deren Konzipierung und technischer Realisierung die GSI maßgeblich beteiligt ist", sagte Wagner. Dies beweise einmal mehr die große Bedeutung der Grundlagenforschung. "Sie bringt, wenn Wissenschaftler bereit sind, Anwendungsbezüge ihrer Disziplin bewusst zu suchen und zu erproben, Innovationen hervor, die in der Praxis vielen Menschen helfen können", so die Wissenschaftsministerin.
Vorbildlich sei auch die enge Zusammenarbeit der GSI mit Universitäten, insbesondere mit den benachbarten hessischen Hochschulen in Darmstadt, Frankfurt und Gießen. "Gemeinsame Berufungen leitender Wissenschaftler, die zugleich als Professoren an Universitäten tätig sind, Kooperationsverträge mit Universitäten, die Durchführung gemeinsamer Forschungsprojekte und vor allem die gemeinsame Ausbildung hoch qualifizierter wissenschaftlicher Nachwuchskräfte, denen die GSI in Absprache mit den Universitäten Arbeitsmöglichkeiten bietet, führen zu einem Höchstmaß an wissenschaftlichen Synergien und effektiver Ressourcennutzung. Schwerionenforschung in Hessen ist auf diese Weise zu einem profilbildenden Schwerpunkt geworden, der Wissenschaftler aus der ganzen Welt anzieht", sagte Wagner.
Professor Henning dankte Ministerin Wagner für die zusätzliche Bewilligung der beantragten Projektfördermittel, die er als Verpflichtung auffasse, die Anstrengungen zur langfristigen Sicherung der GSI als Leuchtturm der Spitzenforschung in Hessen kraftvoll fortzusetzen. In einem harten Wettbewerb aller deutschen Forschungseinrichtungen um Investitionsmittel für Großgeräte naturwissenschaftlicher Grundlagenforschung habe das GSI-Projekt als eines von wenigen den Wettbewerb mit sehr positivem Votum des als Gutachtergremium tätigen Wissenschaftsrates bestanden. Die Bauarbeiten sollten 2005/6 beginnen und rund sechs Jahre dauern.
Henning sagte, die GSI habe dem Land Hessen, das bisher immer ein verlässlicher, förderlicher Partner gewesen sei, ebenfalls zu danken und habe ihm die höchste Reverenz erwiesen, zu der die GSI auf ihrem Spezialgebiet fähig sei. Als überzeugenden, auch für eine breite Öffentlichkeit sinnfälligen Beleg ihrer Leistung werte die GSI die Entdeckung einer Reihe neuer, superschwerer Elemente des chemischen Periodensystems dank großartiger Experimente mit Hilfe des Beschleunigers. Eines dieser Elemente, das mit der Ordnungszahl 108, sei auf Vorschlag der GSI auf den Namen "Hassium" getauft worden und dokumentiere damit für die Naturwissenschaftler der ganzen Welt, welch günstige Perspektiven ihnen die hessische Region zu bieten habe. Professor Henning berichtete, dass die zuständige internationale Fachorganisation der GSI jüngst das Recht zugesprochen habe, ein weiteres von ihr entdecktes Element, das mit der Ordnungszahl 110, zu benennen. Die GSI habe den Namen "Darmstadtium" vorgeschlagen und sei zuversichtlich, dass er genehmigt werde. Damit werde auch die Stadt Darmstadt in das Pantheon der Naturwissenschaft aufgenommen werden; die GSI statte ihren Dank dafür ab, dass Darmstadt ihr ebenfalls stets ein förderlicher Standort gewesen sei. Professor Henning lud Ministerin Wagner als Darmstädter Bürgerin und Landtagsabgeordnete herzlich zur Taufe des Elements "Darmstadtium" ein, die voraussichtlich im Herbst 2003 in der GSI stattfinden werde.
