Low cost hadron colliders at Fermilab: A Discussion paper

Abstract

New more economic approaches are required to continue the dramatic exponential rise in collider energies as represented by the well known Livingston plot. The old idea of low cost, low field iron dominated magnets in a small diameter pipe may become feasible in the next decade with dramatic recent advances in technology: (1) advanced tunneling technologies for small diameter, non human accessible tunnels, (2) accurate remote guidance systems for tunnel survey and boring machine steering, (3) high T{sub c} superconductors operating at liquid N{sub 2} or liquid H{sub 2} temperatures, (4) industrial applications of remote manipulation and robotics, (5) digitally multiplexed electronics to minimize cables, (6) achievement of high luminosities in p-p and p-{anti P} colliders. The goal of this paper is to stimulate continuing discussions on approaches to this new collider and to identify critical areas needing calculations, construction of models, proof of principle experiments, and full scale prototypes in order to determine feasibility and arrive at cost estimates.