Signal to Background

signal to background SLAC’s rise from an ancient ocean floor; TV goes underground at Fermilab; a shirt as old as St. Francis; path-breaking bicycle; Czechs tackle Japanese opera; mysterious wine sign; engineering with toys. Photo: Lizzie Buchen SLAC's rocky past The tectonic plate that bears years of age. This finding Forty members of the Society SLAC was once the deep ocean revealed a tremendous defor- for Sedimentary Geology drove floor, which gradually rose until mation of the Earth’s surface, down Loop Road, passed it broke through the water’s sur- which saw rocks 15 kilometers through the Sector 30 gate, face a mere one million to two below ground abruptly thrust and arrived on the north side of million years ago. Each period of to the shallow ocean floor. the klystron gallery. Stretching this dynamic history left its mark Certain curiosities, however, before them, the earthen walls in the earth, depositing minerals remain open questions, such of the accelerator trench cut and fossilized creatures. as a glaring 20-million-year gap an enticing swath through the At the start of its October in deposits, and maverick blocks foothills, holding the secrets tour, the group heard the tale of of sandstone in the otherwise- to a story that began more than Paleoparadoxia, a hippo-like uniform mudstone matrix at 55 million years ago. beast whose fossils were dis- Sector 11. Led by geologists Susan covered, excavated, and recon- Although Witebsky has been Witebsky of the Stanford structed by Adele Panofsky, at SLAC for more than 10 years, Linear Accelerator Center and the diligent and passionate wife the rocks continue to excite and Ken Ehman of Chevron, the of SLAC’s founder. At the west intrigue her. “Our primary job group of students, academic end of the two-mile-long linear is environmental restoration and researchers, and professional accelerator, they examined a evaluating the ground water 08symmetry | volume 05 issue 01 jan/feb geologists explored the high- large mass of land which had, quality,” she says of the SLAC lights of the lab’s tectonically some millions of years ago, resident geologists. “But every turbulent past. been drastically inverted time there’s an excavation, like SLAC’s campus rests on through faulting and folding. for the Linac Coherent Light a two-mile-thick bed of marine A few hundred meters to the Source, we get to come along sedimentary rock, a rigid south, they studied 165-million- and see what’s revealed. That’s reminder of the waters that cov- year-old rocks encrusted with the real treat.” ered the land until just recently. fossilized algae barely 40 million Lizzie Buchen 4 Notes from the underworld They had braved Parisian cata- combs, gloomy dungeons, and shipwrecks. Yet as the elevator dropped 360 feet into a cavern- Tunic from Cortona ous hall at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, uncer- tainty flickered across the faces of the globe-trotting tele- vision crew. Cities of the Underworld host Don Wildman and his crew had come with the intention of peeling back the layers of the lab as if peeling an onion. Beginning hundreds of feet below ground and working their way to the top of Wilson Hall, the group docu- mented the Tevatron collider, the deep tunnels of the NuMI and Tunic from Florence MINOS neutrino experiments, and the science that goes on there. The September 2007 film- ing took two days. “It turned out great,” says Chris Bray, a producer for Authentic Entertainment. “We were worried about the explanation of such Dating a saint However, another tunic from the abstract and complicated sci- Two towns in Italy lay claim to Basilica of Santa Croce in ence, but when we showed peo- relics from St. Francis of Assisi— Florence was made decades ple an early version, we found pieces of clothing and an later. that they loved neutrinos.” embroidered cushion from his The method the researchers Although the Fermilab segment deathbed. used, known as accelerator is brief, he adds, “This really is But one of those relics can- mass spectrometry, requires the star of the Chicago show.” not be authentic because it much smaller samples than Each episode of the hit was manufactured decades other forms of radiocarbon dat- History Channel series focuses after the saint’s death in 1226, ing. This allowed the scientists on the tunnels, tombs, and sub- according to physicists who to take five to seven samples of terranean hideouts beneath the tested them in May. woolen fabric from the tunics, foundations of today’s modern Contrary to popular fiction, each smaller than one square cities. The show has explored particle accelerators can’t take centimeter; the more samples the dungeons of Scottish cas- people back in time. But they