Ursula Bassler

Naperville Beach

After an owl-shift be indulgent with yourself! No this is not the only reason, why I needed a good dose of being very, very nice with myself: I am in the middle of a quarrel with my mother, feeling half lovelorn and my vacation plans did not work out: after staying for three weeks at Fermilab until mid-August, I wanted to take 3 weeks off. However we get a new lab-director on September 1^st, so I have to be back, and the friend I wanted to visit, is naturally out exactly during the week I could have come to see her. Well, well.

But still: there is wonderful summer-weather here at Fermilab and I went for the first time for swim at the close by Naperville Centennial Beach – it is a funny place: something in between a regular pool and a lake: the water looks and feels like “natural” water – you cannot spot the ground, there is no chlorine (how do they keep it clean?) and it’s pretty big. However, there are lifeguards and diving boards, and the watersides are paved and bordered and there is a nice lawn with trees to sunbath in the shadow.

In a bookstore, I’ve browsed through “SHAM” a book by Steve Salerno on the self-help industry in the US, and I guess anywhere else in the western world. It is very interessting to get to know something about the background of all the John Grays et al. Self-help books are giving hope to many readers, and they can imagine themselfs suceeding somewhere they failed. Yet those books generally don’t help very much and people buy the next one, just to get this nice feeling of hope again. Most of them are based on one or two sound ideas, yet packed in a lot of rubbish and 5-cent psychological tricks. Negative effects, as stated by Salerno, can be either an immense pressure to achieva something out of reach for oneself or an overall victimization, together with making a disease out of everything. This can in the end discredit serious psychology, with a very fuzzy border between the two – nothing to do with the clear cut between astronomy and astrology.

Yet in Salerno's book, there is a feeling of “our parents didn’t have it, so why do we need this?” I think there he goes too far. That self-help became such a big market has certainly also a very simple reason: many people do feel unhappy and would like to change something about it. And very luckily in the recent history some issues became of public concern like child abuse or domestic violence that were more or less accepted a generation or two ago, even if society is still searching for how to deal with. And isn’t that “pursuit of happiness” a very powerful and fundamental principle in order to evoluate?

Hey, wasn’t I blogging about Naperville Beach? 

PS: another thing that made me happy – after years of intensive research I finally found some excellent yogurt in the US! Australian Style, whatever that means. And it's only a 5 miles drive!

Electron Cooling

In Rome I heart from Mont for the first time that the Accelerator Division achieved successfully electron cooling with the Recycler at the Tevatron, actualy a month ahead of their schedule. Today Sergei Nagaitsev, who is leading this project gave a presentation at the weekly “All D0 Meeting”.

Electron cooling is used to reduce the emittance of particle beams, more sloppy to make the beams smaller in size with the same number of particles, hence "cooler".  The principle of electronic cooling is that the “hot anti-proton beam” gets in contacted with a “cool electron beam” and the heat exchange between the two beams results in a cooler anti-proton beam. For this to be possible, both beams must have the same velocity, yet what makes the electron beam cooler is the 2000 times smaller electron mass.

  The principle of electron cooling has been invented around 1966 by Gersh Budker in Novosibirsk, it took nearly 10 years before got it working in Novosibirsk, however at low energies. Since then electron cooling has been used for smaller accelerators. The Recycler group in Fermilab worked for 10 years, to get electron cooling working for the first time at relativistic energies and at a much larger scale.

Why is this important? So far another technique has been used to cool anti-proton beams, the stochastic cooling, which is based on adjusting the particle “positions” by real-time feedback electronics. For high intensity beams, the electron cooling technique should be more advantageous and allow to increase the number of interactions in the Tevatron. Electron cooling is actually of the important steps to get enough interactions at the Tevatron in order to have a chance to discover the Higgs-boson.

Even though there was a Fermilab Today about the electron cooling already, it was very nice to hear this talk of Sergei “live” – he has the capability of explaining very complicated issues in a comprehensive way. So I went out of his talk with the impression I’ve understood something new.

KLM

Yesterday evening I was in no mood to pack my luggage, so I got up at 3 am this morning, to leave for CDG-airport at 6:30, take a flight to Amsterdam and than out to Chicago: during the summer months flying from Europe to the US gets that much more expensive (except if you order your tickets in January!) that reasonable prices were only possible with connecting flights. So this trip is actually my first flight evevr with KLM and for the return with Northwest!