]]>Eine gemeinsame Arbeitsgruppe der IUPAC* und IUPAP* hat die Entdeckung des Elements mit der Ordnungszahl 110 dem GSI-Forscherteam um Sigurd Hofmann zuerkannt. GSI war daraufhin aufgefordert worden, einen Namensvorschlag für Element 110 einzureichen. Basierend auf diesem Vorschlag hat die Abteilung Anorganische Chemie der IUPAC nun eine vorläufige Empfehlung für die Benennung von Element 110 veröffentlicht. Es wird empfohlen, das bei GSI entdeckte Element gemäß dem Sitz der GSI im Norden von Darmstadt "Darmstadtium" mit dem Symbol "Ds" zu benennen (siehe auch https://iupac.org/publications/pac/75/10/1613/ und die nächste Ausgabe des IUPAC News Magazins „Chemistry International“).
Die endgültige Festlegung des Namens für Element 110 erfolgt durch die Generalversammlung der IUPAC, die vom 8. bis 17. August in Ottawa, Kanada, tagen wird. Die Zeitspanne bis dahin ist vorgesehen, damit die IUPAC-Empfehlung in der wissenschaftlichen Welt diskutiert werden kann. Der endgültige Name für Element 110 wird nach der Generalversammlung in einer gemeinsamen Erklärung der IUPAC und der GSI bekannt gegeben.
*IUPAC International Union for Pure and Applied Chemistry
*IUPAP International Union for Pure and Applied Physics
„Dies ist ein enorm wichtiger Meilenstein in der Entwicklung der GSI. Wir sind hocherfreut über diese schnelle und richtungsweisende Entscheidung von Frau Bundesministerin Bulmahn und ihres Ministeriums und werden alles tun, die in uns gesetzten Erwartungen zu erfüllen“ sagte der Wissenschaftlich-Technische Geschäftsführer der GSI, Prof. Dr. Walter Henning. Für GSI bietet diese Entscheidung die Perspektive zu einem führenden europäischen Forschungszentrum mit einem weit gefächerten Forschungsspektrum für die physikalische Grundlagenforschung zu werden.
In breiter internationaler Partnerschaft hat die GSI 2001 einen Projektvorschlag für ein „internationales Beschleunigerzentrum für die Forschung mit Ionenstrahlen und Strahlen von Antimaterie“ vorgelegt. Der Wissenschaftsrat der Bundesrepublik Deutschland wurde vom BMBF beauftragt, das Projekt zusammen mit anderen Großforschungsprojekten zu evaluieren. Als Ergebnis empfahl er dem BMBF das Projekt unter Auflagen zur Förderung. Auf der Basis dieses Gutachtens hat das BMBF nun entschieden: „Die GSI soll gemeinsam mit europäischen Partnern ihre Anlagen stufenweise ausbauen und zu einem führenden europäischen Physikzentrum werden. Mindestens ein Viertel der Kosten in Höhe von 675 Millionen Euro soll dabei von ausländischen Partnern aufgebracht werden.“ Die Bauzeit wird im Projektvorschlag auf 8 bis 9 Jahre veranschlagt.
Die vorgeschlagene Beschleunigeranlage bei GSI wird Ionenstrahlen und Antiprotonenstrahlen von nie erreichter Intensität und Qualität bereit stellen. „Diese Anlage wird weltweit eine Spitzenstellung einnehmen und wird jährlich etwa 2000 Wissenschaftler aus aller Welt zu mehrwöchigen Experimenten anziehen“, sagt der Projektkoordinator Prof. Dr. Hans Gutbrod voraus.
Ziel der Anlage ist es, parallel und in mehreren eigenständigen Forschungsgebieten breit und interdisziplinär wichtige Fragen zum Aufbau und zur Struktur der Materie zu lösen. Diese reichen von den fundamentalen Bausteinen und Naturgesetzen im Mikroskopischen bis hin zu den grundsätzlichen Prozessen und Eigenschaften, welche die komplexen Strukturen der uns umgebenden Materie bestimmen. Jede dieser Stufen in dem hierarchischen Aufbau der Materie ist zudem verknüpft mit einer bestimmten Phase in der Entwicklung des Universums. „Neben der Bedeutung von Erkenntnissen zu den fundamentalen Aspekten des Aufbaus der Materie ist die Aufklärung der Prozesse, welche zum jetzigen Universum und damit letztendlich zu unserer Existenz führen, von großer wissenschaftlicher Faszination“, sagte Dr. Ingo Peter von der Öffentlichkeitsarbeit der GSI.
