There are 2 types of atom smashers: linear and circular. Linacs (linear accelerators) are in a line, while the other is a circle. Shouldn’t linacs be not as good as circular accelerators since circular colliders have unlimited space to accelerate while linacs have a limited amount? I understand it might need more force to go in a circle but the length makes up for it.
In: Physics
It depends on the application. Whether one design is better than the other depends on lots of things:
What is the purpose of the accelerator… Research, medical, or industrial?
What is the desired energy of the beam?
How much land is available?
How much money is available?
Is there existing infrastructure/technology that can be repurposed toward the new machine?
All of these and more are optimized to determine what type of machine to build.
Edit: and to add to this, circular machines do not have unlimited space to accelerate. Beam power loss in circular machines is proportional to the 4th power of the beam energy over the bend radius. Higher energy beam needs a larger radius accelerator in order to not lose its energy to synchroton radiation.
Latest Answers