International Linear Collider Technical Review Committee: Second Report, 2003

Abstract

As this report is being published, the international high energy physics (HEP) community finds itself confronting a set of fascinating discoveries and new questions regarding the nature of matter and its fundamental particles and forces. The observation of neutrino oscillations that indicates that neutrinos have mass, measurements of the accelerating expansion of the universe that may be due to dark energy, and evidence for a period of rapid inflation at the beginning of the Big Bang are stimulating the entire field. Looming on the horizon are the potential discoveries of a Higgs particle that may reveal the origin of mass and of a whole family of supersymmetric particles that may be part of the cosmic dark matter. For the HEP community to elucidate these mysteries, new accelerators are indispensable. At this time, after careful deliberations, all three regional organizations of the HEP community (ACFA in Asia, HEPAP in North America, and ECFA in Europe) have reached the common conclusion that the next accelerator should be an electron-positron linear collider with an initial center-of-mass energy of 500 Giga-electronvolts (GeV), later upgradable to higher energies, and that it should be built and operated in parallel with the Large Hadron Collider under construction at CERN. Hence, this second report of the International Linear Collider Technical Review Committee (ILC-TRC) comes at a very timely moment. The report was requested by the International Committee on Future Accelerators (ICFA) in February 2001 to assess the current technical status of electron-positron linear collider designs in the various regions. Note that the ILC-TRC was not asked to concern itself with either cost studies or the ultimate selection process of a machine. This Executive Summary gives a short outline of the genesis of the report, the charge given to the committee, and its organization. It then presents a brief description of four electron-positron linear collider designs at hand. The methodology used to assess these designs is described in some detail. The assessments are followed by a list of R&D tasks recommended by the committee for the next few years. The tasks are ranked according to certain specific criteria. The summary concludes with a few remarks outlining upcoming developments that may guide ICFA and the HEP community in their future plans to promote and execute an international project. The Executive Summary stands alone in the sense that it allows a busy reader, who may not have the time to read the entire report, to become familiar with its essential contents.