First, I was pretty disappointed. The plane to Chicago was a kind of old style 747 without individual TV-screens and other fancy stuff, yet the worst: I had a middle-seat. I was so up-set by the idea to spend 8 hours trapped in the middle! Yet life is never are as you imagine: the flight was actually ok, unfortunately I missed an ice cream serving in the middle, the flight attendant was charming, and my neighbor a German physicist, faculty at the University New Mexico and working on Neutron Scattering in Los Alamos!

Arriving at Fermilab: 5 mails about the Database having a problem. Why is this always happening at unsuitable moments? 

Evaluation Encounters & Experiences

This year, Bruno Ferrario is co-author with me of the part on the Interdisciplinary Research and Technology Transfer within INFN Evaluation Report. We just finished the 1st draft. Bruno is actually coming from industry, as for this section it is very important to get feet back from someone actif in "the real world" as to see if Technology Transfer is working or can be improved. Bruno is Scientific Advisor for SAES, after being their Research and Developpment Director for 25 years. SAES is the company who produced Getter-pumps for LEP in order to create the vacuum inside the ring and is still working with the accelerator community, as for Brookhaven or the new Soleil project in France. The collaboration with CERN allowed SAES not only to develop and to acquire technology, but also to get recognized as a Hi-Tech, R&D oriented compagny.Funny, I’ve seen their advertisement in the CERN-courier this morning – something I would never have noticed without this personal contact

I was pretty impressed by this encounter: living in the world of Academia, I sometimes have the impression to be within a very peculiar Universe and I tremendously appreciate to get glimpses of the world outside. Besides, Bruno has a fascinating live: coming from nuclear physics, he works for SAES since 37 years, yet he has been associate mayor of the town he lives in for 5 years, he is lecturing at Milan University and he wrote a book about vacuum technologies - no room for void.

It was very interesting how he described product evaluation in his company: there is a whole catalogue of criteria which are evaluated in order to decide if research on a product is worth to be continued and the product to be commercialized. However, many of the most revolutionary products would have failed such an evaluation, like PCs or cell-phones.  From his point of view, those evaluations are a good thing, if they are treated as a tool to ensure, that nothing has been overlooked and get a complete picture. After an evaluation, with all the additional knowledge gained, decisions depending on guts feelings can than be taken with some additional safety.

I think one should also keep this in mind for scientific evaluation. All the numbers of publications, their impact factors per FTE etc. can help to see if in general the evolution is healthy and nothing alarming is happening. However for taking precise decisions, these numbers cannot tell enough.

Living in Languages

The German newsmagazine “Der Spiegel” is published in Hamburg. This is not the reason, why my friend Sonja from Hamburg bought it while being in Paris: her husband recommended last week’s issue, as the cover story was about education - 3 boys: Jo 7, Fynn 9 and Lou 12 years old, all of them sleeping in my living room. But they are doing pretty fine: no need for Supernanny to be around!

In this Spiegel issue, I found a little article about language and personality: Nairan Ramirez-Esparza from the Psychology Department of the University of Austin, Texas, studied personality profiles of bilingual persons, Spanish-English. She found out that the personality descriptions the persons gave from themselves were not the same, if the questioning was done in English or in Spanish! In fact, I've contancted Nairan who sent me the full article. If you would like to have a look at the whole article click here. By the way, the home page of their lab, looks like a lot of fun to work there!

Remember the blog we had from Gordon about foreigners speaking English and subsequent thinking about language: I thought people may really think that I am a strange person, as I stated to feel different in different languages – here you have the scientific "proove", that I am not that strange! I won’t tell you however, who I am in which language.

By the way, “Supernanny“ is another example of cultural globalization. Supernannies have even a similar dress code in each country. However I think it is one of the best educational programs reaching zillions of people and giving them some rather helpful, simple advice (yeah, I don’t have children, but I am still educating the child in me) Only the participating children should be protected by something like the FBI-witness program after the show – I can understand that going to school the next day may not be that easy.

PS: Tobi thinks that "Der Spiegel" is actualy a magazin for desinformation rather than for information. I once wrote an (unpublished) letter to the Spiegel, when they had a article smashing HERA physics, which was completely off the point - Brian Foster got his one published! Still I like anything polemic and easy to read and about Sex & Crime. But I even enjoyed the "Da Vinci Code" ...

Paris Plage

“Sous les paves la page” – you know this song from May ’68 ? As some never give up on the ideals of their youth: Paris gets a beach every year since Bertrand Delanoe, the socialist mayor is in charge. What does this mean? Well the motor-highway along the Seine is closed from mid-July until mid-August, and the right-bank between the University and the Louvre is transformed into an urban beach with deck-chairs on sand, stones, grass or wood, pick-nick areas and all kinds of activities for free. Except the ice cream.

