CERN
Bulletin

The last of the 42 modules for the LHCb Vertex Locator (VELO) arrived safely at the lab during the first week of March. VELO's high-precision silicon detector will rest a mere 5 millimetres from the beam line itself. >>

The production of crystals for the barrel of the CMS electromagnetic calorimeter has been completed. This is an important milestone for the experiment, which received the last of its 62,960 crystals on 9 March. >>

The last of the components for the 42 DFBs (electrical distribution boxes feeding the strings of superconducting magnets in the LHC) produced for CERN by IHEP Protvino (Russia) were delivered to CERN in January 2007. >>

CMS celebrated the successful tests of its solenoid magnet and the end of the first phase of heavy lowering on Thursday March 22. >>

Award-winning playwright and novelist Michael Frayn gave a guest lecture in the main auditorium at CERN on Friday 15 March about his new book The Human Touch: Our Part in the Creation of the Universe. >>

Particle physicists can make good musicians; but did you know particle detectors can make good music? That's what NIKHEF physicist Henk Tiecke learned when he used pipes cut from the ATLAS Monitored Drift Tube detector (MDT) to build his own working Dutch-style barrel organ in the autumn of 2005. >>