In the period 1981-1984 the CERN proton-antiproton collider discovered the W and

Question

In the period 1981-1984 the CERN proton-antiproton collider discovered the W and Z bosons. The experiment used counter circulating colliding beams of protons and antiprotons. p + p rightarrow W^+ + W^- In the actual experiment the colliding protons and antiprotons each had 270 GeV of kinetic energy. Relativistic kinematics must be used to answer these questions! a) What is the minimum proton and antiproton kinetic energy needed to produce the two W bosons using counter circulating beams? b) There was a tremendous technical challenge to overcome because the antiprotons and protons had to be produced as extremely narrow beams. What would be the minimum laboratory kinetic energy of the antiprotons to accomplish the measurement with a fixed target of protons?

Explanation / Answer

a) At the CERN SppS collider, protons and antiprotons were made to collide with a total c.m. energy of 540 GeV

b) The best method of producing a sufficient antiproton flux at CERN is by colliding 26 GeV protons with a target, giving an optimum production energy of 3.5 GeV to the resulting antiprotons.

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