Minutes away from Fermilab’s particle accelerators, the lab’s iconic bison herd welcomes its newest (and most adorable) member. The first calf this spring was born on April 13; mom and baby both are doing well.
The newest calf brings the herd to 40 animals, joining 24 cows, two bulls and 13 yearlings. “This year we have more than usual because we kept more calves from last year,” said Cleo Garcia, Fermilab’s bison herdsman. Normally, calves are sold in the fall after they’ve been weaned, but last year, 11 were not purchased, and two calves arrived so late in the season that they were still nursing.
Fermilab’s first calf was born April 13, marking the start of the new calf season this spring. Photo: Ryan Postel, Fermilab
Bison have been living on the natural areas of Fermilab since 1969 when the lab’s first director, Robert Wilson, established the herd to connect the lab with the Midwestern prairie on which it’s built. The herd started with a single bull, two cows and three yearlings — all introduced with lively personas — and another 12 animals were donated by the Illinois Department of Conservation in 1971 to help diversify the stock.
Most of the Fermilab bison today are descendants of this original herd. “All the cows were born here at Fermilab,” Garcia said, “the only thing we change is the bulls every five to six years.” Rotating the bulls keeps the herd healthy and genetically diverse. In fact, genetic testing in 2015 revealed that the Fermilab herd is 100% bison, free of cattle genes, and shares lineages with wild herds in six other states.
“We hope to have at least 22 calves this year,” said Garcia. Determining exactly how many calves to expect annually is an imprecise science because the grounds team lets everything happen naturally. Rather than testing the cows to see if they’re pregnant, the team must rely on physical signs like swollen udders and bellies for an estimate. “You can see when they’re about to give birth,” Garcia said, “Most of them tend to get away from the rest of the herd, and then they come back with a baby. It’s amazing.”
The newest member of Fermilab’s bison herd was born on an 80-degree Fahrenheit spring day, the same day the lab celebrated the opening of two new research buildings and the groundbreaking of the Linac Complex. Photo: Ryan Postel, Fermilab
Calving season is expected to continue through July, and perhaps a bit longer; the final calf of last year’s season was born in September. As more calves arrive, the grounds team will be on the lookout to ensure they are thriving. “We’re looking for signs that calves are nursing,” explained Garcia, “and that they are welcomed by the herd.” And sometimes, the team must chase coyotes from the pens. Although a single coyote doesn’t present a danger to the bison, Garcia said they don’t want to risk a whole pack taking an interest.
For those visiting the herd, Garcia suggested coming to Fermilab public areas multiple times throughout the season to see the color of the calves change from a light cinnamon to a dark brown. And of course, keeping an eye out for playful newborns. “They play sometimes,” Garcia said, “You see them running around and start jumping, especially after nursing.”
The Fermilab site has been designated a National Environmental Research Park by the U.S. Department of Energy. The lab’s environmental stewardship efforts are supported by the Department of Energy Office of Science as well as Fermilab Natural Areas.
Fermilab is supported by the Office of Science of the U.S. Department of Energy. The Office of Science is the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States and is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, visit Fermilab’s website and follow us on Twitter at @Fermilab.
Gov. Pritzker and other local legislators joined DOE officials at Fermilab in Batavia, Illinois, for the opening of two new buildings and the groundbreaking of another to usher in a new era of science.
The U.S. Department of Energy’s Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory celebrated three important construction milestones yesterday that will increase the lab’s research efficiencies and capabilities. In attendance at the “Building Fermilab’s Future” ceremony in Batavia were representatives from the DOE Office of Science, Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker and local officials, including U.S. Reps. Sean Casten and Bill Foster, and national and international partners and collaborators.
Gov. J.B. Pritzker addressed the audience at Fermilab’s “Building Fermilab’s Future” event while University of Chicago President Paul Alivisatos (back left) and Fermilab Director Lia Merminga (back right) look on. Photo: Ryan Postel, Fermilab
“We don’t know that we’re witnessing history until, frankly, it is in the rear-view mirror. But with Fermilab, we get to celebrate discovery and innovation in real time, right now,” said Gov. J.B. Pritzker.
