Argonne National Laboratory near Chicago and Michigan State University are top contenders for one of the world's most advanced science labs.
The Advanced Exotic Beam Laboratory, which would cost $550 million to build and $80 million a year to operate, would allow researchers to study everything from medical tests to nuclear bombs, the Chicago Sun-Times said Wednesday.
Argonne announced this week it has hired Walter Henning, head of Germany's top physics lab, to lead efforts to win the beam lab.
The beam lab would include two subatomic particle accelerators. Scientists would produce isotopes in the first accelerator and study them in the second accelerator, where the isotopes would smash into various targets, the newspaper said.
Copyright 2007 by United Press International
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