Editing Brookhaven National Laboratory (section)

==History==

===Foundations===
Following [[World War II]], the [[United States Atomic Energy Commission|US Atomic Energy Commission]] was created to support government-sponsored peacetime research on atomic energy. The effort to build a [[nuclear reactor]] in the American northeast was fostered largely by physicists [[Isidor Isaac Rabi]] and [[Norman Foster Ramsey Jr.]], who during the war witnessed many of their colleagues at [[Columbia University]] leave for new remote research sites following the departure of the [[Manhattan Project]] from its campus. Their effort to house this reactor near [[New York City]] was rivalled by a similar effort at the [[Massachusetts Institute of Technology]] to have a facility near [[Boston, Massachusetts|Boston]]. Involvement was quickly solicited from representatives of northeastern universities to the south and west of [[New York City]] such that this city would be at their geographic center. In March 1946 a nonprofit corporation was established that consisted of representatives from nine major research universities — [[Columbia University|Columbia]], [[Cornell University|Cornell]], [[Harvard University|Harvard]], [[Johns Hopkins University|Johns Hopkins]], [[Massachusetts Institute of Technology|MIT]], [[Princeton University|Princeton]], [[University of Pennsylvania]], [[University of Rochester]], and [[Yale University]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Crease |first=Robert P. |date= 1999|title= Making Physics: A Biography of Brookhaven National Laboratory}}</ref>

[[File:Soldier_records,_Camp_Upton_(LOC)_(23546348723).jpg|thumb|right|Soldiers during [[World War I]] at the [[Camp Upton]] site,  which would in 1947 be repurposed as BNL]]
Out of 17 considered sites in the Boston-Washington corridor, [[Camp Upton]] on [[Long Island]] was eventually chosen as the most suitable in consideration of space, transportation, and availability. The camp had been a training center for the [[United States Army|US Army]] during both [[World War I]] and [[World War II]], and a [[Internment of Japanese Americans|Japanese internment camp]] during the latter.{{cn|date=March 2024}} Following the war, Camp Upton was no longer needed, and a plan was conceived to convert the military camp into a research facility.

On March 21, 1947, the Camp Upton site was officially transferred from the [[U.S. War Department]] to the new U.S. Atomic Energy Commission (AEC), predecessor to the [[United States Department of Energy|U.S. Department of Energy]] (DOE).{{cn|date=June 2024}}

===Research and facilities===
====Reactor history====
In 1947 construction began on the first [[nuclear reactor]] at Brookhaven, the [[Brookhaven Graphite Research Reactor]]. This reactor, which opened in 1950, was the first reactor to be constructed in the United States after World War II.  The [[High Flux Beam Reactor]] operated from 1965 to 1999. In 1959 Brookhaven built the first US reactor specifically tailored to medical research, the [[Brookhaven Medical Research Reactor]], which operated until 2000.<ref>{{Cite web |title=BNL {{!}} Our History: Reactors as Research Tools |url=https://www.bnl.gov/about/history/reactors.php |access-date=2025-01-01 |website=www.bnl.gov}}</ref>

====Accelerator history====
[[File:Satoshi Ozaki 1991.jpg|thumb|upright=0.7|right|[[Satoshi Ozaki]] posed with a magnet for the [[Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider]] in 1991]]

In 1952 Brookhaven began using its first [[particle accelerator]], the [[Cosmotron]]. At the time the Cosmotron was the world's highest energy accelerator, being the first to impart more than 1 [[GeV]] of energy to a particle. The Cosmotron was retired in 1966, after it was superseded in 1960 by the new [[Alternating Gradient Synchrotron]] (AGS). The AGS was used in research that resulted in three [[Nobel Prize]]s, including the discovery of the [[muon neutrino]], the [[charm quark]], and [[CP violation]].{{cn|date=June 2024}}

In 1970 in BNL started the [[ISABELLE]] project to develop and build two proton intersecting storage rings. The groundbreaking for the project was in October 1978. In 1981, with the tunnel for the accelerator already excavated, problems with the superconducting magnets needed for the ISABELLE accelerator brought the project to a halt, and the project was eventually cancelled in 1983.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.bnl.gov/about/history/accelerators.php|title=BNL - Our History: Accelerators|website=www.bnl.gov}}</ref>

The [[National Synchrotron Light Source]] operated from 1982 to 2014 and was involved with two Nobel Prize-winning discoveries. It has since been replaced by the [[National Synchrotron Light Source II]].<ref>{{Cite web |title=Directors Named for Brookhaven Lab's Photon Sciences Directorate |url=https://www.bnl.gov/newsroom/news.php?a=111189 |access-date=2025-01-16 |website=Brookhaven National Laboratory |language=en}}</ref>

