Will relativistic heavy-ion colliders destroy our planet?
Abstract
Experiments at the Brookhaven National Laboratory will study collisions between gold nuclei at unprecedented energies. The concern has been voiced that ``strangelets''-hypothetical products of these collisions - may trigger the destruction of our planet. We show how naturally occurring heavy-ion collisions can be used to derive a safe and stringent upper bound on the risk incurred in running these experiments.
- Publication:
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Physics Letters B
- Pub Date:
- December 1999
- DOI:
- 10.1016/S0370-2693(99)01307-6
- arXiv:
- arXiv:hep-ph/9910471
- Bibcode:
- 1999PhLB..470..142D
- Keywords:
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- High Energy Physics - Phenomenology
- E-Print:
- LaTeX, no figures