An accelerator physicist is a scientist who contributes to the field of

Accelerator physics Accelerator physics is a branch of applied physics, concerned with designing, building and operating particle accelerators. As such, it can be described as the study of motion, manipulation and observation of relativistic charged particle beams ...

, involving the fundamental physical mechanisms underlying beams of charged particles accelerated to high energies and the structures and materials needed to do so. In addition to developing and applying such basic theoretical models, an accelerator physicist contributes to the design, operation and optimization of

particle accelerator A particle accelerator is a machine that uses electromagnetic fields to propel charged particles to very high speeds and energies, and to contain them in well-defined beams. Large accelerators are used for fundamental research in particle ...

Significant accelerator physicists

John Cockcroft Sir John Douglas Cockcroft, (27 May 1897 – 18 September 1967) was a British physicist who shared with Ernest Walton the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1951 for splitting the atomic nucleus, and was instrumental in the development of nuclea ...

Ernest Courant Ernest Courant (March 26, 1920 – April 21, 2020) was an American accelerator physicist and a fundamental contributor to modern large-scale particle accelerator concepts. His most notable discovery was his 1952 work with Milton S. Livingston a ...

Helen T. Edwards Helen Thom Edwards (May 27, 1936 – June 21, 2016) was an American physicist. She was the lead scientist for the design and construction of the Tevatron at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory. Career Edwards was best known for leadersh ...

Donald William Kerst Donald William Kerst (November 1, 1911 – August 19, 1993) was an American physicist who worked on advanced particle accelerator concepts (accelerator physics) and plasma physics. He is most notable for his development of the betatron, a novel ...

Ernest Lawrence Ernest Orlando Lawrence (August 8, 1901 – August 27, 1958) was an American nuclear physicist and winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1939 for his invention of the cyclotron. He is known for his work on uranium-isotope separation f ...

Carlo Rubbia Carlo Rubbia (born 31 March 1934) is an Italian particle physicist and inventor who shared the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1984 with Simon van der Meer for work leading to the discovery of the W and Z particles at CERN. Early life and education ...

Ernest Rutherford Ernest Rutherford, 1st Baron Rutherford of Nelson, (30 August 1871 – 19 October 1937) was a New Zealand physicist who came to be known as the father of nuclear physics. ''Encyclopædia Britannica'' considers him to be the greatest ...

Andrew Sessler Andrew Marienhoff Sessler (December 11, 1928 – April 17, 2014) was an American physicist, academic (University of California, Berkeley), former director of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (1973–1980), humanitarian and former ...

* Robert Van de Graaff *

Simon van der Meer Simon van der Meer (24 November 19254 March 2011) was a Dutch Accelerator physics, particle accelerator physicist who shared the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1984 with Carlo Rubbia for contributions to the CERN project which led to the discovery o ...

Ernest Walton Ernest Thomas Sinton Walton (6 October 1903 – 25 June 1995) was an Irish physicist and Nobel laureate. He is best known for his work with John Cockcroft to construct one of the earliest types of particle accelerator, the Cockcroft–Walton g ...

Rolf Widerøe Rolf Widerøe (11 July 1902 – 11 October 1996) was a Norwegian accelerator physicist who was the originator of many particle acceleration concepts, including the ''resonance accelerator'' and the betatron accelerator. Early life Widerøe w ...

References

Accelerator physics * {{Accelerator-stub

Significant accelerator physicists

See Also

References