tested, the more accurate the tles, the underground infrastruc- can provide time stamps for results would be. ture of Rome, and the caves clothing, books, and other The swatches were treated beneath Budapest. ancient items that contain to extract small pellets of While most episodes give carbon. graphite, a form of carbon. viewers glimpses of past Scientists at Italy’s Laboratory These pellets were exposed to achievements, Fermilab’s tun- of Nuclear Techniques for cesium ions in an accelerator, nels offered a look at science Cultural Heritage in Florence releasing carbon isotopes that working to shape the future. examined three relics tied to St. are counted by a detector. By “It appeals to a wide audience. Francis, an aristocrat who took measuring the ratio of carbon People are fascinated by look- a vow of poverty, founded the 14 to carbon 12—a delicate ing at all different aspects of Franciscan Order, and became undertaking, since there is only 08symmetry | volume 05 issue 01 jan/feb what goes on in the world,” says the Roman Catholic patron saint one carbon 14 for roughly a tril- Mike Andrews, safety coordina- of animals. lion carbon 12s—the research- tor for NuMI/MINOS. Examinations conducted at ers determined the age of the The initial airing of the epi- the lab found that a tunic and fabric and discounted Florence’s sode was scheduled for embroidered cushion housed in claim to holding this particular mid-March; see the series’ the Church of St. Francis in piece of history. Web page for listings. Cortona dated from the time Tona Kunz Rhianna Wisniewski when the saint was alive. 5 signal to background Peterson gets thank-you body sizes of Czech singers e-mails, and occasionally are much larger than those of requests for new routes, from the Japanese,” Ohska said. walkers, runners, and other He enlisted a friend to help bicyclists. In the five years scour Japanese antique stores since he started plowing, he for the largest kimonos they says, others have started to could find to match the pitch in with shovels, snow 200-year-old setting of Yuzuru, blowers, and plows hooked up roughly translated as “the crane to all-terrain vehicles, although at dusk.” he knows of only one other “Fortunately, the singers and bike plow like his. “It’s like some the conductor are extremely kind of underground insur- talented, nice people,” Ohska gency of snow clearing,” he says. “They worked with me says happily. with a lot of patience and gave Asked if he would ever pat- me helpful suggestions.” ent his bike plow, Peterson says On opening night in October Biking the snow away no: “I look at it in the same vein 2007, Ohska sat in the front After seeing a documentary as open access publishing. I row, almost holding his breath. on Ernest Shackleton’s 1914 benefit from things other people As the performance ended he Antarctic expedition, in which put up on the Web, so why made his way to the stage, men ate shoe leather to survive should I charge them to look at expecting polite applause. “But in bone-chilling temperatures, my plow?” every time I would go to walk Photo: Reidar Hahn, Fermilab David Peterson felt kind of See symmetrymag.org/plow/ off, the curtain would rise again,” silly about letting snow stop his for more details. he says, for a total of 10 thunder- bicycle ride to work. Tona Kunz ing ovations: “I was so relieved.” “There was no excuse,” he The opera sparked an encore says. “I’ve never had to eat my Czech kimono in the form of an ongoing cul- bicycle.” challenge tural exchange. Opava has since So he built a bicycle snow Tokio Ohska had an opera to hosted a Japanese culture plow. direct. week; and in 2009, the Czech On the snowiest days, a half- As always, there were light- opera Dalibor is scheduled for dozen bicycle commuters form ing, scenery, and music issues its first performance in Japan. a line behind Peterson and his to contend with. But finding Tona Kunz plow as he clears a path to costumes to fit a cast of Fermi National Accelerator Europeans? That was a new Laboratory in Illinois, where he challenge. works as an engineer in the Ohska is a physicist. As the antiproton source department. head of research services at “They all ride behind me KEK, the Japanese particle shouting words of encourage- physics lab in Tsukuba, he 08symmetry | volume 05 issue 01 jan/feb ment,” he says. “Sometimes they tends to the needs of foreign take turns on the plow if it’s scientists and has a knack for really deep or if I look particularly making cultures click. But sad, pedaling.” he’s also a former professional Ohska Photo courtesy of Tokio After experimenting with sev- singer with a background in eral different styles of blades Japanese opera.

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