Robert A. Saar

AEC requests funds for heavy‐ion accelerators

Initial funding for a large tandem electrostatic accelerator at Oak Ridge appears in the FY 1975 AEC budget request. Also included in the

Auroral effects seen in laboratory vortexes

19.2‐million request is money for expansion and upgrading of SuperHILAC at Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory.

Anaheim hosts the APS and AAPT

An explanation of the auroras undulating folds and rays may come from models of instabilities, some of which were developed to explain effects seen in the laboratory. The folds and rays appear to be vortexes of charge density that occur when the aurora charge sheet becomes unstable above a certain charge density. Work reported by Harold F. Webster (General Electric) and Thomas J. Hallinan (University of Alaska) has centered on the analysis of charge distribution in current sheets and charge sheets in the presence of a magnetic field and its possible usefulness as an auroral model.

Proposals for PEP and ISABELLE submitted

Issues directly affecting the human condition—food production, health, energy, education and applications of physics will all be discussed in sessions at the annual joint meeting of the American Physical Society and the American Association of Physics Teachers. The four‐day meeting, starting on 29 January (running Wednesday through Saturday), will take place mostly at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim, California, a southeastern suburb of Los Angeles and the home of world‐famous Disneyland. The gatherings not being held at the Convention Center will be most APS–AAPT joint sessions and all AAPT meetings, to be conducted at the nearby Royal Inn.

Solar‐energy collector accepts diffused sunlight

Two proposals for major high‐energy physics research installations were received by the Atomic Energy Commission this Spring. A 30‐GeV center‐of‐mass energy electron–positron colliding‐beam facility is the subject of a joint Stanford University and University of California proposal submitted in April. The other proposal, submitted in May, comes from Brookhaven National Laboratory and spells out the particulars of ISABELLE, a proton–proton intersecting storage accelerator where center‐of‐mass energies of up to 400 GeV would be available.

Hybrid magnets promise high field for low power

Harvesting the suns bounty of energy is a nontrivial problem—the sun is a nonstationary and often a poorly concentrated source of energy. Another attempt to overcome these difficulties is resulting from a collaboration between workers at the University of Chicago and Argonne National Laboratory. The project, with recently announced funding from the Atomic Energy Commission (

Magnetite used to monitor functioning of human lung

140 000), has reached the stage where prototype collectors have been constructed. These collectors do not need to be redirected during the day and can collect isotropic light more effectively than many earlier designs.

Argonne ZGS yields polarized proton beam

Researchers at MITs National Magnet Laboratory are employing a hybrid system to produce high magnetic fields with relatively low power consumption. A field of 195 kilogauss has been produced through the combined effect of a water‐cooled magnet within a superconducting magnet.

One man's experience

A new technique for monitoring lung contamination and function has been reported by David Cohen of the Francis Bitter National Magnet Laboratory (MIT). The diagnostic handle is magnetite dust, which normally occurs in such low levels in the lungs as to be measurable only in a magnetically shielded room with sophisticated apparatus. Higher amounts of magnetite dust in the lungs can be seen, though, even with a relatively simple and inexpensive flux‐gate magnetometer.

More private participation urged in laser fusion

A collaboration of physicists and engineers at the Argonne National Laboratory has produced polarized proton beams of 6 GeV, the first polarized beam to be achieved in a synchrotron, says Alan Krisch (University of Michigan). The beam, with a polarization of (62±15)% was achieved by using a polarized proton source in conjunction with the Zero Gradient Synchrotron (ZGS).