Cornell Laboratory for Accelerator-based Sciences and Education

The Cornell Laboratory for Accelerator-based Sciences and Education (CLASSE) is a particle accelerator facility located in Wilson Laboratory on the Cornell University campus in Ithaca, NY. CLASSE formed from the merger of the Cornell High-Energy Synchrotron Source (CHESS) and the Laboratory for Elementary-Particle Physics (LEPP) in July 2006^[1]. Maury Tigner is the chairman of the directorate of the organization.

Additional recommended knowledge

Daily Visual Balance Check

What is the Correct Way to Check Repeatability in Balances?

Weighing the right way

LEPP

The Laboratory for Elementary-Particle Physics (LEPP) is a High-energy physics laboratory studying fundamental particles and their interactions.

CHESS

The Cornell High-Energy Synchrotron Source (CHESS) is a high-intensity, high-energy X-ray light source. The lab provides synchrotron radiation facilities for multidisciplinary scientific research, with a particular focus on protein crystallographic studies under the auspices of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

CHESS was built between 1978 and 1980 as a synchrotron x-ray facility tied to the Cornell Electron Storage Ring (CESR) High-Energy Physics program (sometimes referred to, and better known as, particle physics), which produces an electron energy of 5.5 GeV.^[2]

"The original laboratory, CHESS West, included 3 instrumented beamlines [with] 6 independent experimental stations.

"The CHESS East laboratory was constructed during 1988-1989, adding 2 beam lines [...] and 4 instrumented experimental stations. CHESS East contains a biohazard level BL3 facility (built with funds from the NIH) [....]

"Construction began in 1999 for an addition to the facility" to provide a new beam line and three additional experimental stations. This station, commissioned in 2002, was "constructed with extensive toxic gas handling capabilities advancing the prospects for in-situ crystal growth experiments."^[3]

Work performed at CHESS and at the National Synchrotron Light Source (NSLS) at Brookhaven National Laboratory garnered a split of the 2003 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for Dr. Roderick MacKinnon, M.D.^[4]

References