What’s in a name? What if I had a major mid-life crisis and ceased being JoAnne Hewett and insisted on being Susan Smith instead? How would friends and relatives get in contact with me? What if I thought I told everybody, but had forgotten about my best friend from high school who suddenly needed me? How would people connect the theoretical research of JoAnne Hewett with that of Susan Smith? Would all the work and untold fame associated with JoAnne Hewett be lost to the new Susan Smith? My identity and history would be lost, as well as a sense of who I am. People change their names all the time, of course, for various reasons. But what about major research institutions? What if the federal government suddenly decided to change the name of one of its more prestigious national laboratories? One that has been in operation for more than 40 years and has generated several Nobel prizes and major discoveries? This is precisely what is happening to the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, my home institution. The US Department of Energy, in its infinite wisdom, is proposing to change SLAC's name to something as yet undecided. A committee of representatives has been formed to recommend new names for the laboratory. Persis Drell, SLAC director, quotes part of the rationale as:
Our stakeholders have suggested that the name is also no longer fully representative of the laboratory with its increased involvement in photon science and particle astrophysics in addition to our particle physics program
SLAC is in the midst of a transition. We are no longer operating an accelerator for High Energy Physics. We are building the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS), which has an exciting discovery potential in Photon Science. I can’t help but note that the word linac appears in the name of the new machine. In fact, the linear accelerator at SLAC is the cornerstone of the new LCLS. The LCLS could not be built without it. So doesn't it seem appropriate that the lab housing the LCLS be named Stanford Linear Accelerator Center? It is hard to understand this argument. There is also some legalese about the DOE wanting to trademark and patent the name SLAC, but is having difficulty because one apparently can’t patent a name containing "Stanford." The University and DOE are communicating on this issue, but there is no resolution yet. Of course, there are numerous companies dotting Silicon Valley which freely use the name "Stanford" in their moniker, so it is hard to understand this argument as well. The employees at SLAC, no matter what their discipline may be, are understandably upset. They have started a petition, addressed to the President of Stanford University and to the Secretary of Energy, asking that the name of the laboratory not be changed. This petition addresses the history of the lab, the role of accelerators in both photon and particle science, and the close connection between the lab and the university. The petition can be found here, and anyone who agrees with it may sign. Lab name changes have happened before, albeit under different circumstances. Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Laboratory was known as CEBAF (Continuous Electron Beam Accelerator Facility) before 1996, which is the name of its main accelerator. CEBAF was founded in 1984 and the name change took place just after construction was completed and just before the beam turned on. Likewise the National Accelerator Laboratory became the Enrico Fermi NAL in 1972 while the lab was under construction. So while laboratory names have changed, it has happened only before data taking had commenced and long before history and reputation had been established. I wish I could wake up and discover this was only part of a really bad dream.
