On Oct. 21, the PIP-II Injector Test Facility accelerated proton beam through its superconducting section for the first time. At this test bed for the upcoming PIP-II superconducting accelerator, collaborators will test novel particle accelerator physics concepts and technologies to be deployed in the high-tech front section of PIP-II, the future heart of the laboratory accelerator complex. The milestone achievement also marks the start of a new era at Fermilab of proton beam delivery using superconducting accelerators.

Sal Wanying Fu knows there’s more to science than numbers.

From Mining.com, Nov. 2, 2020: Three batches of 99.99% pure copper plates mined in Finland, rolled into plates in Germany, shipped across land and sea to Fermilab, and finally rushed into storage 100 meters underground are being used in an experiment to search for dark matter.

From Data Manager Online, Oct. 29, 2020: Nuovi amplificatori quantistici ultrasensibili in grado di migliorare la trasmissione di dati e qubit nei computer del futuro. Le attività che verranno sviluppate all’interno del progetto “Dart wars” hanno forti sinergie con il progetto americano “Sqms” (Superconducting quantum materials and systems center), guidato dall’italiana Anna Grassellino presso il Fermilab di Chicago, che ha recentemente ricevuto un finanziamento di 115 milioni di dollari dal Dipartimento dell’energia degli Stati Uniti, per sviluppare in cinque anni un computer quantistico d’avanguardia, dalle prestazioni e velocità di calcolo mai raggiunte finora.

From Clarin, Oct. 29, 2020: Cuando era chico, Javier Tiffenberg exploraba las profundidades de los océanos a bordo del Calypso. Si quería ir más lejos, cerraba la escotilla de una nave espacial y se lanzaba a recorrer galaxias brumosas. Sólo era cuestión de sumergirse en El mundo submarino, de Jacques Cousteau, o de sintonizar Cosmos, de Carl Sagan.

From the Chicago Quantum Exchange, Oct. 29, 2020: Quantum technology experts from around the country will convene virtually from Nov. 11-13 to forge new partnerships amid an exciting year for quantum research. The third annual Chicago Quantum Summit will feature Anna Grassellino, director of the Superconducting Quantum Materials and Systems Center at Fermilab.

To detect the rare and subtle interactions of dark matter with ordinary matter, the particle detectors for the SuperCDMS experiment must be cooled to temperatures near absolute zero and surrounded by ultrapure copper. From the mine all the way to deployment at SNOLAB, researchers are going to great lengths to ensure the purity of the copper.

For five years, a recycled MRI magnet has provided strong magnetic fields for cross-calibration and testing of equipment used in major physics experiments, including the Muon g-2 and Mu2e Fermilab experiments.

The newly operational KAGRA will bump the number of gravitational-wave observatories to four, which will allow scientists to better triangulate the source of ripples in space-time.

Department of Energy officials have formally signed off on project completion for LUX-ZEPLIN, or LZ: an ultrasensitive experiment that will use 10 metric tons of liquid xenon to hunt for signals of interactions with theorized dark matter particles called WIMPs.