After ISABELLE'S cancellation, physicist at BNL proposed that the excavated tunnel and parts of the magnet assembly be used in another accelerator. In 1984 the first proposal for the accelerator now known as the [[Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider]] (RHIC) was put forward. The construction got funded in 1991 and RHIC has been operational since 2000. One of the world's only two operating heavy-ion colliders, RHIC is as of 2010 the second-highest-energy collider after the [[Large Hadron Collider]]. RHIC is housed in a tunnel 2.4 miles (3.9&nbsp;km) long and is visible from space.<ref>{{Cite web |last=richardmitnick |date=2024-04-15 |title=From The Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) At The DOE’s Brookhaven National Laboratory: “Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider Begins Run 24” |url=https://sciencesprings.wordpress.com/2024/04/15/from-the-relativistic-heavy-ion-collider-rhic-at-the-does-brookhaven-national-laboratory-relativistic-heavy-ion-collider-begins-run-24/ |access-date=2025-01-16 |website=sciencesprings |language=en}}</ref>

On January 9, 2020, It was announced by Paul Dabbar, undersecretary of the US Department of Energy Office of Science, that the BNL eRHIC design has been selected over the conceptual design put forward by [[Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility]] as the future [[Electron–ion collider]] (EIC) in the United States. In addition to the site selection, it was announced that the BNL EIC had acquired CD-0 (mission need) from the Department of Energy.<ref>[https://www.energy.gov/articles/us-department-energy-selects-brookhaven-national-laboratory-host-major-new-nuclear-physics, "U.S. Department of Energy Selects Brookhaven National Laboratory to Host Major New Nuclear Physics Facility"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200114043150/https://www.energy.gov/articles/us-department-energy-selects-brookhaven-national-laboratory-host-major-new-nuclear-physics, |date=January 14, 2020 }} 2020.</ref> BNL's eRHIC design proposes upgrading the existing Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider, which collides beams light to heavy ions including polarized protons, with a polarized electron facility, to be housed in the same tunnel.<ref>{{Cite arXiv |eprint=1409.1633 |class=physics.acc-ph |first1=E. C. |last1=Aschenauer |first2=M. D. |last2=Baker |title=eRHIC Design Study: An Electron-Ion Collider at BNL |last3=Bazilevsky |first3=A. |last4=Boyle |first4=K. |last5=Belomestnykh |first5=S. |last6=Ben-Zvi |first6=I. |last7=Brooks |first7=S. |last8=Brutus |first8=C. |last9=Burton |first9=T. |last10=Fazio |first10=S. |last11=Fedotov |first11=A. |last12=Gassner |first12=D. |last13=Hao |first13=Y. |last14=Jing |first14=Y. |last15=Kayran |first15=D. |last16=Kiselev |first16=A. |last17=Lamont |first17=M. A. C. |last18=Lee |first18=J. -H. |last19=Litvinenko |first19=V. N. |last20=Liu |first20=C. |last21=Ludlam |first21=T. |last22=Mahler |first22=G. |last23=McIntyre |first23=G. |last24=Meng |first24=W. |last25=Meot |first25=F. |last26=Miller |first26=T. |last27=Minty |first27=M. |last28=Parker |first28=B. |last29=Petti |first29=R. |last30=Pinayev |first30=I. |year=2014 |display-authors=1}}</ref>

====Other discoveries====

In 1958, Brookhaven scientists created one of the world's first [[video game]]s, ''[[Tennis for Two]]''.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.nbcnews.com/id/27328345 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130510074203/http://www.nbcnews.com/id/27328345 |url-status=dead |archive-date=May 10, 2013 |title=The anatomy of the first video game - On the Level|work=NBC News |date=2008-10-23 |access-date=2010-03-17}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.bnl.gov/bnlweb/pubaf/pr/PR_display.asp?prID=842 |title='+alt+' |publisher=Bnl.gov |access-date=2010-03-17 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090912160002/http://www.bnl.gov/bnlweb/pubaf/pr/PR_display.asp?prID=842 |archive-date=September 12, 2009 |url-status=dead }}</ref>

In 1967, Brookhaven scientists patented [[Maglev]], a transportation technology that utilizes [[magnetic levitation]].<ref>{{Cite web |last=Maglev |first=Northeast |date=2018-09-25 |title=Transportation Innovation: History of Maglev in the World |url=https://northeastmaglev.com/2018/09/25/transportation-innovation-history-of-maglev-in-the-world/ |access-date=2025-01-01 |website=Northeast Maglev |language=en-US}}</ref>

In 2024, Brookhaven National Laboratories scientists discovered a new kind of antimatter nucleus.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2024-08-26 |title=Brookhaven National Laboratory researchers make new discovery |url=https://www.wshu.org/long-island-news/2024-08-26/brookhaven-national-lab-research-science |access-date=2025-01-09 |website=WSHU |language=en}}</ref>