Spezielle Beispiele sind: Die Forschung mit Strahlen von exotischen Kernen, die das Verständnis über die Entstehung der chemischen Elemente voranbringen wird. Forschung mit Antiprotonen und Hadronen, die u.a. zur Lösung der Frage beitragen soll, woher die Materie ihre Masse hat. Die Physik dichtester Kernmaterie erlaubt einen tieferen Einblick in die ersten Sekundenbruchteile nach dem Urknall, der Entstehung unseres Universums, und die Eigenschaften von Neutronensternen. Die Plasmaphysik eröffnet die Möglichkeit zu erforschen, wie die Materie im Inneren von großen Planeten aussieht.
Die wissenschaftlich-technische Entwicklung, die mit Geräten an der vordersten Front der Forschung verknüpft ist, ist eine weitere wichtige Motivation. Aus der Grundlagenforschung ergeben sich oft überraschende Anwendungen, die vorher nicht abzusehen sind. Dies zeigt das Beispiel einer neuartigen, seit fünf Jahren sehr erfolgreich praktizierten Tumortherapie mit Ionenstrahlen bei GSI. An der geplanten Anlage lassen sich neue Anwendungen beispielsweise in der Materialforschung, in der Plasmaphysik, für die Raumfahrt und in der Informationstechnologie erwarten.
Die GSI betreibt eine mehrere hundert Meter lange Beschleunigeranlage, mit der schwere Ionen fast auf Lichtgeschwindigkeit beschleunigt werden können. Sie werden zur Grundlagenforschung auf breiter Basis, in Kern- und Atomphysik, Plasmaphysik, Materialforschung und Strahlenbiologie genutzt.
Unter Leitung von Prof. Kraft wurden in langjährigen biophysikalischen Forschungsarbeiten, Kohlenstoffstrahlen als das optimale Werkzeug für die Tumortherapie etabliert. Kohlenstoffstrahlen erzeugen erst am Ende ihrer Reichweite im Tumor ihre größte Wirkung und führen zu einer hohen Inaktivierung der getroffenen Tumorzellen. Im Eingangskanal, zwischen Hautoberfläche und Tumor werden nur wenige, meist reparable Zellschäden verursacht. Dies führt im besten Fall zu einer Tumorkontrolle von 100% für Chondrosarkome.
Mit einem bei GSI entwickelten Scanverfahren kann der Strahl millimetergenau über ein beliebiges Tumorvolumen gerastert werden. Außerdem kann der Ionenstrahl im Patienten durch eine geringe Aktivität von Positron-Emittern mit einer PET-Kamera (Positronen-Emissions- Tomographie) von außen kontrolliert werden.
Nach dem soeben abgeschlossenen Behandlungsblock - genau 5 Jahre nach der ersten Behandlung – sind bisher mehr als 150 Patienten sehr erfolgreich mit nur sehr geringen Nebenwirkungen behandelt worden. Auch wenn für die Mehrheit der Patienten noch keine abschließende Beurteilung abgeben werden kann, liegt die Heilungsrate sehr deutlich über der der konventionellen Tumorbestrahlung.
Dieser Erfolg war nur möglich aufgrund hervorragender Leistungen der gesamten GSI und den beteiligten Mitarbeitern der Uniklinik und des DKFZ Heidelberg und dem FZ Rossendorf, vor allem aber vom engeren Team des Therapie-Pilot-Projekts unter der Leitung von Dr. Dr. Jürgen Debus, Dr. Thomas Haberer und Dr. Wolfgang Enghardt. Der klinische Erfolg der Ionenstrahltherapie bei GSI hat den Bau eines Beschleunigerzentrums an der Heidelberger Klinik angestoßen, der im Frühjahr nächsten Jahres beginnen soll. Auch auf europäischer Ebene gibt es in vielen Ländern ähnliche Projekte, die eine Schwerionentherapie mit Kohlenstoff-Ionen aufbauen werden.
