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Deutsches Elektronensynchrotron (DESY)

Literally “German electron synchrotron” (a synchrotron being a type of particle accelerator). German research centre for particle physics and research using photons, founded in 1959 and located in Hamburg in Northern Germany. Site of the decomissioned particle accelerator HERA, among others.

DESY website

Definitioner

synchrotron

A particle accelerator, in which particles are accelerated with the help of electric fields, while strong magnetic fields keep them on track (the fact that ever-stronger magnetic fields are needed as acceleration proceeds is a consequence of the fact that relativistic mass increases with speed.)

particle accelerator

The most important experimental technique of particle physics: accelerating electrically charged particles with the help of electric forces, make them collide with each other and, from the result of the collision, draw conclusions about the properties of elementary particles and their interactions. It is an intriguing possibility, suggested by models based on the ideas of string theory, that particle accelerators such as the LHC might actually produce miniature black holes (for more about this, see the spotlight text Particle accelerators as black hole factories?).

electron

Low-mass elementary particle with negative electric charge. The atoms that are the constituents of everyday matter each consists of a nucleus surrounded by a shell of electrons.

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Deutsches Elektronensynchrotron (DESY)

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