Scientists go to Lead for science workshop
Posted: Monday, April 21, 2008
LEAD, S.D. (AP) -- Hundreds of the world's top scientists gather in Lead this week to discuss experiments that could be done in a former gold mine nearly 8,000 feet below the northern Black Hills.
The National Science Foundation last year picked Homestake as the preferred site for a Deep Underground Science and Engineering Laboratory, but the state in the interim is building the Sanford Laboratory at Homestake at the 4,850-foot level.
The DUSEL Initial Suite of Experiments Workshop, which begins Monday and runs through Saturday, will focus on experiments that can be done in the deep laboratory, said Jose Alonso, Sanford's lab director.
Scientists will break up into working groups of various specialties. Geoscientists, geomicrobiologists and engineers will meet Monday and Tuesday. Education and outreach programs will be Wednesday's focus, and physics planning workshops will run Thursday though Saturday.
Working groups are expected to select an experiment and begin an extremely detailed cost analysis, which will eventually become part of a preliminary design report due to the NSF in about a year, after a series of reviews.
A formal presentation to the National Science Board, the NSF's governing body, is expected in 2010.
"This is the really crucial step. The NSB has to approve this project. If it does not approve this project, then it's in fact going to have a tough time ahead, so there's a huge amount of effort that's going into the preparation for this," Alonso said.
While all these meetings are going on, scientists looking to gain earlier access to the Sanford lab will be meeting to discuss more short-term experiments.
Alonso and University of California physicist Kevin Lesko have put together an external experimental advisory committee to examine 50 or so proposals for more immediate access to the former gold mine.
"This is an activity that's going to happen at the same time because all of the people are there," Alonso said. "But nonetheless, the focus of it is really on helping me establish the priorities for the experiments that are going to be done right now."
One of those experiments is the Large Underground Xenon detector -- or LUX -- which seeks to detect dark matter, an unknown substance that may make up 80 to 90 percent of matter in the universe. Scientists know it exists because it has a gravitational force, but it's not visible.
The experiment by Tom Shutt of Case Western Reserve in Cleveland, Rick Gaitskell of Brown University in Providence, R.I., and Bob Svoboda of the University of California-Davis is slated to go into a cavern at the 4,850-foot level where physicist Ray Davis Jr. in the 1960s helped demonstrate the existence of neutrinos for a share of the 2002 Nobel Prize in physics.
Alonso said workers have been busy pumping water to gain access to that level and will begin construction as soon as possible. They hope to have the LUX researchers moved in and doing their experiment by the end of the year.
Some early geology and geological engineering experiments have already begun at Homestake.
Professors Bill Roggenthen of the South Dakota School of Mines & Technology and Steve Glaser of the University of California-Berkeley are placing seismometers underground in the former mine to develop a deep seismic observatory. The goal is to advance the field of seismology and scientists' understanding of the deep interior of the earth.
In a separate experiment, School of Mines associate professor Larry Stetler plans to set up sensors inside the former mine to measure the water level and correlate it with the water that's being pumped out. The study could indicate how much water has percolated into the rocks, Alonso said.
President Bush's chief science adviser toured the Sanford lab last week.
John Marburger, who visited the 2,450-foot level with Gov. Mike Rounds on Thursday called Homestake a "unique facility" and said there appears to be a lot of interest in the science community to do things deep underground.
Marburger said Homestake has been chosen as the preferred site, but the foundation hasn't yet made a decision about what it will fund.
"We just have to wait for the process to go forward before the government makes any further commitments to it," Marburger said Friday. "But it looks to me like things are on track to be a useful and successful venture."
Alonso said there's a buzz in the scientific community about Homestake, and he's heard from many researchers at U.S. laboratories and universities who are hoping to do their work in South Dakota.
"Right now they're doing their experiments in Canada or Italy or Japan, and they're saying we would really, really, really want to be able to do this on U.S. soil," Alonso said.
Visiting scientists will get their first opportunity to go on a two-hour underground tour, and the week's agenda also features three public lectures.
-- Princeton geoscientist T.C. Onstott, named one of Time magazine's "100 people who shape our world," will discuss finding life where you don't expect it. 7 p.m. Tuesday, Lead High School auditorium.
-- Svoboda will talk about the search for dark matter. 7 p.m. Thursday, Black Hills State University, Spearfish.
