Till’s 80’
Some personal iconoclast recollection(s)
7 June 2017
We met first at fall 1984.
There was a meeting at
Collège de France where
took place the first
discussions between our
beloved spokesman and the
Saclay group (Michel
Cribier, Jim Rich, Michel
Spiro and DV).
This has been the start of
the best scientific
adventure in my life (and I
am not alone to say this) !
Now I will describe what is
a great spokesman,
a supreme leader,
an outstanding boss,
a lider maximo,…
How to build an experiment (I)
How to build an experiment (I)
How to build an experiment (II)
You buy 30 tons of gallium
GALLEX
How to build an experiment (III)
Play the role of the puppet-master
Scientists
Ph D
Postdocs
ne +
71Ga

71Ge
30.3 tons of gallium
in aqueous solution (GaCl3 + HCl)
ne +
71Ga

71Ge
+ e-
threshold = 233 keV
sensitive to all n
(including pp)
+
e
This alchemic
transformation of Ga into
Ge at a microscopical scale
(1 atom per day)
is not the first…
…It already happened at a
macroscopical scale
(thousands of km2)…
not far from here !
1870
Ga
1870
1871 :
Ga transformed into Ge
Ge
1870
1871 :
Ga transformed into Ge
1919:
Ge has decayed and we
are back to Ga
Ga
Today, the
present
and the
future is
Europe !
We hope
for long !
Some stardust
memories
I. 10 october 1985
In June 1985 at the Savonlinna Conference (Finland) S. Mikheyev
presents for the first time what will become the famous MSW
effect. Our friend Jacques Bouchez comes back enthousiastic in
Saclay with the preprint by A.Yu. Smirnov and S. Mikheyev (for the
fun he had printed only the odd pages !!!). During the summer, we
implement what we understand of the formalism in our oscillation
program.
I present the first results at the GALLEX meeting in Heidelberg on
October 10. We are all enthousiastic by this new and clever
possible interpretation of the solar neutrino deficit. Only Till does
not seem very happy : GALLEX is not yet funded and the present
argumentation was considering only vacuum oscillations. He is afraid
that if he has to say that there is a new possible interpretation the
funds will not come.
II. March 1992 – The 68Ge problem has been solved since summer 91. The
first results show a clear signal around 80 SNU’s. This is the last
Collaboration meeting before the announcement of the first GALLEX result
which is planned in June, just before the Neutrino’92 Conference in Granada
(Spain).
« Daniel, I would like to ask you something. We have a very good result. We
do not know where SAGE is and we cannot take the risk to delay our
announcement. There is a little problem: I think that Mossbauer is not yet
convinced by the result and would probably prefer to postpone the
announcement. He is already famous and does not want to tarnish his
reputation. So I would like to ask you to present the analysis result at the
general meeting. You should be able to convince him! »
Be
careful,
Till !
II. March 1992 – The 68Ge problem has been solved since summer 91. The
first results show a clear signal around 80 SNU’s. This is the last
Collaboration meeting before the announcement of the first GALLEX result
which is planned in June, just before the Neutrino’92 Conference in Granada
(Spain).
« Daniel, I would like to ask you something. We have a very good result. We
do not know where SAGE is and we cannot take the risk to delay our
announcement. There is a little problem: I think that Mossbauer is not yet
convinced by the result and would probably prefer to postpone the
announcement. He is already famous and does not want to tarnish his
reputation. So I would like to ask you to present the analysis result at the
general meeting. You should be able to convince him! »
- I was not sure that I was the best placed to play this role but I was very
honoured that Till was trusting me for this delicate task. It was difficult
to refuse. Fortunately, before the general meeting, we had a first day for
the analysis meeting to finalize the results, followed by a free day in
order to polish the arguments. I received the help from all the people of
the analysis group.
- After the presentation at the general meeting I do not know if Mossbauer
was convinced, but all the collaboration applauded enthousiastically and
the decision to publish was taken without further discussion.
III. June 1990
Campo Imperatore
1000 m underground
The Sun, also the
night !
IV. How difficult was
the life in GALLEX !
An example to illustrate our working conditions.
At the GALLEX meeting in October 1991, few months
after the start of data taking, our beloved spokesman
told us :
"From now we have to keep secret our result and all
MUZZLE
GALLEX members need a
to prevent
any release of information about our experiment" ...
Typical GALLEX physicist in the 90’s!
V. Some days were less difficult…
Joking about the source
We do not forget Emiko!
Some friends (not exhaustive…)
Dark matter exists. Till is an experimental proof !
Gallex has been the
best scientific
adventure in my life !
This has been a
wonderful time !
Thank you Till!
Thank you Till for
having driven the
Gallex collaboration
to major successes !
Happy 80’s
and long life !