Bruno Touschek (1921–1978). The Path to Electron-Positron Collisions

Abstract

The 100th anniversary of Bruno Touschek’s birth also marks 60 years since the first beams of electrons and positrons circulated in AdA, the first ever matter-antimatter collider, built in Frascati National Laboratories following Touschek’s visionary proposal of February 1960. Touschek’s path to such idea is briefly outlined, beginning with his early years as a student—first in Vienna and later in Germany—through his first experiences with Rolf Widerøe’s betatron and the electron synchrotron accelerator in Glasgow after the war, along with his relationships with the fathers of modern physics in Europe, to his arrival in Italy, where crucial reflections during the 1950s led him to the profound belief that matter-antimatter annihilations should become a primary goal for future physics. Based on these premises, Touschek and his collaborators dared to take on the challenge of realizing what at the time seemed an “unthinkable idea”: keep beams of electrons and positron circulating for hours in the vacuum chamber of a storage ring and making them collide.

The Making of AdA: Bruno Touschek’s Journey from Widerøe’s Betatron to Storage Rings

“…4 In the years to follow, Bruno's memory was kept alive by his close friend and collaborator Carlo Bernardini [6] through writings and public talks, while interest in Touschek's life increased alongside planning for new particle colliders [7]. Much more has since been published about Bruno Touschek, as presented in [8]. The present status of the narration of Bruno's life includes three docu-films 5 and readings from unpublished letters sent by Bruno to his family [9].…”

“…After the summer, he impulsively resigned from the position at the firm, forcing himself to give up whatever he was doing and start on a new road. 8 The move which changed his life course, took place in November 1942. After resigning from his job, with his resources at the lowest, he decided to go to Berlin and claim his compensation for the referee work he was doing for the Chemischen Zentralblatt.…”

“…Paul Urban 1905-1995 was later to become Professor at University of Graz and, in 1962, founded the Schladming Winter School on Theoretical Physics 8. From his letters home during the war, Bruno worked for the Studiengesellschaft für Elektronengeräte from March until November 1942, in partial contradiction with[1], where it is said that he worked there for a "long time", pag.…”