This year Paris Plage is devoted to Brazil, so the different areas are named from Copacabana to Ipanema – however since Paris Plage opened on Thursday, the weather has not been really Brazilian, and it may be the grayish sky and the rather cool temperatures, why I didn’t get into the mood, I didn’t feel like enjoying the “brumisateurs”, providing fresh fog to cool down. And without getting wet, a beach is not a beach! Swimming in the Seine is still not a good idea, even if Chirac promised it for 1996 when he was mayor of Paris.

However Sonja, a friend from Hamburg, visited on her way back from holidays, and with her three kids visiting Paris Plage was the best thing to do! They enjoyed much more to play some Sand-Ball or Speedball, than visiting Montmartre and the Sacre Coeur.

After the succes in Paris, many European cities are proposing similar initiatives now, yet: Paris Plage was not invented in Paris, but in St. Quentin!

Taormina - the whole story by Pr. Panelli

Asking Valeria if it is ok with her to publish her name on the blog concerning the INFN evaluation, she sent me this reply:

Ciao Ursula,
in attachment there is the story of BNCT-Taormina written by Prof. Tazio Pinelli: probably it is better to cite him as the source of information. He is sad because everything stopped, and he wants to distribute the information inside the diary.
bye, Valeria

Remember Taormina is this technique to cure cancer in isolated organs by injecting a boron solution, explanting the organ, irradiating it with neutrons and re-implanting it. Tazio Pinelli describes the story from the point of view of  the leading physicist of the project. I am not an expert in the field, maybe someone more approriate could comment, maybe someone knows why such descisions have been taken, maybe someone would be interessted in pusuing this project with the physicists of Pavia. These are serious issues that touch life and death of actual people.

The Sad Story of T.A.Or.M.I.N.A. (Neutron Bath) After Pre-clinical Trials "in vivo" by Pr.Tazio Pinelli

1997-1998: Pre-clinical trials "in vitro" and "in vivo" evidence effectiveness and safety of the out-of-body liver neutron capture therapy. In particular the "in vivo" trials show the incredible destructive power on cancer metastases associated to the absolute preservation of normal tissue.

1998-2001: Prof. Zonta screens first patients for neutron bath. In this period the Ethical Committee of Pavia Polyclinic does not approve any patient suffering from liver metastases only.

2001 December: Suddenly the above Ethical Committee gives a positive opinion for treating the first patient. The patient suffers from liver metastases spread by a colon cancer. 14 metastases having dimensions from 1 to 2.5 cm are evidenced in the intra-operative ecoscan. After the treatment many cancerous nodules are observed with neutron-radiography of liver biopsies used for boron measurement. The patient is still alive.

2002 first months: Contrary to our expectations after the good results of first treatment, the Ethical Committee restarts to take up a negative position. In this time the group of patients, including young people suffering from liver metastases, leave the Pavia Polyclinic without understanding their different treatment with respect to the previous patient.

2003 May: During 17 months after the treatment of the only patient, the Ethical Committee of Pavia Polyclinic expressed continuous negative opinions
In such a condition we, the group of physicists that realized the neutron bath procedure, decides to collaborate with the transplantation center of University Polyclinic in Milan.
The Ethical Committee of Milan Polyclinic approves the clinical trials. Patients to be treated in Pavia (reactor) and Milan (liver self-implant) must be of a convenient number.

2003 June: The collaboration Milan Polyclinic and Pavia Physicists are ready to start the clinical trials. The first patient is ready, one of our colleague having only liver metastases.

2003 July: Pavia Ethical Committee gives a surprising second positive opinion. The patient is a young man whose liver is malformed, small and with abnormal geometry. His liver contains 5 metastases of 4-5 cm. size and many very small nodules (a split of a millimeter). The neutron irradiation (neutron bath) realizes the incredible result. Also the five largest metastases are completely destroyed. Unfortunately one month after treatment the patient passes away as a result of medical complication.
At this point, after 13 years research and 2 human procedures, the President (rettore) of Pavia University orders the Technical Director of the Reactor Laboratory to stop the activity of neutron bath in the thermal column of the reactor. This is an incredible surprise, the reasons of such a misbehavior is difficult to understand because the President knows about the 13 years of research, the first 2 human procedures and the noticeable money paid to the reactor laboratory for using the thermal column both for research and human neutron therapy. In this situation our colleague cannot be treated by neutron bath. He is obliged to try with a special chemotherapy and few months after he passes away.

