Production & decay of bottom quarks in the SLD detector at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC), California. The computer display shows in cr

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Production & decay of bottom quarks in the SLD detector at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC), California. The computer display shows in cross-section the inner part of the detector; the yellow lines represent the central 'barrel' of silicon CCD detectors. An electron & positron, accelerated to high-energy in SLAC's collider, annihilate at centre & create a Z particle which immediately decays to a bottom quark & antiquark. These particles live too briefly to be seen, but the quark & antiquark give rise to short-lived B mesons which in their turn produce the sprays of particles (green tracks) to left & right. (See A142/444 for close-up of central area).

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Size: 3480px × 2622px
Photo credit: © SLAC/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No

Keywords: accelerator, bottom, ccd, computer, detector, display, electronic, high-energy, linear, mesons, odyssey, particle, particles, physics, quarks, research, screen, slac, sld, stanford, subatomic