Wie wir heute sehen, hat die GSI vor fünf Jahren mit dem Beginn der Patientenbestrahlung mit Kohlenstoff-Ionen einen guten und folgenreichen Anfang gemacht für weitere Therapie- Zentren, vor allem aber für die Patienten, die dadurch geheilt werden.
]]>In seiner Stellungnahme bezeichnet der Wissenschaftsrat die geplante Beschleunigeranlage der GSI als „ein für Europa zentrales Instrument zur Erforschung der Materie im Dimensionsbereich Atom/Atomkern/subnukleare Teilchen und im Wirkungsbereich der starken Kraft (Quark-Materie, Nukleonen, Atomkerne). Die in Darmstadt geplante Anlage wird neuartige Forschungsmöglichkeiten mit Ionen- und Antiprotonenstrahlen bieten, mit denen neue Wege in der Grundlagenforschung und der anwendungsorientierten Forschung beschritten werden können.[...] Das Projekt wird es erlauben, die führende Rolle Europas in der Kern- und Hadronenphysik langfristig zu erhalten und auszubauen.“ Weiterhin heißt es: „Das geplante Beschleuniger- und Detektorsystem ist weltweit ohne Vergleich und von hohem technologischen Anspruch.“
Die GSI ist erfreut über die positive Beurteilung des Beschleunigerprojekts, das in Zusammenarbeit mit vielen Hochschulen und internationalen Partnern erarbeitet wurde. Sie wird alles tun, um die Bedingungen für eine endgültige Realisierung zu erfüllen.
Die uns auf der Erde umgebende Materie besteht hauptsächlich aus stabilen Atomkernen. Bei diesen natürlich vorkommenden Kernen herrscht immer ein relativ ausgeglichenes Verhältnis der beiden Bausteine des Kerns, der Protonen und Neutronen. Bei Abweichungen von diesem Verhältnis werden die Kerne radioaktiv und zerfallen, üblicherweise über die bekannten Zerfallsarten Alpha-, Beta-, Gamma-Zerfall und Kernspaltung. Bei sehr protonen- bzw. neutronenreichen Kernen wurde als zusätzliche Zerfallsart auch die Emission einzelner Kernbausteine – Protonen oder Neutronen – beobachtet. Seit langem gibt es Vorhersagen, dass für Kerne mit extremem Protonenüberschuss wie z. B. Eisen-45 außerdem der Zweiprotonen- Zerfall auftreten sollte. Bislang konnte dies jedoch nicht experimentell nachgewiesen werden. Von der Untersuchung solcher extrem protonen- und auch neutronenreicher Kerne und ihrer Zerfälle versprechen sich die Wissenschaftler über die reine Kernphysik hinaus grundlegende Erkenntnisse zur Elementsynthese in Sternexplosionen wie Novae und Supernovae.
Die Beschleunigeranlage der GSI erlaubt es, exotische Atomkerne mit großem Protonen- oder Neutronenüberschuss zu erzeugen und ihren Zerfall zu untersuchen. Beim jetzigen Experiment wurden Nickel-58-Ionen auf ca. 50 Prozent der Lichtgeschwindigkeit beschleunigt und auf Hindernisse (Beryllium-Folien) geschossen. Dadurch fragmentieren die Nickel-Kerne in viele verschiedene Bruchstücke. Im Fragment-Separator der GSI wurden die Bruchstücke anschließend separiert und die gesuchten Eisen-45-Bruchstücke (bestehend aus 26 Protonen und 19 Neutronen) identifiziert. Die Produktion der Eisen-45-Kerne ist extrem selten. In einer knappen Woche Messzeit konnten nur sechs Atomkerne erzeugt werden. Bei vier von ihnen gelang es anschließend, in einer speziellen Messapparatur den Zweiprotonen-Zerfall, d.h. die Umwandlung in Chrom-43 durch Emission von zwei Protonen, eindeutig nachzuweisen.
