15 and the injector system. The request will also support a needed expansion in the detector subsystems R&D program. The Capital Equipment request of $33.0 million will provide for prototypes in support of the R&D activities on the many accelerator components and systems of the collider and its four injector accelerators, such as power supplies and test and control instrumentation. The request also provides for components for the magnet test facility. Further equipment funds will also be used for prototypes of detector subsystems and components as SSC experiments and detectors become more completely defined, as well as for general laboratory and computer equipment essential for establishing a new research laboratory. The FY 1991 Construction request of $168.9 million will allow constructionrelated activities to proceed in a number of areas, including detailed design of technical systems and conventional facilities, industrialization of magnets, procurement of materials for the magnet prototypes, initial fabrication of injector system components, site preparation, and project management and support. No tunneling construction is expected to occur until a decision has been made to go to commercial production of the superconducting magnets. The FY 1991 budget request for SSC Program Direction is $5.7 million. The requested funds are required to provide for the salaries, benefits, travel and other expenses associated with 52 full-time equivalent employees for the Office of Superconducting Super Collider, both at Headquarters and at the SSC on-site Project Office. The new management organization for the SSC is consistent with the Secretary's objective of strengthening Departmental management of its large projects. It provides direct line management authority including an on-site office reporting directly to the headquarters program office, with significant expertise in the area of project management and control. NUCLEAR PHYSICS 16 Nuclear processes determine the physical characteristics of our universe. Thus, an understanding of nuclei and nuclear phenomena is essential to understanding the world around us. The science of nuclear physics has spawned many diverse technologies, including nuclear weapons, nuclear power, and nuclear medicine. While these technologies are mature and are conducted independently of the research program, vital interactions still occur in the pursuit of better theories of nuclear structure and reactions, in the development of advanced instrumentation of mutual interest, and in the need for more precise data in selected areas. The interaction between nuclear physics and other disciplines can be seen in many areas, including medicine and basic materials research. In the area of medicine, Nuclear Physics accelerators provide the facilities for the diagnosis and treatment of cancers using beams of charged particles. Extensive and diverse cooperation also occurs in the area of activation analysis, a nondestructive nuclear technique using small neutron generators to identify, in detail, the composition of complex materials. For example, neutron activation is a widely used technique in oil exploration to identify the substances through which a well test bore passes. Use of this technique to identify trace element impurities shows promise for improving the clean burning of coal; and nuclear physicists active in heavy ion research have helped perfect a process which uses activation analysis to identify plastic explosives that might be smuggled aboard aircraft in the luggage of terrorists. 17 These applications of basic research are made possible by a growing fundamental understanding of the materials and forces of nature. Over the years, many theoretical models have been developed to describe the structure of the nucleus and its behavior. Models in which nuclear matter is treated as a fluid (liquid drop model) or an organized collection of nucleons (shell model) have been highly developed. More fundamentally, scientists now know that neutrons and protons, the constituents of the nucleus that are called nucleons, are composed of smaller constituents called quarks. These quarks are believed to be bound together in tightly knit groups of threes. Despite many attempts, scientists have not been able to isolate single quarks outside the nucleus. It is as if quarks were tied together by elastic strings that cannot be broken. This confining mechanism forms the basis of the newest theory of the strong nuclear force, called quantum chromodynamics (QCD). Many aspects of this theory are addressed both by the Nuclear Physics and High Energy Physics research programs. However, only the Nuclear Physics program emphasizes tests of QCD predictions of quark behavior in nuclear matter. Only within the medium of nuclear matter can an individual quark be separated from its tightly knit group and studied as a free entity. 18 The Nuclear Physics research program is carried out at accelerator facilities around the country. Accelerators located at Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory (LBL), Argonne National Laboratory (ANL), Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), Brookhaven National Laboratory, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) support broad research programs with experimental time allocated on the basis of scientific merit. Smaller facilities dedicated to in-house research are located at Yale University, the University of Washington, Triangle Universities National Laboratory, and Texas A&M. In addition, nuclear physics research is performed using experimental facilities located at High Energy Physics accelerators. In FY 1990, Nuclear Physics accelerators continued providing beams for a vigorous research program. Operating time which was increased at the LBL 88inch cyclotron and at the Tandem/AGS facility at BNL in FY 1989 will continue in FY 1990. Operations at the Clinton P. Anderson Meson Physics Facility at LANL were enhanced by the start of research using a new source of polarized protons which permitted new detailed measurements of nuclear structure. The LBL Bevalac produced record intensities of uranium beams for its heavy ion research program as a result of continuing improvements and modifications to its accelerators. Similarly, the Holifield Heavy Ion Research Facility at ORNL achieved a new high in terms of both research hours and number of users, with the latter representing 50 institutions. The experimental research program based on the use of these facilities was also very productive. At ANL, the phenomenon of super deformation was extended to a new region of nuclear masses. Deformed nuclei roughly take the |