Collider Detector at Fermilab
The Collider Detector at Fermilab, CDF short, is a particle physics experiment at the proton -antiproton Tevatron storage ring of the Fermi National Accelerator laboratorys. The CDF experiment is operated by an international collaboration, in which about 600 physicists from 60 universities and national research institutions have joined forces from 13 countries.
History
The experiment was proposed in August 1981 and approved on April 1 of the following year. The first data, which led to the publication of the measurement results were recorded in 1987. Since then, CDF has been remodeled several times to adjust the experiment to ever higher beam intensities.
Research objectives
The aim of the CDF experiment is to study the production and decay of heavy elementary particles such as top, bottom and Charmquarks and the electroweak gauge bosons W and Z. In addition, CDF studied the production of high-energy photon and particle jets. In addition, the CDF collaboration searched for signatures of so-called new physics, ie for new particles and phenomena that can not be explained by the standard model of particle physics.
Structure of the experiment
CDF is a general purpose detector for recording high-energy collisions of protons and antiprotons. The central part of the detector has a size of about 12 by 12 by 12 meters.
The detector is radially symmetric around the beam, which hosts the particle collisions, built. The jet is closest to a system of silicon strip detectors, with which the primary vertex, ie the location of the proton -antiproton collision, and secondary vertices, ie the locations of decays of long-lived particles, measured precisely leave. Next, a drift chamber, with the tracks of charged particles can be traced over a large volume. The curvature of the tracks of charged particles in a strong magnetic field of 1.4 Tesla, the pulse of the particles can be determined. The magnetic field is generated by a 4.8 m long superconducting magnet coil with a radius of 1.5 m. Outside the solenoid are electromagnetic and hadronic calorimeter so called, in which electromagnetically interacting particles (electrons and photons) and hadrons stopped and their energies are measured. Outside the calorimeters are drift chambers to detect muons.
The data acquisition is controlled by a data acquisition system trigger ( triggers), the 1.7 million proton -antiproton collisions per second and analyzed in real time from the data stream selects about 100 collision events for later detailed analysis.
Main Results
Among the key findings of the CDF experiment, the discovery of the top quark belongs ( together with D0) and the measurement of its properties as well as the measurement of matter -antimatter oscillation of Bs mesons.