We visited the TRIUMF particle accelerator on the UBC campus yesterday! This is a giant accelerator that is used for many different experiments in physics, engineering and materials science. We wanted to see it because until 2019, it was where Canadians with ocular melanoma went for treatment. How this was done was that some of the protons being made by TRIUMF’s 520 MeV cyclotron would be directed into a person’s eye to obliterate the tumour. The cyclotron makes proton beams by stripping electrons off hydrogen molecules. TRIUMF provided this service for 25 years and treated over 200 patients. These days, patients are more likely to receive a radioactive plaque instead, which has fewer side effects.
This is one of the detectors being adjusted.
Unrelated – here is a crazy photo of a mouse eye that we recently sectioned for Chloe’s project, looking like an artistic painting of a eye!