The brand-new, 80,000-square-foot Integrated Engineering Research Center (IERC), located next to the iconic Wilson Hall, will provide state-of-the-art lab space, making research and development a more collaborative and centralized process. It will be the new home of engineers and technicians working on high-energy physics projects, like the international Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment led by Fermilab and the proposed next-generation cosmic microwave background project called CMB-S4. It will also enable cutting-edge engineering for emerging technologies, including quantum and microelectronics.
U.S. Reps. Sean Casten (far left) and Bill Foster (back, third right) joined the ribbon-cutting of Fermilab’s PIP-II cryoplant building with Gov. J.B. Pritzker (second left), Deputy Secretary of Energy David Turk (center left), Fermilab Director Lia Merminga (center right), University of Chicago President Paul Alivisatos (second from right) and Fermi Site Office Manager Roger Snyder (far right). Photo: Ryan Postel
Fermilab Director Lia Merminga welcomed all who attended, adding, “The completion of two buildings and the start of the PIP-II Linac Complex are major steps toward transforming our lab’s physical and scientific/engineering landscape. The new IERC and the PIP-II Cryoplant buildings will be centers of excellence for research, innovation and collaboration that will accelerate the science of DUNE and a rich array of discoveries.”
The new PIP-II Cryogenic Plant Building was also opened at today’s event. It will house a cryogenic plant, which is an in-kind contribution from the Department of Atomic Energy, India, to provide the PIP-II accelerator with liquid helium to cool superconducting radio-frequency modules for particle acceleration. PIP-II is an essential enhancement to the Fermilab particle accelerator complex that will power beamline-based experiments at Fermilab. Its new 215-meter linear accelerator, or linac, will eventually power the high-energy neutrino beam that will send neutrinos through the earth toward the international DUNE project in Lead, South Dakota. PIP-II is the first U.S. accelerator project to be built with significant international contributions.
Fermilab had the ceremonial groundbreaking of the PIP-II Accelerator Complex with representatives from the DOE Office of Science, Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker and local officials, including U.S. Reps. Sean Casten and Bill Foster, and national and international partners and collaborators.
Photo: Ryan Postel, Fermilab
The groundbreaking today for the Linac Complex for the PIP-II accelerator kicks off the construction of the approximately 800,000-square-foot complex that will have four components: the linac tunnel, where the linear accelerator will reside; the linac gallery that will house equipment, much of which will come from international partners as in-kind contributions; the high bay building, where the loading dock and room-temperature front end of the linac will be located; and a beam transfer line. The entire construction project is expected to take approximately 39 months.
Fermilab is located on 6,800 acres of prairie land in Batavia, Illinois, a Chicago suburb. The area selected for the PIP-II site minimizes the impact on the prairie, which Fermilab maintains. The site resides along Fermilab’s Main Ring Road, where contractors can work without interrupting other operations of the lab.
The construction of the Integrated Engineering Research Center was funded by the Science Laboratory Infrastructure program within the Department of Energy Office of Science.
Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory is supported by the Office of Science of the U.S. Department of Energy. The Office of Science is the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States and is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, please visit science.energy.gov or at www.fnal.gov and follow us on Twitter at @Fermilab.
The Integrated Engineering Research Center at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory is about to become the place to tackle the technical challenges of particle physics experiments. It will be the new home of engineers and technicians working on high-energy physics projects, like the Fermilab-hosted Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment and the proposed next-generation cosmic microwave background project called CMB-S4.
The brand-new, 80,000-square-foot building provides space for research, design, construction and testing of technologies. It will host state-of-the-art infrastructure for the development of technologies for particle detectors, including electronics and application-specific integrated circuits. And it was built to kindle innovation across the lab.
“To me, the most important thing is getting a lot of people together and no longer spread out all over the Fermilab site,” said Leo Bellantoni, a senior scientist at Fermilab working on the project. “It’s going to be a great facility for getting stuff launched.”
The brand-new, 80,000-square-foot Integrated Engineering Research Center provides space for research, design, construction and testing of technologies for particle physics research at Fermilab. Photo: Ryan Postel, Fermilab
Centrally located next to Fermilab’s iconic, 16-story Wilson Hall, the sustainably built center has two floors, with lab space on the ground floor and office and conference space on the second. Two of these labs will provide much-needed space dedicated to DUNE-related work — one cold lab for work with cryogenic liquids, and one warm lab for non-cryogenic work. These new labs will provide space for DUNE engineers and scientists to develop and test modules for neutrino detectors while streamlining workflows and providing opportunities for more collaboration.