An den GSI-Experimenten waren Forscher aus mehreren Ländern beteiligt: Universität Warschau, Polen; GSI Darmstadt, Deutschland; University of Tennessee, USA; CEN Bordeaux, Frankreich; University of Liverpool, Großbritannien; ORNL Oak Ridge, USA; University of Edinburgh, Großbritannien; GANIL Caen, Frankreich.
]]>Zentrales Thema der internationalen Konferenz an der GSI ist die Frage nach den Eigenschaften komprimierter Kernmaterie, wie sie zum Beispiel im Zentrum von Neutronensternen existiert. ähnlich extreme Verhältnisse können auf der Erde nur in Stößen zwischen schweren Atomkernen kurzzeitig erzeugt werden. Hierbei wird Kernmaterie – die aus Protonen und Neutronen besteht – so stark erhitzt und verdichtet, dass diese Teilchen ihre Eigenschaften verändern und sich schließlich in ihre elementaren Bestandteile - die Quarks - auflösen. Die Physiker versuchen, mit diesen Experimenten fundamentale Fragen der modernen Physik zu beantworten:
Warum hat man noch nie freie Quarks die elementaren Bestandteile der Materie – beobachten können? Warum sind Protonen und Neutronen etwa 40 Mal schwerer die drei Quarks, aus denen sie bestehen? Was ist der Ursprung dieser Masse, die immerhin über 99% der uns umgebenden Materie ausmacht?
Antworten auf diese und ähnliche Fragen suchen auch die Wissenschaftler am europäischen Forschungszentrum CERN in Genf und in Brookhaven (USA). In diesen Labors werden Atomkerne mit extrem hohen Energien aufeinander geschossen, sodass sich die Kernmaterie sehr stark erhitzt. An der GSI hingegen soll ein alternativer Weg eingeschlagen werden: die größtmögliche Kompression von Kernmaterie bei moderater Erhitzung. Diese Experimente erfordern weniger hohe Energien aber dafür höhere Intensitäten der Schwerionenstrahlen. Genau dies soll die an der GSI projektierte Experimentier – und Beschleunigeranlage leisten. Am Ende ihrer Vorträge und Diskussionen hoffen die Wissenschaftler aus aller Welt, die zur Zeit an der GSI versammelt sind, dem optimalen Konzept für ein zukünftiges Experimentierprogramm einen großen Schritt näher gekommen zu sein.
]]>Die Geschäftsführung möchte alle Mitarbeiterinnen und Mitarbeiter zu diesem Thema informieren und lädt sie hierzu für
Montag, den 17. September 2001, 10.00 Uhr,
zu einer Mitarbeiterversammlung in den Hörsaal ein.
Professor Dr. Walter Henning
Dr. Helmut Zeitträger
Die GSI hat Herrn Schmelzer sehr viel zu verdanken. Er war Vorbild einer ganzen Wissenschaftlergeneration. Die Wissenschaft bildete den Mittelpunkt seines Lebens. Mit dem Bau des UNILAC konnte er seine Vision eines neuartigen Beschleunigerkonzepts umsetzen. Mit seinen strategischen Ideen legte er die Grundlage für bahnbrechende wissenschaftliche Erfolge, die der GSI hohe internationale Anerkennung brachten und neue Wege für die Zukunft aufzeigten.
Carl Christoph Schmelzer wurde am 17. November 1908 in Lichtentanne in Sachsen geboren; er legte in Zwickau sein Abitur ab und begann 1928 an der Technischen Hochschule in München Chemie zu studieren. Nach zwei Jahren wechselte er die Universität, er ging nach Jena, und - wahrscheinlich signifikanter - er wechselte das Fach: Er begann das Studium der Physik, das er 1935 mit der Dissertation über "Absolutmessung dielektrischer Verluste bei hohen Frequenzen" abschloss. Sein Doktorvater war Max Wien.