2003 June-December: Beginning of June, our group is in touch with a European group of surgeons, physicists and biologists for organizing the clinical trials outside Italy.
In June we are informed that the Italian Ministry of Health wants to organize and finance the T.A.Or.M.I.N.A. clinical trials. After various meetings of managers from the ministry, the President (rettore) of Pavia University, surgeons, physicists and managers of Milan and Pavia Polyclinics the project is concluded. Late December was decided to open the clinical trials on 2004 January 1st.

2005 April: Since 2004 January 1st, no patient is indicated for the neutron bath procedure. This situation is really strange for two reasons:
>   During the period 2001-2003 suitable candidates for our neutron treatment arrived with a discrete continuity.
>   Each year, according to statistics, 3400 Italian people suffer from colon adeno-carcinoma. A sensible fraction of such a tumor spreads to the liver. Up to now no traditional remedy is able to completely destroy the diffused metastases except our neutron bath procedure.
End of April: we are informed by the chief of Milan Transplant Center that the ministerial funds guaranteed to the Pavia and Milan Policlinics are no more available.

2005 July: No more briefing on clinical trials. We are still waiting for patients. The indispensable instruments are maintained in the best conditions.

Happy birthday Gordon!

I remember a post about your birthday not being your official birthday, but still being your birthday: http://qd.typepad.com/4/2005/04/my_birthday_isn.html 

So hopefully I get it right! Happy birthday Gordon, and enjoy it in sunny Marseille!

TV breakdown

Over the weekend the TV of my parents broke down: my father wanted to watch Lance Armstrong getting defeated on the Tour de France (which doesn’t happen anyhow) and then, suddenly, no sound! Nothing to about it! No, I am not that much of a physicist to actually open the TV and start checking out all the components.

This evening, getting home, I looked forward to watching my favored daily TV-program: Kaamelot (5 minutes, delirously funny) – and then: no clear picture, no clear sound, impossible to watch anything, on any channel! and there were also the Simpsons! and the Guignols! VCR is still ok, so probably it’s the antenna, I checked the connections, it must be on the roof – I should go ask someone in the house.

The two TVs breaking down is definitely a pure coincidence and not a sign from heaven, telling us something! Yet I am behaving exactly like this: I could still setup TV via my dsl-modem – so far I always refrained from doing it, considering that 50 channels would be far too much for me to zap through – but, I take the absence of a intelligible image as a sign to experience an evening at home without TV. Remains of a bad conscience!

Like many, I would not admit to myself that I am actually pretty much into watching TV. And not only culturally valuable programs. No, lately I mostly watch TV-series, sitcoms, even reality-shows and other crappy programs, hard to admit in public.

Jonathan Franzen wrote in “How to be alone” about socially isolated children reading books to pass time with imaginary company – TV just works the same. The advantage of books/TV over real people: you can switch on and off, and whenever it’s boring zap to another program. The disadvantage: they are never interested in what you might have to tell. I know, that during phases I feel interested in my own life, I don’t care about watching TV. Yet when I feel tired and I just don’t want to think about what I would like to do, nor talk with someone, I love this effortless company. So what now? Maybe simply go to sleep?

Ninja turtle going wild

After changing x-times my plans, I finally spent the weekend with my parents for several birthdays’ post-celebrations. Yes, it is hot, and humid, and thunderstorms are coming in – yet how nice to be on the countryside in summer.

When I was a little child, my brother Gerd got three turtles. They lived outside in on a 12 square meter lawn surrounded by a little brick wall. Two females and a male, it must have been ok for them, they even tried to get little ones, but the weather is to cold for the eggs to get on term and we never suceeded in getting them on term in a terrarium. In the beginning, we took the turtles inside during winter, but then we forgot and they survived outside, digging holes into the ground and coming back in spring. Well, during one very cold winter, one of them died. Another one managed to escape and never came back: live is still more interessting beyond the walls.

Now there is a female left, all alone. Even though she has more space and freedom than most turtles in capture, life must be pretty boring for her. So I took her to the vegetable garden, looking how she would react to a new environment. It didn’t take her that long to find the salad, and starting to go wild about it. An unexpected feast. After a while she had enough, and the next day, she didn’t care about salad anymore – no wonder, she had just been fed a tomato – doesn’t tell this something about natural eating?

By the way: she doesn’t like raspberries, but she’s crazy about cherries and strawberries, she doesn’t like ground meet, but slugs!

This is a goody from the local section of the Badische Zeitung! It happend last Wednesday in the village of my parents, but it wasn't our turtle.