DUSEL

On July 10, 2007 the National Science Foundation selected the Homestake Mine located in the Black Hills of South Dakota in the town of Lead to be the leading candidate for a Deep Underground Science and Engineering Laboratory.  The 4850 foot level is initially planned to house the state-run Sanford Laboratory until construction for DUSEL can begin below 7000 feet.

 The Department of Physics at SDSU is currently collaborating with the University of South Dakota, South Dakota School of Mines & Technology, Dakota State University, Augustana, and the national laboratories at Berkeley and Los Alamos on two DOE EPSCoR projects.  The first will develop strategies to remove radioactive Argon-39 from Argon gas to enhance dark matter detection at Homestake, but it could also affect next-generation purification and verification techniques.  The second will establish a low level counting facility to assay the radioactive content of materials brought into the mine (and the mine itself).

 Besides particle physics, the department also has submitted letters of interest to pursue materials free of cosmic ray defects, and radiation biology in a reduced radiation environment at Homestake.  

Departmental Contact:  Dr. Robert McTaggart
Website:  http://www.engineering.sdstate.edu/~physics/mctaggartr/mctaggartr.html

South Dakota State University College of Engineering
Department of Physics
Box 2219
Brookings, SD 57007
voice:   (605) 688-5428
fax:   (605) 688-5878