The LHC today reached its target luminosity for 2010 - 1032/cm2/s. This is a measure of the proton-proton collision rate in the experiments.

Physicists gathering proton collision data in the LHCb experiment's control room (picture by CERN)

This is a signifcant milestone in gathering the amount of data expected by the end of 2011 - called one inverse femtobarn by physicists. With that amount of data there will be a good chance of seeing new physics in the LHC's current energy range.

The remainder of this year’s proton running will be devoted to obtaining as much data as possible before switching to lead ions collisions in November.

Below was the message from CERN Director General, Dr. Rolf Heuer.

When we started running the LHC at the end of March, we set ourselves the objective of reaching a luminosity of 1032 by the end of 2010 proton running. Last night, we achieved that goal. The beams that went in at around 2:00am, were colliding with a luminosity of 1.01 × 1032 by 3:38am in both ATLAS and CMS, and had delivered an integrated luminosity of over 2 inverse picobarns to ATLAS, CMS and LHCb by midday today. It’s a great achievement by all concerned to reach this important milestone with over two weeks to spare. The remainder of this year’s proton running will be devoted to maximising the LHC 2010 data set and preparing for 2011 proton running before we switch to lead ions in November.

The significance of this milestone can’t be underestimated, since it is a necessary step on the way to the larger goal of delivering an integrated luminosity of one inverse femtobarn to the experiments by the end of 2011. That’s the amount of data we need to ensure that if nature has put new physics in our path at the LHC’s current collision energy, we’ll have a good chance of seeing it.

At the moment, we’re running the LHC with 248 bunches per beam in a configuration that allows us to go much higher. As 2011 proton running gets underway early next year we’ll continue increasing the number of bunches, since a factor of two or so more luminosity is still needed if we’re to reach our one inverse femtobarn goal. That, however, is for next year. In the meantime, the objective we set ourselves for this year was realistic, but tough, and it’s very gratifying to see it achieved in such fine style.

Rolf Heuer

Source: CERN Website