Nach 10-monatiger Tätigkeit als Privatassistent bei Max Wien folgte Herr Schmelzer einer Einladung in die USA, wo die Arbeiten über das dielektrische Verhalten von Elektrolyten fortgesetzt wurden. 1939 kehrte Herr Schmelzer nach Deutschland zurück und wurde 1. Assistent von Georg Goubeau am Technisch-Physikalischen Institut der Universität Jena, wo er sich bis Kriegsende mit Physik und Technik der Dezimeterwellen befasste. 1948 ging Herr Schmelzer als Assistent zu Walther Bothe nach Heidelberg, wo er sich 1949 mit einer Arbeit über das dielektrische Verhalten polar aufgebauter Materie habilitierte. Nach Arbeiten in der Optik wandte er sich Beschleunigerproblemen zu. 1952 erschien eine Veröffentlichung mit dem Titel "Über günstige Betriebszustände des Elektronenzyklotrons". Ebenfalls im Jahre 1952 begann eine wichtige Epoche im Leben Herrn Schmelzers und in der Entwicklung von Hochenergiebeschleunigern; er wurde Mitglied der Protonen-Synchrotron-Gruppe, die später den großen Protonenbeschleuniger PS des CERN bei Genf bauen sollte.
Herr Schmelzer war verantwortlich für das Hochfrequenzsystem, die magnetische Führung der Protonen und ihre phasenrichtige Beschleunigung. 1954 wurde er stellvertretender Leiter des Projekts. Mit dem Bau des ersten kybernetisch gesteuerten Beschleunigers wagte er sich in unbekanntes Gebiet vor, und noch kurz vor der Fertigstellung des Beschleunigers zweifelten Experten am Erfolg. Die Situation, bei dem Versuch, das Synchrotron erstmals in Betrieb zu nehmen, schildert Robert Jungk in seinem Buch "Die große Maschine" folgendermaßen: "Kaum war ein Fehler behoben, da machte nun wieder das außerordentlich diffizile, auf Schnellschaltungen von zehntausendstel Sekunden gestimmte Hochfrequenzsystem Schwierigkeiten. Die in Heidelberg entwickelte Methode der kybernetischen "Beam Control", in der die Beschleunigung des Protonenstrahls durch seine eigenen "Rückmeldungen" geregelt wurde, ließen sich einfach nicht zur Räson bringen, und ihr Meister, der sonst so gemütliche Professor Schmelzer, zeigte zum ersten Mal deutliche Zeichen von Nervosität, gegen die nicht einmal sein geliebtes Bier wirkte". Aber kurz darauf klappte alles, die Maschine lief an, die Protonenenergie überschritt den kritischen Bereich der Übergangsenergie mühelos und erreichte 24 GeV bei einer Transmission von 90 %. Dieses historische Ereignis fand am 24. November 1959 statt.
Herr Schmelzer wurde zum Honorarprofessor an der Universität Heidelberg und zum Mitglied der Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften ernannt. 1959 nahm er den Ruf auf den Lehrstuhl für Angewandte Physik in Heidelberg an, nachdem er vorher Rufe nach Hamburg, Würzburg und München abgelehnt hatte. Schon Mitte der fünfziger Jahre war Herr Schmelzer für die Physik, die man mit schnellen schweren Ionen machen könnte, begeistert. Nun griff er diese Ideen erneut auf, und sein Weg zum UNILAC begann. Am 17.12.1969 wurde die GSI gegründet und Herr Schmelzer wurde ihr erster Wissenschaftlicher Geschäftsführer. Unter seiner Führung wurde der Unilac geplant und marschierte die GSI an die Spitze der Schwerionenforschung. Bereits kurz nach der Fertigstellung des UNILAC regte Herr Schmelzer eine Erweiterung der GSI um einen Ringbeschleuniger für höhere Energien an, die in den achtziger Jahren mit der Synchrotron-Speicherring-Kombination SIS/ESR realisiert wurde. Die GSI gehört heute zu den international führenden Zentren der Schwerionenforschung. Professor Schmelzer hat den Grundstein für diese von vielen wissenschaftlichen Erfolgen gekennzeichnete Entwicklung gelegt. Für seine herausragenden Beiträge zur Beschleunigerphysik und zur Wissenschaftslandschaft in Deutschland erhielt er zahlreiche Auszeichnungen, Ehrendoktorwürden sowie im Jahr 1978 das Bundesverdienstkreuz. Wir verlieren einen warmherzigen und bescheidenen Menschen, der stets für alle Anliegen der GSI-Mitarbeiter offen war. Sein Tod bedeutet den Verlust einer Leitfigur für die wissenschaftliche Forschung. Wir werden Christoph Schmelzer stets in guter und dankbarer Erinnerung behalten.
