Lillian Hoddeson

Adrienne W. Kolb

Michael Riordan

Starting in the 1950s, US physicists dominated the search for elementary particles; aided by the association of this research with national security, they held this position for decades. In an effort to maintain their hegemony and track down the elusive Higgs boson, they convinced President Reagan and Congress to support construction of the multibillion-dollar Superconducting Super Collider project in Texas—the largest basic-science project ever attempted. But after the Cold War ended and the estimated SSC cost surpassed ten billion dollars, Congress terminated the project in October 1993. Drawing on extensive archival research, contemporaneous press accounts, and over one hundred interviews with scientists, engineers, government officials, and others involved, Tunnel Visions tells the riveting story of the aborted SSC project. The authors examine the complex, interrelated causes for its demise, including problems of large-project management, continuing cost overruns, and lack of foreign contributions. In doing so, they ask whether Big Science has become too large and expensive, including whether academic scientists and their government overseers can effectively manage such an enormous undertaking.

The Rise and Fall of the Superconducting Super Collider

Tunnel Visions

In October 1993 the US Congress terminated the Superconducting Super Collider at the time the largest basic-science project ever attempted, with a total cost estimated to exceed $10 billion. Its termination was a watershed event a pivot point not only in the history of physics but also for science in general. "Tunnel Visions" follows the evolution of the endeavor from its origins in the Reagan Administration s military buildup of the early 1980s to its post-Cold War demise a decade later. The failure of the SSC raises the question of whether Big Science has become too big and expensive; can scientists and their government backers effectively manage such enormous undertakings? The case of the Super Collider offers important lessons about the conditions required to build and sustain a large scientific laboratory, and the rise and fall of the SSC also serves as a cautionary tale about the long-term viability of a research community that comes to depend as much as did US high-energy physics upon a single experimental facility of such an unprecedented scale. Riordan, Hoddeson, and Kolb have written the definitive history of the SSC. "

Adrienne W. Kolb

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