On 24 September, US Energy Secretary Bill Richardson put the finishing touches to the installation of the 366th and final 20-ton dipole magnet to steer the beams in Fermilab’s new 150 GeV, 2.25 mile Main Injector Ring.
Construction work on the Main Injector began in 1993 and the new machine should begin operation next year, boosting performance of Fermilab’s Tevatron by increasing its supply of protons and antiprotons. With higher collision rates, the Tevatron, already the world’s highest-energy particle collider, will be able to attack new physics goals.
The Main Injector replaces Fermilab’s original 400 GeV four-mile Main Ring, closed in September 1997 after 25 years of service as the hub of the laboratory’s particle beam system. Many of the Main Ring’s components, including quadrupole focusing magnets, have been taken over for the new Main Injector.
Built as Fermilab’s front-line machine, the Main Ring took on a new role in 1983 as the injector for the superconducting 800900 GeV Tevatron, which operated as a protonantiproton collider and in fixed target mode using proton beams. For the future, the Tevatron is a dedicated protonantiproton collider. As well as feeding the Tevatron collider, the Main Injector will be able to support its own programme of fixed target experiments.
The Main Ring and the Superconducting Tevatron shared the same tunnel. The Main Injector is in a new tunnel which is tangential to the Tevatron.
