Stanford linear collider scheduled to operate in 1986

Construction of the Stanford Linear Collider is well under way. The SLC is the crucial testing ground of a new accelerator technology, widely thought to be indispensible if we are to push electron–positron collision energies much beyond what LEP will make available. LEP, the Large Electron–Positron storage ring under construction at CERN, near Geneva, is scheduled to provide $e+e−$ collision energies of 100 GeV by the beginning of 1989. But this gargantuan $400‐million ring, 27 km in circumference, is regarded by many as the largest practicable $e+e−$ collider one can base on the well‐tried storage‐ring technology. Significantly higher $e+e−$ energies, it is believed, will require linear colliders.