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BEAMS – JLab’s Science, Math Outreach Program Needs Your Help

Becoming Enthusiastic About Math and Science – BEAMS – Jefferson Lab's long-running math and science enrichment program needs volunteers to assist with, student activities conducted at the Lab during normal business hours.

BEAMS supports Newport News inner-city public school students as they progress from sixth through eighth grade. Nearly 1,500 students and their teachers visit JLab between two and five days each school year to participate in science and math activities conducted by JLab scientists, engineers, technicians and administrators. Volunteers spend about 75 minutes in a BEAMS classroom (VARC 72A & 72B), either leading an activity or assisting the students as they carry out an activity.

BEAMS students learn about energy transfer, insulators and scientific procedure during the Cold Stuff activity.

The latest round of BEAMS visits began in February and will run through May. Usually two classes attend at a time and participate in two to four separate activities during each day-long visit. Volunteers are needed to lead or help with the following activities:

• Go-Far Cars: Determine how the height of an inclined ramp (potential energy) impacts the distance a model car travels.
• Hot Stuff: Study how heat (energy) transfer works and test materials for their heat absorption or reflecting capabilities.
• Ultra-Violet Detectives: Learn about ultra-violet light and make your own UV detector key chain.
• Is it Getting Hot in Here?: Learn how to measure temperature changes and build a thermometer.
• Hurricanes: Learn how hurricane strength is measured and use longitude and latitude readings to track a storm's path on a grid map.
• Cold Stuff: Study how heat (energy) transfer works and test materials for their insulation capabilities.
• Microscopes: Learn about the parts of a microscope, and look at various items and materials under a dissecting microscope and at prepared slides under a compound microscope.
• Solar System: Learn about the solar system and build a scale model of the solar system.

"JLab staff, students and users are critical to the success of all of the Lab's science education programs, especially BEAMS," said Christine Wheeler, Science Education administrator. "Our BEAMS volunteers have been exposing young students to the applications, importance, and excitement of mathematics and scientific principles for more than 16 years. Students get to learn about you and your job and you get to have fun working with lots of smiling faces. Everybody wins!"

"We'd love to have you join us: for the first time, the hundredth time, or for the first time in a long time," she added.

"Want to help, but not sure how? That's what we're here for," Wheeler explained. "We need volunteers to help students during the activities and we need volunteers to lead activities. Science Education staff will provide the training you need. If you want to observe a classroom activity to see if it's something you want to do, we can schedule that."

For additional information, contact Wheeler at ext. 7560 or email wheelerc@jlab.org.

JSA Awards Inaugural Postdoctoral Research Fellowship

Brad Sawatzky

Research that will cast a new spin on particles inside the atomic nucleus has earned a researcher based at Temple University the first-ever Jefferson Science Associates Postdoctoral Research Fellowship at Jefferson Lab.

Brad Sawatzky, a Canadian who earned bachelor's and master's degrees at the University of Saskatchewan and a Ph.D. at the University of Virginia, will spend the fellowship's $10,000 research grant to purchase and assemble components of a flash-ADC-based data acquisition system. This cutting-edge electronics system, which is still in development, may allow researchers to record five times more data than they can currently capture.

Sawatzky plans to test the system in the upcoming Spin Asymmetries on the Nucleon Experiment that is scheduled to run in JLab's Experimental Hall C and the d2n experiment scheduled for Experimental Hall A. Both experiments aim to exploit a property of protons and neutrons, their spin, to determine how the constituent quarks and gluons are distributed inside. To do that, Sawatzky and his colleagues will control the orientation of the spin of both the electrons used to probe the protons and neutrons and the spin of the protons and neutrons themselves.

This circuit board is similar to a prototype that Brad Sawatzky will use for his flash-ADC-based data acquisition system.

The JSA Postdoctoral Research Fellowship honors nuclear physics postdoctoral candidates who have a record of accomplishment in physics and whose planned research will have a high impact on the physics program at JLab. The fellow is expected to be a future leader in the Lab's research fields. Fellows receive a $10,000 research grant for JLab-related research. The fellowship was initiated by representatives of the roughly 1,200 scientists who conduct research at JLab, the Users Group Board of Directors.