Die Geschäftsführung
]]>In dem gerade abgeschlossenen Experiment kamen die Wissenschaftler zu dem Ergebnis, dass Hassium der Gruppe 8 des Periodensystems angehört. Sein nächster chemischer Verwandter ist das Schwermetall Osmium. Beide besitzen die für ein Schwermetall außergewöhnliche Eigenschaft, mit Sauerstoff eine leicht flüchtige Verbindung (Oxid) einzugehen.
Das Experiment wurde an der Beschleunigeranlage UNILAC der GSI durchgeführt. Dort wurden mit einer neuen Bestrahlungstechnologie Magnesium-Ionen höchster Intensität auf Curium geschossen, sodass durch Kernverschmelzung (Fusion) einzelne Atome des schweren Elements Hassium entstehen konnten. Mit einer am Paul Scherrer Institut (Schweiz) und am Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (USA) neu entwickelten hochempfindlichen Analysemethode konnten die Wissenschaftler mit diesen Atomen anschließend eine Sauerstoffverbindung herstellen und deren Abscheidung auf Siliziumdetektoren bei sehr tiefen Temperaturen messen. Dies gibt Aufschluss über die Einordnung in das Periodensystem. Die Methode ist so sensitiv, dass nur sechs Hassium-Atome ausreichten, um eine eindeutige chemische Charakterisierung vorzunehmen.
An dem Experiment bei GSI war ein internationales Team von Wissenschaftlern aus Deutschland, der Schweiz, den USA, Russland und China beteiligt. Bereits 1984 war das Element 108 bei GSI entdeckt worden und wurde zu Ehren des Bundeslandes Hessen auf den lat. Namen Hassium getauft. Damals konnte zwar die Existenz des Elements bewiesen werden, aber über die chemischen Eigenschaften konnten keine Aussagen gemacht werden. Mit der nun eingesetzten neuen Methode eröffnen sich für die Zukunft ganz neue Möglichkeiten. So sollen weitere superschwere Elemente im Gebiet der Ordnungszahlen 112 und 114 untersucht werden.
Dabei erwarten die Wissenschaftler deutliche Abweichungen von den Vorhersagen innerhalb des Periodensystems.
]]>In dieser Woche werden in Berlin zahlreiche Vorträge von Wissenschaftlern über Themen aus den Forschungsgebieten der 'Kernphysik' und der 'Elementarteilchenphysik' gehalten, vor allem für Schüler und die interessierte Öffentlichkeit. In einer Ausstellung kann spielerisch das Gebiet der Kernphysik Interessierten nähergebracht werden.
Für den Auftakt der Veranstaltung am 3. April hat sich die GSI eine kleine Aktion einfallen lassen: Ein sportlicher, rennradbegeisterter Mitarbeiter der GSI, Herr Dr. Heilmann, wird in zwei Tagen mit dem Fahrrad von Darmstadt nach Berlin fahren. Dabei wird das Thema "Reise zum Urknall und Evolution unseres Universums" anhand des Reiseweges zeitgerafft dargestellt.
Herr Dr. Heilmann wird zur Eröffnung dieser Veranstaltungsreihe am 3. April, 10.00 Uhr, Herrn Staatssekretär Wolf-Michael Catenhusen vom Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung Briefe des Oberbürgermeisters der Wissenschaftsstadt Darmstadt, Herrn Peter Benz, sowie der GSI überbringen.
