Work Experience

Katherine Risk – Work experience student,
May 2009, Daresbury Laboratory.

“it really was an amazing week …. something I will remember for the rest of my life. It has inspired me to think more about science as a career and I have a better understanding of what working in science involves”

Katherine’s words following her week spent with Dr. Lee Jones in the Accelerator Science and Technology Centre, part of the Cockcroft Institute at the Daresbury Laboratory, During her week at the Laboratory, Katherine saw the ALICE¹ and EMMA² particle accelerators, and learned how this cutting-edge technology will form the basis of the UK’s next particle accelerator-based light source, currently under design, and known simply as NLS. She also learned how the ALICE technologies are being used to build tuneable, high-power lasers, and how the technology behind the EMMA accelerator might be used to deliver cancer therapy using particle beams to treat otherwise-inoperable cancers, or to or to drive safer nuclear reactors which don’t use Uranium fuel.

As a year 10 student, the scientific concepts she was exposed to were far beyond those which had been covered in her school syllabus. Katherine seized the chance to look beyond the syllabus, and understand the scale of the impact that modern ‘big science’ can have on society, and the benefits it brings.

“I have had some amazing experiences, seeing all the machines that could be life changing in the future, and meeting the Minister for science in the UK!!”

Besides successfully completing an experiment to measure the charge-to-mass ratio of an electron (using a device which was in fact a miniature particle accelerator), Katherine also met with the Minister for Science, Lord Drayson of Kensington. Lord Drayson took the opportunity to learn first hand from Katherine how the classroom perception of science compared to the reality of cutting-edge ‘big science’ at national facilities, such as Daresbury Laboratory.


Katherine with the Science Minister, Lord Drayson of Kensington.

Katherine working with the fine beam apparatus (beam detail shown in upper-left inset) to measure the charge-to-mass ratio of an electron.

¹Accelerators and Laser in Combined Experiments – The first energy-recovery linear accelerator in Europe.

²The Electron Model of Many Application – A unique prototype for a class of compact particle accelerators which may be used to treat cancer.

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