The Case For a Muon Collider Succeeding the LHC Just Got Stronger

StartsWithABang writes: If you strike the upper atmosphere with a cosmic ray, you produce a whole host of particles, including muons. Despite having a mean lifetime of just 2.2 microseconds, and the speed of light being 300,000 km/s, those muons can reach the ground! That's a distance of 100 kilometers traveled, despite a non-relativistic estimate of just 660 meters. If we apply that same principle to particle accelerators, we discover an amazing possibility: the ability to create a collider with the cleanliness and precision of electron-positron colliders but the high energies of proton colliders. All we need to do is build a muon collider. A pipe dream and the stuff of science fiction just 20 years ago, recent advances have this on the brink of becoming reality, with a legitimate possibility that a muon-antimuon collider will be the LHC's successor.

Comments

Silly Monkeys

[Greyfox]

10,000 years of civilization and they're still just beating rocks together.

Re:Silly Monkeys

[JeremyWH]

But, progress nevertheless, as the rocks are now much smaller! Nanorocks

Good idea because ...

[dbIII]

It's a good idea to use muons. Especially after that article about a proton failure.




P.S. Where is the JOKE tag when you need one?