The third and fourth year students of the MEPhI Department № 11 have visited the first Open day of the NICA complex. During the second visit to the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR, Dubna) the guys visited excursions to the BM@N and MPD experiments, the site of the future NICA accelerator, the superconducting magnets factory and listened to lectures on the processing of the accelerator experiment data. The purpose of the trip was to get acquainted with the key elements and subsystems of NICA complex under construction and future experiments on it.
The trip was eventful and left positive feedback from students.
Daniil Milyutinsky, student of a group Б16-104: "NICA project gives great prospects for students. A large number of modern equipment, an immense amount of raw data – all this is waiting for young professionals.
The most interesting stay, in my opinion, was the magnets factory. Its worker told us about all stages of production: from sealed piece of iron to ultra-powerful magnets, which, by the way, will be installed on NICA and FAIR (experiment in Germany). True professionals told us about computer data processing, tracking, modeling and visualization of the experiment, gave advice on the choice of "environments" for future training, and shared programs for work".
Oleg Kuznetsov, a student of a group Б16-104: "At first we saw the experiment which searches for baryonic matter – BM@n. It is an experiment with extracted from the Nuclotron beams with fixed targets.
Then there was a clean room where such elements of detector systems as GEM and cathode strip detectors are collected and tested, staff briefly described their structure, principles of operation and testing.
One of the most interesting places was the factory of superconducting magnets. It is a place where magnets for the NICA project and for the related FAIR project are producing. The superconducting magnet consists of a yoke and a superconducting winding (NbTi) produced at JINR. A large part of the production facilities allotted for testing of already assembled magnets. First, the magnets are tested for defects, then scientists check the quality of the field created by the magnet (the field is measured by the method of harmonic coils), then look for the magnetic axis of the magnet, and then check for tightness. The last stage is the so-called magnet training - for this, an increasing current is consistently passed through the conductor, starting with 5kA and reaching up to 13kA. During this process, superconductivity disruptions occur – loss of superconductivity in the local sections of the conductor. Then they reduce current and produce training again.
Finally, the staff of the High Energy Physics Laboratory lectured on data processing of the accelerator experiment. The main stages of data processing were described in general terms: creation of the hits tree, reconstruction of tracks, calibration, alignment and visualization. The trip was both useful and interesting."
The final part of the event was a lecture from young researchers on data processing and solutions to urgent problems.
Dmitry Savin, student of Б16-104 group: "Most of all I remember the factory of superconducting magnets, which seemed even a bit cinematic (this is how scientific institutions are showed in films – large and amazing). A useful lecture was at the very end of the meeting – we understand which applications and programming languages need to be mastered for further work in the scientific field.
At the end of the tour we attended a lecture by employees of the High Energy Physics Laboratory. The following topics were covered: computer data processing, modeling and visualization of the experiment, etc. Lecturers showed main programs used at the BM@N experiment. It was especially interesting.”
The trip to the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research was very interesting, everyone found something useful, the students expanded their horizons and the range of possible activities.
