Russian President Vladimir Putin paid a visit on June 13 to Russia’s Nuclotron-based Ion Collider Facility (NICA) at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in Dubna, a district of Moscow. Dubna is called a naukograd, meaning a science city. The NICA is a unique particle and/or beam superconducting accelerator.
The synchrotron, which evolved from cyclotron, operates so that the accelerating particle beams travel around a fixed closed-loop path. The beams collide at speeds near the speed of light. The NICA is based on a unique Russian technology of superconducting magnets with direct-flow cooling, operating with boiling helium.
Putin is close to this project, having worked to usher it into existence. The decision to build the NICA collider was made in 2011 at a meeting of the Government Commission on High Technologies and Innovations, and its first phase went into operation in 2020. It is designated as one of Russia’s “Mega-projects.” The facility Putin toured is directed by Grigory Trubnikov, the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research’s director. The Chief Engineer of the injection complex, Artyom Galimov, and the Acting Director of the Laboratory of High Energy Physics Andrey Butenko explained the processes to the Russian President.