"The Users Group Board was very happy this year to work on a new program sponsored by Jefferson Science Associates, JLab's management contractor, which allows us to recognize and reward our finest postdocs," said Ron Gilman, board chairman and a Rutgers University professor.

"We had a number of excellent fellowship candidates, which made the process of choosing the winner both more difficult and longer than I expected. Brad Sawatzky's research proposal was chosen because he has been outstanding in all aspects of experimental physics."

"I really enjoy working with the great group of people at JLab, and I try hard to support the collaboration and develop the physics. It's just very nice to have that effort be recognized," Sawatzky said of winning the inaugural fellowship.

Editor's note: This story first ran on JLab's main webpage earlier this year.

Woman Credits JLab Technology With Saving Her Life

When Sue Parham underwent tests prior to undergoing surgery for breast cancer, she had no idea how much her life was about to change.

Parham's surgeon had sent her to the hospital for a new procedure designed to provide better images of a small tumor in her left breast. To get those better images, Parham underwent a BSGI scan, short for Breast-Specific Gamma Imaging, at Legacy Good Samaritan Hospital in Portland, Ore.

Based on gamma imaging technology developed by Jefferson Lab's Radiation Detector and Medical Imaging Group, BSGI is a non-invasive breast imaging procedure that captures the cellular function of breast tissue, complementing mammography in helping to resolve difficult to interpret cases.

"As the fifth patient to use the Breast-Specific Gamma Imaging at Portland's Good Samaritan Hospital, I could tell they were still working with the technology. But that didn't explain what was to follow," the 49-year-old Parham recalled of the procedure she underwent a year ago.

The BSGI found "a slow-growing, potentially deadly tumor in my right breast that had reached 3 centimeters in size that had gone unnoticed by the mammogram," Parham said. And it was then discovered that the cancer had spread to the lymph nodes in her right arm.

"My diagnosis moved from straightforward to complex, my treatment from routine to aggressive and my life from normal to anything but," Parham explained.

"For me, the past year has been the most challenging of my life. I've endured a double-mastectomy, removal of the lymph nodes under my right arm, removal of both ovaries, reconstructive breast surgery, four-and-a-half months of chemotherapy, and six-and-a-half weeks of radiation therapy. But, most important, I am alive. I am a living, breathing testament to the early detection made possible by BSGI."

The BSGI machine used to diagnose Parham's cancer was manufactured by Dilon Technologies, a Newport News company. Dilon licensed its high-resolution gamma imaging technology from Jefferson Lab after recognizing its potential for use in a marketable compact dedicated breast-imaging camera.

JLab's Radiation Detector and Medical Imaging Group began exploring the use of nuclear physics detector technology for medical imaging applications in 1995, starting with two types of breast imagers. Members of the group are experts in radiation detector technology, which is used extensively at JLab to conduct basic nuclear physics research. In the biomedical field, the group has been involved in the development of high-resolution gamma and positron imagers and in novel multimodality (including X-ray and optical) imaging concepts.

"It's a never-ending challenge and desire for us to take our technical expertise and make a difference in people's lives. BSGI is the first of what we anticipate will be more instruments we hope to develop and help bring to market," says Stan Majewski, head of the Radiation Detector and Medical Imaging Group.

BSGI is designed for situations where mammography is inconclusive and further evaluation is needed, especially when patients have dense breast tissue, implants, multiple suspicious lesions or clusters of microcalcifications, palpable lesions not detected by mammography or ultrasound, post-surgical or post-therapeutic mass, or if they have been taking Hormone Replacement Therapy.
Parham had dense breast tissue, and she noted, "I didn't know there was a connection between breast density and breast cancer, nor did I understand that mammograms were less effective on women with dense breasts."

The link is that both cancer and breast tissue are dense in nature, and the more dense the breast tissue, the more likely that a cancer could be missed in evaluation, especially with imaging tests that look at structure and not metabolic function, such as mammography and ultrasound.

In the Newport News area, BSGI procedures are available at Riverside Diagnostic and Breast Imaging Center and the Dorothy G. Hoefer Comprehensive Breast Center at Sentara Port Warwick.  Dr. Curtis Stoldt, director of Riverside Diagnostic and Breast Imaging, says he first heard about BSGI in 2005 at a conference and immediately began working to secure a BSGI machine for his hospital.