-- Physicist Hitoshi Murayama of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory will present "Cosmology for everyone." 7 p.m. Friday, School of Mines campus, Rapid City.
The National Science Foundation last year picked Homestake as the preferred site for a Deep Underground Science and Engineering Laboratory, but the state in the interim is building the Sanford Laboratory at Homestake at the 4,850-foot level.
The DUSEL Initial Suite of Experiments Workshop, which begins Monday and runs through Saturday, will focus on experiments that can be done in the deep laboratory, said Jose Alonso, Sanford's lab director.
Scientists will break up into working groups of various specialties. Geoscientists, geomicrobiologists and engineers will meet Monday and Tuesday. Education and outreach programs will be Wednesday's focus, and physics planning workshops will run Thursday though Saturday.
Working groups are expected to select an experiment and begin an extremely detailed cost analysis, which will eventually become part of a preliminary design report due to the NSF in about a year, after a series of reviews.
A formal presentation to the National Science Board, the NSF's governing body, is expected in 2010.
"This is the really crucial step. The NSB has to approve this project. If it does not approve this project, then it's in fact going to have a tough time ahead, so there's a huge amount of effort that's going into the preparation for this," Alonso said.
While all these meetings are going on, scientists looking to gain earlier access to the Sanford lab will be meeting to discuss more short-term experiments.
Alonso and University of California physicist Kevin Lesko have put together an external experimental advisory committee to examine 50 or so proposals for more immediate access to the former gold mine.
"This is an activity that's going to happen at the same time because all of the people are there," Alonso said. "But nonetheless, the focus of it is really on helping me establish the priorities for the experiments that are going to be done right now."
One of those experiments is the Large Underground Xenon detector -- or LUX -- which seeks to detect dark matter, an unknown substance that may make up 80 to 90 percent of matter in the universe. Scientists know it exists because it has a gravitational force, but it's not visible.
The experiment by Tom Shutt of Case Western Reserve in Cleveland, Rick Gaitskell of Brown University in Providence, R.I., and Bob Svoboda of the University of California-Davis is slated to go into a cavern at the 4,850-foot level where physicist Ray Davis Jr. in the 1960s helped demonstrate the existence of neutrinos for a share of the 2002 Nobel Prize in physics.
Alonso said workers have been busy pumping water to gain access to that level and will begin construction as soon as possible. They hope to have the LUX researchers moved in and doing their experiment by the end of the year.
Some early geology and geological engineering experiments have already begun at Homestake.
Professors Bill Roggenthen of the South Dakota School of Mines & Technology and Steve Glaser of the University of California-Berkeley are placing seismometers underground in the former mine to develop a deep seismic observatory. The goal is to advance the field of seismology and scientists' understanding of the deep interior of the earth.
In a separate experiment, School of Mines associate professor Larry Stetler plans to set up sensors inside the former mine to measure the water level and correlate it with the water that's being pumped out. The study could indicate how much water has percolated into the rocks, Alonso said.
President Bush's chief science adviser toured the Sanford lab last week.
John Marburger, who visited the 2,450-foot level with Gov. Mike Rounds on Thursday called Homestake a "unique facility" and said there appears to be a lot of interest in the science community to do things deep underground.
Marburger said Homestake has been chosen as the preferred site, but the foundation hasn't yet made a decision about what it will fund.
"We just have to wait for the process to go forward before the government makes any further commitments to it," Marburger said Friday. "But it looks to me like things are on track to be a useful and successful venture."
Alonso said there's a buzz in the scientific community about Homestake, and he's heard from many researchers at U.S. laboratories and universities who are hoping to do their work in South Dakota.
"Right now they're doing their experiments in Canada or Italy or Japan, and they're saying we would really, really, really want to be able to do this on U.S. soil," Alonso said.
Visiting scientists will get their first opportunity to go on a two-hour underground tour, and the week's agenda also features three public lectures.
-- Princeton geoscientist T.C. Onstott, named one of Time magazine's "100 people who shape our world," will discuss finding life where you don't expect it. 7 p.m. Tuesday, Lead High School auditorium.
-- Svoboda will talk about the search for dark matter. 7 p.m. Thursday, Black Hills State University, Spearfish.
-- Physicist Hitoshi Murayama of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory will present "Cosmology for everyone." 7 p.m. Friday, School of Mines campus, Rapid City.
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