CDF is one of two large, multisystem particle detectors operating at the proton-antiproton storage ring, Tevatron Collider at Fermilab. The Tevatron is the world's most powerful particle accelerator, and consequently will remain the particle physics frontier well into the next decade. Dr. Gold's research interests are in searches for exotic particles and in the development and application of silicon microstrip detectors. The CDF silicon-microstrip detector was crucial for the recent discovery of the sixth and heaviest quark, top .
Quarks are the fundamental building blocks of all matter in the universe.
The reason for the great mass of the top quark, nearly 40 times heavier than the next heaviest quark and equal to that of an entire gold atom, remains a mystery. Answers to this and other mysteries will be sought at Fermilab's upcoming Collider Run II , starting in March of 2001. Hubble image of farthest galaxies. By colliding particles at high energies, we reproduce conditions at the dawn of the universe, the big bang, which occured some 15 Billion years ago. Properties of the elementary particles, such as the top quark, reveal secrets of the evolution of the universe.