“One of the draws of bringing people to Fermilab is having the facilities that would be difficult for them to have of similar scale or complexity at their university,” said Jen Raaf, a senior scientist working on DUNE. “So having things like this will definitely draw more people to come here, which feeds into this nice environment where you get to talk to people from different backgrounds and spark new ideas.”
One of the first DUNE projects to go into the cold lab will be work on the photon detection system for the second detector module planned for the DUNE far detector in South Dakota. This detector module will have X-ARAPUCA photon detectors on the cathode, at minus 300 kilovolts, surrounded by cryogenic liquid. This has never been done before, according to Ryan Rivera, an electrical engineer and deputy head of the Real-time Processing Systems Division. To accomplish it, engineers are testing the use of optical fiber to send power and signals to and from the detector.
“At the engineering building, we want to keep optimizing this power-and-signal-over-fiber system to get the most we can out of it, the most efficient operation,” Rivera said. “There’s implications for even the proposed far detector three. It’s a perfect time for R&D to come out of the engineering building that could be the spark for decision-making for far detector three.”
View of the DUNE Cold lab inside the IERC building, which includes a 25-ton overhead bridge crane and space for the testing of DUNE prototype detector components with liquid argon. Photo: Brian Rubik, Fermilab
In addition to DUNE, other projects and experiments will have R&D labs on the ground floor of the new building. Researchers working on CMB-S4 will use lab space for developing and testing modules and electronics for detectors that will end up as components of telescopes in the South Pole and Chile. According to Adam Anderson, a Wilson fellow and associate scientist working on CMB electronics, the new space will allow for the testing of about 500 of these modules, thanks to a new grove of dilution refrigerators.
“That’s absolutely necessary for doing this testing activity for CMB-S4 because we have so many modules that we need to test,” Anderson said. “The ability to run large numbers of cryostats is a requirement for being able to do this work.”
While the new labs for DUNE, CMB-S4 and other experimental projects moving into the new building will enhance the R&D process with more space and new equipment, the relocation will also free up cleanroom and lab space in Fermilab’s Silicon Detector Facility. The reclaimed space will become available for the testing and mass production of detector components for the high-luminosity upgrades of the CMS experiment at the Large Hadron Collider.
Perhaps most importantly, the Integrated Engineering Research Center, which was funded by the Science Laboratory Infrastructure program within DOE’s Office of Science, will allow for more scientific collaboration between scientists, engineers and technicians. It will bring together engineers and scientists who have worked on related topics in locations spread out across the 6,800-acre Fermilab site. For Rivera’s work on DUNE, for example, this will mean more frequent interactions with scientists in Wilson Hall to keep everyone involved on the same page.
“It’ll be the first time at such a large scale all this research can be happening doors away from each other,” he said. “So, there’s a lot of unpredictable synergy that can happen.”
Future research on charge-coupled devices, which scientists use to detect photons, will take place in the CCD lab on the ground floor of IERC. This lab is an example of the typical high-bay space that the building provides. The infrastructure in these spaces provides clean power, grounding bars, compressed air, nitrogen and vacuum hook-ups. Photo: Dan Fograse, Fermilab
These interactions can also be facilitated more easily for scientists and engineers working on astrophysics experiments, according to Anderson. By moving closer to Wilson Hall, he hopes for increased communication between experimentalists and theorists, which in turn can yield more scientific developments from collaborations.
“People who are primarily working in Wilson Hall in astrophysics, like the theory people, also express that they find it interesting to be closer to the experimental work,” he said. “They learn something from us as much as we learn from them.”
According to Bellantoni, the benefits of being near Wilson Hall and in the same building also go beyond just scientific developments. Bringing people closer together not only helps the scientific process but fosters community as well.
“All the labs have big windows, and people are going to walk by and look in and maybe be curious about what their coworkers are doing,” he said. “Just having people in the same space is a tremendous benefit.”
The construction of the Integrated Engineering Research Center was funded by the Science Laboratory Infrastructure program within the Department of Energy Office of Science.
Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory is supported by the Office of Science of the U.S. Department of Energy. The Office of Science is the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States and is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, please visit science.energy.gov.