Diese Aktion bietet die Möglichkeit in Publikationsorganen zu erscheinen, die durch Wissenschaft alleine nicht erreicht wird. Dieses medienwirksame Konzept soll auch für unsere Heimatstadt werben.
Vom 1. bis 3. April war der Rad-Kurier der GSI, Johannes Heilmann, mit dem Rennrad unterwegs, um die "Reise zum Urknall" von der GSI zur Urania, dem Ausstellungsort der 2. Großveranstaltung zum "Jahr der Physik", symbolisch nach zu vollziehen.
Er startete am Samstag um 7.15 Uhr bei GSI, und am Montag früh um viertel nach neun, nach einer Fahrzeit von knapp 22 Stunden, war es geschafft. Er überbrachte dem Parlamentarischen Staatssekretär Wolf Michael Catenhusen (MdB) Briefe des Darmstädter Oberbürgermeisters Peter Benz und der Geschäftsführung der GSI, zwei Videos über die "Tumortherapie mit schweren Ionen" und die "Reise zum Urknall" sowie den Sportwimpel der GSI. Die einwöchige Veranstaltung lockte über 15.000 Besucher an. Dies war der größte Besucherstrom pro Woche, den die Urania je hatte.
B o n n. Für interdisziplinäre Forschung hat die Hermann von Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft Deutscher Forschungszentren anlässlich ihrer Jahrestagung erstmals den Erwin-Schrödinger-Preis vergeben.
Der Preis wurde vom Stifterverband initiiert und mit 100.000 DM dotiert, "um ein Zeichen für das Engagement der deutschen Wirtschaft für die Wissenschaft zu setzen", sagte der Vorstandsvorsitzende des Stifterverbandes, Dr. Arend Oetker, in seiner Laudatio. Für beide seien Grenzüberschreitungen überlebensnotwendig. "Die Preisträger haben die Fähigkeit dazu in vorbildlicher Weise bewiesen; interdisziplinäre, aber auch institutsübergreifende und überregionale Zusammenarbeit charakterisieren ihren Erfolg", sagte Oetker.
Der Preis ging zur Hälfte an Professor Dr. Gerhard Kraft, Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung, Darmstadt, die andere Hälfte erhielten zu gleichen Teilen Dr. Wolfgang Enghardt, Forschungszentrum Rossendorf, und Privatdozent Dr. Dr. Jürgen Debus, Radiologische Universitätsklinik Heidelberg und Deutsches Krebsforschungszentrum Heidelberg.
Gewürdigt werden damit ihre herausragenden Beiträge zur Vorbereitung, Entwicklung und klinischen Einführung der Krebstherapie mit Ionenstrahlen.
Die Ionenstrahltherapie erlaubt eine wirksamere Bekämpfung von bislang nicht oder nur unbefriedigend behandelbaren lokal begrenzten Krebserkrankungen. Mit dem innovativen Verfahren ist es möglich, tiefliegende Tumore zu zerstören, ohne das umliegende gesunde Gewebe zu schädigen.
Das kooperative Projekt der Wissenschaftler aus Darmstadt, Rossendorf und Heidelberg zur Krebstherapie mit Ionenstrahlen steht international an vorderster Front, heißt es in der Begründung der Jury unter Vorsitz von Frau Professor Dr. Karin Mölling von der Universität Zürich. An keiner anderen Stelle seien die Probleme so umfassend, zielgerichtet und mit so vielen neuen Ideen und Methoden von Medizinern, Physikern, Radiologen und Ingenieuren angegangen worden.
Bei der Namenswahl für den Preis entschieden sich der Stifterverband und die Helmholtz-Gemeinschaft für den österreichischen Physik-Nobelpreisträger Erwin Schrödinger (1887-1961), der auch die Entwicklung der Biologie nachhaltig beeinflusste. Auf der Suche nach physikalischen Gesetzen des Lebens schlug er 1944 erstmals die Idee eines genetischen Codes vor - 10 Jahre, bevor dieser wirklich entdeckt wurde. Diese Gedanken des vielseitigen Physikers haben die Welt der Lebenswissenschaften revolutioniert.
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