Muon Colliders: A Brief History

Below is a brief potted history of the muon collider concept.
Click here for a one transparency summary.
The muon collider concept is an idea dating back to Tinlot (1960), Tikhonin (1968), Budker (1969), Skrinsky (1971), and Neuffer (1979). The modern enthusiasm for the muon collider results from the realization that ionization cooling [Skrinsky and Parkhomchuk (1981)] offers the possibility of making very bright muon beams and hence a high luminosity muon collider. This realization surfaced at the Sausalito workshop in 1995, where it was also demonstrated that it may be possible to reduce to a reasonable level the backgrounds in the detector due to the prolific production of high energy electrons from muon decay all the way around the ring. Thus the muon collider might provide a unique facility for particle physics research.

As a result of the Sausalito meeting an informal muon collider collaboration was formed consisting of about 80 physicists, most of whom were accelerator physicists. The initial goal of this group was to write a "feasibility study" for the Snowmass 1996 workshop. This was accomplished, and the report together with the presentations and discussions at Snowmass showed that although the muon collider provided plenty of technical challenges, no show stoppers had been discovered. In addition the theoretical motivation for both very high energy and lower energy muon colliders had been growing with time. Between Sausalito and Snowmass the collaboration had been strengthened with the increased participation of particle physicists, and the motivation had strengthened with the publication of theoretical papers on the potential of muon colliders. The collaboration was thus encouraged to continue, and a series of smaller specialized workshops was organized for the following year, leading up to a larger meeting at Orcas Island in May 1997. At this meeting the muon collider collaboration was formalized, with Bob Palmer as Spokesperson, and Alivin Tollestrup plus Andy Sessler as Associate Spokespersons.
Muon Collider Bibliography
Neutrino Factory History and Bibliography
Neutrino Factory History and Organization S. Geer, Lecture at the Neutrino Factory International Summer Institute, Cosner's House, Abingdon, England, June 2002
Last updated June 19, 2002
Suggestions ? Contact sgeer@fnal.gov