Innovation and Development

Key Crystal Materials for LHC Successfully Developed

CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC) started to operate on Sep.10(10:00 a.m. Beijing Time). It boasts the world largest scientific engineering with investment of over1 billion USD. Its core detector, a “crystal cave” (large sized lead tungstate crystals) assembled by 6000 crystal materials, is independently developed by the Shanghai Institute of Ceramics, CAS. This super engineering is situated over 100 meters down the earth at the border of France and Switzerland. It has a 27-km long ring-shaped channel where numerous high energy particles run through with light speed. When they pass the CMS, light output will be generated. It is the place where thousands of crystal sticks developed by the Shanghai Institute of Ceramics, CAS built a “crystal cave”, which is just like a barrel, with the height of two or three persons. This “cave” can accurately detect the energy of various particles when they pass through and capture and track those new particles. This is a result achieved by a research team with over 10 members, including Liao Jingying and Yuanhui, and headed by Yan Dongsheng, Member of CAS and CAE, after 14 years’ hard work.

High Spectral Precision Achieved in Chemical Reaction Resonance States

A research team headed by Yang Xueming of the State Key Laboratory of Molecular Dynamics, Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, CAS, obtained for the first time reaction differential cross sections with a full quantum state resolution and under varying collision energies for the F+HD->HF+D reaction by using a home-made cross molecular beam - hydrogen atom Rydberg state tagging installation. The experimental result was accurately verified by theoretical model. This result was published in the Journal of Proceedings of National Academy of Sciences, USA (PNAS) as cover article in the "Chemical Dynamics Special Feature" monograph. They also observed experimentally that within a reaction energy range of 0.3 kcal/mol, the differential cross section of the reaction changed drastically. This experimental investigation has attained a spectral precision in kinetic studies which has never been reached so far, thus providing a very scarce experimental basis for high-precision theoretical research. The high precision potential surface of the reaction developed by Zhang Donghui and Xu Xin, etc. almost perfectly explains the dynamic change of reaction resonance. This work is of great significance for further understanding of resonance dynamics, especially the influence of isotopic on resonance.