Public Access Days at Rutherford Appleton Laboratory (RAL) are a fantastic way of seeing behind the scenes at our world-leading laboratory. After an introduction to the site, and a talk about some of the work we do on site, visitors will be split into small groups for tours of our experimental facilities by our scientists and engineers. There will also be hands-on activities for families with younger children.

There is far more at the lab than can be seen in just one visit! On registration, we'll ask you to choose which facilities you'd like to visit, although as a working lab there is a chance we will have to change the tours at short notice. RAL is a big site, and so please note that there will be some walking involved in all tours

There will be three sessions - starting at 10:00, 11:15 and 13:45, each lasting for 2 hours and 30 minutes. The talks will be:

• 10:00: The Large Hadron Collider
• 11:15: Exoplanets and the ARIEL mission
• 13:45: Applications of Particle Accelerators

Please note that as a working laboratory, under-16s must be accompanied on site at all times.

Tour options include:

• Detector Clean Room: Our Technology Department work with experiments across the world - including the Large Hadron Collider at CERN - to build incredibly sensitive detectors. This is a fantastic opportunity to visit one of our clean rooms, dressing up in clean room suits in order to see for yourselves the high-precision work that goes on behind the large experiments.
• ISIS Neutron and Muon Source: The ISIS Neutron and Muon Source produces beams of particles to study the structure and properties of materials on the atomic scale, from spider silk and soaps to ancient swords and superconductors. Protons are accelerated to 84% the speed of light in our synchrotron and these beams of high energy protons are used to produce neutrons and muons.
  • A tour of the ISIS Experimental Halls will allow you to walk over the beamlines, and see the instruments we use to study the world around us.
  • A visit to the ISIS Ion Source takes you to the very start of the process of creating beams of neutrons to probe deep into the heart of matter
    
  Please note that there are age restrictions on this tour for health and safety reasons.
• Visualisation Facility - The Atlas Visualisation Facility enables users from the STFC experiments to extract the maximum information from their data. Using our huge video wall, you will get a chance to manipulate 3D images and even go for a tour around the outside of the International Space Station.
• Particle Physics - We have a large particle physics department here at RAL, but the majority of the work undertaken by these scientists is done at huge facilities elsewhere, such as the Large Hadron Collider in CERN. To talk to you about the work we do in this field, you will have the opportunity to visit our show and tell area, full of fascinating objects from past and present experiments.
• Scientific Computing: Scientific computing is fundamental to modern research. This broad and rapidly-changing field involves exploiting advanced computers to understand and solve complex problems in science. This tour includes the opportunity to visit our computing machine rooms and Tier One, where data from the Large Hadron Collider is stored. Please note that for health and safety reasons, there are age restrictions on this tour.
• RAL Space - you will get the opportunity to look around our new building, seeing our assembly areas and clean rooms and also our magnificent space test chambers. These five metre diameter chambers are where all instruments built here at RAL are tested for the harsh environment of space, enduring extreme temperatures whilst in a vacuum.
  
• Astra Gemini -Astra Gemini is a high power, ultra-short pulse, high repetition rate, near infrared laser. The pulses from this laser are so short that they are like sheets of light, thinner than a human hair. This tiny sheet of light is then focused to a spot a few thousandths of a millimetre across. This is then hit into a very small target extremely quickly, allowing scientists to study the way matter behaves under extreme conditions of temperature and pressure.
• Vulcan laser (control room) - Vulcan is one of the most powerful laser systems in the world, used to study plasma – the fourth state of matter after solids, liquids and gases. Vulcan is so powerful, that we can use it to create miniature stars for a fraction of a second so that we can study astrophysics in the laboratory.
  • Take this opportunity to visit the control room of this enormous laser system, see where all the actions and even take a peek inside.
  • Take this opportunity to see into Vulcan's largest target area from a balcony (Target Area Petawatt (TAP) mezzanine floor), giving you a birds eye view of the room. Here the size of the laser beam goes from 60cm in diameter to less than the width of a single human hair!
• Target Fabrication - Our target fabrication group builds and identifis the properties of micro-targets for our high-powered lasers. This requires incredible precision, and a suite of powerful microscopes, building targets that are only a few nanometres big.
• Space Carousel - this is a family-friendly set of activities on the theme of space. Make your own planets, handle some real meteorites and even get to see some communications equipment used in the Apollo moon landings (a gift to us from NASA).
• Build a rocket (shaker table activity) - when we build any instrument here at RAL that is destined for space, it needs to be rigorously tested to ensure that it will survive the violence of take off. In this activity, any budding scientists and engineers can design and build their own structure from highly technical materials (spaghetti and marshmallows - allergy warning!) and test it on our shaker table - a miniature version of our vibration testing facility.

BOOKING PROBLEMS

If you experience any difficulties with booking, it may be due to the limited number of tickets available for each activity.

If you are booking for a group of people and you find any tour/activity options struck through part way through your choices, this is because there are a limited number of tickets available and the maximum has been reached.

Apologies for any inconvenience, but hope that you find a suitable activity with enough spaces for all your group to attend together.