"It took three years but it is online and we are doing 6-8 patients a week, and that number is increasing quickly," Stoldt says. "BSGI images are simpler and easier for the patient and technologist. The studies are much simpler to read and compare with mammograms," Stoldt adds. "There are fewer studies with questionable or indeterminate findings, and my overall confidence is greater.

Editor's note: This story first ran on JLab's main webpage earlier this year.

JLab Technology Saves Energy and Money in Cooling RHIC

During February, Brookhaven National Lab highlighted in its newsletter and on its webpage substantial energy and money savings at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider after implementing portions of a process invented by Jefferson Lab Cryogenics Group staff.  The process has been saving BNL approximately $50,000 per week in electric costs for running RHIC. All told, because of using this technology, called the "Ganni Cycle," as part of a three-phase upgrade to the RHIC cryogenic system, the electricity needed to operate the system has dropped from 9.2 megawatts (MW) in 2002 to 5 MW currently, saving the Laboratory as much as $1.5 million per year during a typical 30-week annual operating schedule for RHIC.
                           
"The Jefferson Lab technology saves energy and was inexpensive to implement," said Roberto Than, head of cryogenics for the Collider-Accelerator Department. "We programmed the computer system with new control logic and installed some new piping and valves. Because the plant is currently operating so efficiently, it uses fewer compressors. Now we have more spare compressors to use as backups. This means we can maintain cooling and ensure the system's high availability. This also reduces maintenance costs, so we are saving on every level."

RHIC's cryogenic plant – the largest in the world – cools the collider's 1,740 superconducting magnets to -456 degrees Fahrenheit, the temperature at which there is no resistance to electricity. The cooling cycle begins by compressing room-temperature helium to high pressure. This high-pressure helium is then expanded through turbines to make it progressively colder until the liquid helium temperature of -456 degrees Fahrenheit is reached. This liquid helium is then supplied to the collider ring where it boils off to cool the superconducting magnets. The vapor created is returned to the plant to begin the cycle again.

The final phase of the cryogenic upgrade was completed in 2006, three years after the Ganni Cycle was first implemented. With the help of funding from the Department of Energy's Energy Management Program and in consultation with JLab's Venkatarao Ganni, the primary inventor of the Ganni Cycle, piping and valves in the cryogenic plant were reconfigured. Also, the method used to send helium flow through the RHIC magnets was modified to eliminate the use of liquid-helium circulating pumps, more efficient heat exchangers were installed, and a seventh turbine was added to the existing six in RHIC's refrigeration system.

These upgrades further reduced the helium flow-rate and the compression ratio needed by the refrigerator, thus decreasing electrical power consumption and component wear. The Ganni Cycle had reduced electric power consumption for cooling RHIC from 9.2 MW to 7.2 MW in 2003, and the completion of the upgrade brought about another 2.2 MW reduction.

The Ganni Cycle improved the cryogenic system's reliability, availability, stability, and efficiency. The technology effectively reconfigured the RHIC refrigeration compute – control system to match the amount of helium being compressed with the heat load from the RHIC magnets.

"The Ganni system increases plant capacity very efficiently when we need it and decreases it when we don't need it, all automatically via computer," Than said.

Milestones for February – early April 2008

Hello
Alessandro Bacchetta, Nathan Isgur Distinguished Post Doctoral Fellow, Theoretical & Computational Physics Division
Andrew Kimber, Radio Frequency Engineer, Engineering Division
DeAnn Maddox, Facilities Work Control Coordinator, Chief Operating Officer Division
James Stewart, Hall D Staff Scientist, Experimental Nuclear Physics Division
Benedikt Zihlmann, Hall D Staff Scientist, Experimental Nuclear Physics Division

Goodbye
Lei Guo, Experimental Nuclear Physics Division
Christopher Jenkins, Accelerator Operations, Research & Development Division
Gretchen Kadesch, Human Resources, Chief Operating Officer Division
Robert Nichols, Engineering Division
Richard Rafter, Auditor, Chief Operating Officer Division
John Seeberger, Engineering Division