Neon explains how TRIUMF helps companies test their space tech:
Slide 1: Curious about how we can simulate space at TRIUMF?
Slide 2: Did you know that many companies that send technology (like laptops and computers) into space test their equipment at TRIUMF before they put it on a rocket?
Slide 3: We can simulate years of exposure to cosmic radiation in just hours at our unique facility. This testing keeps travellers, astronauts, and space-bound technologies safe from the effects of harmful radiation!
Learn more about TRIUMF with Flux:
Slide 1: Want to know why is this paperclip is standing?
Slide 2: TRIUMF’s Cyclotron (the world’s largest!) has a very strong magnetic field…when you stand on top of it, the field is so strong that metal objects can stand on end!
Slide 3: If you want to experience this (completely safe) magnetic field for yourself, consider booking a free tour of our lab! Check out TRIUMF.ca/tours
Becq unearths some underground science at TRIUMF:
Slide 1: Want to know what is happening underground?
Slide 2: Compressed air sends radioisotopes from TRIUMF to UBC Hospital in 120 seconds via a 2.5km underground tube! These isotopes have a short shelf life so this saves time in getting them safely to the hospital where they are used for medical scans.
Slide 3: When the isotopes are injected into the body, they decay and emit gamma rays, which can be detected and visualized using a PET scanner to reconstruct images of the brain.
TRIUMF’s rabbit line: the only system where a pressure situation is actually a good thing.
Tau is here to chat about scientific concepts:
Tau explains what mesons do:
Slide 1: Not sure what you’re looking at?
Slide 2: These are gold plated aluminum wires from a prototype machine known as BABAR - named after the “B” and “B-bar” meson particles it was designed to study.
Slide 3: Inside an atomic nucleus, protons repel each other because they all have a positive charge. Mesons act as carriers of the strong force that binds protons and neutrons together. Without this force, atomic nuclei would break apart, so mesons help keep all matter stable!
Nova is here to explain what happens behind the science!
Nova explains what a ‘cold trap’ is:
Slide 1: Wondering what’s going
on here?
Slide 2: This is a ‘cold trap’ that protects our equipment from freezing while we’re using liquid nitrogen (LN2) and prevents damage to the vacuum pumps. It harmlessly evaporates outside.
Slide 3: Vacuum pumps draw all the air from the pipes we use to move ultra cold liquids around the lab.
The trap freezes and captures any foreign material we don’t want in the pipes like water, oil, grease, etc that could damage equipment and possibly ruin experiments.
The TRIUMF characters are here to explain science behind the scenes!
Ray explains what a ‘hot cell’ is:
Slide 1: Curious about advanced technology?
Slide 2: This is called a Hot Cell – it allows us to handle radioactive materials, safely, using remote controlled ‘tele-manipulators’.
Slide 3: The yellow glass you see is actually 1 metre thick! It has been engineered to protect the operator while still being optically clear and correct for viewing the task at hand.
- Ray, The technical guy
50 years of stories ‘behind the science’! Visit 50stories.triumf.ca to learn about the people that made TRIUMF, Canada’s particle accelerator centre, what it is today.
Photographers! Join us for the 2025 Global Physics Photowalk at TRIUMF where you’ll go behind the scenes to capture images of our world-unique particle accelerator infrastructure and experimental facilities. Visit TRIUMF.ca/photowalk for more information and to apply to participate
Our friends at @interactions.physics.news have a new dark matter related podcast episode out now!
There is something enormous scattered throughout the universe—so, what could it be? Scientists are dissecting the underlying clues of dark matter and discovering that their investigation is becoming increasingly complex. Explore how the study of the smallest particles intersects with our understanding of the largest bodies in the universe. Strap on your helmet, as we need to go underground for this journey.
On this episode of The Coldest Case, we follow our hosts underground as they visit scientists conducting experiments in the search for Dark Matter. Explore how the study of the smallest particles intersects with our understanding of the largest bodies of the universe.
Listen to the latest episode here: /dark-matter-day/podcast
Another share from our big picture gal:
Neon: Hi everyone! Ready for another exciting peek inside TRIUMF? Let’s dive into the fascinating world of medical isotopes and uncover what it all means together!
This is the water manifold on the TR-24 cyclotron within TRIUMF’s Institute for Advanced Medical Isotopes, IAMI. It cycles chilled water to cool different parts of the new cyclotron. The heat from those parts is transferred to the water, which then comes back to the 'return' side of the manifold. The warm water then passes through a chiller, and comes back to the cyclotron to chill the parts again.
IAMI is set to be a world leading facility in nuclear medicine which will produce isotopes for the imaging and diagnosis of cancer and cardiovascular diseases, for Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s research, and for the development of new, targeted treatments for late-stage cancers.
In short, IAMI is where cutting-edge science meets life-saving innovation. Stay tuned for more!
Introducing Neon! She is a big picture kind of gal who loves to talk about TRIUMF and is always calm, cool, and collected.
Neon:
Hi, I’m very keen to share what the inside of TRIUMF’s Photosensor Test Facility looks like. Our teams have been hard at work prototyping and building multi-photomultiplier tubes (mPMTs) for two next-generation physics experiments based in Japan: Hyper-Kamiokande and Intermediate Water Cherenkov Detector.
Lining the walls of ultra-pure water detectors buried deep underground, these highly sensitive ‘compound-eye’ detectors are designed to catch the faintest glimmers of rare particle phenomena and behaviours, helping researchers to explore a wide variety of avenues in physics from proton decay to potentially unravelling the mysteries of the Universe’s evolution.
Through TRIUMF, Canadian researchers will construct approximately 250 mPMTs for the Intermediate Water Cherenkov Detector and 200 for Hyper-K. Stay tuned to see more TRIUMF Behind the Scenes.
