DØ experiment

The DØ experiment (sometimes written D0 experiment, or DZero experiment) consists of a worldwide collaboration of scientists conducting research on the fundamental nature of matter. DØ was one of two major experiments (the other is the CDF experiment) located at the world's second highest-energy accelerator, the Tevatron Collider at the Fermilab in Batavia, Illinois, USA.

The research is focused on precise studies of interactions of protons and antiprotons at the highest available energies. It involves an intense search for subatomic clues that reveal the character of the building blocks of the universe.

The DØ experiment is located at one of the interaction regions, where proton and antiproton beams intersect, on the Tevatron synchrotron ring, labelled 'DØ'. It is expected to record data until the end of 2011. DØ is an international collaboration of about 550 physicists from 89 universities and national laboratories from 18 countries.

The experiment is a test of the Standard Model of particle physics. It is sensitive in a general way to the effects of high energy collisions and so is meant to be a highly model-independent probe of the theory. This is accomplished by constructing and upgrading a large volume elementary particle detector.

The detector is designed to stop as many as possible of the subatomic particles created from energy released by colliding proton/antiproton beams. The interaction region where the matter–antimatter annihilation takes place is close to the geometric center of the detector. The beam collision area is surrounded by tracking chambers in a strong magnetic field parallel to the direction of the beam(s). Outside the tracking chamber are the pre-shower detectors and the calorimeter. Muon chambers form the last layer in the detector. The whole detector is encased in concrete blocks which act as radiation shields. About 1.7 million collisions of the proton and antiproton beams are inspected every second and about 100 collisions per second are recorded for further studies.

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